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Chicago, IL - Criminal defense lawyer represented defendant with possession with intent to distribute 500 grams or more of methamphetamine (Count 1) and heroin (Count 2) charges.

I.

A magistrate judge held a hearing on Cole’s motion to
suppress. Evidence at the hearing included the trooper’s police report and dash camera video as well as testimony from
Cole, the trooper, and another officer involved in the stop. After the hearing, the magistrate judge entered a report and recommendation with extensive factual findings, which the district court adopted. Absent clear error, we defer to the district
court’s factual findings. United States v. Bacon, 991 F.3d 835,
840 (7th Cir. 2021).
A.
Sheriff’s Deputy Derek Suttles was on criminal interdiction patrol in central Illinois when he spotted a silver
Volkswagen hatchback traveling east on the interstate. The
car caught his attention because it was travelling 10 to 15 miles
below the posted speed limit. Deputy Suttles also noticed a
covering over the car’s rear cargo area. He messaged Illinois
State Police Trooper Clayton Chapman, who was doing criminal interdiction patrol further east on the interstate, and told
him to look out for the Volkswagen. Trooper Chapman had
about 250 hours of training, mostly related to drug interdiction and other crime interdiction on roadways.
4 No. 20-2105
Deputy Suttles relayed the information that he considered
to be suspicious, along with the results of a license plate
check. The check revealed that the Volkswagen had been sold
and registered three weeks earlier to Janhoi Cole, with an address in Los Angeles, California. It had been insured only four
days earlier.
Trooper Chapman spotted the Volkswagen, whose driver
was leaned far back in the seat with his arms fully extended,
obscuring his face, and began following the vehicle. Shortly
thereafter, Trooper Chapman saw another car merge in front
of the Volkswagen from the far-left lane. When the other car
merged, the Volkswagen did not move into the right lane, but
instead followed closely behind the merged car. From his vantage point—about a football field behind the Volkswagen—
Trooper Chapman determined that the Volkswagen was two
car lengths or less behind the merged car.
Trooper Chapman stopped the Volkswagen for following
too closely, in violation of Illinois law. See 625 ILCS 5/11-
710(a). After calling in the license plate and confirming that
the plate matched the car, Trooper Chapman approached the
Volkswagen and asked the driver (Cole) for his license and
registration. Cole produced his Arizona driver’s license and
California registration. In response to Trooper Chapman’s
questions, Cole confirmed that his license showed his current
address and that he owned the Volkswagen. Trooper Chapman then asked Cole to sit in his squad car so he could explain
the purpose of the stop in a quieter and safer setting. While
standing by Cole’s car, Trooper Chapman saw numerous
drinks and snacks in the car, which led him to believe that
Cole had been traveling long distances. He observed, though,
that the only luggage in the car was a small backpack.
No. 20-2105 5
In the squad car, Trooper Chapman spent about a minute
explaining the details of how Cole had followed the other car
too closely. He then asked Cole about his Arizona driver’s license and California license plate. Cole offered, “I’m a chef. I
spend most of my time between Los Angeles and Maryland
and New York at work. But I genuinely had a job in Arizona.
And I genuinely keep this driver’s license because of the expiration date.”
About four minutes into the stop, Trooper Chapman began inquiring into Cole’s travel plans. He first asked where
Cole was headed. Cole answered, Maryland, because his boss
resided in Maryland. Following up, the trooper asked where
Cole worked and for whom. Cole responded that he was a
personal chef for two former professional football players
and, in between, an ordinary chef. After confirming Cole’s
destination (Maryland), the trooper asked Cole where his trip
began. Cole did not answer the question initially. Instead, he
offered that he had met up with some friends and family in
Colorado Springs. The trooper asked again where the trip began. Cole clarified that his trip started in Maryland. From
there, he went to Cincinnati, before heading to Colorado
Springs, then Boulder, and was going back home to Maryland
when the trooper stopped him. The trooper asked Cole when
he left on the trip. Cole said about four to five days earlier.
The trooper then moved on to the vehicle’s information.
