Opinion ID: 23906
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Statutory Authority for the Stop

Text: 7 Fort contends that the district court erroneously determined that the officer's stop of his truck was justified as a regulatory seizure. He argues that the Texas statutes the district court relied upon do not authorize the stop of a moving vehicle without probable cause or reasonable suspicion. 8 The district court relied on United States v. Burch, 153 F.3d 1140 (10th Cir. 1998), to provide the framework for considering Fort's argument that the warrantless stop violated his Fourth Amendment rights. In Burch, the Tenth Circuit analyzed a stop and concluded that the officer's action was justified at its inception pursuant to the regulatory exception to the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement announced in New York v. Burger, 482 U.S. 691, 702-03 (1987). See Burch, 153 F.3d at 1141-42. 1 In the instant case, the district court concluded that the stop of Fort's truck was justified as a regulatory seizure, relying on Tex. Transp. Code Ann. 644.103(a), which provides that an officer may enter or detain on a highway or at a port of entry a motor vehicle that is subject to this chapter, and 644.104(a)(1), which authorizes officers to enter a motor carrier's premises to inspect real property, including a building, or equipment. 9 Fort contends that the statutory authority under section 644.103 to detain a vehicle does not confer authority to stop it in the first place. 2 The government responds that the term detain under section 644.103 includes the authority to stop a vehicle, relying on a definition from a previous edition of Black's Law Dictionary 535 (4th ed. 1951), and on the rule that words are to be construed according to common usage and common sense, see Tex. Govt. Code Ann. 311.011. 10 The interpretation of the Texas statutes relied upon by the district court is an issue of first impression. Neither the state courts nor the Fifth Circuit have addressed whether either statute provides authority for an officer to stop a vehicle in the absence of probable cause or reasonable suspicion. The only Texas case that has addressed section 644.103 involved a stop for which the officer had probable cause. See $217,590.00 In United States Currency v. State, 970 S.W.2d 660, 664-65 (Tex. App. 1998) (en banc), rev'd on other grounds, 18 S.W.3d 631 (Tex. 2000). The court therefore relied upon section 644.103 solely to support the officer's subsequent detention and inspection of the vehicle. See id. at 665. 11 If section 644.103 had simply provided stop and detain, its intent would be clear. Instead, we must determine whether stop is interchangeable with detain, so as to render section 644.103 sufficient statutory authority for a vehicle stop. We hold that under the circumstances it must be considered so. It is impossible to detain a moving vehicle, as Fort's truck clearly was, unless the vehicle is first brought to a stop. We therefore conclude that the district court did not err by ruling that sections 644.103 and 644.104 authorized the stop. 3 12 Because we agree with the district court that the Texas statutes provided authority to stop the truck, we must now determine whether the warrantless stop and inspection of the truck were permitted under the regulatory exception to the warrant requirement announced in New York v. Burger, 482 U.S. 691 (1987). 13