State v. Davila
| Decision Date | 29 March 2023 |
| Docket Number | 21-1032 |
| Parties | STATE OF IOWA, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. ROBERTO LUIS ROSADO DAVILA, Defendant-Appellant. |
| Court | Iowa Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the Iowa District Court for Polk County, Christopher Kemp (motion to suppress) and Becky Goettsch (trial and sentencing), District Associate Judges.
Roberto Luis Rosado Davila appeals from his conviction and sentence for operating while under the influence and driving while license was revoked. .
Martha J. Lucey, State Appellate Defender, and Nan Jennisch Assistant Appellate Defender, for appellant.
Brenna Bird, Attorney General, and Kyle Hanson, Assistant Attorney General, for appellee.
Considered by Tabor, P.J., Badding, J., and Vogel, S.J. [*]
Roberto Luis Rosado Davila appeals from his conviction for operating while under the influence (OWI), first offense, and driving while his license was revoked. He contends the district court should have suppressed evidence from the traffic stop and suspended his fine for OWI. Because the investigating officer had reasonable suspicion to conduct the traffic stop and the court had no discretion to suspend his fine, we affirm.
On November 29, 2020, Trooper Andrew Albright with the Iowa State Patrol saw a vehicle with Iowa license plates traveling in Polk County. Trooper Albright noticed the color of the vehicle's registration sticker indicated the registration expired sometime in 2020, so he used his patrol cruiser's computer to check the registration and the registered owner. The computer showed the registration was still valid; however, the computer also showed the vehicle's registered owner did not have a valid Iowa driver's license and had received citations for such in Mahaska County "a couple months prior."[1] Trooper Albright initiated a traffic stop and identified the driver as Rosado Davila. Based on his observations during the stop, Trooper Albright suspected Rosado Davila was intoxicated. Trooper Albright arrested Rosado Davila and transported him to the patrol office, where a breath test showed his alcohol concentration was .208. Rosado Davila was charged with OWI, first offense, and driving while his license was revoked. He filed a motion to suppress evidence from the traffic stop, arguing Trooper Albright lacked reasonable suspicion. After a hearing in which Trooper Albright testified, the district court denied Rosado Davila's motion. Rosado Davila filed a motion to reconsider, which the court also denied. He stipulated to a trial on the minutes of testimony, and the court found him guilty as charged. For OWI, the court sentenced him to a term of incarceration not to exceed one year, with all but ten days suspended, and imposed a fine of $1250. He now appeals the denial of his motion to suppress and the imposition of a fine for OWI.
Rosado Davila contends the traffic stop violated his constitutional protections from unreasonable search and seizure. U.S. Const. amend. IV; Iowa Const. art. I, § 8. We review constitutional issues de novo. State v. Price-Williams, 973 N.W.2d 553, 561 (Iowa 2022).
The federal and state constitutions guarantee an individual protection from unreasonable searches and seizures and generally require a government official to obtain a warrant before such actions. State v. Kinkead, 570 N.W.2d 97, 100 (1997). However, this right is not absolute, and there are exceptions to the protection. When a "police officer observes unusual conduct which leads him reasonably to conclude in light of his experience that criminal activity may be afoot," the officer may conduct a warrantless search and seizure. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30-31 (1968).
To determine whether an investigatory stop of a vehicle by an officer is constitutionally permissible, we look to "whether the articulated facts warrant intrusion on an individual's [constitutional] right and whether the scope of the intrusion is reasonably related to the circumstances that justified the intrusion." State v. Mitchell, 498 N.W.2d 691, 693 (Iowa 1993). Reasonable suspicion of the officer is reviewed under "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?" Terry, 392 U.S. at 21-22 (1968). "Mere suspicion, curiosity, or hunch of criminal activity is not enough." State v. Tague, 676 N.W.2d 197, 204 (Iowa 2004).
Trooper Albright stopped Rosado Davila after his computer showed the registered owner of the vehicle did not have a valid Iowa driver's license. The record contains no indication Trooper Albright knew this information was incorrect or the registered owner was not the current driver. Under similar facts, our supreme court found reasonable suspicion to justify a traffic stop. See State v. Vance, 790 N.W.2d 775 (Iowa 2010) ().
Nevertheless, Rosado Davila mantains Trooper Albright's information was too stale to justify a traffic stop. Specifically, he argues the earlier citations for driving without a valid license cannot form reasonable suspicion the registered owner still lacked a valid license "a couple months" later. Accord State v. Randle, 555 N.W.2d 666, 670 (Iowa 1996) ("Allegations of criminal conduct may be so distant in time as to provide no probable cause for a warrant.").
Our supreme court recently considered whether an officer's knowledge about a driver's license being barred was too stale to provide reasonable suspicion for a traffic stop. State v. Sallis, 981 N.W.2d 336, 338 (Iowa 2022). There, the officer last checked the defendant's license status two to six months before the stop and found his license barred. Id. at 339. The court rejected the defendant's staleness claim, finding the time period "falls within a time range that courts have generally found acceptable" for reasonable suspicion to exist. Id. at 345.
Trooper Albright testified he checked the vehicle on his patrol computer and "noticed that the registration was indeed valid but the registered owner did not have a valid Iowa driver's license and had received citations for that in Mahaska County a couple months prior." This period of "a couple months" between the registered owner being cited for driving without a license and Trooper Albright's traffic stop is well within the time the court found acceptable in Sallis. See id. Furthermore, Trooper Albright had access to more recent information than the citations, as...
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