State v. Robinette

• Decision Date: 06 September 1995
• Docket Number: No. 94-1143,94-1143
• Parties: , 64 USLW 2183 The STATE of Ohio, Appellant, v. ROBINETTE, Appellee.
• Court: Ohio Supreme Court

Page 650

73 Ohio St.3d 650

653 N.E.2d 695, 64 USLW 2183

The STATE of Ohio, Appellant, v. ROBINETTE, Appellee.

No. 94-1143.

Supreme Court of Ohio.

Submitted May 24, 1995.

Decided Sept. 6, 1995.

SYLLABUS BY THE COURT

1. When the motivation behind a police officer's continued detention of a person stopped for a traffic violation is not related to the purpose of the original, constitutional stop, and when that continued detention is not based on any articulable facts giving rise to a suspicion of some separate illegal activity justifying an extension of the detention, the continued detention constitutes an illegal seizure.

2. The right, guaranteed by the federal and Ohio Constitutions, to be secure in one's person and property requires that citizens stopped for traffic offenses be clearly informed by the detaining officer when they are free to go after a valid detention, before an officer attempts to engage in a consensual interrogation. Any attempt at consensual interrogation must be preceded by the phrase "At this time you legally are free to go" or by words of similar import.

On August 3, 1992, appellee, Robert D. Robinette, was driving his car at sixty-nine miles per hour in a forty-five miles per hour construction zone on Interstate 70 in Montgomery County. Deputy Roger Newsome of the Montgomery County Sheriff's office, who was on drug interdiction patrol at the time, stopped Robinette for a speeding violation.

Before Newsome approached Robinette's vehicle, he had decided to issue Robinette only a verbal warning, as was his routine practice regarding speeders in that particular construction zone. Newsome approached Robinette's vehicle and requested Robinette's driver's license. Robinette supplied the deputy with his driver's license, and Newsome returned to his vehicle to check it. Finding no violations, Newsome returned to Robinette's vehicle. At that point, Newsome had no intention of issuing Robinette a speeding ticket. Still, Newsome asked Robinette to get out of his car and step to the rear of the vehicle. Robinette complied with Newsome's request and stood between his car and the deputy's cruiser. Newsome returned to his vehicle in order to activate the cruiser's video camera so that he could videotape his interaction with Robinette. Newsome returned to Robinette, issued a verbal warning regarding Robinette's speed, and returned Robinette's driver's license.

After returning the license, Newsome said to Robinette, "One question before you get gone [sic]: are you carrying any illegal contraband in your car? Any weapons of any kind, drugs, anything like that?" Newsome testified that as part of the drug interdiction project he routinely asked permission to search the cars he stopped for speeding violations. When Robinette said that he did not have any contraband in the car, Newsome asked if he could search the vehicle. Robinette testified that he was shocked at the question and "automatically" answered "yes" to the deputy's request. Robinette testified further that he did not believe that he was at liberty to refuse the deputy's request.

Upon his search of Robinette's vehicle, Newsome found a small amount of marijuana. Newsome then put Robinette and his passenger in the back seat of the cruiser and continued the search. As a result of this extended search, Newsome found "some sort of pill" inside a film container. The pill was determined to be methylenedioxy methamphetamine ("MDMA") and was the basis for Robinette's subsequent arrest and charge for a violation of R.C. 2925.11(A).

Robinette's indictment was issued on December 18, 1992. On February 19, 1993, Robinette filed a motion to suppress the evidence found in the search of his vehicle. The trial court overruled the motion on March 8, 1993, finding that the deputy made clear to Robinette that the traffic matter was concluded before asking to search the vehicle. The court ruled that Robinette's consent did not result from any overbearing behavior on behalf of Newsome.

Robinette appealed. The Court of Appeals for Montgomery County reversed the trial court, holding that Robinette remained detained when the deputy asked to search the car, and since the purpose of the traffic stop had been accomplished prior to that point, the continuing detention was unlawful and the ensuing consent was invalid.

This matter is before this court upon an allowance of a discretionary appeal.

Mathias H. Heck, Jr., Montgomery County Pros. Atty., Carley J. Ingram and Michael L. Gebhart, Asst. Pros. Attys., for appellant.

James D. Ruppert, Franklin, for appellee.

