Protective Vehicle Sweeps After Civil Traffic Stops: Reasonable Suspicion from Gang Indicators, Rival-Territory Context, and Anticipated Return to the Car

1. Introduction

In United States v. Raban (10th Cir. Dec. 30, 2025), the Tenth Circuit affirmed the denial of a suppression motion challenging a warrantless “protective sweep” of a vehicle during a traffic stop. Two Denver gang-unit officers stopped Antoan Raban for civil traffic violations (no front plate and failure to signal). During the stop they observed Crips-associated facial tattoos, an open beer can, and—within seconds—another known Crips member (Deshay Armstrong) drove past, turned around, parked nearby, watched the stop, and called Raban’s phone. While officers worked to verify Raban’s identity by fingerprinting him, an officer conducted a limited search of the passenger compartment and discovered a loaded handgun and ammunition.

The key Fourth Amendment issues were the two prerequisites for a vehicle protective sweep under Michigan v. Long: (1) whether officers had reasonable suspicion that Raban was presently dangerous, and (2) whether they had reasonable suspicion that he may gain immediate control of weapons in the vehicle.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The court affirmed. It held that, under the totality of circumstances, officers had reasonable suspicion that Raban was presently dangerous based largely on: (i) contemporaneous gang affiliation (visible Crips tattoos, reinforced by association with another known Crips member), (ii) the high-crime setting and gang-violence context, including that the stop occurred in rival-gang territory, and (iii) Armstrong’s conspicuous on-scene presence and behavior.

On Long’s second prong, the court held that the protective sweep was justified because the searching officer reasonably believed Raban would receive a citation and be permitted to return to the car (at least to retrieve belongings or wait for a ride), giving him potential access to any weapon inside. The court emphasized that Raban’s known violations were civil matters under Colorado law and did not support arrest.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

