No. 41 October 1, 2026 703
IN THE SUPREME COURT OF THE
STATE OF OREGON
STATE OF OREGON,
Respondent on Review,
v.
MICHAEL ADAM HUMPHREY,
Petitioner on Review.
(CC 21CR50460) (CA A179475) (SC S071818)
En Banc
On review from the Court of Appeals.*
Argued and submitted November 4, 2025, at Chemeketa
Community College, Salem, Oregon.
David Sherbo-Huggins, Deputy Public Defender, Oregon
Public Defense Commission, Salem, argued the cause and
filed the briefs for petitioner on review. Also on the briefs
was Ernest G. Lannet, Chief Defender.
Gregory A. Rios, Assistant Attorney General, Salem,
argued the cause and filed the brief for respondent on review.
Also on the brief were Dan Rayfield, Attorney General, and
Benjamin Gutman, Interim Deputy Attorney General.
JAMES, J.
The decision of the Court of Appeals and the judgment of
the circuit court are affirmed.
* Appeal from Lane County Circuit Court, Kamala H. Shugar, Judge. 337 Or App 715, 564 P3d 490 (2025).
704 State v. Humphrey
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 705
JAMES, J.
In this criminal case, officers responded to a report
of an assault, where witnesses informed them that the suspect was a “Black male, around 45, 50 years of age,” who just
“went around the corner, * * * [o]ne block down the street
that way.” The officers drove a short distance in that direction and saw defendant sitting alone at a bus stop. One of the
officers turned on her squad car’s emergency lights, parked
in a canted position in defendant’s general direction, and
got out of the car to approach him, and was closely followed
by a second officer who parked in a similar fashion. This
case presents two questions: (1) when did a stop occur; and
(2) whether, at the time the stop occurred, there was reasonable suspicion, as required by Article I, section 9, of the
Oregon Constitution, if that suspicion was based, in part,
upon witness descriptions that relied on generalized characteristics of gender, age, and race. The trial court denied
defendant’s motion to suppress, concluding that there was
reasonable suspicion for the stop. The Court of Appeals
affirmed, holding that the relevant stop occurred when the
officers activated their emergency lights. We agree that the
stop occurred at that time. And although we recognize that
conducting stops based upon such generalized characteristics as race may, in some circumstances, raise constitutional
concerns, we conclude that the stop in this case met the
standard of reasonable suspicion. Accordingly, we affirm.
I. BACKGROUND
On an October evening in 2021, Officers Mueth
and Kroeker of the Eugene Police Department responded to
“vague” 9-1-1 calls that two people had been hit by an assailant with a stick. A couple of minutes after receiving the call, the officers arrived at the scene. They remained in their
vehicles and gathered information from bystanders and the
victims. One of the victims told Mueth that the assailant
was a 45- to 50-year-old Black male, and the victim indicated the direction in which the assailant had run. Kroeker
could not hear the information that the victim conveyed to
Meuth, but she learned from a bystander that the assailant
“was a Black male wearing a gray hooded sweatshirt” and
that he had just “taken a left” and “r[u]n up the street.” The
706 State v. Humphrey
entire interaction lasted less than 20 seconds before Mueth
drove in the direction that the bystander had indicated, and
Kroeker followed Mueth in her vehicle.
Mueth estimated that, about 40 seconds after she
drove off, she saw defendant sitting alone at a bus stop.
Mueth activated her squad car’s emergency lights, parked
in a canted position, and got out of her car. Kroeker drove
slightly past Mueth, parked, and likewise left her car.
Kroeker later estimated that she and Mueth must have been
about a block away from the original scene. Kroeker further
testified that there was not a lot of foot traffic out that night, as she had only seen one woman walking. Mueth’s bodycam
footage did not show the streets as she drove along them,
but it appeared that no one besides the defendant was at the
scene when she got out of her squad car.
Upon approaching defendant, Mueth said, “Hey
man, Eugene Police, so you know our contact is being
recorded, so the reason for the stop tonight is we got a call
that somebody was beating somebody with a baseball bat,
and you match the description for the guy involved.” In the
conversation that followed, defendant acknowledged that
he had been in an altercation. Mueth read defendant his
Miranda rights, and defendant made further incriminating
statements about using a piece of bamboo to hit one of the
victims.
