State v. Laplante

26 A.3d 337

2011 ME 85

STATE of Maine

v.Ronald A. LaPLANTE.

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Argued: June 15, 2011.Decided: Aug. 2, 2011.

Jeffrey C. Toothaker, Esq., Toothaker & Chong, Ellsworth, ME, Zachary Heiden, Esq. (orally), Maine Civil Liberties Union, Portland, ME, for Ronald LaPlante.William M. Entwisle, Asst. Dist. Atty. (orally), Prosecutorial District VII, Ellsworth, ME, for State of Maine.Walter F. McKee, Esq., Maine Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Freeport, ME, for amicus curiae Maine Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.Zachary Heiden, Esq., Maine Civil Liberties Union, Portland, ME, for amicus curiae Maine Civil Liberties Union.William J. Schnieder, Attorney General, Donald W. Macomber, Asst. Atty. Gen., Augusta, ME, for amicus curiae Attorney General.Panel: SAUFLEY, C.J., and ALEXANDER, LEVY, SILVER, MEAD, GORMAN, and JABAR, JJ.LEVY, J.

[¶ 1] In this appeal, we consider the constitutionality of a state trooper's stop of a vehicle for the sole purpose of seeking information from the operator concerning another vehicle that the trooper observed speeding. This issue arises from Ronald A. LaPlante's conviction of operating under the influence (Class C), 29–A M.R.S. § 2411(1–A)(C)(3) (2010), entered in the Superior Court (Hancock County, Cuddy, J.) after his conditional guilty plea. LaPlante contends that the court ( Hunter, J.) erred when it denied his motion to suppress because the information-seeking stop that led to his arrest was an unreasonable seizure of his person. We conclude that a law enforcement officer's investigation of a third party's civil speeding offense cannot, standing alone, justify the stop and seizure of a motorist, and we vacate the judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

[¶ 2] The facts are not disputed. On September 1, 2007, Elmer Farren, a trooper with the Maine State Police, was patrolling in his marked cruiser on Route 179 in Hancock County. While on patrol, the trooper clocked by radar a red Pontiac automobile traveling seventy-one miles per hour in a forty-five-mile-per-hour zone. As the trooper was making a turn to pursue the car, a motorcycle passed him.

[¶ 3] The trooper lost sight of the car, and after traveling a brief distance, arrived at a fork where Route 179 intersects Route 180. He continued along Route 179 but did not see the Pontiac, so he drove back to the fork. On Route 180, the trooper still did not see the Pontiac, but he did come upon the motorcycle. The trooper stopped the motorcyclist “to take a chance that maybe the motorcycle operator had seen where this vehicle might have turned.” He activated his blue lights and stopped the motorcycle, which was being operated by LaPlante, for the sole purpose of asking about the direction of the Pontiac. LaPlante had not been speeding or noticeably breaking any laws, and his motorcycle did not demonstrate any vehicular defects that might justify a safety-related stop.

[¶ 4] LaPlante was able to identify where the Pontiac had turned. While they spoke, the trooper noticed that LaPlante seemed “a little bit unstable on his feet” and “his speech seemed to be thick.” The trooper surmised that LaPlante might have been drinking. He requested LaPlante's license and redirected his efforts to investigating LaPlante for operating under the influence.

[¶ 5] LaPlante was charged with criminal operating under the influence (Class C), 29–A M.R.S. § 2411(1–A)(C)(3). LaPlante moved to suppress the evidence obtained during his vehicle stop, but the court denied the motion. Upon his entry of a conditional guilty plea, because of his existing driving record, LaPlante was sentenced to two years of imprisonment, with all but sixty days suspended, and two years of probation.¹

II. DISCUSSION

[¶ 6] LaPlante contends that the stop violated the constitutional proscription against unreasonable searches and seizures because a third party's civil speeding offense is not sufficiently serious to justify an information-seeking seizure of a motorist. Conversely, the State contends that LaPlante's stop was constitutionally permissible because the public interest in addressing speeding outweighs the minimal interference with a motorist's liberty interest that results from a brief stop. Because the facts are not disputed, we review the denial of the motion to suppress de novo as to issues of law. State v. McDonald, 2010 ME 102, ¶ 5, 6 A.3d 283, 285.

[¶ 7] The question presented is whether evidence obtained from an information-seeking stop of a single vehicle, made in the absence of any reasonable articulable suspicion, for the sole purpose of investigating a third party's civil speeding infraction, can be used in a criminal proceeding against the person who has been stopped. To answer this question, we (A) address the constitutional significance of a traffic stop; (B) analyze LaPlante's stop in light of the three factors articulated in Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47, 50–51, 99 S.Ct. 2637, 61 L.Ed.2d 357 (1979); and (C) state our conclusion.

