State v. Gonzalez

812                   March 12, 2025                No. 221

   This is a nonprecedential memorandum opinion
    pursuant to ORAP 10.30 and may not be cited
         except as provided in ORAP 10.30(1).

         IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE
                 STATE OF OREGON

                  STATE OF OREGON,
                   Plaintiff-Respondent,
                             v.
               VICKI MARIE GONZALEZ,
                   Defendant-Appellant.
              Deschutes County Circuit Court
                   23VI64576; A182719

  Andrew C. Balyeat, Judge pro tempore.
  Submitted February 3, 2025.
  Vicki M. Gonzalez filed the briefs pro se.
   Ellen F. Rosenblum, Attorney General, Benjamin Gutman,
Solicitor General, and Jennifer S. Lloyd, Assistant Attorney
General, filed the brief for respondent.
  Before Ortega, Presiding Judge, Hellman, Judge, and
Mooney, Senior Judge.
  HELLMAN, J.
  Affirmed.
Nonprecedential Memo Op: 

 (2025)                               813

           HELLMAN, J.
        Defendant, appearing pro se, appeals a judgment
of conviction for driving while uninsured, ORS 806.010,
entered after a police corporal stopped her for failing to stop
at a stop sign and ultimately impounded her vehicle.1 On
appeal, defendant raises three assignments of error. For the
following reasons, we affirm.
        Traffic stop. In her first assignment of error, we
understand defendant to argue that the corporal violated
her rights under the state and federal constitutions because
he lacked reasonable suspicion to stop her.
         The Supreme Court has explained that “[d]etermination of the legality of searches and seizures depends
largely on the facts of each case. What actually happened
is a question of fact for the trial court. A trial court’s findings of historical fact are binding on appellate courts if
there is constitutionally sufficient evidence in the record to
support those findings.” State v. Ehly, 

, 

 (1993) (citation omitted). Accordingly, “[o]ur function is to decide whether the trial court applied legal principles correctly to those facts. If findings of historical fact
are not made on all pertinent issues and there is evidence
from which such facts could be decided more than one way,
we will presume that the facts were decided in a manner
consistent with the court’s ultimate conclusion.” Id. at 75
(citation omitted).
         As relevant here, “[a]n officer has reasonable suspicion that a person has or is about to commit a crime if the
officer holds a belief that is reasonable under the totality of
the circumstances existing at the time and place the peace
officer acts.” State v. Wiseman, 

, 

 (2011) (internal quotation marks and brackets omitted). “A stop must be based on the officer’s subjective belief
that a crime has been or is about to be committed, and that
subjective belief must be objectively reasonable under the
    1
      ORS 806.010(1)(a) provides, in relevant part, that a person drives while
uninsured when “the person operates a motor vehicle in this state on any highway or premises open to the public in this state without … being insured while
driving the vehicle under a motor vehicle liability insurance policy that meets the
requirements described under ORS 806.080.”
814                                                        State v. Gonzalez

totality of the circumstances. The statutory standard represents a codification of both state and federal constitutional
standards.” 

 (citation omitted); State v. Farrar, 

, 

 (2012) (“The officer must be able
to point to specific and articulable facts, interpreted in the
light of the existing circumstances and his experience, that
the person has committed or is about to commit a crime.”
(Internal quotation marks omitted.)).
        We conclude that the trial court did not err. Here,
the record demonstrates that the trial court implicitly determined that the corporal had reasonable suspicion to stop
defendant.
   “[THE COURT]: So, the evidence that I’ve heard is that
   [the corporal] pulled [defendant] over because of what he
   perceived to be an improper complete stop and upon further questioning and upon further inquiry of the driver.
   The driver admitted that she did not have insurance. It’s
   required in the state of Oregon.”
As a consequence, the trial court found “by a preponderance of the evidence that [defendant was] not driving with
valid insurance of the time and the date of the citation as
required by Oregon law and therefore we’re find[ing] [defendant] guilty of driving without insurance.”
         We have reviewed the record and conclude that the
evidence supports the trial court’s findings. Specifically, the
corporal testified that he saw defendant driving on a public
highway and that she failed to stop at a stop sign. The corporal then “activated [his] overhead lights to get the vehicle
to stop. The vehicle continued past several safe pull outs, so
[he] then had to activate [his] siren trying to get it to pull
over.” Thus, the corporal “point[ed] to specific and articulable facts” that defendant had committed the offense of failure obey a traffic control device, ORS 811.265.2 Farrar, 

 (internal quotation marks omitted). Because
we are bound by the trial court’s findings that are supported
by the record, Ehly, 

, we conclude that the
trial court did not err in determining that the corporal had
reasonable suspicion to stop defendant.

   2
       ORS 811.260 provides that a stop sign is a “traffic control device.”
Nonprecedential Memo Op: 

 (2025)                                815

         Vehicle tow. In her second and third assignments of
error, we understand defendant to challenge the trial court’s
denial of her motion to consolidate the case concerning the
towing of her vehicle—in which she lived—with her citation
for driving while uninsured. We are unable to review those
assignments of error.
         Here, the record demonstrates that the corporal
ordered defendant’s vehicle to be towed under ORS 809.120.3
In turn, ORS 819.190 permits a person whose car is towed
under ORS 819.120 to “request a hearing … to contest the
validity of the towing and custody.” Defendant acknowledges that she received such a hearing and that the court
found that the towing was valid. Because the court’s determination from that hearing “is final and is not subject to
appeal,” ORS 819.190(11), we are unable to review defendant’s arguments.
           Affirmed.




    3
      ORS 819.120(1) provides, in relevant part, that an officer “may immediately take custody of and tow a vehicle that is … left standing unattended on
a road or highway right of way and that is in such a location as to constitute a
hazard or obstruction to motor vehicle traffic using the road or highway.” See also
ORS 809.720(1)(d) (providing that an “officer who has probable cause to believe
that a person, at … the time the police officer stops the person, has committed”
the offense of driving while uninsured, ORS 806.010, “may, without prior notice,
order the vehicle impounded”).