The state charged defendant with two counts
of second-degree assault, two counts of unlawful use of a
weapon, and two counts of menacing. Before trial, defendant moved to suppress all evidence obtained from the stop,
arguing that Mueth stopped defendant when she parked her
car in his direction with her lights activated and that she
did not have reasonable suspicion justifying the stop at that
time. At the hearing on defendant’s motion to suppress, the
state conceded that there was a stop, but it did not specify
when, in its view, the stop had occurred. Only Kroeker testified at that hearing, but the state entered Mueth’s bodycam footage into evidence.1 The state argued that the two
1
Before the Court of Appeals, defendant conceded that the footage could be used to prove Mueth’s subjective belief that defendant committed a crime. State v. Humphrey, 337 Or App 715, 719, 564 P3d 490 (2025).
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 707
officers, working as a team, had reasonable suspicion. The
court ultimately denied defendant’s motion. The court did
not explicitly determine when the stop had occurred, but
it concluded that both Kroeker and Mueth had reasonable
suspicion based on the totality of the circumstances.2 A jury
found defendant guilty on multiple counts related to the
assaults.
On appeal, defendant again challenged the legality
of the stop. State v. Humphrey, 337 Or App 715, 717, 564 P3d
490 (2025). He argued that the stop occurred when Mueth
parked and activated her car’s emergency lights. That was
so, he argued, because a reasonable person in his position
would have believed that, by taking such actions, the officer was exercising her official authority to detain. The state
countered that the stop occurred only when the officers
exited their vehicles and began speaking with defendant.
It argued that a reasonable person would conclude that the
officers were conducting some kind of investigation in the
vicinity by arriving on scene with emergency lights, then
parking near a bus stop at an intersection in downtown
Eugene, not that they were specifically investigating a single individual. The Court of Appeals concluded that a stop
occurred when Mueth parked her car with activated her
emergency lights, because, [w]ith no one else around, and no
other obvious targets of a stop, a reasonable person would
believe that they were not free to leave upon the arrival of a
police car with its emergency lights on that parked pointed
towards them.” Humphrey, 337 Or App at 718.
As to whether reasonable suspicion justified the
stop at that time, defendant argued that there was none,
because Mueth was acting on nothing more than a generic
description of the suspect and defendant was simply the
first Black man she came across in the general vicinity of
the crime. Defendant also argued that, prior to effectuating the stop, Mueth could not tell whether defendant exhibited signs of physical exertion; and, he emphasized, he was
neither running nor carrying a bat or stick when officers
2
However, when considering the admissibility of his statements, the court determined that the circumstances became compelling only after the officers Mirandized defendant, not when they approached him immediately upon contact when “officers [had] both [of] their lights flashing in their vehicles.” 708 State v. Humphrey
encountered him. The state argued that, even assuming a
stop had occurred before Meuth exited the vehicle, any such
stop was supported by reasonable suspicion because of (1)
the close match between defendant and the described suspect, (2) defendant’s physical proximity to the crime scene in
an otherwise unoccupied location, and (3) defendant’s location soon after that crime being consistent with the direction of the suspect’s flight.
The Court of Appeals agreed with the state that
Mueth had reasonable suspicion at the time she made the
stop. Humphrey, 337 Or App at 719. It concluded that Mueth’s
statements recorded on her bodycam footage—that she was
stopping defendant because she had received reports of an
assault with a weapon and that he matched the description
of the suspect—were sufficient for the trial court to conclude
that Mueth subjectively believed that defendant had committed a crime. Moreover, the court agreed that Mueth’s
basis for suspicion was objectively reasonable, concluding:
“Mueth knew that the suspect was a Black male, aged
45 to 50, that the crime had occurred just minutes earlier,
and that the suspect had fled on foot in a particular direction. She came upon defendant less than a minute away
from the scene, and only a few minutes after the crime had
occurred, and defendant matched the information she had.
Based on that information, Mueth’s belief that defendant
had committed the crime was objectively reasonable.”
Id. Accordingly, the Court of Appeals affirmed the trial
court’s denial of defendant’s motion to suppress. Id.
