Walk It Through: The Stop on the Interstate
Lights behind on the interstate, a license and an insurance card on a phone, and a question about the trunk.
A trooper's lights come on behind a car on the interstate, and the driver pulls onto the shoulder.
Two things a person in this spot might do. Picking one shows what the law says about it.
An interstate stop for a moving violation that ends in a warning. A DUI investigation, a stop with a gun in the car, and a search on probable cause are left to their own walkthroughs.
A practice walkthrough, not a prediction of how any real one will go. Legal information, not legal advice.
Words this turns on
Terms with a legal meaning that is narrower than the everyday one. Each links to the definition and the authority behind it.
- FriskA search for firearms or other dangerous weapons an officer who has stopped someone may make on reasonable suspicion that personal safety requires it.
- Probable causeThe ground an officer needs to arrest without a warrant for a felony, or for a misdemeanor with a further reason it cannot wait.
- Stop and identifyAn officer may stop someone in a public place whom the officer reasonably suspects of a crime, and demand their name, address and an explanation of their actions.
- Person crimeA crime the code labels person rather than nonperson; burglary of a dwelling is a person felony, while burglary of another building is a nonperson felony.
- Severity levelThe rank of a felony on the sentencing grid, whose other axis is criminal history; each box gives a range in months of imprisonment.