Michigan v. Long, 463 U.S. 1032 (1983)
Role in Raban: The governing rule: officers may conduct a limited search of areas in a vehicle where a weapon may be placed or hidden if they have reasonable suspicion the suspect is dangerous and may gain immediate control of weapons. Raban is an application case, but it also refines how the second prong is evaluated when only civil traffic violations are present and officers plausibly anticipate release.
United States v. Canada, 76 F.4th 1304 (10th Cir. 2023)
Role in Raban: Provides Tenth Circuit framework and language for protective sweeps: officer safety, “steps reasonably necessary,” and the three scenarios for “immediate access” (breakaway; return-to-car after citation; reentry before investigation ends). Raban relies on Canada’s “return to the car” scenario and quotes its “at the time of the search” focus.
United States v. McGregor, 158 F.4th 1082 (10th Cir. 2025)
Role in Raban: Supplies analytic structure: assess each factor’s probative value, then evaluate totality. It also supports the proposition that gang affiliation can contribute to reasonable suspicion when officers have an objective basis for contemporaneous association, and that cooperation/daylight do not necessarily negate reasonable suspicion.
United States v. Hammond, 890 F.3d 901 (10th Cir. 2018)
Role in Raban: (i) gang membership can support reasonable suspicion; (ii) criminal history alone is insufficient, but can be relevant when it interacts with circumstances of the stop. Raban uses Hammond to down-weight the ankle monitor, treating it as a weak proxy for criminal history without context.
United States v. Dennison, 410 F.3d 1203 (10th Cir. 2005)
Role in Raban: High-crime location is a relevant contextual consideration (not sufficient alone). Raban uses Dennison to validate factoring the neighborhood’s violent-crime and gang-violence backdrop into the reasonable suspicion calculus.
Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119 (2000)
Role in Raban: Reinforces that officers need not ignore “relevant characteristics of a location.” Raban uses Wardlow to support treating the stop’s setting as context—especially when combined with gang-related indicators.
United States v. Huerta, --- F.4th ----, 2025 WL 3018105 (10th Cir. Oct. 29, 2025)
Role in Raban: Cited for the limiting principle: location alone cannot establish reasonable suspicion that someone is dangerous. Raban adheres to this constraint by tying location to gang rivalry and other case-specific factors.
United States v. Daniels, 101 F.4th 770 (10th Cir. 2024)
Role in Raban: Confirms that third-party behavior can be part of the “totality” and that location is contextual. Raban analogizes Armstrong’s nearby conduct to third-party actions considered in Daniels.
Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968)
Role in Raban: Foundational reasonable-suspicion case; invoked specifically to show that courts may consider a suspect’s companions and their behavior in evaluating reasonable suspicion.
United States v. McHugh, 639 F.3d 1250 (10th Cir. 2011) and United States v. Briggs, 720 F.3d 1281 (10th Cir. 2013)
Role in Raban: Support considering suspicious conduct by a companion/nearby associate as adding to the reasonable suspicion calculus.
Kansas v. Glover, 589 U.S. 376 (2020)
Role in Raban: Validates “commonsense judgments and inferences about human behavior,” used to justify treating Armstrong’s behavior (rapid arrival, turnaround, parking, watching, calling) as meaningful rather than innocuous.
United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411 (1981)
Role in Raban: Provides “totality of the circumstances” / “whole picture” approach; central to synthesizing the gang/territory/third-party factors.
United States v. Chavez, 985 F.3d 1234 (10th Cir. 2021) and United States v. Frazier, 30 F.4th 1165 (10th Cir. 2022)
Role in Raban: Chavez for the general warrant/probable-cause baseline and exceptions; Frazier for the government’s burden to prove reasonable suspicion.
United States v. Hernandez, 847 F.3d 1257 (10th Cir. 2017) and United States v. Simpson, 609 F.3d 1140 (10th Cir. 2010)
Role in Raban: Hernandez for deference to credibility determinations and officers’ ability to distinguish innocent from suspicious actions; Simpson for the idea that conduct need not be “innocuous” to be suspicious in context.
People v. Barrientos, 956 P.2d 634 (Colo. App. 1997)
Role in Raban: Used to establish that civil traffic violations (like those at issue) do not authorize arrest under Colorado law, supporting the inference that a citation-and-release was objectively plausible at the moment of the search.
United States v. Rodriguez, 33 F.4th 807 (5th Cir. 2022)
Role in Raban: Persuasive authority supporting the “until the gun was found, no reason to doubt release/return to car” rationale, even when a person lacks a license or is not the owner.
United States v. Burke, 633 F.3d 984 (10th Cir. 2011) and United States v. Guzman, 149 F.4th 1132 (10th Cir. 2025)
Role in Raban: Burke for waiver (argument raised first on appeal); Guzman for Fourth Amendment “standing” concerns when a defendant lacks authority over a vehicle. These appear in a footnote rejecting a late-breaking “no authority over the car” argument.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

A. Long Prong One: “Presently Dangerous”

The court followed United States v. McGregor’s two-step method: evaluate each factor’s probative value, then assess the totality. It agreed with the district court that three of the four cited factors meaningfully supported reasonable suspicion.

Gang affiliation as a present-tense indicator of risk. The court treated Raban’s Crips-associated facial tattoos as an objective basis to believe he was contemporaneously affiliated with a gang. Consistent with United States v. McGregor and United States v. Hammond, gang affiliation is not a standalone trump card, but it can support an inference that an individual may be armed—particularly when supported by other circumstances.
High-crime area and, especially, rival-gang territory as context. Drawing on United States v. Dennison, Illinois v. Wardlow, and United States v. Huerta, the court treated location as contextual and not dispositive. What elevated location’s significance here was the officers’ testimony that the area was an active locus of Bloods/Crips violence and that Raban’s apparent Crips identity in Bloods territory was “odd” given recent violence.
Third-party gang associate’s on-scene conduct. Armstrong’s rapid arrival, turnaround, parking directly across from the stop, watchfulness, and phone call to Raban were treated as behavior that increases officer-safety concerns under Terry v. Ohio, United States v. Daniels, United States v. McHugh, and United States v. Briggs. The court invoked Kansas v. Glover to legitimize commonsense inferences about what this sort of “hovering” may signal during a stop.
Ankle monitor: acknowledged, but minimized. The court explicitly found the ankle monitor added little. Raban is notable for its insistence (consistent with United States v. Hammond) that criminal-history proxies matter only when they meaningfully “interact” with stop circumstances. Here, the searching officer did not know why the monitor existed, did not know Raban’s criminal history, and did not testify that the monitor increased safety concerns—so it carried limited weight.

