United States v. Jamal Williams, AKA Jamal Abdullah

Jamal Williams appeals the district court’s order denying his motion to suppress as evidence a gun recovered when the car in which he was a passenger was stopped for a traffic infraction, and Williams, after being ordered to get back inside the car, threw the weapon out of the passenger window. While it is well established that an officer effecting a lawful traffic stop may order the driver and the passengers out of a vehicle, Maryland v. Wilson, 519 U.S. 408, 410 , 117 S.Ct. 882 , 137 L.Ed.2d 41 (1997), we consider for the first time in this circuit whether an officer may order a passenger who voluntarily gets out of a lawfully stopped vehicle back into the automobile without violating the passenger’s Fourth Amendment rights. In upholding the officer’s discretion to control the situation as he or she deems necessary to ensure the safety of the officer and the vehicle occupants, we answer in the affirmative the question explicitly left open by the Wilson Court. Id. at 415 n. 3, 117 S.Ct. 882 (finding it unnecessary to consider whether “an officer may forcibly detain a passenger for the entire duration of the stop”). We now hold that a passenger’s compliance with an officer’s…