Traffic stop questions didn’t violate Fourth Amendment

A 12-second line of questioning from a Newport News police officer during a traffic stop did not constitute a Fourth Amendment violation, the Supreme Court of Virginia held.

In a reversal of a 2025 Court of Appeals of Virginia decision, the high court determined in Commonwealth v.
Knight-Walker (VLW 026-6-019) that the traffic stop’s “mission” was not complete at the time the officer asked the questions, and that the inquiry was reasonable under the circumstances.

The questions, pertaining to weapons, illegal drugs or “anything crazy” in the vehicle, preceded the eventual search of the vehicle, where the officer found drug paraphernalia in the car’s glove compartment.

The driver was later indicted for possession of cocaine, later amended to possession of controlled paraphernalia, and ultimately was sentenced to serve 12 months, with 12 months suspended.

The driver argued that the officer’s line of questioning impermissibly extended the stop in violation of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Rodriguez v. United States decision.

Justice Stephen R. McCullough wrote that the present case “differs from the one the officers confronted in Rodriguez.

“In Rodriguez, the officer initiated a separate investigation unrelated to the traffic ticket and he did so after the mission of the traffic stop had ended,” McCullough wrote. “Here, the mission of the traffic stop was not complete, even though the officer informed [Nafeesa] Knight-Walker that he would not arrest her, because Officer
[Jordan] Allen had a ‘further need to control the scene.’”

McCullough’s mid-April opinion was joined by Chief Justice Cleo E. Powell, Justices D. Arthur Kelsey, Teresa M. Chafin, Wesley G. Russell Jr. and Thomas P. Mann, and Senior Justice LeRoy F. Millette Jr.

Counsel for the parties in this case could not be immediately reached for comment.

Fairfax appellate attorney Juli Porto, principal at Blankingship & Keith, said that attorneys “should take note that the court is willing to define the ‘mission’ of a stop broadly when the circumstances genuinely prevent its natural conclusion.

“Where a driver cannot legally leave the scene, the officer retains a continuing lawful presence, and inquiries during that window will be evaluated under a reasonableness standard that gives officers meaningful latitude,” Porto said.

Porto noted that defense counsels will have to work to distinguish when the extended presence is “genuinely necessary” versus when it is a violation.

Background

The case stems from a traffic stop initiated by Newport News Police Officer Jordan Allen, after he noticed the car in front of him made frequent lane changes and was driving 15 mph below the speed limit.

He pulled the car over on suspicion of driving with a suspended license. Nafeesa
Knight-Walker was driving the vehicle, and Allen obtained her driver’s license. Upon running checks on her license, Allen learned Knight-Walker’s license was suspended and that she had multiple convictions for driving on a suspended license.

Upon returning to the vehicle, Allen told Knight-Walker she had a suspended license and could not continue to drive the car. The vehicle’s passenger said that he could not drive the car either.

Ultimately, Allen told Knight-Walker that he would not arrest her, but that she could not drive away. Knight-Walker told the officer that she would have her son pick her up.

Fifteen seconds later, Allen asked Knight-Walker if there were any weapons, drugs or anything “crazy” in the vehicle, with Knight-Walker answering that there were not. The exchange lasted approximately 12 seconds.

Allen then asked if he could check, and Knight-Walker opened the door of the vehicle after pausing “for several moments.” At this time, Allen still had possession of Knight-Walker’s suspended license and had not issued a summons.

The subsequent search revealed drug paraphernalia in the car’s glove compartment. Knight-Allen was later indicted for possession of cocaine, which was amended to possession of controlled paraphernalia.

The circuit court declined Knight-
Walker’s motion to suppress, holding that Knight-Walker and her passenger both couldn’t drive, and that Allen was not going to leave them “as a practical matter” because it might lead to them illegally driving away.

The circuit court further determined that Knight-Walker consented to the search and that the stop was not extended because
Allen “had to wait for a person with a valid license to arrive and drive the car away.”

Knight-Walker appealed to the Court of Appeals of Virginia, which reversed in a split decision. The court’s majority held that Allen’s questions “impermissibly extended the duration of the stop and, as a consequence, the contraband that the officer recovered must be suppressed.”

The case was subsequently appealed to the Supreme Court of Virginia.

Reversal

McCullough noted that in the present case, the stop’s reasoning was not at issue; rather, the officer’s conduct is under the judicial microscope.

Quoting Rodriguez, McCullough wrote that the duration of a traffic stop is “determined by the seizure’s mission — to address the traffic violation that warranted the stop” and that a lawful detention ends only when “tasks tied to the traffic infraction are — or reasonably should have been — completed.”

In this case, McCullough noted that Knight-Walker could not legally drive away due to her suspended license, and that her passenger also could not drive. Thus, she was waiting on her son to pick her up and drive her and the car away from the stop.

“The mission of the stop at that point was to ensure that Knight-Walker did not continue to break the law by driving away moments after receiving her summons, not simply to issue a summons,”
McCullough wrote.

As such, the circumstances “meant more extended contact between the officer and two persons, Knight-Walker and the passenger,” noted McCullough.

“This more extended period of contact reasonably prompted questions from the officer to ensure that there were no additional considerations that could heighten the danger while he completed his enforcement action,” McCullough wrote.

Thus, the justice wrote that Allen’s actions “were reasonable under the particular circumstances he faced.

“As the United States Court of
Appeals for the Fourth Circuit observed, ‘the
Supreme Court’s decision in Rodriguez does not require courts to second-guess the logistical choices and actions of a police officer that, individually and collectively, were completed diligently within the confines of a lawful traffic stop,’” McCullough wrote. “Here, Officer Allen’s twelve second exchange, inquiring about weapons, illegal drugs, or ‘anything crazy,’ was reasonable under these particular circumstances.”

Consent

The Supreme Court also issued a secondary holding on the issue of consent that Porto said “also deserves attention.”

McCullough wrote that the Court of Appeals’ conclusion that the traffic stop extension “tainted Knight-Walker’s consent” and rendered the search illegal “must be reversed” because of the reversal of the appeals court’s decision that the stop was impermissibly extended.

The Supreme Court further held that Knight-Walker’s consent was voluntary, and that her consent to the search was supported by the record.

“Among other considerations, after viewing the video of the officer’s interaction with Knight-Walker, the circuit court observed that the officer ‘was being polite, she was being polite, everybody was being polite,’” McCullough wrote.

McCullough’s opinion referenced the
6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ 2025 opinion in United States v. Santos, in which the federal court held that a request for consent does not alone extend a stop because it “is itself a request to extend the stop that a driver may deny.”

“Asking for consent during the course of a still incomplete traffic stop is not the sort of unconstitutional ‘detour’ envisioned by Rodriguez,” McCullough wrote.

Porto flagged the secondary decision as noteworthy due to the referencing of Santos.

“The opinion endorses the Sixth Circuit’s reasoning that a request for consent is not itself an impermissible extension of a stop, because the driver retains the right to refuse,” Porto said.

Commonwealth v. Knight-Walker

THE ISSUE    Did an officer’s questions during a traffic stop constitute an impermissible extension?

Answer      No (Supreme Court of Virginia)

Attorneys  Jason A.S. Davis, assistant public defender (appellee),
J. Brady Hess, assistant attorney general (appellant)

• Commonwealth v. Knight-Walker
• Rodriguez v. United States
• United States v. Santos