Summary
The Utah Supreme Court considers whether police had reasonable, articulable suspicion to stop Jose Baltarcar Roybal after a 911 call from his live-in girlfriend reported that they had been drinking and that he was leaving in a van. The court held that the identified citizen-informant's call, viewed under the totality of the circumstances, gave the dispatcher reasonable suspicion of driving under the influence, and that the responding officer could rely on the dispatch absent contradictory observations. The court reversed the court of appeals and affirmed Roybal's conviction.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the 911 dispatch report supplied reasonable, articulable suspicion that Roybal was driving under the influence.
- Whether the responding officer could rely on the dispatcher's reasonable suspicion when his own observations did not contradict the reported suspicion.
- Whether the personally involved relationship between the identified citizen-informant and Roybal created a presumption that the informant was less reliable.
Holdings
- A personally involved informant is not presumed to be either more or less reliable solely because of the personal relationship; an identified citizen-informant remains presumptively reliable, and the totality of the circumstances determines whether the information supports reasonable suspicion.
- The caller's identified, detailed, firsthand report, combined with her apparent intoxication and statement that she and Roybal had been drinking together, gave the dispatcher reasonable, articulable suspicion that Roybal was driving under the influence.
- Once the originator of a police dispatch has reasonable suspicion, a responding officer may rely on the information and stop the suspect unless the officer's own observations or interaction with the suspect indicate that the reported suspicion is incorrect.
Key quotations
“We therefore hold that the fact of personal involvement with the suspect carries no presumption one way or the other; a personally involved informant is not presumed to have any lesser or greater reliability than any other identified informant.” (¶ 19)
“The 911 call by Roybal's girlfriend was of adequate reliability and detail to give the dispatcher a reasonable suspicion of Roybal's intoxication while driving, and Sergeant Ledford's own observations of Roybal's conduct did not contradict that suspicion.” (¶ 23)
Factual background
A 911 caller, Roybal's live-in girlfriend, reported a domestic dispute, stated that both she and Roybal had been drinking, and provided identifying information, a vehicle description, a partial license plate number, and Roybal's direction of travel. A dispatcher issued a bulletin stating that Roybal might be intoxicated. Sergeant Ledford located Roybal driving substantially below the speed limit and apparently attempting to avoid the police vehicle, although Roybal committed no traffic violation. Ledford stopped Roybal, smelled alcohol, observed failures on field-sobriety tests, and arrested him for driving under the influence.
Procedural history
Roybal was charged with driving under the influence and moved to suppress evidence obtained during the traffic stop. The district court denied suppression, after which Roybal entered a conditional guilty plea preserving his right to appeal. The court of appeals reversed, concluding that the stop was unsupported by reasonable suspicion. The Utah Supreme Court granted the State's certiorari petition, reversed the court of appeals, and affirmed the conviction.