¶1A grand jury indicted Brett Loring Butler for possession of cocaine with intent to distribute. A jury convicted him of the lesser included offense of possession of cocaine. Before sentencing, the trial judge ordered Butler to submit to a drug test. When the test returned positive for marijuana, the judge revoked five years of Butler’s suspended sentence on a prior conviction and sentenced him to four years imprisonment on his conviction for possession of cocaine. Butler appeals. We reverse and remand.
¶2FACTS/PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
¶3On March 8, 1998, William Lynch, a police office with the North Myrtle Beach Police Department, stopped Butler. Butler was driving a red BMW with an Atlantic Chevrolet “temporary paper tag” on the back. Lynch testified that he stopped Butler to check to make sure the car was properly registered and had insurance. After approaching Butler’s car, Lynch noticed an overturned cup in the passenger-side floorboard. Suspecting the cup contained alcohol, Lynch asked Butler to open the passenger-side door so that Lynch could examine the cup. Upon examination, Lynch determined that the cup contained Coca-Cola mixed with alcohol. Lynch arrested Butler for having an open container. Lynch then transported Butler to the police station where a search uncovered 1.17 grams of cocaine hidden in Butler’s sock. Butler was then arrested on charges of possession of cocaine with intent to distribute.
¶4At trial, Butler moved to have the cocaine suppressed on the ground that Officer Lynch lacked reasonable suspicion that Butler was involved in criminal activity, and thus the stop was unconstitutional. At the suppression hearing, Lynch testified that the reason he pulled Butler over was because Butler’s car had a temporary tag on it, and that in his experience, cars bearing these tags could be unregistered, uninsured, or stolen. On cross-examination, Lynch admitted that other than the presence of the temporary tag, there was no indication that Butler was involved in criminal activity or that his car was *201unregistered or unlicensed.
¶5The trial court denied Butler’s motion to suppress. A jury convicted Butler of possession of cocaine. Butler appeals.
¶6LAW/ANALYSIS
¶7On appeal, Butler argues the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress. Butler contends that the stop was unconstitutional because Lynch failed to establish that he had a reasonable suspicion that Butler was violating registration or insurance laws. We agree.
¶8The Fourth Amendment guarantees “the right of the people to be secure ... [from] unreasonable searches and seizures.”
¶9*202In Delaware v. Prouse,
[E]xcept in those situations in which there is at least articulable and reasonable suspicion that a motorist is unlicensed or that an automobile is not registered, or that either the vehicle or an occupant is otherwise subject to seizure for violation of law, stopping an automobile and detaining the driver in order to check his driver’s license and the registration of the automobile are unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment.7
¶10Reasonable suspicion must be based on “specific and articulable facts which, taken together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that intrusion”
¶11The State argues that the mere presence of a “temporary tag” on a car is reasonable suspicion that the car is either unregistered, uninsured, or is otherwise involved in criminal activity. We disagree and hold that the mere presence of a temporary tag on the back of a car, without more, is insufficient to provide a reasonable suspicion that the driver is *203violating registration or insurance laws or that the driver is otherwise involved in criminal activity.
¶12South Carolina Code section 56-3-210, titled “Grace period for procuring registration and license,” reads as follows:
Persons newly acquiring vehicles and owners of foreign vehicles being moved into this State and required to be registered under this chapter may have not more than forty-five days in which to register and license them.12
¶13Under the statute, a South Carolina resident has forty-five days to register his car and obtain his state-issued license plate.
¶14Unlike other states, South Carolina has not implemented a legislative scheme to temporarily register “newly acquired” cars pending receipt of a permanent tag. If such legislation were in place, the expiration of the forty-five day grace period would be ascertainable by any law enforcement officer and any failure to display the state-issued temporary tag could provide a reasonable suspicion that the car was not registered. Because South Carolina has no such system in place, however, we must decide whether the presence of a temporary tag gives an officer reasonable suspicion that the car has exceeded the forty-five day grace period provided for by statute. We think it does not.
¶15We note that at least two other states have addressed a similar argument made by the State in this case. In Ohio v. Chatton,
*204If we were to uphold the detention of appellee ... upon the generalized statement that temporary tags are sometimes used in criminal activity, we would be sanctioning, in effect, the detention of the driver of any vehicle bearing temporary tags. We are unwilling to place our imprimatur on searches of the citizens of this state and their vehicles simply because of the lawful and innocuous presence of temporary tags. The potential for abuse if such a rule were in effect, through arrogant and unnecessary displays of authority, cannot be ignored or discounted.15
¶16The Nebraska Supreme Court likewise rejected a similar argument in Nebraska v. Childs.
