Court Opinion

ID: 9855956
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:34:54.116441+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:37:19.614157
License: Public Domain

WYNN, Judge
concurring.
While I concur in the majority’s result, I disagree with the majority opinion to the extent that it holds that commanding a passenger in a vehicle subject to a stop to remain in the vehicle is per se permissible. In my opinion, allowing police officers arbitrarily to detain passengers in vehicles stopped for traffic violations without any reason to believe the passenger poses a threat to safety or is involved in criminal activity violates the constitutionally guaranteed privacy rights of our citizens.
I.
The majority posits a dichotomy between two lines of cases, one holding that requiring a passenger to remain in a vehicle during a legal automobile stop is a de minimis intrusion on that individual’s *236personal liberty and thus per se permissible, the other holding that a passenger’s constitutional rights are violated when an officer detains a passenger in a vehicle during a traffic stop without articulable suspicion that the passenger is dangerous or engaged in criminal activity.
The cases cited by the majority for the proposition that detaining a passenger' in a vehicle during a traffic stop is per se constitutional do not provide a strong foundation for the majority opinion to the extent that it deems such detentions permissible as a matter of course.
In the first case cited by the majority, People v. Gonzalez, 184 Ill.2d 402, 418, 704 N.E.2d 375, 382-83 (1998), cert. denied, 528 U.S. 825, 145 L. Ed. 2d 63 (1999), superseded on other grounds, People v. Sorenson, 752 N.E.2d 1078 (2001), the majority of the Illinois Supreme Court held that
because the public interest in officer safety outweighs the potential intrusion to the passenger’s liberty interests, it is reasonable for a police officer to immediately instruct a passenger to remain at the car, when that passenger, of his own volition, exits the lawfully stopped vehicle at the outset of the stop. We find that because the ... risk of harm to officers ... is present where a passenger unexpectedly exits a lawfully stopped vehicle, the officer’s need to exercise “ ‘unquestioned command of the situation’ ” is likewise present. See Wilson, 519 U.S. at 414, 137 L. Ed. 2d at 48, 117 S. Ct. at 886, quoting Michigan v. Summers, 452 U.S. 692, 702-03, 69 L. Ed. 2d 340, 350, 101 S. Ct. 2587, 2594 (1981).
Notably, however, three of the seven Illinois Supreme Court justices joined in a blistering dissent stating, inter alia:
The fundamental purpose of the fourth amendment is to safeguard the privacy and security of individuals against arbitrary invasions by government officials. At the heart of the protections afforded by the fourth amendment is the requirement of individualized suspicion. Even in cases where obtaining a warrant based on probable cause is impractical, the police must have knowledge of sufficient facts to create a reasonable suspicion that the person in question has committed, or is about to commit, a crime. A showing of individualized suspicion is constitutionally required except in the rare case where the privacy interest implicated by the search or seizure is minimal and an important government interest furthered by the intrusion would be placed in jeopardy by *237a requirement of individualized suspicion. The majority’s abandonment of the individualized suspicion standard in this case is wholly unwarranted.
The majority gratuitously asserts that the intrusion on the passenger’s liberty is minimal because the car in which the passenger is traveling has already been stopped. In so ruling, however, the majority trivializes the liberty interest at stake in this case. The only encounter many citizens of this state will ever have with the police will be a routine traffic stop. Allowing police officers to arbitrarily detain passengers in vehicles stopped for traffic violations without any reason to believe the passenger has committed a crime or threatens the safety of the police officer ensures that this encounter will be annoying, frightening, and perhaps a humiliating experience. The thousands upon thousands of petty indignities legitimized by the majority opinion will have a substantial impact on the liberty and freedom of the citizens of this state.
* * *
The right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures is one of our most precious constitutional rights. The exercise of this right does not depend on the grace of law enforcement officials. This opinion trashes the protections of the fourth amendment.
* * *
The majority fails to articulate any reason why a police officer would be safer if a passenger in a vehicle stopped for a traffic violation is detained at the scene rather than allowed to walk away. A police officer must have a reasonable suspicion that a passenger in a vehicle stopped for a traffic violation has .committed or is about to commit a crime. This standard is more than sufficient to protect officer safety. It does no disservice to police officers to insist upon exercise of reasoned judgment.
