Opinion
No. 2 CA-CR 2017-0230
03-28-2018
THE STATE OF ARIZONA, Appellant, v. FRANCISCO R. SANCHEZ, Appellee.
COUNSEL Barbara LaWall, Pima County Attorney By Jacob R. Lines, Deputy County Attorney, Tucson Counsel for Appellant Dean Brault, Pima County Legal Defender By Jeffrey Kautenburger, Assistant Legal Defender, Tucson Counsel for Appellee
THIS DECISION DOES NOT CREATE LEGAL PRECEDENT AND MAY NOT BE CITED EXCEPT AS AUTHORIZED BY APPLICABLE RULES.
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
See Ariz. R. Sup. Ct. 111(c)(1); Ariz. R. Crim. P. 31.19(e). Appeal from the Superior Court in Pima County
No. CR20162491001
The Honorable Kenneth Lee, Judge
REVERSED AND REMANDED
COUNSEL Barbara LaWall, Pima County Attorney
By Jacob R. Lines, Deputy County Attorney, Tucson
Counsel for Appellant Dean Brault, Pima County Legal Defender
By Jeffrey Kautenburger, Assistant Legal Defender, Tucson
Counsel for Appellee
MEMORANDUM DECISION
Presiding Judge Staring authored the decision of the Court, in which Chief Judge Eckerstrom and Judge Brearcliffe concurred. STARING, Presiding Judge:
¶1 The trial court granted appellee Francisco Sanchez's motion to suppress the evidence acquired during an investigatory stop for a possible traffic violation. The state appeals that ruling, maintaining the stop was constitutionally permissible. For the reasons that follow, we reverse the court's suppression order and remand for further proceedings.
Factual and Procedural Background
¶2 "In reviewing a trial court's ruling on a motion to suppress, 'we consider only the evidence presented at the suppression hearing and view the facts in the light most favorable to sustaining the . . . ruling.'" State v. Salcido, 238 Ariz. 461, ¶ 2 (App. 2015), quoting State v. Gonzalez, 235 Ariz. 212, ¶ 2 (App. 2014) (alteration in Salcido). One morning in May 2016, at approximately 1 a.m., a Tucson police officer on patrol observed a pickup truck traveling without its headlights illuminated. As the officer was making a U-turn, he saw that the driver of the pickup truck had turned on the headlights. After catching up with the truck, the officer initiated a traffic stop. Sanchez was the driver of the truck.
¶3 The officer conducted an investigation and ultimately arrested Sanchez for driving under the influence (DUI). Afterwards, the state indicted Sanchez on three counts: aggravated DUI with a suspended license; aggravated driving with a blood alcohol concentration of .08 or more with a suspended, revoked, or restricted license; and aggravated DUI having committed or been convicted of two or more prior DUI offenses.
¶4 Sanchez moved to suppress the evidence obtained during the police officer's investigation, arguing the short period during which his headlights were not activated amounted to only a de minimis violation of A.R.S. § 28-922, and, accordingly, the officer lacked the reasonable suspicion necessary to initiate the traffic stop. After an evidentiary hearing, the trial court granted the motion. The court reasoned the statute permits drivers to drive without their headlights illuminated "if the driver of the vehicle can discern vehicles and persons 500 feet in front of him." And it found, in this instance, "there [was] a lot of ambient lighting" in the area and the state presented no evidence "as to what the lighting conditions were at the time the officer saw" Sanchez.
¶5 The state appealed the trial court's ruling, and we have jurisdiction pursuant to A.R.S. §§ 12-2101(A)(1) and 13-4032(6).
Discussion
¶6 On appeal, the state argues the trial court erred in its interpretation of § 28-922, as well as its application of State v. Livingston, 206 Ariz. 145 (App. 2003), in finding the officer lacked reasonable suspicion to stop Sanchez. "'We review the trial court's granting of a motion to suppress for an abuse of discretion' but review de novo 'the trial court's ultimate legal determination of the propriety of a stop.'" State v. Garcia-Navarro, 224 Ariz. 38, ¶ 11 (App. 2010), quoting Livingston, 206 Ariz. 145, ¶ 3. We review issues of statutory interpretation de novo. State v. Christian, 205 Ariz. 64, ¶ 6 (2003).