II. ANALYSIS
We review a trial court’s denial of a motion to suppress for legal error, and we are bound by the trial court’s
factual findings if there is constitutionally sufficient evidence in the record to support them. State v. Ehly, 317 Or 66,
75, 854 P2d 421 (1993) (citing Ball v. Gladden, 250 Or 485,
487-88, 443 P2d 621 (1968)). If the trial court did not make
express findings of historical fact on all pertinent issues and there is evidence from which those facts could be decided in
more than one way, we “presume that the facts were decided
in a manner consistent with the court’s ultimate conclusion.” Id. (citing State v. Stevens, 311 Or 119, 126, 806 P2d
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 709
92 (1991)). So, too, may we consider any inferences that reasonably may be drawn from the evidence. State v. JuarezGodinez, 326 Or 1, 7, 942 P2d 772 (1997).
A. When did the stop occur?
As a preliminary matter, we consider when the
stop in this case occurred. When litigating motions to suppress, it is helpful—for both parties and courts—to begin by
identifying the specific moment in the timeline where the
moving party alleges the constitutional violation occurred.
Identifying that point in time will determine what information was available to the officers, and thus what information
is to be properly considered in the constitutional evaluation
by the court. Here, defendant argues that the stop occurred
as soon as the officers activated their overhead lights. The
state counters that the stop did not occur until after the
officers exited their vehicles and approached defendant on
foot. If the state is correct, the facts supporting reasonable
suspicion for the stop would include the officer’s observations while outside their vehicles, including that the defendant was sweating, an alleged indicator that he had recently
been running.
As we have recognized, there are an “infinite variety” of encounters between law enforcement and citizens.
State v. Holmes, 311 Or 400, 406, 813 P2d 28 (1991). Only
some of those encounters implicate the prohibition against
unreasonable seizures under Article I, section 9, of the
Oregon Constitution:
“Analytically, police-citizen encounters typically fall
into one of three categories that correlate the degree of
intrusiveness on a citizen’s liberty with the degree of justification required for the intrusion. At one end of the continuum are mere encounters for which no justification is
required. At the other end are arrests, which involve protracted custodial restraint and require probable cause. In
between are temporary detentions for investigatory purposes, often termed ‘stops,’ which generally require reasonable suspicion. Both stops and arrests are seizures for
constitutional purposes, while less restrictive encounters
are not.”
State v. Fair, 353 Or 588, 593-94, 302 P2d 417 (2013).
710 State v. Humphrey
A person is seized under Article I, section 9, of the
Oregon Constitution: “(a) if a law enforcement officer intentionally and significantly restricts, interferes with, or otherwise deprives an individual of that individual’s liberty or
freedom of movement; or (b) if a reasonable person under the
totality of the circumstances would believe that (a) above
has occurred.” State v. Ashbaugh, 349 Or 297, 316, 244 P3d
360 (2010) (emphasis in original). An officer intentionally
and significantly interferes with an individual’s liberty
either by physical force or by some “show of authority.” State
v. Backstrand, 354 Or 392, 399, 313 P3d 1084 (2013). For
a “show of authority” to give rise to a seizure, the circumstances must be such that a reasonable person, under the
totality of the circumstances, would believe that an “officer is exercising his or her official authority to restrain.”
Id. at 401. That requires “something more” than the officer
just asking a question, requesting information, or seeking
an individual’s cooperation. Id. The “something more” can
include the content or manner of questioning, or the accompanying displays of official authority or other physical acts
by the officer, if those added factors would reasonably be
construed as a show of authority requiring compliance with
the officer’s request. Ashbaugh, 349 Or at 317; see also Ehly,
317 Or at 76-77 (mere requests for cooperation not seizures
unless officer, through demeanor, tone, language, or totality
of circumstances, conveyed a restraint on liberty).
The state argues that this court has previously held
that “an officer’s activation of their patrol car’s overhead
lights do not constitute a stop when unaccompanied by other
gestures of police authority.” The state principally relies on
two cases—Holmes, 311 Or 400, and State v. Gerrish, 311 Or
506, 815 P2d 1244 (1991)—for the proposition that, without
more, “an officer’s activation of overhead lights nearby, or
even pointed at, a person does not constitute a seizure under
Article 1, section 9.” It is not entirely clear to us how far the state intends that argument to reach. To the extent that the
state would read Holmes and Gerrish to hold that an individual can never be seized through the activation of overhead lights alone, and that the “gestures of police authority”
accompanying overhead lights must include exiting a patrol
vehicle and confronting a suspect, we disagree.
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 711
Holmes involved a fatal motor vehicle accident that
had completely blocked travel on a bridge on Highway 197.