Betty D. Montgomery, Atty. Gen., Richard A. Cordray, State Sol., and Simon B. Karas, Deputy Chief Counsel, urging reversal for amicus curiae, Ohio Atty. Gen.

Joseph T. Deters, Hamilton County Pros. Atty., and William E. Breyer, Asst. Pros. Atty., urging reversal for amicus curiae, Ohio Pros. Attys. Ass'n.

PFEIFER, Justice.

The issue in this case is whether the evidence used against Robinette was obtained through a valid search. We find that the search was invalid since it was the product of an unlawful seizure. We also use this case to establish a bright-line test, requiring police officers to inform motorists that their legal detention has concluded before the police officer may engage in any consensual interrogation.

In order to justify any investigative stop, a police officer "must be able to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken together with the rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion." Terry v. Ohio (1968), 392 U.S. 1, 21, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1880, 20 L.Ed.2d 889, 906. Absent any additional articulable facts arising after the stop is made, the police officer must tailor his detention of the driver to the original purpose of the stop. State v. Chatton (1984), 11 Ohio St.3d 59, 63, 11 OBR 250, 253, 463 N.E.2d 1237, 1240.

In Chatton, the police officer stopped the defendant's car when he noticed it had no license plates. When he approached the car after it had pulled over, the officer saw a valid temporary tag in the car's rear window. Despite the fact that the original question which gave rise to the stop had been resolved, the officer approached the driver and asked to see his driver's license. A check of the license revealed that it was suspended, and the officer ordered the defendant out of his vehicle and placed him under arrest for driving with a suspended license. Upon searching the vehicle, the officer discovered a loaded revolver under the driver's seat. The defendant was charged with carrying a concealed weapon.

This court ruled in Chatton that the evidence resulting from the search should have been suppressed. This court reasoned that the officer, upon seeing the valid temporary tag, no longer maintained a reasonable suspicion that the defendant's vehicle was not properly licensed, and thus had no articulable reason to further detain the defendant to determine the validity of his driver's license. As a result, any evidence seized upon a subsequent search of the vehicle was inadmissible under the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

In this case, Newsome certainly had cause to pull over Robinette for speeding. The question is when the validity of that stop ceased. Newsome testified that from the outset he never intended to ticket Robinette for speeding. When Newsome returned to Robinette's car after checking Robinette's license, every aspect of the speeding violation had been investigated and resolved. All Newsome had to do was to issue his warning and return Robinette's driver's license.

Instead, for no reason related to the speeding violation, and based on no articulable facts, Newsome extended his detention of Robinette by ordering him out of the vehicle. Newsome retained Robinette's driver's license and told Robinette to stand in front of the cruiser. Newsome then returned to the cruiser and activated the video camera in order to record his questioning of Robinette regarding whether he was carrying any contraband in the vehicle.

When the motivation behind a police officer's continued detention of a person stopped for a traffic violation is not related to the purpose of the original, constitutional stop, and when that continued detention is not based on any articulable facts giving rise to a suspicion of some separate illegal activity justifying an extension of the detention, the continued detention constitutes an illegal seizure. Chatton, supra.

The entire chain of events, starting when Newsome had Robinette exit the car and stand within the field of the video camera, was related to the questioning of Robinette about carrying contraband. Newsome asked Robinette to step out of his car for the sole purpose of conducting a line of questioning that was not related to the initial speeding stop and that was not based on any specific or articulable facts that would provide probable cause for the extension of the scope of the seizure of Robinette, his passenger and his car. Therefore the detention of Robinette ceased being legal when Newsome asked him to leave his vehicle.

However, this case contains a feature not discussed in Chatton: Robinette consented to the search of his vehicle during the illegal seizure. Because Robinette's consent was obtained during an illegal detention, his consent is invalid unless the state proves that the consent was not the product of the illegal detention but the result of an independent act of free will. Florida v. Royer (1983), 460 U.S. 491, 501, 103 S.Ct. 1319, 1326, 75 L.Ed.2d 229, 238. The burden is on the state to prove that the consent to search was voluntarily given. Id. at 497, 103 S.Ct. at 1324, 75 L.Ed.2d at 236. The factors used in consideration of whether the consent is sufficiently removed from the taint of the illegal seizure include the length of time between the illegal seizure and the subsequent search, the presence of intervening circumstances, and the purpose and flagrancy...