¶17We cannot sanction the random stop of any and every car bearing a temporary tag, leaving in the hands of law enforcement officers the freedom to detain whomever they desire without having to justify why they chose to stop one motorist over another. Requiring law enforcement to articulate a particularized and objective reason as to why they believed the car was unregistered, uninsured, or otherwise involved in criminal activity would alleviate this potential for abuse.
¶18Finally, we refuse to create the suspect presumption in this state that every motorist traveling the highways with a temporary tag is guilty of driving an unregistered or uninsured car and is subject to detention until he or she can prove otherwise. Even the statute that empowers the South Carolina Highway Patrol commands that there be a reasonable belief that a *205vehicle is being operated in violation of the law prior to stopping the driver.
¶19We understand the problem faced by law enforcement officers who are unable to determine whether a car bearing a temporary license tag is registered, insured, stolen, or otherwise involved in criminal activity. Given the legislative solutions available, however, we cannot conclude that mere compliance with the current law results in a reasonable suspicion of criminal activity.
¶20To lawfidly stop and detain Butler, Officer Lynch needed an objective, particularized, and articulable reason as to why he thought Butler was no longer within his forty-five grace period or was otherwise involved in criminal activity.
¶21REVERSED AND REMANDED.
¶22.
Q.: ... And you are testifying you had suspicion he was involved in criminal activity, based upon his paper tag?
A.: I wouldn't say he was involved in criminal activity.
Q.: ... So you did not believe he was involved in criminal activity, correct?
A.: I can’t say for sure if he was or wasn’t. I mean, I deal with paper tags on a daily basis, and some people are and some people aren’t.
¶23. U.S. Const. amend. IV.
¶24. Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 809, 116 S.Ct. 1769, 135 L.Ed.2d 89 (1996); see also Sikes v. State, 323 S.C. 28, 448 S.E.2d 560 (1994).
¶25. Whren, 517 U.S. at 809, 116 S.Ct. 1769.
¶26. Knight v. State, 284 S.C. 138, 325 S.E.2d 535 (1985).
¶27. 440 U.S. 648, 99 S.Ct. 1391, 59 L.Ed.2d 660 (1979).
¶28. Id. at 663, 99 S.Ct. 1391 (emphasis added).
¶29. Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968); see also State v. Lesley, 326 S.C. 641, 486 S.E.2d 276 (Ct.App.1997).
¶30. United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 417, 101 S.Ct. 690, 66 L.Ed.2d 621 (1981).
¶31. Nebraska v. Soukharith, 253 Neb. 310, 570 N.W.2d 344, 354 (1997).
¶32. Brown v. Texas, 443 U.S. 47, 99 S.Ct. 2637, 61 L.Ed.2d 357 (1979).
¶33. S.C.Code Ann. § 56-3-210 (Supp.1999).
¶34. 11 Ohio St.3d 59, 463 N.E.2d 1237 (1984).
¶35. At the time Chatton was decided, Ohio had state-issued temporary tags, but had no law that governed how the tags had to be displayed. The officer who stopped Chatton justified his stop based on two grounds: the tag was not visibly displayed, and cars with temporary tags are often used in criminal activity.
¶37. 242 Neb. 426, 495 N.W.2d 475 (1993). At the time Childs was decided, Nebraska issued "In Transit” stickers to newly acquired cars. The expiration date was not visible, however, without pulling the car over to examine the sticker.
¶38. See State v. LaBarge, 275 S.C. 168, 268 S.E.2d 278 (1980) (noting that all presumptions of law are in favor of innocence until proven otherwise).
¶39. S.C.Code Ann. § 56-3-2420 (1991).
¶40. See United States v. Wilson, 205 F.3d 720 (4th Cir.2000) (holding that absent an articulable, reasonable suspicion of unlawful conduct, the Fourth Amendment forbids stopping a car simply because it has a temporary tag).
¶41. See State v. Copeland, 321 S.C. 318, 323, 468 S.E.2d 620, 624 (1996) ("The ‘fruit of the poisonous tree’ doctrine provides that evidence must be excluded if it would not have come to light but for the illegal actions of the police, and the evidence has been obtained by the exploitation of that illegality.”) (citing Wong Sun v. United States, 371 U.S. 471, 83 S.Ct. 407, 9 L.Ed.2d 441).