311 Or at 402. Officers set up a detour at the north end of the bridge to reroute southbound traffic around the accident. Id.
Officers deployed flares on the highway, north of the bridge,
and positioned a patrol car, with its overhead lights flashing, behind the flares. Id. In addition, they stationed a uniformed officer in the center of the southbound lane, about
one-half mile from the accident, to divert traffic. Id. With
a flashlight in one hand, that officer motioned with his free
hand for approaching vehicles to stop so that he could advise
the drivers of the accident and reroute them. Id. at 403.
When the officer reached the defendant’s vehicle,
the driver-side window was down. Id. Shining his flashlight
into the defendant’s car, the officer explained that, because
of the accident on the bridge, the defendant would have to
take a detour through the neighboring town. Id. As the
defendant responded, the officer detected a strong odor of
alcohol on the defendant’s breath and observed that his eyes
appeared to be bloodshot, his eyelids were “sleepy” or not
fully open, his face was flushed, and his speech was slurred.
Id. The officer asked the defendant to step out of his car, the defendant ultimately failed field sobriety tests, and he was
arrested for driving under the influence of intoxicants. Id.
The defendant argued that the police lights had effectuated
a stop. We disagreed, holding that an officer’s activation of
overhead lights solely to reroute motorists around an accident scene was not a seizure within the meaning of Article I,
section 9. Id. at 403.
In Gerrish, an officer responded to a report of an
armed robbery and shooting at a resort on the Oregon Coast.
311 Or at 508. The officer positioned his patrol car to establish a roadblock on the sole road leading out of the resort in
order to gather information from patrons leaving the resort
and potentially apprehend the perpetrator. Id. Although the
officer had his emergency lights activated, the defendant initially drove past the officer without stopping. Id. When the
officer commanded the defendant to stop, however, he complied. Id. at 509. The officer asked the defendant whether
he knew anything about the robbery and, observing the
712 State v. Humphrey
defendant’s lack of sobriety, instructed him to remain there
as the officer called for backup. Id. The defendant was later
charged with driving under the influence of intoxicants, and
he moved to suppress all evidence on the grounds that the
officer had unlawfully seized him. Id.
We rejected the defendant’s argument that the officer’s conduct created a “psychologically intimidating environment” that amounted to a seizure under Article I, section
9. Id. at 512. Instead, we likened his case to Holmes, holding
that the officer’s actions of flagging down the defendant to
stop with his emergency lights was akin to “tapping [a] citizen on the shoulder at the outset to get a citizen’s attention.” Id. at 513 (brackets in Gerrish). We thus concluded that a
reasonable individual would not believe that this was a significant restriction on his liberty or freedom of movement.
Id.
Contrary to the state’s claim, Holmes and Gerrish
are distinguishable from this case.3 In Holmes, the officer’s use of police lights could not reasonably be perceived
as directed at anyone in particular; rather, the lights were
used for general safety and traffic control, not unlike a roadside flare. Similarly, the officer in Gerrish used police lights to establish a roadblock, which indicated a generic intent to
interact with all approaching motorists to gather information. Here, by contrast, the officer zeroed in on this specific defendant. She drove up to defendant, activated her emergency lights, and parked her patrol car in close proximity
and facing his general direction before finally exiting the
car to approach him.
Gerrish and Holmes reflect the practical reality
that there are many scenarios in which an officer might use
emergency lights for reasons other than effectuating a stop.
As noted, in neither case did the use of emergency lights
effect a seizure. Even so, those cases do not stand for the
3
The state also briefly mentions State v. Jacobus, 318 Or 234, 864 P2d 861 (1993), but it is not applicable here. In that case, an officer pulled up behind defendant’s vehicle, turned on his emergency lights, and then approached the defendant in his car before asking him to step out. Id. at 236. We held that the stop occurred when the officer “ordered defendant out of the car.” Id. at 240. Because we did not analyze the use of emergency lights in effectuating the stop, that case is not on point.
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 713
proposition that the use of emergency lights alone is never
enough to constitute a seizure.