A. The Constitutional Significance of a Traffic Stop

[¶ 8] A traffic stop of a motorist by a law enforcement officer is a seizure for purposes of the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution and article I, section 5, of the Maine Constitution. Illinois v. Lidster, 540 U.S. 419, 425–26, 124 S.Ct. 885, 157 L.Ed.2d 843 (2004); State v. Hutchinson, 2009 ME 44, ¶ 18 n. 9, 969 A.2d 923, 928; State v. Brewer, 1999 ME 58, ¶ 12, 727 A.2d 352, 355. A seizure is unlawful if it is unreasonable. U.S. Const. amend. IV; Me. Const. art. I, § 5. In almost all circumstances, a warrantless seizure is unreasonable in the absence of an objectively reasonable, articulable suspicion “that criminal conduct has taken place, is occurring, or imminently will occur.” ²State v. Donatelli, 2010 ME 43, ¶ 11, 995 A.2d 238, 241 (quotation marks omitted). However, the Supreme Court recognized in Brown that even in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion, a seizure for information-seeking purposes may be reasonable if “the gravity of the public concerns served by the seizure [and] the degree to which the seizure advances the public interest” outweigh “the severity of the interference with individual liberty.” 443 U.S. at 50–51, 99 S.Ct. 2637.

[¶ 9] Courts have applied the three-factor balancing test articulated in Brown to uphold the constitutionality of traffic stops in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion. For example, in Lidster, a highway roadblock stop was deemed constitutionally sound in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion when law enforcement conducted the roadblock to identify possible witnesses to a fatal hit-and-run accident, the roadblock was in the vicinity of where the accident occurred, and the officers stopped every approaching vehicle for only a brief time. 540 U.S. at 422, 427, 124 S.Ct. 885. We thus examine the reasonableness of the trooper's stop of LaPlante by evaluating (1) the gravity of the public concern in addressing a civil speeding infraction; (2) the degree to which the seizure of a motorist advances a speeding investigation; and (3) the severity of the interference with a motorist's constitutionally-protected liberty interest when that motorist is stopped for questioning by law enforcement.

B. Application of the Brown v. Texas Factors1. The Gravity of the Public Concern in Addressing a Civil Speeding Infraction

[¶ 10] The requirement that searches and seizures be reasonable “reflects the Framers' recognition ‘that searches and seizures were too valuable to law enforcement to prohibit them entirely’ but that ‘they should be slowed down.’ ” Thomas K. Clancy, The Fourth Amendment: Its History and Interpretation § 11.1 at 466 (2008) (quoting Berger v. New York, 388 U.S. 41, 75, 87 S.Ct. 1873, 18 L.Ed.2d 1040 (1967) (Black, J., dissenting)). Accordingly, when the State points to a public concern to justify the reasonableness of a search or seizure, courts must consider the gravity of that public concern in the context of the constitutionally-protected right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures. See Brown, 443 U.S. at 50–51, 99 S.Ct. 2637.

[¶ 11] As noted above, the investigation of serious crimes has been deemed sufficiently important to outweigh certain interferences with the liberty interests of stopped motorists. For example, we concluded that the public concern in the investigation of a recently-committed burglary was sufficiently grave to outweigh the interference with a motorist's liberty interest when the motorist was stopped briefly at a roadblock for questioning about the burglary. State v. Gorneault, 2007 ME 49, ¶¶ 2, 9, 918 A.2d 1207, 1208, 1209. Our reasoning in Gorneault mirrored the Supreme Court's approach in Lidster, in which the public concern related to the investigation of a fatal hit-and-run accident was sufficiently grave to outweigh the interference with a motorist's liberty interest when he was stopped at a roadblock for questioning about the accident. 540 U.S. at 422, 427, 124 S.Ct. 885. Similarly, other courts have concluded that the investigation of serious crimes can be deemed sufficiently urgent and important to justify warrantless seizures of motorists in the absence of reasonable articulable suspicion, including investigations of a robbery, see Gipson v. State, 268 S.W.3d 185, 188–89 (Tex.App.2008), an armed robbery, see Baxter v. State, 274 Ark. 539, 626 S.W.2d 935, 936, 937 (1982), and the repeated discharge of a firearm, threatening personal injury, see Williamson v. United States, 607 A.2d 471, 477 (D.C.1992).

[¶ 12] In contrast, the investigation of noncriminal offenses is generally not a sufficiently grave public concern to outweigh the interference with a motorist's liberty interest that occurs when the motorist is stopped without any reasonable articulable suspicion.³ See, e.g., State v. Ryland, 241 Neb. 74, 486 N.W.2d 210, 213–14 (1992).

[¶ 13] In this case, the trooper was investigating a noncriminal speeding...