The Kentucky Supreme Court recently held that after the initial justification for a traffic stop expires, law enforcement must release the individual and cease searching for additional evidence of other crimes. (Davis v. Commonwealth, March 17, 2016).
The defendant was stopped in his car for a routine traffic violation. The police had a narcotics detection dog conduct a sniff test outside the vehicle. Because the dog alerted, police searched the vehicle and located a controlled substance.
The Kentucky Supreme Court cited controlling precedent from a Cox and Mazzoli case (Turley v. Comm., 399 S.W.3d 412, 421 (Ky. 2013) and ordered that all evidence should have been suppressed. The Court cited our case, holding that: "Although an officer may detain a vehicle and its occupants in order to conduct an ordinary traffic stop, any subsequent detention . . . must not be excessively intrusive and that the officer's actions must be reasonably related in scope to circumstances justifying the initial interference." (Turley at 421).
Mike Mazzoli is widely regarded as the best criminal appellate lawyer in Kentucky in both state and federal appeals. As this case demonstrates, his impressive history winning appellate cases helps both our clients and other defendants who have similar legal and factual issues.