We further disagree with the state’s argument
that a reasonable person in defendant’s position would have
“conclude[d] that the officers were conducting some kind of
investigation in the vicinity, most likely at the apartment
building where the lights were directed.” In this case, the
officers parked multiple patrol cars, whose lights were activated, in canted positions nearest to the only person in the
vicinity. On the facts before us, that constituted a “show of
authority” from which a reasonable person would conclude
that they are not free to leave.4 For that reason, like the
Court of Appeals, we conclude that the stop here occurred
when Mueth activated her lights and parked her car, before
she exited the vehicle.
B. Reasonable Suspicion and “Specific and Articulable
Facts”
Having concluded that defendant was stopped when
Officer Mueth activated her lights and parked her car, we
next consider whether the facts known to her at the time
of the stop, combined with any reasonable inferences she
might have drawn from those facts, were sufficient to give
rise to “reasonable suspicion.”
Reasonable suspicion refers to the degree of justification that a police officer must have before conducting a
criminal investigative stop. See, e.g., State v. Watson, 353 Or 768, 775-781, 305 P3d 94 (2013) (so explaining). The standard balances the “practical necessities” of law enforcement,
4
It is well established in other jurisdictions that, given social norms, reasonable persons would view the targeted activation of police lights as a “show of authority” by police. Michigan v. Chesternut, 486 US 567, 575, 108 S Ct 1975 (1988) (suggesting that activating sirens or flashing lights can amount to a show of authority that constitutes a seizure); People v. Brown, 61 Cal App 4th 968, 977-78, 353 P3d 305, 312-13 (2015) (holding that a reasonable person in the defendant’s position would have perceived officer’s actions — pulling up behind the defendant’s legally parked car and activating his emergency lights — as a show of authority, i.e., a seizure); State v. Gantt, 163 Wash App 133, 142, 257 P3d 682, 688 (2011) (officer “made a show of authority by turning on the patrol car’s emergency lights”); Hudson v. State, 247 SW3d 780, 786 (Tex App 2008) (holding that “activation of the patrol car lights” caused defendant-pedestrian to yield to officer’s “show of authority”); State v. Johnson, 599 SW3d 196, 201 (Mo Ct App 2020) (discussing case law suggesting that “the presence of emergency lights in pedestrian encounters would be a show of authority effectuating a seizure”). 714 State v. Humphrey
State v. Cloman, 254 Or 1, 8, 456 P2d 67 (1969), with the
need “to prevent arbitrary and oppressive interference” with
individual privacy and personal security. Fair, 355 Or at
602. Reasonable suspicion reflects the understanding that
a stop—even a temporary and brief one—is still a “constitutionally significant seizure.” State v. Maciel-Figueroa, 361
Or 163, 171, 389 P3d 1121 (2017). For those reasons, reasonable suspicion is less than probable cause to arrest, State
v. Holdorf, 355 Or 812, 823, 333 P3d 982 (2014), but it is
beyond “mere speculation,” State v. Kreis, 365 Or 659, 665,
541 P3d 954 (2019).
The legal standard for reasonable suspicion is satisfied if the court concludes (1) that an officer actually suspected that the stopped person had committed or was about
to commit an identifiable crime, and (2) that the officer’s subjective belief was objectively reasonable under the totality of the circumstances existing at the time of the stop. MacielFigueroa, 361 Or at 182. In assessing reasonableness, we
typically review the officer’s testimony at the suppression
hearing. State v. Belt, 325 Or 6, 12, 932 P2d 1177 (1997).
Specifically, we consider “the totality of the circumstances
confronting a police officer and not just those circumstances
that directly relate to a suspect or are personally observed
by the police officer stopping a suspect.” Holdorf, 355 Or at
824.
Defendant contends that, because Mueth did not
testify, this court may only consider the “specific and articulable” facts that Mueth verbalized in the bodycam footage.
That would limit this court’s reasonable suspicion analysis
to the statement that defendant “matched the description of
the guy involved.” Defendant argues that our inquiry must
be so limited because we would otherwise be required to
speculate about additional, unarticulated facts of which
Mueth may or may not have been aware. For example,
defendant emphasizes that Mueth’s bodycam does not establish that Mueth drove in the direction that the victim had
indicated, nor that she found defendant along that path.
Similarly, defendant argues that it does not necessarily follow from Kroeker’s general observation that there “wasn’t a
heavy amount of foot traffic out” that Mueth made similar
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 715
observations, or that, even if she had, that those observations were among Mueth’s reasons for stopping defendant.
