There are several but the most common is Terry V Ohio, where the court ruled that a officer can make a search and a seizure during a stop for officer safety as long as the officer has RAS. You were stopped for speeding so the officer had RAS, and you offered up the information that you had a firearm, which you did not have to do since it was not concealed. The courts may take your offering the information up as a consent to seizure of the firearm. Outside of providing the necessary information, drivers license, registration, and insurance it is best to keep your mouth shut. The officer had no RAS IMO that the firearm was stolen, or otherwise unlawful, so IMO he could not run the numbers.
1. After a person is temporarily seized (detained) for investigation based on reasonable articulable suspicion,
Terry v Ohio requires three conditions for a weapons search and seizure: reasonable suspicion the person is armed
and dangerous, and nothing in the initial moments of the encounter serves to dispel the cop's reasonable concern for his safety. (I've never seen that last point hashed out in a later case--it seems totally ignored by police, defense attorneys, and courts.) However, when it comes to traffic stops, another case gives cops more lattitude.
Pennsylvania vs Mimms. The
Terry court required two conditions: armed + dangerous. The
Mimms court sneakily changed that to armed = dangerous. I say sneakily because of their sophistry in explaining their position while omitting to mention that they were changing the conditions given under
Terry. So,
Mimms basically is saying that a gun in a traffic stop is immediately seizeable for officer safety without further consideration as to whether the vehicle occupant(s) are dangerous.
So, unless NC law has more restrictive requirements,
Mimms is going to allow the gun seizure in this case.
2. WW's comment about running the serial number on the gun raises an interesting point. In this case the gun was holstered. If the cop took from the passenger seat the holster (with the gun in it), then the cop may have needed to remove the gun from the holster to read the serial number. A
rizona v Hicks makes it clear that even as little as lifting a record player to view its serial number is a search and thus governed by probable cause. A cop would need actual probable cause, not just an officer safety concern, to lawfully remove the gun from the holster to view the serial number. In the OPers case, we don't yet know whether the cop ran the serial number, nor whether the serial number is still visible while holstered as, for example, engraved on the grip frame; so, we can't say this cop illegally ran the serial number. But, WW touches on an interesting point.
Links to cases mentioned above.
http://forum.opencarry.org/forums/s...-Your-4th-and-5th-Amendment-Resources-Here!!&
