The Alaska Court of Appeals on Friday put law enforcement agencies on notice that it would not tolerate “implicitly coercive” search requests during traffic stops. The warning came in the form of a ruling on the case of Susan S. Brown, a driver pulled over on November 24, 2004 allegedly because of the light illuminating her car’s rear license plate was dirty.

On that night, Alaska State Trooper Maurizio Salinas never explained to Brown the reason for the stop, nor that he had no intention of issuing a ticket. Instead, Salinas convinced Brown to allow him to search her car and her body — even though Brown had no warrants and showed no signs of illegal conduct. Salinas testified that his policy was to conduct as many random searches as possible during traffic stops. In this case, Salinas discovered a crack pipe hidden in Brown’s coat. Speaking for the unanimous court, Judge David Mannheimer found that such search requests not based upon any reasonable suspicion of criminal conduct abused the rights of motorists.

Full Story: The Newspaper

(via The Agitator)