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There is a running gag that if a police officer can’t find a reasonable suspicion for stopping you within so many yards of your vehicle, they’re doing something wrong. While this is an obvious exaggeration, it’s essential to know what your rights are with police stops, when a stop is illegal, and what reasonable suspicion means in the context of being stopped by the police.
If you are facing a criminal charge of any kind, your rights and future are on the line, and it is too important not to reach out for the trusted legal representation of an experienced Round Rock criminal defense attorney.
Stops Made with Warrants and Stops Made without Warrants
In Texas, there are times when the police can stop you without a warrant, but there are other times when they need a warrant to do so. Warrantless stops break down into several basic categories, including:
A consensual or voluntary encounter
A stop based on reasonable suspicion
A stop based on probable cause
When an Officer Can Stop You without a Warrant
The police can detain you and your vehicle in several different ways, even without a warrant.
A Consensual or Voluntary Encounter
When an officer approaches you in a public place – whether you are in your car or not – to ask you questions, it is a voluntary encounter as long as you are not required to answer their questions. At this point, the Fourth Amendment, which protects us from unreasonable search and seizure, does not apply – because you haven’t been detained or arrested.
Have You Been Detained?
As long as you have not been detained, the police can ask you as many questions as they’d like for as long as they’d like, and while you have the right to move along, you may not feel comfortable doing so. Further, you may not be sure if you have been detained or not. If you find yourself in a situation like this, there are several considerations to keep in mind:
If the officer used their overhead red and blue lights to pull you over, you were detained.
If the officer used their siren to pull you over, you were detained.
If the officer physically indicated that you should pull over, you were detained.
If none of the above apply, you should ask the officer if you are required to answer their questions, and if the answer is no, you should follow up with – Am I free to leave? If the answer is yes, you can head out on your merry way, but if it’s no, you’ve been detained. And this can play a very important role in your case moving forward.
Even if You Don’t Think You Have Anything to Hide
From the point that you disentangle yourself from the consensual encounter and leave, the police need a reason to pull you over again. The minimum reason required is having a reasonable suspicion that you committed a crime, are committing a crime, or are about to commit a crime.
If, on the other hand, you choose to stay and answer the officer’s questions, there is a very real chance that you’ll provide them with the reasonable suspicion they need to actually detain you.
While you may think that you have nothing to hide and therefore have no reason to quit answering the officer’s questions – and you may not – you should consider all the following:
You at least occasionally have passengers in your car, and it’s hard to know what they may have left behind that could potentially lead to your arrest.
While you’re answering the officer’s questions, they may determine – or believe – that your speech is slurred, which could support a DWI charge.
While you’re answering the officer’s questions, they may detect the scent of – or believe they detect the scent of – marijuana, which can lead to a marijuana possession charge.
While you’re answering the officer’s questions, they may spy an open container of alcohol – that a passenger potentially left – in your car, which can lead to a charge of open container.
If you haven’t been detained by the police, it’s in your best interest to continue on your way.
A Stop Based on Reasonable Suspicion
When an officer pulls you over with their red and blues on, it’s important to know that you’ve been temporarily detained. While you’re not free to leave, you’re not under arrest at that point, and the officer isn’t required to Mirandize you. This is called a Terry stop, and it must be based on something.
The least amount of cause the police need to pull you over and temporarily detain you is a reasonable suspicion that one of the following is true:
You were committing a crime.
You were about to commit a crime.
You just committed a crime.
Clearly identifying one’s reasonable suspicion is challenging, but it refers to a set of specific facts that can be articulated, which means that the officer can put them into words.
This makes reasonable suspicion more than just a guess, a hunch, or a feeling, but it doesn’t rise to the level of probable cause, which means more likely than not. Reasonable suspicion is the lowest rung when it comes to standards of proof in the criminal justice system.
In order to temporarily detain you, the police don’t need any actual proof that you engaged in an illegal act. In fact, ordinary actions that are commonly associated with crimes can suffice.
For example, if the officer sees you drive away from a bar at closing time and thinks that you weaved a bit within your lane, they likely have reasonable suspicion to stop you – even though none of your actions in and of themselves are illegal.
However, when the officer considers this scenario as a whole, they may determine that they have the reasonable suspicion necessary to pull you over and temporarily detain you.