* * *
Those who cherish their right to be free from arbitrary invasions of privacy can only hope that a more enlightened court in a future case will restore our citizens’ constitutional rights which this court has today taken away.
Id. at 425-28, 704 N.E.2d at 385-87 (quotations and citations omitted) (Heiple, J., Harrison, J., and Nickels, J., dissenting).
*238Moreover, the Gonzalez majority, to support its holding, noted “a trend of decisions” reaching similar results and cited several cases with similar holdings. The very first case cited is State v. Mendez, 88 Wash. App. 785, 947 P.2d 256 (1997), a case overturned by the Washington Supreme Court in 1999 on the grounds that “[a]n officer must... be able to articulate an objective rationale predicated specifically on safety concerns, for officers, vehicle occupants, or other citizens, for ordering a passenger to stay in the vehicle .... This articulated objective rationale prevents groundless police intrusions on passenger privacy.” State v. Mendez, 137 Wash. 2d 208, 220, 970 P.2d 722, 728 (1999). Mendez therefore ultimately evidences, if anything, a trend in the direction directly opposed to that taken by the majority in Gonzalez.
The majority here next cites State v. Webster, 170 Ariz. 372, 374, 824 P.2d 768, 770 (1991), wherein the majority in that case, engaging in only brief analysis, held that:
If a passenger can be ordered out of a vehicle for-the officer’s safety, he can also be ordered back inside the vehicle for safety purposes. In fact, it may be even less of a privacy intrusion to order him back inside the car which is where he was prior to the stop. We cannot allow the officer’s safety to depend on how fast the driver and passenger can get out of the vehicle after it has been stopped. Ordering the occupants back into the vehicle does no more than establish the status quo at the time of the stop. To hold otherwise could well lead to the unnecessary death of an officer, gunned down by those walking away who suddenly turn and fire or who circle behind the officer, either assaulting or killing him while he is talking to the driver.
Notably, however, as in Gonzalez, the Webster majority of two was countered by a dissent, authored by the chief judge of the Court of Appeals of Arizona, Division Two, and stating:
Implicit in the court’s ruling is the proposition that in every case in which police may stop a person, even for something as minor as driving with a broken taillight, they may seize anyone with the person stopped. Of course, any time a car is stopped everyone within it is stopped. It does not seem to me to follow, though, that those incidentally stopped are powerless to leave if they wish to and instead must remain involuntarily under police control until the police decide otherwise. Their detention is not supported by reasonable suspicion. The detention, if justified by considera*239tions of officer safety, has to be premised on the notion that any stop creates a significant risk that those associated with the person stopped will attempt to harm the officer. That may be true when the reason for the stop is serious criminal activity. It cannot, it seems to me, be seriously argued that because danger exists sometimes, it must be assumed always to exist so as to justify the seizure of everyone present when anyone is stopped for whatever reason. No argument is made, specific to the facts of this case, that the officer felt the seizure was necessary for his safety. He testified otherwise. Instead it is justified on the broad rule that routine seizures may occur for officer safety regardless of the facts of the case. That rule, permitting wholesale seizures without individual justification, conflicts with the fourth amendment.
Id. at 374-75, 824 P.2d at 770-71 (footnote omitted) (Livermore, C.J., dissenting).
In the third case cited by the majority here, Rogala v. D.C., 161 F.3d 44, 53 (D.C. Cir. 1998), the officer who ordered a passenger to remain in a vehicle during a traffic stop did so explicitly on the grounds that “she was blocking traffic and interfering with the field sobriety test that [the officer] was conducting . . . .” The court therefore “conclude [d] that in the circumstances presented, it follows . . . that a police officer has the power to reasonably control the situation by requiring a passenger to remain in a vehicle during a traffic stop, particularly where, as here, the officer is alone and feels threatened.” Id. Rogala does not stand for the proposition that requiring a passenger in a car subject to a traffic stop to remain in the vehicle is per se permissible. Indeed, in a case the majority cites for its second line of cases, Wilson v. Florida, 734 So. 2d 1107, 1112-13, disc. review denied, 749 So. 2d 504 (1999), cert. denied, 529 U.S. 1124, 146 L. Ed. 2d 820 (2000), the Court of Appeal of Florida, Fourth District, explicitly included Rogala as a case meeting the criteria of the second line of cases, which requires objective circumstances supporting the reasonableness of ordering a passenger to remain in a vehicle. Rogala therefore is misplaced in the majority’s first line of cases.