Although the lack of testimony from Mueth slightly
limits the amount of information available in our analysis,
we reject defendant’s suggestion that our objective analysis
of the totality of the circumstances is limited to the specific and articulable facts verbalized by the officer specifically at the time of the stop. In fact, we rejected such a truncated
approach in Holdorf, where we held that the Court of Appeals
erred in its reasonable suspicion analysis by refusing to consider any information that suggested criminal activity simply because it “did not ‘relate to defendant himself’ or was
not personally observed” by the officer. 355 Or at 824. We
recognize that this case presents a unique scenario in which
an officer stated certain specific and articulable facts in her bodycam footage but was unable to appear at the suppression hearing to supplement or clarify those statements. See,
e.g., State v. Miller, 375 Or 173, 197-98, 589 P3d 151 (2026)
(discussing more generally the challenges appellate courts
have in dealing with a limited record). We agree with defendant that Mueth’s failure to testify limits the inferences
that may be drawn from the record about what Mueth did
or did not know when she made the stop. However, the lack
of testimony does not preclude a reviewing court from drawing reasonable inferences. See Juarez-Godinez, 326 Or at 9
(accepting implicit findings about an officer’s intent and a
defendant’s interpretation of an officer’s actions where those
inferences could be “reasonably” inferred by a trier of fact
from the record and were consistent with the trial court’s
ultimate finding on the legal issue).
It can be reasonably inferred from the record that
Mueth knew to look for defendant in the direction that the
witness indicated he had fled. Kroeker, meanwhile, learned
from another bystander the direction in which the suspect
had run, and she decided to follow Mueth in her vehicle.
This suggests that the witnesses both said that the suspect
fled in that direction. Because Mueth learned that defendant had fled on foot, it is also a reasonable inference that
she expected to find defendant in a more limited area than
if he had fled by car or bicycle.
716 State v. Humphrey
Similarly, it can be reasonably inferred that Mueth
knew the crime occurred, as defendant notes, “some point
relatively recently,” even if she did not articulate as much
during her initial contact with defendant. Although it is
unclear how much time elapsed between the assault and the
call to police at 9:26 p.m., the record establishes that it took only an additional ten minutes for the officers to arrive at
the scene, gather information from the victims and bystanders, and then drive to the bus stop where Mueth initiated
the stop at 9:36 p.m. At that time, one of the victims was
still bleeding and the ambulance had not yet arrived.
Lastly, it can be reasonably inferred from the record
that Mueth noticed what Kroeker noticed—that there were,
at most, only a few people out on the streets of Eugene that
evening, and that defendant was the only one at or near the
bus stop at the time she initiated the stop. Neither Mueth’s
nor Kroeker’s bodycam footage shows the streets as they
were driving. However, Kroeker testified that she saw only
one woman on the street before the stop, and that there was
“not a lot of foot traffic” that night. Because Kroeker followed Mueth in her vehicle on the way to the bus stop, it is reasonable to infer that Mueth would similarly have noticed the
lack of pedestrian activity along the suspected flight path.
The footage at the time of the stop confirms that pedestrian
traffic was light: When Mueth exits her vehicle, her bodycam shows that defendant is the only one at or near the bus
stop. It is only later, after the stop occurred and after three police cars were at the scene with their emergency lights on,
that other individuals can be seen exiting the apartment
building behind defendant.
To summarize, Mueth saw an individual who was
(1) one of few people out on the streets, (2) within minutes
of the reported assault, (3) located about a block away, (4) in the reported suspect’s path of flight, and who (5) approximated the description of the age range, gender, and race of
the suspect.
C. Generalized descriptions and racial profiling
This brings us to the issue of generalized descriptions. Defendant cautions that “a generalized physical
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 717
description of a suspect, involving the nondescript features
of gender, race, and age range is nearly always insufficient
to stop a given person in a public space * * * because those
factors merely generate a broad profile shared by large numbers of people entitled to be in those public spaces at any
given time.”
Both parties address the issue of racial profiling.
Defendant expresses a legitimate concern that relying exclusively on a generalized physical description is insufficient to prevent law enforcement from arbitrarily interfering with
the personal security of any number of individuals who also
fit that description. Defendant further argues that such practices “cannot be sufficiently scrutinized by reviewing courts
to ensure that intuitions and stereotypes played no part in
the seizure of an individual.” To hold otherwise, defendant
cautions, will diminish the rights of all Oregonians in general and racial minorities in particular.
