EDWARD ROBINSON, APPELLANT,
v.
STATE OF FLORIDA, APPELLEE
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Edward Robinson was convicted of carrying a concealed weapon and driving with a suspended license after a police officer stopped his vehicle for careless driving. Robinson appealed, arguing the stop was pretextual, and the appellate court agreed, holding that the officer lacked reasonable suspicion to believe Robinson's vehicle was the source of the commotion he heard from 150 yards away.
The court reversed Robinson's convictions, holding that the officer's stop was pretextual and violated the Fourth Amendment because a reasonable officer would not have stopped the vehicle absent the officer's invalid suspicion of drug activity. The court found the evidence of careless driving insufficient and the frisk unjustified.
[1] A traffic stop is invalid if it is a pretext for an ulterior motive unrelated to the traffic violation.
[2] To be valid, a traffic stop must be based on facts and circumstances that would lead a reasonable officer to stop the vehicle absent an additional invalid purpose.
Previewing 2 of 5 headnotes on this case. FLexlaw’s editorially structured points of law — every proposition, pinpointed — are reserved for members.
Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligence“the state must show that under the facts and circumstances a reasonable officer would have stopped the [*414] vehicle absent an additional invalid purpose.”
Establishes the legal standard for evaluating pretextual stops under Kehoe v. State
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceOfficer Mann was parked in a police cruiser outside a nightclub in a high-crime area at 4:00 a.m. when he heard yelling, tire-spinning, and brake-slam…
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HALL, Judge.
Edward Robinson appeals his convictions for carrying a concealed weapon and driving while license suspended or revoked. He contends that his motion to suppress should have been granted because the stop of his vehicle for a traffic infraction was a pretext stop. We agree and reverse.
At the hearing on Robinson’s motion to suppress, Officer Mann testified that he was parked in his police cruiser in the parking lot of a night club located in a high drug or crime area at 4:00 a.m. on a Saturday morning. He heard a lot of yelling and a vehicle slam on its brakes, spin its tires, slam on its brakes again, and then drive off. The vehicle was approximately one hundred and fifty yards away, and it was not in Officer Mann’s line of view. Officer Mann drove out onto the road and saw Robinson’s vehicle approximately thirty seconds after he heard the commotion. He stopped Robinson for careless driving. Officer Mann asked Robinson to get out of the car, patted him down for weapons, and discovered a .32 automatic in Robinson’s belly bag. He then placed Robinson under arrest for carrying a concealed weapon and gave him a citation for careless driving. In addition, Robinson was charged with driving while license suspended or revoked.
Robinson argues that the trial court should have granted his motion to suppress because Officer Mann’s stop of his vehicle for careless driving was a pretext for Officer Mann’s suspicion that Robinson had been involved in a drug transaction. Robinson refers to Officer Mann’s testimony that what he heard before pulling out and seeing Robinson’s vehicle was consistent with what happens when a participant in a drug transaction has been cheated. Officer Mann also testified that he speculated that the vehicle he heard was involved in some type of drug rip-off because he had seen known drug dealers on the street about five minutes earlier. In addition, Robinson points out that Officer Mann did not testify that he usually stops drivers for spinning their tires and slamming on their brakes. Kehoe v. State, 521 So. 2d 1094 (Fla.1988).
In Kehoe, the supreme court held that police officers may not stop citizens upon a pretext. Rather, “the state must show that under the facts and circumstances a reasonable officer would have stopped the vehicle absent an additional invalid purpose.” 521 So. 2d at 1097.
We do not believe that the state has shown that a reasonable officer would have stopped Robinson when he could not see the vehicle that he heard, and he did not see Robinson’s vehicle until thirty seconds after he heard the spinning of tires and the slamming of brakes. The spinning of tires and slamming of brakes can be just as consistent with an attempt to avoid an accident as with careless driving. Thus, the evidence adduced in this case constituted an insufficient basis upon which to believe that it was Robinson who spun his wheels and slammed on his brakes and that those actions were in violation of the careless driving statute, § 316.1925, Fla.Stat. (1991).
The pretextual nature of the stop is supported by Officer Mann’s testimony that he did not have reason to believe that Robinson was armed and that he patted Robinson down for weapons immediately after stopping him for no other reason than his speculation that what he had heard was a drug rip-off. Thus, even if the stop of Robinson had been valid, the search of him clearly was not. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 20, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1879, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968).
Accordingly, since Robinson’s motion to suppress should have been granted, we reverse his convictions for carrying a concealed weapon and driving while license suspended or revoked.
Reversed with directions consistent with this opinion.
DANAHY, A.C.J., and SCHOONOVER, J., concur.
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Ware v. State, 679 So. 2d 3 (Fla. 2d DCA 1996)…istrict court). In Ware’s view, the suppression of his identity upon disclosure that he was operating a vehicle without a proper license, a fact learned in the context of an unlawful stop, was required by this court’s decision in Robinson v. State, 617 So. 2d 412 (Fla. 2d DCA 1993). We are quick to note that the opinion in that case discloses that identity was not expressly suppressed due to the improper [*5] detention and search. It is true that Robinson was driving during a time when his license was suspen…1 / 2
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Authorities Cited
- Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (U.S. 1968)
- Kehoe v. State, 521 So. 2d 1094 (Fla. 1988)