Brendlin

*1111 Opinion

When a peace officer directs the driver of a vehicle to pull over for a traffic stop but, in effecting the stop, gives no indication that the passenger of the vehicle is the focus of the officer’s investigation or show of authority, is the passenger subjected to a “seizure” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment? This is a question that has divided courts inside and outside this state. We find that the passenger, whose progress is momentarily stopped as a practical matter, is not seized as a constitutional matter in the absence of additional circumstances that would indicate to a reasonable person that he or she was the subject of the peace officer’s investigation or show of authority. We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal, which (1) held that the passenger was automatically seized as a result of the traffic stop; (2) determined that the traffic stop was unlawful; and (3) suppressed the evidence of methamphetamine manufacturing found in the car and on defendant’s person as the fruit of the illegal seizure.

Background

Around 1:40 a.m. on November 27, 2001, Sutter County Sheriff’s Deputy Robert Charles Brokenbrough effected a traffic stop of a…

I respectfully dissent. Passengers in a vehicle pulled over for a traffic stop are not free to leave, in either a practical or a constitutional sense. Certainly no one can safely leave the vehicle before it stops. Once it has pulled over, the officer has the authority, as a matter of law, to order that the passengers remain inside (People v. Castellon (1999) 76 Cal.App.4th 1369 , 1374—1375 [ 91 Cal.Rptr.2d 204 ]), or get out of the vehicle (Maryland v. Wilson (1997) 519 U.S. 408, 410 [ 137 L.Ed.2d 41 , 117 S.Ct. 882 ]). This authority is soundly based on the need to protect the officer’s *1124 safety. One of its necessary consequences, however, is that the passengers, having been forced to interrupt their journey, are deprived of further freedom of movement. Accordingly, the passengers have been detained and thus “seized” for Fourth Amendment purposes.

The precedents cited by the majority support this conclusion, or are distinguishable. Under the Mendenhall test, a person is detained if, under the circumstances, “a reasonable person would have believed that he was not free to leave.” (United States v. Mendenhall (1980) 446 U.S. 544, 554 [ 64 L.Ed.2d 497 , 100 S.Ct. 1870 ].) When…

When a peace officer directs the driver of a vehicle to pull over for a traffic stop but, in effecting the stop, gives no indication that the passenger of the vehicle is the focus of the officer's investigation or show of authority, is the passenger subjected to a "seizure" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment? This is a question that has divided courts inside and outside this state. We find that the passenger, whose progress is momentarily stopped as a practical matter, is not seized as a constitutional matter in the absence of additional circumstances that would indicate to a reasonable person that he or she was the subject of the peace officer's investigation or show of authority. We therefore reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeal, which (1) held that the passenger was automatically seized as a result of the traffic stop, (2) determined that the traffic stop was unlawful, and (3) suppressed the evidence of methamphetamine manufacturing found in the car and on defendant's person as the fruit of the illegal seizure.

Around 1:40 a.m. on November 27, 2001, Sutter County Sheriff's Deputy Robert Charles Brokenbrough effected a traffic stop of a brown 1993…