Ultimately, reasonable suspicion is defined as the officer having specific reasons that they can identify for temporarily detaining you, and this reasonable suspicion is based upon their experience and personal knowledge as an officer, which is coupled with the logical inferences they’ve made regarding the available facts.
In other words, a vague hunch or notion doesn’t rise to the level necessary to support reasonable suspicion.
Traffic Offenses Are Crimes in Texas
In Texas, traffic offenses – and there are hundreds of them – are crimes, and you can be legally detained for violating even one of them. For example, if you speed past an officer who is driving the speed limit, they have the reasonable suspicion they need to pull you over, and there’s no need to confirm it with their radar or laser equipment.
Once You’re Temporarily Detained
Once the police temporarily detain you, they have the right to ask several questions of you, including:
Where are you coming from, and where are you headed?
Have you been drinking?
How many drinks have you had?
When did you have your last drink?
The police can also ask you to produce your driver’s license in order to see if there are any warrants out for your arrest, in addition to asking for your car registration and proof of insurance. Finally, they can ask you to exit your vehicle.
It’s important to understand that, at this juncture, the police can begin building a case against you without reading you your right to remain silent and your right to have an attorney represent you. This means that anything you say at this time can be used against you.
Not Every Police Stop Is Legal
Some police officers are overzealous when it comes to stops based on reasonable suspicion, and some are sloppy. The bottom line is that not every stop is legal.
If you’ve been stopped and detained illegally, you can attempt to have the evidence gathered against you in the unlawful stop suppressed. If your motion to suppress proves successful, the evidence obtained will be thrown out for the case against you, and it can be a turning point.
In order to suppress evidence, your criminal defense attorney will file a motion to suppress that establishes the unlawful nature of the stop. The court will consider the motion in the context of what the officer knew at the time of the stop – and not in the context of whatever information has come to light since.
Finally, the presiding judge – after reviewing the totality of the circumstances – will determine if the officer’s decision to stop you was reasonable to begin with.
If your motion to suppress evidence prevails, all the evidence gathered from the point of the unlawful stop will be thrown out. In the case of a traffic stop, this generally means that the entire case will be dismissed. It should be noted, however, that the prosecution has the right to appeal the court’s decision.
A Stop Based on Probable Cause
Sometimes, an officer makes a stop that is based on considerably more than reasonable suspicion. An example is when they pull over a motorist for doing something that is clearly dangerous and against the law, such as passing on the shoulder, which can lead to a warrantless stop that is based on probable cause.
When an officer stops you for a reason that would cause a reasonably prudent person to believe it’s more likely than not that you committed a crime, the police have probable cause to stop you for further investigation.
A Higher Standard of Proof
Probable cause is a higher standard of proof than reasonable suspicion, and as such, it requires more evidence. That said, officers often simply observe motorists breaking laws, such as speeding, failing to yield the right of way, ignoring traffic signs and signals, failing to indicate a turn, and so on. As a result, traffic stops are often based on probable cause.
The Police Can Overreach When It Comes to Probable Cause
Not every stop that the police base on probable cause is a legitimate stop. And when they overreach, you have the same opportunity to file a motion to suppress the evidence they collected during the unlawful stop that you did when unlawfully stopped under reasonable suspicion.
When the Police Stop You with a Warrant
When there is a warrant out for your arrest, the police can detain and arrest you legally at any time – whether you’re on foot, driving your car, or doing anything else. The police can run license plates on the road in search of motorists with outstanding warrants. Once an officer gets a hit on a license plate, they proceed to confirm the matter with dispatch.
When there is an outstanding warrant out for the registered owner of the car in question and when the person behind the wheel resembles the registered owner, the driver can be stopped whether there is an outstanding warrant for them specifically or not.
If you’re stopped for an outstanding warrant, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you will be immediately arrested. Once you’ve been detained, however, the officer may go into investigative mode to drum up probable cause for whatever crime they suspect you of having committed.
An Experienced Round Rock Criminal Defense Attorney Can Help
Brett Pritchard at The Law Office of Brett H. Pritchard – proudly serving Round Rock, Texas, for decades – is a dedicated criminal defense attorney who is committed to fiercely advocating for your case’s best possible resolution– in support of your brightest future.
Our formidable legal team is here for you, and we encourage you to reach out and contact or call us at 254-781-4222 to schedule a FREE consultation and learn more about what we can do to help you today.