He questioned Cole as to how long he had owned the
Volkswagen. Cole said six months, adding that he just had the
paperwork transferred. He explained that the car was a recent
purchase. He had been driving with his friend’s paperwork
and had only recently acquired the insurance and registration. Looking at Cole’s paperwork, the trooper noted that the
6 No. 20-2105
car had been registered on June 4, 2018. Cole verified that was
correct; his girlfriend had registered the car then.
Trooper Chapman next inquired where Cole was living.
Cole said he spent most of his time in Los Angeles, adding
that he had a child in both Los Angeles and Florida and was
planning to move to Florida. The trooper wondered, “So,
you’ve got an Arizona driver’s license that says Tucson … I’m
just trying to … And you said you’ve been traveling from
Maryland, so have you been staying recently in Maryland?”
Cole replied, “Yes. I have family in Maryland. My boss is in
Maryland. When I work in Maryland, I stay by my uncle. But
this driver’s license, I genuinely keep it just because of the expiration. I haven’t been in Arizona in a long time.” The
trooper followed up, “So your primary address, or your current address, is in California. But recently you’ve been staying
in ….” Before he could finish, Cole interjected, “Yeah, cause
I’m a chef. I travel.” The trooper asked, “Back and forth?”
Cole said yes, explaining that he went wherever he got jobs.
The trooper concluded by asking Cole why he did not fly.
Cole responded, “Fly? I have a car. And I travel with pots
sometimes. I’m a chef. Occasionally I travel with a bicycle.”
Trooper Chapman thought that Cole’s travel details
sounded vague and made up. Cole appeared extremely nervous during the stop. Among other physical symptoms, he was
breathing heavily, and his neck was sweaty.
Less than nine minutes into the stop, Trooper Chapman
told Cole that he was going to issue him a warning. He explained, though, that they would have to relocate to a nearby
gas station for safety reasons. Cole returned to his own car,
and they drove separately to the gas station. At the gas station,
Trooper Chapman called for a K-9 unit. While waiting,
No. 20-2105 7
Trooper Chapman continued questioning Cole about his
travel plans. He regarded Cole’s answers as increasingly suspicious. He also learned from dispatch that Cole had been arrested three times on drug trafficking charges. About 45
minutes after the stop began, the K-9 unit alerted on Cole’s
car. Officers searched the car and found large quantities of
methamphetamine and heroin.
B.
A federal grand jury charged Cole with possession with
intent to distribute 500 grams or more of methamphetamine
(Count 1) and heroin (Count 2). Cole moved to suppress the
drugs found in his car and his statements during the stop. The
magistrate judge recommended denying the motion. The district court accepted the recommendation and denied the motion. Cole conditionally pleaded guilty to both counts, while
reserving his right to appeal the denial of his motion to suppress. A divided panel of this Court reversed, but we vacated
that opinion and voted to rehear the case en banc.
II.
Cole maintains that Trooper Chapman violated his Fourth
Amendment rights by stopping him without reasonable suspicion of a traffic violation and by unreasonably prolonging
the stop to inquire into his travel plans. We review the district
court’s legal conclusions de novo, Bacon, 991 F.3d at 840, and
its factual findings for clear error, United States v. Gholston,
1 F.4th 492, 496 (7th Cir. 2021).
The Fourth Amendment provides that “[t]he right of the
people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be
violated.” U.S. Const. amend. IV. Time and again, the
8 No. 20-2105
Supreme Court has held that “the ultimate touchstone of the
Fourth Amendment is reasonableness.” Lange v. California,
141 S. Ct. 2011, 2017 (2021) (quoting Brigham City v. Stuart, 547
U.S. 398, 403 (2006)). “Reasonableness, in turn, is measured in
objective terms by examining the totality of the circumstances.” Ohio v. Robinette, 519 U.S. 33, 39 (1996).
Traffic stops are seizures, so they must be reasonable under the circumstances. Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806, 809
(1996). To be reasonable, a traffic stop must be “justified at its
inception, and reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the interference in the first place.”
Hiibel v. Sixth Jud. Dist. Ct. of Nevada, Humboldt Cnty., 542 U.S.
177, 185 (2004). Because traffic stops are typically brief detentions, more akin to Terry stops than formal arrests, they require only reasonable suspicion of a traffic violation—not
probable cause. Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 354; Navarette v. California, 572 U.S. 393, 396–97 (2014); see also Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S.
