00-262 Arkansas v. Sullivan

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“The court’s decision on rehearing is flatly contrary to this Court’s controlling precedent, we grant the State’s petition for a writ of certiorari and reverse. As an initial matter, we note that the Arkansas Supreme Court never questioned Officer Taylor’s authority to arrest Sullivan for a fine-only traffic violation (speeding), and rightly so.

See Atwater v. Lago Vista, 532 U.S. – (2001). Rather, the court affirmed the trial judge’s suppression of the drug-related evidence on the theory that Officer Taylor’s arrest of Sullivan, although supported by probable cause, nonetheless violated the Fourth Amendment because Taylor had an improper subjective motivation for making the stop. The Arkansas Supreme Court’s holding to that effect cannot be squared with our decision in [Whren v. U.S.], in which we noted our ‘unwilling[ness] to entertain Fourth Amendment challenges based on the actual motivations of individual officers,’ and held unanimously that ‘[s]ubjective intentions play no role in ordinary, probable-cause Fourth Amendment analysis.’ 517 U.S., at 813. That Whren involved a traffic stop, rather than a custodial arrest, is of no particular moment; indeed, Whren itself relied on United States v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218, 94 S.Ct. 467, 38 L.Ed.2d 427 (1973), for the proposition that ‘a traffic-violation arrest … [will] not be rendered invalid by the fact that it was “a mere pretext for a narcotics search.”‘ 517 U.S., at 812-813.”

Reversed and remanded.

Local Effect:

The decision in this case merely reaffirms established law, Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (1996), that neither the Wisconsin Supreme Court nor the Seventh Circuit has disputed.

00-262 Arkansas v. Sullivan

Per Curiam

On Certiorari to the Supreme Court of Arkansas.