In totality, the court concluded the stop presented more than a “hunch”: visible gang markers, a high-crime and gang-violence context in rival territory, and the nearby presence and conduct of another known gang member with a violent history combined to support reasonable suspicion that Raban was presently dangerous. The court also rejected the idea that calm cooperation, daylight, and the absence of furtive movements necessarily defeat reasonable suspicion, echoing McGregor.

B. Long Prong Two: “May Gain Immediate Access to Weapons”

The opinion’s most practically consequential reasoning is its treatment of “immediate access” when officers anticipate citation-and-release. Using United States v. Canada, the court framed “access” through Canada’s three scenarios and adopted the second: the suspect is not arrested and will be permitted to reenter the car, giving access to any weapon inside.

The critical move was temporal and legal: at the time of the search, the officers had reason to believe Raban would not be detained further. Unlike jurisdictions where certain licensing offenses are criminal, Colorado treated the observed violations as civil. The court relied on Colorado statutes and People v. Barrientos to conclude officers could not arrest Raban for those civil matters. That made a citation-and-release—and thus a potential return to the vehicle—objectively reasonable.

The opinion also clarifies how the record supported that belief: Officer Moldenhauer told Officer Danielson “I think he’s good,” and Danielson did not yet know Raban’s criminal history. The district court’s initial oral skepticism about “returning him to the car” was later refined on reconsideration: what the district court ultimately disbelieved was a different proposition (that Danielson knew the violent criminal history yet would still return him). The Tenth Circuit deferred to the district court’s final credibility and fact findings.

Finally, the court used United States v. Rodriguez (5th Cir.) to reinforce the proposition that, absent an arrest, it can be reasonable to believe a detained person may soon return to the vehicle (even if not the owner), thereby creating the “immediate access” risk that Long addresses.

3.3 Impact

Clarifies “return-to-car” access where underlying offenses are civil. Raban strengthens the government’s ability to satisfy Long’s second prong in jurisdictions (like Colorado) where common traffic violations do not authorize arrest. When officers can articulate that a citation-and-release was likely, courts may find “immediate access” satisfied even if the driver lacked a license.
Elevates the evidentiary value of “nearby associate” conduct in gang contexts. The decision reinforces that a third party’s real-time behavior at the stop can materially affect officer-safety analysis—especially when the third party is known to officers and shares gang affiliation with the detainee.
Limits reliance on criminal-history proxies without linkage. By down-weighting the ankle monitor, Raban discourages reliance on generalized indicators of prior criminal justice involvement unless officers can articulate how that indicator matters to safety in the specific encounter.
Practical litigation consequence: focus on “what the searching officer knew.” The case underscores a recurring Fourth Amendment theme: the reasonableness analysis turns on the information possessed by the searching officer at the time of the search, and on objective plausibility of release/reentry, not on post hoc discoveries.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

Protective sweep (vehicle)

A limited, warrantless search of areas in a vehicle where a weapon could be hidden, permitted only to protect officer safety—not to look for evidence generally. The governing standard comes from Michigan v. Long.

Reasonable suspicion

A lower standard than probable cause. It requires specific, articulable facts that make a safety risk plausible—more than a “hunch,” less than proof.

Totality of the circumstances

Courts do not require any single fact to be decisive; they evaluate how factors combine into a “whole picture” (see United States v. Cortez).

Long’s two prongs

Dangerousness: whether a reasonable officer would believe the person is presently dangerous.
Immediate access: whether the person might gain access to a weapon in the car—often because they may be allowed back into it.

High-crime area evidence

It cannot, by itself, justify a search, but it can provide context that changes how other facts are understood (see Illinois v. Wardlow and United States v. Huerta).

5. Conclusion

United States v. Raban applies Michigan v. Long through the modern Tenth Circuit framework of United States v. Canada and United States v. McGregor, and in doing so it solidifies two practical rules: (1) contemporaneous gang indicators combined with rival-territory context and a nearby gang associate’s conduct can amount to reasonable suspicion of present dangerousness; and (2) Long’s “immediate access” prong can be satisfied where officers reasonably anticipate citation-and-release—particularly when the underlying violations are civil and thus do not support arrest—making return to the vehicle objectively plausible at the time of the sweep.