In the final case cited by the majority, U.S. v. Moorefield, 111 F.3d 10, 13 (3rd Cir. 1997), the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, in a brief opinion, held that:
In view of the Supreme Court’s ruling in Wilson, we have no hesitancy in holding that the officers lawfully ordered Moorefield to *240remain in the car with his hands in the air. We follow the Court’s analysis in Wilson. The only change in Moorefield’s circumstances resulting from the order to remain in the car and put his hands in the air, was that he remained inside of the stopped car with his hands in view, rather than inside of the stopped car with his hands lowered into a passenger compartment that could potentially contain a concealed weapon. Just as the Court in Wilson found ordering a passenger out of the car to be a minimal intrusion on personal liberty, we find the imposition of having to remain in the car with raised hands equally minimal. We conclude that the benefit of added officer protection far outweighs this minor intrusion.
Notably, however, our own Fourth Circuit has emphasized the incompatibility of bright-line tests, such as that established in Moorefield, with the Fourth Amendment. See, e.g., Alvarez v. Montgomery County, 147 F.3d 354, 358 (4th Cir. 1998) (“The textual touchstone of the Fourth Amendment is reasonableness. When applying this basic principle, the Supreme Court has consistently eschewed bright-line rules, instead emphasizing the fact-specific nature of the reasonableness inquiry.” (internal quotations omitted)).
In sum, the majority opinion’s first line of cases does not provide a strong foundation on which to hold that North Carolinians who happen to be passengers in vehicles stopped by law enforcement may lawfully be detained as a matter of course.
II.
The majority here states that the second line of cases it cites holds that “the Fourth Amendment is violated when a police officer detains a passenger in a vehicle during a traffic stop, unless the officer has an independent articulable suspicion that the passenger is dangerous or involved in criminal activity.” I believe this overstates the holdings of the cases cited.1
In the first case cited by the majority, Mendez, 137 Wash. 2d at 220, 970 P.2d at 728, the Washington State Supreme Court does not hold that an officer must have “an independent articuable suspicion that the passenger is dangerous or involved in criminal activity” but that the officer “must... be able to articulate an objective rationale predicated specifically on safety concerns, for officers, vehicle occu*241pants, or other citizens, for ordering a passenger to stay in the vehicle . . . Indeed, the Mendez court made clear that the Terry standard of reasonable suspicion is not required:
To satisfy this objective rationale, we do not mean that an officer must meet Terry’s standard of reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. Terry must be met if the purpose of the officer’s interaction with the passenger is investigatory. For purposes of controlling the scene of the traffic stop and to preserve safety there, we apply the standard of an objective rationale. Factors warranting an officer’s direction to a passenger at a traffic stop may include the following: the number of officers, the number of vehicle occupants, the behavior of the occupants, the time of day, the location of the stop, traffic at the scene, affected citizens, or officer knowledge of the occupants.
Id. at 220-21, 970 P.2d at 728.
In Wilson, 734 So. 2d at 1113, the second case cited by the majority, the court held that:
a police officer conducting a lawful traffic stop may not, as a matter of course, order a passenger who has left the stopped vehicle to return to and remain in the vehicle until completion of the stop. The officer must have an articulable founded suspicion of criminal activity or a reasonable belief that the passenger poses a threat to the safety of the officer, himself, or others before ordering the passenger to return to and remain in the vehicle.
The Wilson court made clear that suspicion of criminal activity was one ground for ordering a passenger to remain in a vehicle. However it also made clear, not least by endorsing Rogala, discussed above, that, for example, a passenger’s posing a traffic hazard constitutes an objective ground for detaining the passenger in the vehicle. This holding cannot be equated with the Terry stop “reasonable suspicion of criminal activity” standard the majority here implies Wilson and Mendez require.
Moreover, the two cited cases are not alone in holding that officers may not, as a matter of course, order passengers in cars lawfully stopped to remain in the vehicles. See, e.g., Castle v. State, 999 P.2d 169 (Alaska Ct. App. 2000) (reversing the defendant’s conviction of misconduct involving controlled substances and suppressing cocaine evidence where the defendant was a passenger in a stopped vehicle and was seized without justification); Dennis v. State, 345 Md. 649, *242693 A.2d 1150 (1997) (reversing the defendant’s disorderly conduct conviction where there was no basis for detaining a passenger who ignored an officer’s command to remain in the vehicle), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 928, 139 L. Ed. 2d 255 (1997).
