By Robert Phillips

Deputy District Attorney (ret.)

Legal Issues, Case Citation

1. Traffic stops, ordering a driver out of a vehicle
2. Pretextual motivations for ordering a subject out of a vehicle
3. Unlawful prolonging of a traffic stop
4. Ordering out of a vehicle and the mission of a traffic stop

People v. Ramirez (Aug. 20, 2024) 104 Cal.App.5th 315

Rule: During a lawful traffic stop, a police officer may order the driver out of the vehicle without having to justify why. An officer’s subjective motivation for ordering a subject out of his vehicle is irrelevant. Ordering a subject out of a car, done for safety reasons, does not unlawfully prolong the detention or take it outside the “mission of a traffic stop.”

Facts: At 10:45 pm on Aug. 1, 2022, Santa Ana police officers Travis Booth and James Driscoll observed defendant Luis Ramirez slide through a stop sign without making a complete stop, a violation of Vehicle Code §22450(a). Making a traffic stop, Officer Booth contacted Ramirez - the sole occupant - while Officer Driscoll took a position on the passenger side of the car. With body cameras recording the contact, Officer Booth asked Ramirez for his driver's license. Instead of providing it, Ramirez responded with "I did stop." After Officer Booth told Ramirez that he did not stop and that if he wished to debate the issue he could do so in court, Ramirez volunteered that he was not on probation or parole. While Ramirez picked up his cellphone, the officer asked for his license a second time while telling him "Keep your hands on the steering wheel and calm down," and "You can film all you want."

About a minute into the stop, Ramirez produced his driver’s license. As Officer Booth returned to his patrol vehicle to run a records check, Officer Driscoll kept his flashlight on Ramirez, who was speaking into his phone. Officer Driscoll asked him “Why are you so shaky ” Ramirez responded that “I hate cops man. I don't like when they, when they question me…’cause I used to be on parole.” When asked what he had been on parole for, Ramirez told the officer for assault with a deadly weapon. When asked if he was “staying clean,” and whether there was anything illegal in the vehicle, Ramirez responded “yes,” and “no,” respectively, while also volunteering, “...and I don’t consent to a search.”

About three minutes into the stop, Officer Booth returned to the car and told Ramirez to put both hands on top of his head. At around this time, Officer Booth later testified, he observed a bulge in Ramirez’s waistband. When Ramirez protested that he was not on parole, Officer Booth told him that it didn’t matter. Ignoring Ramirez’s comment that he has rights, the officer told defendant that “this is a lawful traffic stop and you’re detained. And we have the right to remove you from the vehicle.” Officer Booth repeatedly told Ramirez to put his hands on his head and his phone on the dash. When Ramirez contested the taking of his phone, Officer Booth told him that he was not taking his property from him but that he needed to put his phone down and put his hands on the top of his head.

Four minutes into the contact, Ramirez set his phone on the dash. Telling Ramirez that it would all go “much smoother” if he cooperated, Officer Booth coaxed Ramirez out of his car. The officer moved him a couple of steps away from the car while telling him that he was not under arrest, that he was only being detained, and that it had nothing to do with his parole status. Once Ramirez was removed from the car, Officer Driscoll looked through the rear window and observed a handgun tucked into a pouch on the back of the driver’s seat. He verbally informed Officer Booth of the presence of a gun using the police radio code for a handgun. Upon hearing this, Officer Booth handcuffed Ramirez and did a pat-down search, recovering a plastic handgun holster from his waistband. The handgun (along with some cocaine) was later recovered from the car.

Charged in state court with possession of a firearm by a felon and possession of a controlled substance, Ramirez filed a motion to suppress the evidence. The trial court judge granted the motion. The court’s reasons for finding a Fourth Amendment violation centered on when in the sequence of events Officer Booth made Ramirez exit his car. As ruled by the court: “The court is finding it constitutionally unreasonable to remove a defendant from the car after a few minutes have passed in the traffic stop if there is no change in circumstances to the safety of the officers between the beginning of the stop and that later removal.” The people appealed.

Held: The Fourth District Court of Appeals (Div. 3) reversed.

The issue on appeal, as it was in the trial court, was the lawfulness of ordering the defendant out of his car under the circumstances of this case. Despite the trial court’s apparent disagreement, the law on this issue is well settled. As noted by the court “‘The touchstone of the Fourth Amendment is reasonableness.’ (Florida v. Jimeno (1991) 500 U.S. 248, 250) ...‘The Fourth Amendment does not proscribe all state-initiated searches and seizures; it merely proscribes those which are unreasonable.’ (Ibid., italics added by the court.)

