Court Opinion

ID: 9488483
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 12:47:04.55067+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:52:55.346555
License: Public Domain

JAMES M. BURNS, Senior District Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part:
Although I agree that the district court’s denial of Ruvalcaba’s motion for judgment as *1329a matter of law and motion for new trial was proper under the circumstances particular to this ease, I do not concur with the majority’s establishment of a bright-line rule that permits an officer to routinely order all occupants to exit a vehicle legally stopped for a traffic violation.
As the majority states, in Pennsylvania v. Mimms, 434 U.S. 106, 98 S.Ct. 330, 54 L.Ed.2d 331 (1977), the Supreme Court held that an officer may routinely ask the driver to exit a vehicle lawfully stopped for a traffic violation because the officer’s safety is always a matter of concern under those circumstances. The Mimms Court weighed the public’s interest in allowing an officer to take precautionary safety measures when he confronts a driver for a traffic violation against “the individual’s right to personal security free from arbitrary interference by law officers.” Id. at 109, 98 S.Ct. at 332. The Court concluded the officer’s safety takes precedence under these circumstances because the additional intrusion is de minimis when an officer asks the driver, a person already lawfully detained because he violated a law, to exit a lawfully stopped vehicle.
The Court did not, however, generalize its holding to embrace all occupants of a vehicle. In fact, the Court’s reasoning was geared directly and specifically to the inherent and potential risk arising from the interaction between an officer and a driver during a stop for a traffic violation:
(1) “[W]e ... recognize[ ] the inordinate risk confronting an officer as he approaches a person seated in an automobile.” Id. at 110, 98 S.Ct. at 333.
(2) “Establishing a face-to-face confrontation diminishes the possibility, otherwise substantial, that the driver can make unobserved movements.... ” Id.
(3) “The hazard of accidental injury from passing traffic to an officer standing on the driver’s side of the vehicle may also be appreciable in some situations.” Id. at 111, 98 S.Ct. at 333.
(4) “Rather than conversing while standing exposed to moving traffic, the officer prudently may prefer to ask the driver of the vehicle to step out of the car and onto the shoulder of the road where the inquiry may be pursued with greater safety to both.” Id.
The Mimms Court, in essence, concluded that an officer’s safety is per se at risk during a traffic stop even though the driver’s offense may be minor because of (1) the physical juxtaposition of officer, driver, ear, and passing traffic; and (2) the confrontation that inevitably takes place between a driver and an officer during a traffic stop. These factors, however, may not necessarily exist in relation to other occupants of the vehicle; thus, the blanket balancing test the Mimms Court performed to establish a per se rule permitting an officer to routinely ask the driver to exit a vehicle lawfully stopped for a traffic violation may not fit well when “passenger” is substituted for “driver.” A passenger, for example, may well be detained inadvertently and unavoidably during a routine stop for a traffic violation. Unlike the driver, who “owns” the unlawful conduct, the passenger may have done no more than unluckily place himself in the hands of a negligent driver. The passenger does not become an active participant in the stop unless criminal activity is suspected; thus, a passenger is not routinely approached nor confronted face-to-face by the officer. Also, the officer’s exposure to “the hazard of accidental injury from passing traffic” during a traffic stop is not a risk associated with a passenger since traffic generally passes on the driver’s side.
Just as the Mimms Court did not extend its per se rule to encompass all occupants of a vehicle, neither has the Ninth Circuit until now. In the past, this Circuit, like others, has only cursorily and inexactly generalized the Mimms holding in dictum. See, e.g., United States v. Wiga, 662 F.2d 1325, 1332-33 (9th Cir.1981), cert. denied, 456 U.S. 918, 102 S.Ct. 1775, 72 L.Ed.2d 178 (1982) (“Occupants of a lawfully detained motor vehicle may be routinely ordered out of the vehicle” pursuant to Mimms); United States v. Shabazz, 993 F.2d 431, 437 n. 7 (5th Cir.1993) (“Ordering someone to get out of a car is itself a ‘seizure,’ but a constitutionally permissible one when done incident to a lawful traffic stop” pursuant to the ruling in Mimms); United States v. Powell, 929 F.2d 1190, 1195 (7th Cir.) (The occupants of a car lawfully stopped for a traffic violation “may even be asked to leave their vehicles.”), cert. denied, 502 U.S. 981, 112 S.Ct. 584, 116 *1330L.Ed.2d 609 (1991).1 Our prior decisions, however, are compatible with the view that an officer may ask passengers as well as drivers to exit vehicles lawfully stopped for routine traffic violations for the limited purpose of ensuring an officer’s safety. See, e.g., United States v. Cannon, 29 F.3d 472, 476-77 (9th Cir.1994) (An officer can take reasonable protective measures such as ordering the driver to get out of the car as the particular circumstances warrant upon lawfully stopping a vehicle for a traffic violation.); United States v. Behanna, 814 F.2d 1318, 1321 (9th Cir.1987) (Although the vehicle was stationary, we held the officer’s precautionary action of requesting the occupants to get out of the car was reasonable when the officers found two persons asleep in a vehicle bearing an expired license plate and the person in the passenger seat had a record of concealed weapon charges).
Although “the safety of the officer ... is both legitimate and weighty,” Mimms, 434 U.S. at 110, 98 S.Ct. at 333, it is unreasonable for an officer to have discretion without limits. I would hold, therefore, that an officer may ask passengers to exit a vehicle if the vehicle has been lawfully stopped for a traffic violation and if the officer’s request is legitimate and reasonable for the limited purpose of ensuring the officer’s safety under the circumstances. Subjecting an officer’s conduct to this minimal test of reasonableness is a minor burden compared to the import of virtually eradicating a passenger’s Fourth Amendment right to freedom from “arbitrary interference by law officers.” In effect, application of the majority’s per se rule to passengers unnecessarily does away with the Fourth Amendment rights of persons who may be merely along for the ride, so to speak.

. In addition to relying on the dicta in these cases, the majority also cites to United States v. Tellez, 11 F.3d 530 (5th Cir.1993), cert. denied, — U.S. —, 114 S.Ct. 1630, 128 L.Ed.2d 354 (1994), and United States v. Hardnett, 804 F.2d 353 (6th Cir.1986), cert. denied, 479 U.S. 1097, 107 S.Ct. 1318, 94 L.Ed.2d 171 (1987). In Tellez, however, the court stated "the police can generally order a suspect out of a car after a routine traffic stop.” 11 F.3d at 533 (emphasis added). In Hardnett, the court found that “officers ... may also order occupants out of a car when they have a particularized suspicion that the occupants are armed.” 804 F.2d at 358 (emphasis added).