Opinion ID: 891705
Heading Depth: 5
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Terry scope analysis considers the reasonableness of the length of the detention during a traffic stop.

Text: {18} The Terry analysis remains applicable to traffic stops. While even members of the United States Supreme Court initially viewed the bright-line rule as effectively discarding the scope requirement of a Terry stop, see Caballes, 543 U.S. at 421, 125 S.Ct. 834 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting) (In my view, the Court diminishes the Fourth Amendment's force by abandoning the second Terry inquiry (was the police action reasonably related in scope to the circumstances justifying the initial interference). (internal quotation marks, citation, and brackets omitted)), application of Caballes, Muehler, and Johnson by lower courts underscores that those cases modified, rather than abandoned, the second prong of the Terry test. The temporal limitations on Terry stops continue to define the limits of the reasonableness of the scope of the investigation. See United States v. Everett, 601 F.3d 484, 488 (6th Cir.2010) (Under Terry's duration prong, a stop must last no longer than is necessary to effectuate the purpose of the stop. (internal quotation marks, citation, and ellipses omitted)). The questions posed during a traffic stop no longer need to be reasonably related to the initial justification of the stop in order to be permissible under the Fourth Amendment; the length of the stop, however, is limited by the time required to conduct a reasonable investigation into the initial justification for the stop. See id. at 488-89; Shabazz, 993 F.2d at 438; State v. Jenkins, 298 Conn. 209, 3 A.3d 806, 828-29 (2010). {19} In sum, after an officer has made a stop based on at least reasonable suspicion of criminal activity, [a]n officer's subsequent actions are not reasonably related in scope to the circumstances that caused him to stop the vehicle if he detains its occupants beyond the time needed to investigate the circumstances that caused the stop, unless he develops reasonable suspicion of additional criminal activity in the meantime. United States v. Pack, 612 F.3d 341, 350 (5th Cir.2010). Whether a detention becomes unreasonably prolonged depends on whether the police diligently pursued a means of investigation that was likely to confirm or dispel their suspicions quickly, during which time it was necessary to detain the defendant. Sharpe, 470 U.S. at 686, 105 S.Ct. 1568. The length of the detention should be reasonably limited to the time it takes to complete the underlying justification for the stop. Duran, 2005-NMSC-034, ¶ 35, 138 N.M. 414, 120 P.3d 836. {20} While the temporal limitations of a Terry stop generally require an investigating officer return a driver's documents and permit the driver to depart as soon as the reason for the traffic stop has been completed (unless, of course, the officer has developed reasonable suspicion to conduct an investigation into other criminal activity), most courts have found that a de minimis detention caused by questioning after the completion of the traffic stop is not unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment. This is because reasonableness is the touchstone of any Fourth Amendment analysis. See Everett, 601 F.3d at 492; see also United States v. Olivera-Mendez, 484 F.3d 505, 510 (8th Cir. 2007) (Whether a particular detention is reasonable in length is a fact-intensive question, and there is no per se time limit on all traffic stops.). But see United States v. Pruitt, 174 F.3d 1215, 1220-21 (11th Cir. 1999) (finding that the traffic stop should have been completed as soon as the questions related to the initial investigation were completed); 4 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure: A Treatise on the Fourth Amendment § 9.3 (4th ed. 2004 & Supp.2010-11) (noting that because the United States Supreme Court essentially removed the subject matter scope limitation of Terry questioning, that is all the more reason for holding firm on the matter of temporal limits). The rationale for permitting de minimis extensions of time also is based in Johnson's modification of the Muehler Court's  no extension standard to permitting question so long as there is no measurable extension of the detention. Accord State v. Morlock, 289 Kan. 980, 218 P.3d 801, 807-08 (2009). {21} This Court also has refuse[d] to draw a bright-line, temporal cut-off point for an officer's actions during a traffic stop under the Fourth Amendment. State v. Vandenberg, 2003-NMSC-030, ¶ 36, 134 N.M. 566, 81 P.3d 19; see also State v. Neal, 2007-NMSC-043, ¶ 39, 142 N.M. 176, 164 P.3d 57 (Bosson, J., dissenting) (stating that a de minimis detention to conduct an investigation for reasons unrelated to the initial stop does not violate the Fourth Amendment). Whether an officer's questioning measurably extends the length of a traffic stop remains the proper analysis under the Fourth Amendment. We agree with the Sixth Circuit that a categorical ban on questions that extend the time of a stop is unwarranted because a police officer intent on asking extraneous questions could easily evade [a bright-line rule] by delegating the standard traffic-stop routine to a backup officer, leaving himself free to conduct unrelated questioning all the while, or simply by learning to write and ask questions at the same time. Everett, 601 F.3d at 492. [2] {22} Extended detentions caused by questioning unrelated to the initial purpose of the stop continue to violate the Fourth Amendment. See United States v. Peralez, 526 F.3d 1115, 1121 (8th Cir.2008). To determine whether questioning creates an unreasonable detention, the pertinent inquiry is whether the officer conducted the investigation diligently. See Everett, 601 F.3d at 492 ([W]e join our sister circuits in declining to construe Muehler and Johnson as imposing a categorical ban on suspicionless unrelated questioning that may minimally prolong a traffic stop.). We adopt the Sixth Circuit's articulation of the diligence analysis: [B]ecause the touchstone of any Fourth Amendment analysis is reasonableness, we must conduct a fact-bound, context-dependent inquiry in each case. Furthermore, we conclude that it would be inappropriate merely to evaluate the reasonableness of the interval of prolongation in isolation. Instead, the proper inquiry is whether the totality of the circumstances surrounding the stop indicates that the duration of the stop as a whole including any prolongation due to suspicionless unrelated questioningwas reasonable. Id. at 493-94 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).