Opinion ID: 2586281
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Detention Outside the Car

Text: Officer Pettus's discovery of the gun magazine in the car clearly gave rise to reasonable suspicion to detain defendant and Alvarado for further investigation. The issue is whether defendant was unlawfully detained during the time period starting at the point he was standing outside the car being watched by Officer Pietrzak and ending at the point that Officer Pettus discovered the gun magazine. As discussed below, we conclude that defendant's detention during this time period was lawful as a brief continuation of detention for officer safety. ( Wilson, supra, 519 U.S. at p. 410, 117 S.Ct. 882.) A person has been `seized' within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment ... `only if, in view of all of the circumstances surrounding the incident, a reasonable person would have believed that he or she was not free to leave.' ( Michigan v. Chestemut (1988) 486 U.S. 567, 573, 108 S.Ct. 1975, 100 L.Ed.2d 565, citation and fn. omitted.) The high court later made clear that this test states a necessary, but not a sufficient, condition for seizure. ( California v. Hodari D. (1991) 499 U.S. 621, 628, 111 S.Ct. 1547, 113 L.Ed.2d 690.) In order for there to be a seizure under the Fourth Amendment there must also be an arrest, by the application of physical force or by submission to the assertion of authority. ( Id. at p. 626, 111 S.Ct. 1547.) As to whether defendant was seized when he was ordered out of the car, neither Mimms nor Wilson clarifies whether an officer's ordering the driver or a passenger out of the car is to be considered a seizure. However, the high court has recently concluded that a Mimms/Wilson order is a seizure because it is reasonable for both the driver and passenger to expect that a police officer at the scene of a crime, arrest, or investigation will not let people move around in ways that could jeopardize his safety. ( Brendlin v. California (2007) 551 U.S. ___, 127 S.Ct. 2400, 2407, 168 L.Ed.2d 132.) In the situations in which a Mimms/Wilson order is used, there is a social expectation of unquestioned police command, which is at odds with any notion that a passenger would feel free to leave without advance permission. ( Ibid. ) But while defendant was seized for the time period between the officer's ordering him out of the car and the officer's discovery of the gun magazine, his Fourth Amendment rights were not violated. The initial stopping of the car was valid, as was the subsequent MimmsfWilson order by which the officer ordered the codefendants to exit the car. Consistent with the Fourth Amendment, detention following a MimmsfWilson order may continue at least as long as reasonably necessary for the officer to complete the activity the MimmsfWilson order contemplates. Here, the officers needed the codefendants out of the car and out of the way while the first officer did an inventory search of the car before impounding it. The second officer kept an eye on the codefendants in order to ensure the first officer's safety during his search. The trial judge found the period of detention may have been less than a minute, but at any rate was no more than a minute or two. Under these circumstances, we discern no violation of defendant's Fourth Amendment rights.