When analyzing the reasonableness of a particular search or seizure, ‘it is imperative that the facts be judged against an objective standard.’ (Terry v. Ohio (1968) 392 U.S. (1), at page 22.) The Fourth Amendment ‘allows certain actions to be taken in certain circumstances’ by police officers, ‘whatever the subjective intent.’” (Whren v. United States (1996) 517 U.S. 806, 807)

The issue here, therefore, was whether ordering a driver out of his car is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. The legality of ordering a driver out of his car is an issue the Supreme Court has already addressed in some detail in Pennsylvania v. Mimms (1977) 434 U.S. 106. The trial court judge was aware of the Mimms decision but believed there to be exceptions. Unable to determine why Officer Booth didn’t order defendant out of the car upon initially contacting him, the judge had some difficulty deciphering why he did so some three to four minutes later without any changed circumstances.

The Fourth District Court of Appeal held that it did not matter when in the sequence of events the “ordering out” took place. The officer’s subjective motivation for why he ordered defendant out of the car, or why he might have waited some three or four minutes into the contact to do so, are irrelevant. (See Whren v. United States, supra.) The California Supreme Court in People v. Hoyos (2007) 41 Cal.4th 872, has interpreted Mimms to mean that an officer may order a driver out of his car without having to justify why. Although Officer Booth later testified that he ordered Ramirez out of his car because he’d seen a bulge in his waistband and thus removed him from the car for safety reasons, why he ordered defendant out of his car was in fact irrelevant.

Per Mimms and Hoyos, the officer did not have to have a reason. The court also rejected Ramirez’s argument that Officer Booth’s action was all based upon a “pretext.” Per the court, under Whren “Booth’s intent or motives for his actions — even if they were pretextual — are irrelevant.”

Lastly, almost in passing, the court held that ordering a subject out of his car — typically done for safety reasons — did not unlawfully prolong the traffic stop. “At this point, the mission of the traffic stop was not yet complete (dealing with the traffic violation and attending to officer safety concerns), so it would have been reasonable for Booth to briefly detain Ramirez outside of the car.”

The court concluded that “the initial traffic stop of Ramirez’s car was lawful based on an observed traffic violation; Officer Booth did not need any additional justification to order Ramirez out of the vehicle; ordering Ramirez out of the vehicle did not unreasonably prolong the traffic stop; and once Officer Driscoll saw the firearm in the vehicle, all subsequent search and seizure actions, including the handcuffing, pat-down search, and eventual arrest of Ramirez, were all objectively reasonable under long established United States Supreme Court precedents.”

Note: Officers Booth and Driscoll did everything here by the book. There was absolutely no reason why the trial court should have granted the defendant’s suppression motion. Note also that the U.S. Supreme Court has similarly held that the same rules apply to passengers other than the driver. If anything, as noted by the High Court, the need to protect the safety of the officers is even greater when he must deal with more than just a lone driver. (Maryland v. Wilson (1997) 519 U.S. 408; see also Ruvalcaba v. City of Los Angeles (9th Cir. 1995) 64 F.3rd 1323; and People v. Saunders (2006) 38 Cal.4th 1129, 1134.) Either way, officers should take whatever action (ordering a driver and/or passenger out of the car, or to stay in the car) under the circumstances is most appropriate for safety purposes.

Unrelated to this case, the court felt it necessary to chastise the prosecutor for language he used in his court filings in this appeal. Specially, the court quoted the prosecutor as having said the following: “The trial court here has fabricated a new requirement to vehicle detentions and has done so in defiance of United States and California Supreme Court precedent.” This, the court held, violated an attorney’s duty to “maintain the respect due to the courts of justice and judicial officers.” (Bus. & Prof. Code § 6068(b).) The court further noted that the current oath taken by every attorney on admission to practice law includes the following oath: “As an officer of the court, I will strive to conduct myself at all times with dignity, courtesy and integrity.” (Cal. Rules of Court rule 9.7.) Accusing a trial court judge of “fabrication” and in defiance of the Constitution violates these rules. Although the deputy district attorney who orally argued this appeal submitted that the deputy district attorney who wrote the appeal did not mean to disrespect the court, the appellate court offered the following advice for future appeals: “We advise the district attorney in the future to be more cautious and consider his language more carefully when challenging a ruling of a trial court in an appellate brief, or he may be subject to sanctions. Words are to lawyers, as scalpels are to surgeons. They are tools to be used with precision.” Good point.