Court Opinion

ID: 9739345
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 20:12:43.749254+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:24:11.772806
License: Public Domain

NEUMANN, Justice,
concurring.
I agree with the majority opinion, which I have signed. I write separately to clarify a troublesome mischaracterization of the majority opinion in Justice Levine’s dissent.
Despite my colleague’s statement in her dissent, the majority opinion most emphatically does not state that “findings on the existence of reasonable and articulable suspicion ... are subject to full review by this court.” I would not sign an opinion which said that. The majority opinion very clearly and explicitly says we defer to the trial court’s factual findings, and resolve eviden-tiary conflicts in favor of affirmance. It is only the legal standard applied by the trial court which is subject to full review.
In this case the trial court applied the standard of probable cause, rather than reasonable and articulable suspicion, in reviewing the propriety of the officer’s stop. Probable cause is not the correct legal standard by which to judge the legality of an investigative stop which falls short of an arrest. The trial court’s error was therefore one of law, fully reviewable by this court.