1 (1968). By the same token, though, traffic stops must remain
limited in scope: “A seizure for a traffic violation justifies a
police investigation of that violation.” Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at
354. Police may not “detour[]” from that “mission” to investigate other criminal activity. Id. at 356–57. A detour that “prolongs the stop” violates the Fourth Amendment unless the officer has reasonable suspicion of other criminal activity to independently justify prolonging the stop. Id. at 355.
A.
The first issue we address is whether Trooper Chapman
had a lawful basis to initiate the stop.1 We have little trouble
1 We, of course, do not consider Trooper Chapman’s subjective motivations for deciding to conduct a traffic stop. As the Supreme Court has
No. 20-2105 9
concluding that he did. Under Illinois law, “[t]he driver of a
motor vehicle shall not follow another vehicle more closely
than is reasonable and prudent, having due regard for the
speed of such vehicles and the traffic upon and the condition
of the highway.” 625 ILCS 5/11-710(a). Trooper Chapman testified that Cole was less than two car lengths behind the car in
front of him. The magistrate judge credited that testimony
and made an express factual finding that Cole was following
too closely behind the other car. Cole does not challenge that
factual finding on appeal. Instead, he argues that the district
court failed to consider the statutory factors (speed of other
cars, traffic, and road conditions) when determining that
there was reasonable suspicion of a traffic violation. The question, however, is whether Trooper Chapman reasonably believed that he saw a traffic violation, not whether Cole actually violated the statute. United States v. Muriel, 418 F.3d 720,
724 (7th Cir. 2005); see also United States v. Simon, 937 F.3d 820,
829 (7th Cir. 2019) (“If an officer reasonably thinks he sees a
driver commit a traffic infraction, that is a sufficient basis to
pull him over without violating the Constitution.”). As in
Muriel, the trooper’s “estimation” of a short following distance justified the stop. Muriel, 418 F.3d at 724; accord Lewis,
920 F.3d at 490.
unequivocally held, “[s]ubjective intentions play no role in ordinary,
probable-cause Fourth Amendment analysis.” Whren, 517 U.S. at 813. To
the extent that the dissent opposes the objective test established by Whren,
or suggests that police discretion informs how courts should approach
Fourth Amendment law more generally, that is an issue for the Supreme
Court, not us.
10 No. 20-2105
B.
The more substantial issue is whether Trooper Chapman
unlawfully prolonged the traffic stop by inquiring about
Cole’s itinerary.
1.
To answer this question, we start with Rodriguez. There,
the Supreme Court held that “the tolerable duration of police
inquiries in the traffic-stop context is determined by the seizure’s ‘mission.’” Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 354 (quoting Illinois v.
Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 407 (2005)). The mission of a traffic stop,
in turn, is “to address the traffic violation that warranted the
stop and attend to related safety concerns.” Id. (citations omitted). Tasks within that mission include “determining whether
to issue a traffic ticket” and pursuing “‘ordinary inquiries incident to [the traffic] stop.’” Id. at 355 (quoting Caballes, 543
U.S. at 408). Typically, the ordinary inquiries incident to a
traffic stop “involve checking the driver’s license, determining whether there are outstanding warrants against the
driver, and inspecting the automobile’s registration and proof
of insurance.” Id. Such inquiries fall within the mission of a
stop because they “serve the same objective as enforcement of
the traffic code: ensuring that vehicles on the road are operated safely and responsibly.” Id. Rodriguez distinguished
those ordinary inquiries from measures aimed at investigating other criminal activity, such as a dog sniff for drugs. Id.
As part of making these ordinary inquiries, no one disputes that an officer may ask questions unrelated to the stop,
and even conduct a dog sniff, if doing so does not prolong the
traffic stop. As the Supreme Court explained in Arizona v.