Defendant particularly cautions against using race
as a matching criterion. Given the “significant variation in
phenotypic expression both within and across ‘races’ (e.g.,
skin tone; hair color, texture, and style; and body shape) as
well as those aspects of culture and ancestry that may influence whether one person may categorize or misperceive the
‘race’ of another,” defendant argues, “no reasonable person
could consider race alone to be a sufficient basis to believe
* * * that a particular person committed a crime.” Defendant
contends that a description comprised solely of general physical characteristics like race must be supported by additional facts to justify a stop. Absent additional corroborating facts such as “holding the instrumentalities or proceeds of
the crime,” or “engaging in some other ‘remarkable’ activity
reasonably indicative of having just committed the crime,”
such a stop does not pass constitutional muster.
We agree with defendant that it is difficult to foresee
a scenario in which the generalized description of a suspect’s
race, without more, would be sufficient to give an officer reasonable suspicion that a particular person had committed
a crime. However, we perceive a critical difference between
an officer’s consideration of a suspect’s race as described by
a bystander to aid in identifying the observed perpetrator of
718 State v. Humphrey
a known crime, and an officer’s reliance on a person’s race
to generate suspicion about criminality generally. Our case
law recognizes as much.
In State v. Valdez, 277 Or 621, 629, 561 P2d 1006
(1977), for example, we held that officer intuition alone is not a sufficient basis to establish reasonable suspicion of a crime. In that case, officers saw the defendant and two other men
preparing to enter a vehicle in a motel parking lot in a high
vice area in Portland. Id. at 623. When the men detected that
they were being observed, they ceased what they were doing
and watched the officers. Id. Because one of the suspects
had a “nice looking blue leisure suit, shiny black shoes,” and
“neat” Afro, one of the officers testified that he looked like a “typical pusher.” Id. Although we acknowledged that “police
develop what amounts to an intuitive sixth sense” about
what amounts to reasonable suspicion, we held that “such
instinct and experience cannot * * * form the entire basis for
‘reasonable suspicion,’ ” because “no practical control could
be exercised over police by courts if, in the absence of any
very remarkable activity, the officer’s instinct and experience may be used as the sole reason to justify infringement
upon the personal liberty sought to be protected.” Id. at 628.
We reiterated that “shined shoes, sharp clothes, neat ‘Afro’
haircuts, and people who stand and stare at officers do not
say very much—even in a setting where they are not usually found.” Id.; see also State v. Miglavs, 337 Or 1, 12, 90
P3d 607 (2004) (holding that “appearance alone never can
support reasonable suspicion of unlawful activity,” because
“officer[ ] suspicion must be particularized to the individual
based on the individual’s own conduct”); State v. Bates, 304
Or 519, 526, 747 P2d 991 (1987) (holding that “the late hour
[and] the high crime rate in the area” did not alone provide
reasonable suspicion that “this defendant is likely to be a
criminal, unless there is some reason to think that everyone
driving in that particular area at that time of night is up to
no good (or is a policeman)” (italics in Bates)).
Defendant’s concerns, legitimate though they may
be, are not present in this record. At the time she initiated
the stop, Mueth observed an individual who matched two of
the general descriptors given by the bystanders (race and
Cite as 375 Or 703 (2026) 719
sex), and who approximated the third one (age). That individual (i.e., defendant) appeared to be located close to the
scene of the crime spatially, temporally, and in the suspect’s
reported path of flight. Importantly, defendant appeared to
be the only one at or near the bus stop at the time Mueth initiated the stop. This is a point in the analysis that the Court of Appeals did not address, but which we view as important:
The reasonableness of the stop obviously has a relationship
to the surrounding environment. Responding to “They went
that way!” and then encountering a person nearby in the
indicated direction who matches a general description is
more likely to be reasonable in an area with little-to-no foot
traffic than in Times Square on New Year’s Eve. The stop in
this case took place on a quiet evening in Eugene, with few
people around, not in the middle of Manhattan. In light of
those facts, we conclude that Mueth’s suspicion that defendant had committed the reported assault was objectively
reasonable.
III. CONCLUSION
We conclude that Mueth stopped defendant when
she turned her emergency lights on and parked her vehicle.
Reasonable suspicion supported the stop.
The decision of the Court of Appeals and the judgment of the circuit court are affirmed.