¶7 The Fourth Amendment prohibits the government from engaging in unreasonable searches and seizures. U.S. Const. amend. IV. "Temporary detention of individuals during the stop of an automobile by the police, even if only for a brief period and for a limited purpose, constitutes a 'seizure' of 'persons'" under the Fourth Amendment. Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 809-10 (1996). "[B]ut because such stops are less intrusive than arrests, they do not require the probable cause necessary to issue an arrest warrant." State v. Gonzalez-Gutierrez, 187 Ariz. 116, 118 (1996). "Rather, [the police] need only possess a reasonable suspicion that the driver has committed an offense." Livingston, 206 Ariz. 145, ¶ 9. "Thus, an officer who has witnessed a traffic violation may initiate a stop." State v. Kjolsrud, 239 Ariz. 319, ¶ 9 (App. 2016).
¶8 When interpreting a statute, we look first to the plain text of the statute, as it is "the best and most reliable index of a statute's meaning," and look no further if the plain text is "clear and unambiguous." Christian, 205 Ariz. 64, ¶ 6. "When possible, we interpret statutes to give meaning to every word." State v. Pitts, 178 Ariz. 405, 407 (1994). Thus, "[w]e must interpret the statute so that no provision is rendered meaningless, insignificant, or void." Mejak v. Granville, 212 Ariz. 555, ¶ 9 (2006).
¶9 The state argues the trial court's interpretation effectively rewrote the statute by narrowing it to require a driver to display headlights only when there is not sufficient light. According to the state, the statute requires drivers to display headlights at both any time between sunset and sunrise and any time there is not sufficient lighting to render persons or vehicles on the highway clearly discernible within five hundred feet. We agree.
¶10 Section 28-922 requires drivers to display "lighted lamps and illuminating devices" "[a]t any time from sunset to sunrise and at any other time when there is not sufficient light to render clearly discernible persons and vehicles on the highway at a distance of five hundred feet ahead." Id. (emphasis added). Because the statute uses the conjunctive "and" to describe the two times during which lamps and illuminating devices must be displayed, a driver must display those items during both of those conditions. Id.
¶11 This reading is buttressed by the language describing the second condition as "any other time" than between "sunset to sunrise." Id. Further, reading the statute as the trial court did would render the first requirement, between sunset and sunrise, meaningless because, in that case, the requirement to display lamps and illuminating devices would only depend on whether or not there is sufficient light to render persons and vehicles clearly discernible at a distance of five hundred feet, regardless of the sun's rise or set. See Mejak, 212 Ariz. 555, ¶ 9 ("We must interpret the statute so that no provision is rendered meaningless, insignificant, or void.").
¶12 Sanchez maintains, however, although he committed a violation of § 28-922, "the brief infraction constituted only a de minim[i]s deviation from the relevant statutory equipment requirements" and "de minim[i]s deviations do not equate to reasonable suspicion to support" the stop, citing Livingston. We disagree.
¶13 In Livingston, the driver, Livingston, while driving within the speed limit and without weaving, crossed over the white shoulder line on a stretch of highway characterized as "rural, curved, and dangerous." 206 Ariz. 145, ¶¶ 4-5. Although Livingston did not jerk or over-correct after crossing the line, the officer initiated a traffic stop for an alleged lane-usage violation. Id. ¶¶ 5-6. The trial court granted Livingston's motion to suppress, finding the officer had not observed any true legal violation, and we agreed. Id. ¶¶ 8, 12.
¶14 In affirming the trial court's ruling, we focused on the language of the statute the officer used as a basis for the stop. Id. ¶¶ 10-12. That statute, A.R.S. § 28-729, requires that a person "drive a vehicle as nearly as practicable entirely within a single lane and shall not move the vehicle from that lane until the driver has first ascertained that the movement can be made with safety." We concluded the statute's language, "'as nearly as practicable,'" expressed a "legislative intent to avoid penalizing brief, momentary, and minor deviations outside the marked lines." Livingston, 206 Ariz. 145, ¶ 10. Thus, because "Livingston otherwise drove safely on a dangerous, curved road apart from the alleged isolated and minor breach of the shoulder line," we affirmed "that the officer had lacked a reasonable basis for the stop." Id. ¶ 12.
¶15 In Livingston, therefore, the issue did not involve an objective indication of behavior amounting to a violation. Unlike the statute in Livingston, § 28-922 includes a plain, unambiguous, objective measure for when a vehicle's lamps and illuminating devices must be displayed: between sunset and sunrise. It was this objective measure that formed the basis for the officer stopping Sanchez, who was driving without headlights between sunset and sunrise. Cf. State ex rel. Hyder v. Superior Court, 114 Ariz. 337, 340 (1977) (concluding failure to operate taillights at night reason enough to stop vehicle).
Disposition
¶16 For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the trial court's suppression ruling and remand for proceedings consistent with this decision.
Livingston did not establish a bright-line rule excluding de minimis traffic violations from forming an officer's reasonable suspicion to stop a vehicle.