- AYON, ___ CA5 ___, ___ CR3 ___ (22) #H047360:
Ayon was driving in San Jose around 9:00 p.m. when he was stopped for a traffic violation. The police took his license and registration, and transmitted it to a dispatcher. About three and a half minutes into the stop, police ordered Ayon out of the car and patted him down. The dispatch came back on the license and registration. Both valid.
Officer asked Ayon for consent to search his car. Ayon refused. The officer handcuffed Ayon and told him he was detaining him “for my safety because of the way you’re acting.” After Ayon objected to being handcuffed for a traffic infraction, the officer again asserted he handcuffed Ayon for “officer safety because you’re being very aggressive.” The police then called for a dope-sniffing dog. It arrived almost thirteen minutes into the stop.
The dog alerted. police searched the car and found $6,200 hidden in a compartment under the driver’s side of the dashboard. An officer then discovered a secret compartment under the back seat of the car. The compartment had been designed to be opened with a secret switch, and the officer could not find the switch during the initial stop.
All this was captured on the body cams of the officers.
After taking Ayon into custody, the police took the car to the department garage, where they forced the compartment open. Inside, they found 1,132 grams of cocaine; 73.5 grams of methamphetamine; and an additional $10,000 in currency. The police never obtained any warrants for the search or arrest.
Ayon moves to suppress the evidence. Denied. The court found that under the totality of the circumstances, the police did not unduly or unreasonably prolong the detention. The court found “the officer’s actions were objectively reasonable under the circumstances of this particular case” and “the time spent interacting with the defendant before the dog determined probable cause” was objectively reasonable to pursue “legitimate investigative pursuits.”
The Court of Appeal, Per. Greenwood, P.J., reversed.
“A seizure for a traffic violation justifies a police investigation of that violation.” (Rodriguez v. U.S. (2015) 575 U.S. 348, 354 (Rodriguez).) A traffic stop begins once the vehicle is pulled over for investigation of the traffic violation. (People v. McDaniel (2021) 12 Cal.5th 97, 130.)
Because the traffic violation is the purpose of the stop, the stop “may ‘last no longer than is necessary to effectuate th[at] purpose.’ [Citation.]” (Rodriguez, supra, 575 U.S. at p. 354.) “[T]he tolerable duration of police inquiries in the traffic-stop context is determined by the seizure’s ‘mission’—to address the traffic violation that warranted the stop, [citation] and attend to related safety concerns.” (Ibid.) “A police stop exceeding the time needed to handle the matter for which the stop was made violates the Constitution’s shield against unreasonable seizures.”
A part of the justification for prolonging the detention, the Officer alleged that Ayon was acting in a “hostile,” “aggressive,” “confrontational,” and “strange” manner. He blamed Ayon for prolonging the stop and claimed he suspected Ayon was using drugs based on this asserted behavior. He testified that he ordered the narcotics dog after he became suspicious that Ayon was under the influence of something.
But, as Warner Wolf used to say, “Let’s go to the videotape!”
[T] video shows Officer Williams requested a narcotics dog before conducting any purported sobriety checks, and the dog handler admitted he had been informed his presence would be required before the stop had even occurred. And Ayon’s conduct as documented by the videos is at odds with Officer Williams’s testimony. Although Ayon questioned why the police would ask to search his car and handcuff him in a routine stop for a traffic infraction, he was cooperative at all times. He showed no signs of hostility or aggression.
Reports of Miranda’s Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated
On June 23 the Supreme Court released its opinion in Vega v. Tekoh, Docket #21-499. As summarized on SCOTUSblog:
During a March 2014 custodial interrogation of Terence Tekoh at his workplace regarding sexual assault allegations, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Deputy Carlos Vega failed to give Tekoh a Miranda warning. Vega emerged from that interrogation with Tekoh’s handwritten statement that offered an apology for inappropriately touching the complainant. Tekoh was subsequently prosecuted for the alleged sexual assault, and at Tekoh’s criminal trial, the government introduced his un-Mirandized statement. The jury found Tekoh not guilty.
Tekoh then sued Vega and other defendants for civil damages, alleging that, per Miranda, the custodial interrogation violated his Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit agreed with Tekoh and held that the government’s use of the un-Mirandized statement provided a basis upon which Tekoh could seek civil damages under Section 1983.
The Supreme Court rejected the 9th Circuit’s decision.
According to the majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito (and joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett):
Miranda did not hold that a violation of the rules it established necessarily constitute a Fifth Amendment violation, and it is difficult to see how it could have held otherwise. For one thing, it is easy to imagine many situations in which an un-Mirandized suspect in custody may make self-incriminating statements without any hint of compulsion. In addition, the warnings that the Court required included components, such as notification of the right to have retained or appointed counsel present during questioning, that do not concern self-incrimination per se but are instead plainly designed to safeguard that right. And the same is true of Miranda’s detailed rules about the waiver of the right to remain silent and the right to an attorney. [Mirand] 384 U. S., at 474–479.
At no point in the opinion did the Court state that a violation of its new rules constituted a violation of the Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination. Instead, it claimed only that those rules were needed to safeguard that right during custodial interrogation.
The conclusion over at SCTOUSblog is dire:
Miranda, one of the increasingly few cultural and court canons that binds us, has been injured, perhaps fatally. What it stood to protect, the Fifth Amendment, now stands before us, newly naked, stripped of its heretofore powerful prophylactic. And in too many quarters, its rules are meant to be broken.
However, according to the ever-quotable Al Menaster of the L.A. Public Defender’s Appellate Branch:
The news headlines are, US Supreme Court Guts Miranda. NO. The court did NOT overrule or even undermine Miranda. All the court held, read slowly, is, “The question we must decide is whether a violation of the Miranda rules provides a basis for a claim under §1983. We hold that it does not.” To repeat. A violation of Miranda does not allow a lawsuit under section 1983 for civil damages. The court does NOT say that evidence obtained in violation of Miranda is admissible in a criminal case. “Miranda rests on a pragmatic judgment about what is needed to stop the violation at trial of the Fifth Amendment right against compelled self-incrimination. That prophylactic purpose is served by the suppression at trial of statements obtained in violation of Miranda.”
Continue to make motions to suppress under Miranda. Nothing changed on that point.