Updated Paper on Traffic Stops (September 12, 2012)
Jeff Welty
I’ve updated my paper on traffic stops, which a fair number of people have said they found useful. It covers reasonable suspicion, the scope of a stop, termination of a […]
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September 12, 2012
I’ve updated my paper on traffic stops, which a fair number of people have said they found useful. It covers reasonable suspicion, the scope of a stop, termination of a […]
READ POST "Updated Paper on Traffic Stops (September 12, 2012)"August 9, 2012
May an officer prolong a routine traffic stop for four and a half minutes to allow a drug dog to sniff the exterior of the vehicle–even if the officer lacks […]
READ POST "State v. Sellars: De Minimis Delay for Dog Sniffs Permissible (August 9, 2012)"June 19, 2012
Drunk drivers have difficulty driving in a straight line. Therefore, police officers frequently stop drivers who are weaving, suspecting them of impaired driving. Until very recently, it seemed that the […]
READ POST "Weaving and Reasonable Suspicion (June 19, 2012)"April 3, 2012
Jeff has written before about whether a traffic stop may be prolonged to allow time for a drug-sniffing dog to arrive on the scene and sniff about the car (which […]
READ POST "Air Fresheners? You Betcha. Eating on the Go? Not So Much. (April 3, 2012)"March 14, 2012
Two recent cases from the court of appeals have added to our state’s weaving jurisprudence. One of them is a pretty big deal, as I’ll explain below. But first, the […]
READ POST "Weaving and Reasonable Suspicion (March 14, 2012)"August 30, 2011
I’ve written about traffic stops at some length, in this paper. One of the areas in which the law is unsettled is the extent to which officers may engage in […]
READ POST "Fourth Circuit Adds to the Controversy over Traffic Stops (August 30, 2011)"January 3, 2011
Happy new year! It’s great to be back at work after a relaxing vacation. I’ve written before about traffic stops. Recently, I returned to the subject and completed a pretty […]
READ POST "Traffic Stops from Soup to Nuts (January 3, 2011)"October 28, 2009
I noted yesterday that a law enforcement officer conducting a traffic stop may order the driver and any passengers out of the vehicle. It’s also reasonably clear that the officer […]
READ POST "Traffic Stops, Part II (October 28, 2009)"October 27, 2009
As one eminent Fourth Amendment scholar has observed, “[i]n recent years more Fourth Amendment battles have been fought about police activities incident to . . . what the courts call […]
READ POST "Traffic Stops (October 27, 2009)"April 14, 2009
Several recent inquiries have been variants of the following question: can an officer administer field sobriety tests during a routine traffic stop? In other words, if an officer has reasonable […]
READ POST "Field Sobriety Tests During Traffic Stops (April 14, 2009)"