III.
In the case sub judice, the majority’s endorsement of the first line of cases renders anyone who simply happens to be a passenger in a car stopped by law enforcement for any reason powerless to leave the vehicle until law enforcement, at its discretion, decides otherwise. This holding does not comport with the Fourth Amendment or United States Supreme Court case law, which dictate that some objective reason and the availability of judicial review are required for a seizure to be lawful:
The scheme of the Fourth Amendment becomes meaningful only when it is assured that at some point the conduct of those charged with enforcing the laws can be subjected to the more detached, neutral scrutiny of a judge who must evaluate the reasonableness of a particular search or seizure in light of the particular circumstances. And in making that assessment it is imperative that the facts be judged against an objective standard: would the facts available to the officer at the moment of the seizure or the search “warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief’ that the action taken was appropriate? Cf. Carroll v. United States, 267 US 132, 69 L Ed 543, 45 S Ct 280, 39 ALR 790 (1925); Beck v. Ohio, 379 US 89, 96-97, 13 L Ed 2d 142, 147, 148, 85 S Ct 223, 229 (1964). Anything less would invite intrusions upon constitutionally guaranteed rights based on nothing more substantial than inarticulate hunches, a result this Court has consistently refused to sanction. See, e. g., Beck v. Ohio, supra; Rios v. United States, 364 US 253, 4 L Ed 2d 1688, 80 S Ct 1431 (1960); Henry v. United States, 361 US 98, 4 L Ed 2d 134, 80 S Ct 168 (1959).
Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21-22, 20 L. Ed. 2d 889, 906 (1968) (footnote omitted). Moreover, the United States Supreme Court has instructed us that the application of privacy rights to our citizens urider the Fourth Amendment is not a matter that this country leaves to the unfettered discretion of law enforcement:
And simple “ ‘good faith on the part of the arresting officer is not enough.’ ... If subjective good faith alone were the test, the pro*243tections of the Fourth Amendment would evaporate, and the people would be ‘secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects,’ only in the discretion of the police.” Beck v. Ohio, supra, at 97, 13 L Ed 2d at 148.

Id.

Further, while it is true that when a vehicle is stopped, passengers are by definition also stopped, it does not flow from that that the detention of passengers in the vehicle potentially for the duration of the traffic stop is a “minimal intrusion.” In Maryland v. Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, 414, 137 L. Ed. 2d 41, 47 (1997), the United States Supreme Court held that ordering a passenger in a stopped vehicle to step out of the vehicle was a de minimis intrusion because the passenger was already stopped and thus “[t]he only change in [the passenger’s] circumstances which will result from ordering [him/her] out of the car is that [he/she] will be outside of, rather than inside of, the stopped car.” Here, in contrast, law enforcement is being empowered to dictate, at its discretion, not only the location of the passenger but also the detention and length of detention of the passenger.
I agree with the majority that officer safety must be prioritized where safety concerns exist. In this case, such concerns did exist: The traffic stop occurred relatively late at night, in a poorly lit area, and Defendant appeared agitated from the beginning. I agree with the majority that, under these circumstances, it was reasonable for the officer to decide that it was safer to have Defendant remain in the vehicle for the duration of the traffic stop.
However, the existence of threats to officer safety in some cases, as in this one, does not warrant issuing to law enforcement a carte blanche for seizing anyone present when any vehicle is stopped for any reason. Requiring law enforcement to be able to articulate some objective rationale predicated on safety concerns for officers, vehicle occupants, or others to justify ordering a passenger to remain in a vehicle during a traffic stop erects a relatively low hurdle.2 Once law enforcement meets this hurdle, I agree that the intrusion on passenger privacy is de minimis when balanced against safety concerns. And where the hurdle is not met, it protects North Carolinians from groundless seizures.

. I also note that both opinions cited for the second line of cases are straight concurrences.

. Clearly, if law enforcement has reasonable suspicion that the passenger is engaged in criminal activity, an investigatory detention is constitutional.