Opinion ID: 1119821
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 18

Heading: Midtrial Motion to Suppress.

Text: (13) Defendant contends that the trial court erroneously denied the motion to suppress evidence he made during the course of the trial. The evidence he sought to suppress was the photograph taken of him during a traffic stop and the lineup identifications of him. The trial court allowed the motion after defendant asserted that the grounds for the motion arose during the testimony of Detective Parrott and were unknown to him before trial. Detective Parrott testified that she asked for a marked police car to stop a car she saw driving away from defendant's residence because she thought that a person in the car resembled the composite drawing of the killer of Angel Rodriguez. Her purpose for the stop was to take a photograph of the person to aid in the murder investigation. The officer who stopped defendant's car testified that he was told via radio broadcast that the occupants of the car were involved in an investigation and that he should stop their car if he saw a Vehicle Code violation. The officer stopped the car for having a bald tire in violation of the Vehicle Code. Detective Parrott arrived, sought and obtained defendant's permission to photograph him, and did so while the officer was writing a citation for the bald tire and for failure to produce a driver's license. Only five to ten minutes elapsed from the time defendant's car was stopped until Detective Parrott took defendant's photograph and left. Defendant argued that the stop was invalid because it was based on a pretext. The trial court denied the motion on the ground that there was probable cause to arrest and to stop the vehicle to issue a citation. Defendant contends that the stop was unlawful because it was based on a pretext. Defendant's argument appears to be premised on the proposition that there was not sufficient cause to stop defendant absent the traffic violation. However, that is not the situation here. We are not faced with a situation in which the traffic stop is used as a pretext for investigation of other crimes for which there were not grounds to stop. (See Cummins v. United States (1991) ___ U.S. ___ [116 L.Ed.2d 448, 112 S.Ct. 428], dis. opn. of White, J., on denial of cert.) In the present case, Detective Parrott wanted to stop defendant because he resembled the composite drawing of the person who killed Angel Rodriguez. She wanted to investigate whether he was in fact that person. Thus, the facts known to Detective Parrott clearly justified a temporary detention for investigation, which is all she wanted. (See In re Tony C. (1978) 21 Cal.3d 888, 893 [148 Cal. Rptr. 366, 582 P.2d 957].) There was no impropriety in such investigation or in asking defendant for his permission to be photographed. Defendant gave his consent, and the photograph was taken. The entire encounter lasted no more than five to ten minutes. We conclude that the trial court properly denied the motion to suppress. (14) Although our reasoning differs somewhat from the trial court's reasoning, it is settled that the trial court's ruling must be upheld if there is any basis in the record to sustain it. (See People v. Braeseke (1979) 25 Cal.3d 691, 701 [159 Cal. Rptr. 684, 602 P.2d 384].)