Search & seizure; Motion to suppress evidence; Traffic stop by officers who did not personally witness the traffic infraction; MCL 257.742(1); Applicability of the exclusionary rule; People v Hawkins

The court held that even if defendant’s interpretation of MCL 257.742(1) was correct (which it did not decide), “exclusion of the evidence obtained during the resulting stop is not a remedy available to defendant for the statutory violation.” The case arose from a traffic stop of a vehicle in which he was a passenger. An officer observed the vehicle fail to “use a turn signal when it left a parking lot,” in violation of MCL 257.648. He relayed that information to two other officers who were in a marked police vehicle, and they conducted the stop. Defendant argued that any evidence seized as result of the stop must be suppressed because “MCL 257.742(1) prohibits an officer from stopping an individual for a traffic infraction that the officer did not personally” observe. The court concluded it did not need to address this argument because even if he was “correct, the exclusionary rule would not apply to evidence obtained as a result of such a statutory violation.” It noted that while he framed “his argument in constitutional terms,” he did not argue that the officers who stopped the vehicle “lacked probable cause to believe that a traffic infraction occurred. This is significant because if the officers had probable cause to believe that a traffic violation occurred, then the ensuing seizure was constitutionally permissible.” He did not contest the lower courts’ reasoning in support of their ruling that the stop was supported by probable cause. Whether exclusion was available as a remedy for the “perceived statutory violation depends on whether the Legislature intended for the exclusionary rule to apply to evidence obtained in violation of MCL 257.742(1).” Based on the clear statutory language, the court held “that the Legislature did not. Nothing in MCL 257.742(1)’s language suggests that . . . should an officer stop an individual for a traffic infraction that the officer did not personally witness, the Legislature intended for the exclusionary rule to apply to evidence obtained during the resulting stop.” Thus, the court affirmed the denial of defendant’s motion to suppress.