Traffic stop justifies running wants or warrants on motorist

Officers are justified in running wants or warrants on any traffic stop to know who they are dealing with for officer safety. United States v. Villagrana-Flores, 467 F.3d 1269 (10th Cir. November 7, 2006):

The next question then is whether the officer was justified in using Mr. Villagrana-Flores’s identity to run a warrants check during the course of the Terry stop. In other words, we must determine whether running the warrants check was “reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the interference in the first place.” Terry, 392 U.S. at 20-21. We have previously held, in the context of traffic stops based on reasonable suspicion alone, that a “motorist may be detained for a short period while the officer runs a background check to see if there are any outstanding warrants or criminal history pertaining to the motorist even though the purpose of the stop had nothing to do with such prior criminal history.” United States v. Holt, 264 F.3d 1215, 1221 (10th Cir. 2001) (en banc). Several of our sister circuits have similarly held. See United States v. Brigham, 382 F.3d 500, 507-08, 507-08 n.5 (5th Cir. 2004) (en banc) (holding similarly and collecting cases). We explained in Holt that “[t]he justification for detaining a motorist to obtain a criminal history check is, in part, officer safety” because “[b]y determining whether a detained motorist has a criminal record or outstanding warrants, an officer will be better apprized of whether the detained motorist might engage in violent activity during the stop.” 264 F.3d at 1221-22. As long as the detention is for a short period, “the government’s strong interest in officer safety outweighs the motorist’s interests.” Id. at 1221.

Officer safety, however, is just as strongly implicated where the individual being detained for a short period of time is on foot, rather than in an automobile. An officer detaining a pedestrian has an equally strong interest in knowing whether that individual has a violent past or is currently wanted on outstanding warrants. The citizen’s interest, on the other hand, is no more robust merely because a short detention occurs while traversing on foot. Moreover, permitting a warrants check during a Terry stop on the street also “promotes the strong government interest in solving crimes and bringing offenders to justice.” See United States v. Hensley, 469 U.S. 221, 229, 105 S. Ct. 675, 83 L. Ed. 2d 604 (1985). Indeed, an identity’s utility in “inform[ing] an officer that a suspect is wanted for another offense, or has a record of violence or mental disorder,” Hiibel, 542 U.S. at 186, would be non-existent without the ability to use the identity to run a criminal background check. Thus, we hold that Mr. Villagrana-Flores’s Fourth Amendment rights were neither violated when his identity was obtained during a valid Terry stop nor when his identity was shortly thereafter used to run a warrants check.

Stop lacked reasonable suspicion. Defendant was merely sitting in a car idling on the street. United States v. Duty, 204 Fed. Appx. 236 (4th Cir. 2006) (unpublished):

We find that Winston lacked the reasonable suspicion necessary to seize Duty. The only evidence presented was that Duty was sitting in an idle car on a private street, and looked at Winston when she drove by. Such evidence plainly does not provide a basis for reasonable suspicion.

Accordingly, the seizure was invalid because Winston did not possess articulable, reasonable suspicion that criminal activity was afoot when she pulled behind Duty with the emergency lights activated. Because the seizure was illegal, the district court erred in denying Duty’s motion to suppress evidence.

911 call of a domestic disturbance and a man with a gun justified a stop of a man that matched the description. United States v. Hicks, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 81154 (N.D. Ind. November 6, 2006):

Here, the 911 caller was reporting an ongoing emergency – a domestic dispute in which the perpetrator was armed with a gun – and therefore Officer Tinsley was entitled to presume that the caller’s information was reliable without further corroboration. Furthermore, there is no indication that Officer Tinsley was aware of the caller’s inconsistent information, particularly since there was no mention of the caller in the dispatch. See Lenoir, 318 F.3d at 729. Accordingly, Officer Tinsley was entitled to rely on the dispatch report as reliable information that an ongoing emergency was occurring at 4033 Buell.