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State v. Yazzie6/9/2005
6, -26, 523 Utah Adv. Rep. 34. However, Markland is easily distinguished. In Markland, a police officer was dispatched to a neighborhood at 3:00 AM, following a 911 report of a scream heard in the area. See id. at . When he arrived, the officer observed the defendant walking down a dimly lit, dead-end street with two cloth bags swinging from his shoulders. See id. The officer approached the defendant and asked him a few questions, but the defendant's answers were, to the officer, "inconsistent with the observable facts." Id. at . Thus, the officer detained the defendant to run a warrant check, and to check his background for any indication of past violence. See id. In concluding that the officer's detention of the defendant was reasonable, our supreme court relied on the 911 report of a scream in the area, the fact that the defendant was the only individual to be found in the area of the scream, his presence near the reported scream on a dimly lit dead end street, and that when questioned, his answers did not comport with the circumstances observed by the officer. See id. at -21, 25 n.2.
In contrast, not only are the factual settings of this case and Markland extremely dissimilar, but here the State has presented us with no circumstances that existed at the time of Halliday's decision to stop Yazzie that suggest Yazzie was involved in any illegal activity, let alone circumstances sufficient to justify the detention. Although the State would have us accept Halliday's history of contact with Yazzie as a very strong factor, it is, under these circumstances, virtually immaterial to the question of reasonable suspicion. Granted, Halliday testified that he was aware of a great number of encounters between Yazzie and law enforcement over a twenty-year period--including at least ten encounters between Halliday and Yazzie--but none in the year or more before the day of the detention, and none involving a driving offense. Furthermore, Halliday could not recall having ever requested Yazzie's driver license, and, most importantly, apparently he had never had reason to check on the status of Yazzie's driving privileges.
The State also would have us accept as a contributing factor to Halliday's suspicion his testimony that he had never seen Yazzie driving a car before. But this is also of no relevance to the question at hand. Halliday clearly did not shadow Yazzie's every move, and the mere fact that Halliday had not previously witnessed Yazzie as a driver is not an indicator that Yazzie was not licensed to drive. The State points us to no factor, or group of factors, which, taken as a whole, support Halliday's decision to detain Yazzie. Consequently, we conclude that the trial court erred in denying Yazzie's motion to suppress the evidence that resulted from the detention.
CONCLUSION
The State failed to prove that Halliday had sufficient articulable facts to form the requisite reasonable suspicion necessary to justify the traffic stop. In absence of such a showing, we are left with a strong impression that Halliday's decision to detain Yazzie was based on nothing more than a hunch, a guess, or a "bet." Therefore, we conclude that the trial court erred in denying Yazzie's motion to suppress.
Accordingly, we reverse Yazzie's convictions and remand this case to the trial court for proceedings consistent with this decision.
William A. Thorne Jr., Judge
WE CONCUR:
Norman H. Jackson, Judge
Gregory K. Orme, Judge
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