Johnson, 555 U.S. 323 (2009), “[a]n officer’s inquiries into
No. 20-2105 11
matters unrelated to the justification for the traffic stop … do
not convert the encounter into something other than a lawful
seizure, so long as those inquiries do not measurably extend
the duration of the stop.” Id. at 333; see Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at
354–55; Caballes, 543 U.S. at 408 (dog sniff). This recognition
does not resolve this appeal because the record is undeveloped as to whether Trooper Chapman’s travel-plan questions
prolonged the stop. If they did not, then they would have
been permissible even if they exceeded the mission of the
stop. See Lewis, 920 F.3d at 492; United States v. Walton, 827 F.3d
682, 687 (7th Cir. 2016). But because the district court never
made such a factual finding, we put this issue aside and ask
whether Trooper Chapman’s travel-plan questions fell within
the mission of the stop, such that they could not have prolonged it in the first place.
Rodriguez did not list travel-plan questions among the ordinary inquiries of a traffic stop. See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 351.
From this, Cole infers that the Supreme Court must have
meant to exclude them. Judicial opinions are not statutes,
however, and we decline to extrapolate a holding about
travel-plan questions from the Supreme Court’s silence on
them in a case where they were not at issue. See United States
v. Skoien, 614 F.3d 638, 640 (7th Cir. 2010) (en banc). The question presented in Rodriguez was “whether the Fourth Amendment tolerates a dog sniff conducted after completion of a
traffic stop.” Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 350. The Court had no occasion to reach—and did not reach—the propriety and permissible scope of travel-plan questions. We decline to read Rodriguez as creating an exhaustive list of mission-related inquiries. See United States v. Gholston, 1 F.4th 492, 496 (7th Cir.
2021) (noting that “[a] stop may call for a variety of measures
beyond” the ordinary inquiries listed in Rodriguez).
12 No. 20-2105
Though Rodriguez did not address whether travel-plan
questions fall within the mission of a traffic stop, it supplied
an analytical framework for answering that question.
Namely, we must ask whether, in the totality of circumstances, reasonable travel-plan questions, like the other ordinary inquiries of a stop, are justified by the traffic violation
itself or by the “related” concerns of “[h]ighway and officer
safety.” Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 354, 356–57. Our sister circuits
have followed this approach in deciding whether other unlisted inquiries fall within the mission of a traffic stop. See, e.g.,
United States v. Buzzard, 1 F.4th 198, 203–04 (4th Cir. 2021);
United States v. Clark, 902 F.3d 404, 410–11 (3d Cir. 2018);
United States v. Evans, 786 F.3d 779, 786–87 (9th Cir. 2015).
Applying the Rodriguez framework, we hold that travelplan questions ordinarily fall within the mission of a traffic
stop. To begin, travel-plan questions supply important context for the violation at hand. If, for example, “a given driver
was speeding in order to get his pregnant wife to the hospital,” then perhaps this “extenuating circumstance” might persuade the officer to issue a warning or simply release the
driver. United States v. Brigham, 382 F.3d 500, 508 & n.6 (5th
Cir. 2004) (en banc); accord United States v. Cortez, 965 F.3d 827,
839 (10th Cir. 2020) (reasoning that officer’s travel-plan questions “could cast light on why Cortez had been speeding, tying them to the initial justification for the stop”). In other circumstances, the context of a stop might counsel in favor of a
ticket or arrest. See Brigham, 382 F.3d at 508 & n.6.
A driver’s travel plans may also inform an officer’s assessment of roadway safety concerns beyond the immediate violation. An officer investigating a broken taillight, for example,
has a legitimate interest in knowing whether the driver is two
No. 20-2105 13
miles from home or halfway through a cross-country trip. Cf.
United States v. Ellis, 497 F.3d 606, 613–14 (6th Cir. 2007) (holding that officer who stopped car for weaving “was justified in
asking the occupants general questions of who, what, where,
and why regarding their 3:23 a.m. travel,” as such questions
could help “determine the driver’s ability to safely operate the
vehicle”).
At a more general level, “[t]ravel plans typically are related to the purpose of a traffic stop because the motorist is
traveling at the time of the stop.” United States v. Holt, 264 F.3d
1215, 1221 (10th Cir. 2001) (en banc), abrogated on other grounds
as recognized in Cortez, 965 F.3d at 839; see also United States v.
Collazo, 818 F.3d 247, 258 (6th Cir. 2016) (describing travelplan questions as “classic context-framing questions directed
at the driver’s conduct at the time of the stop” (quoting United
States v. Lyons, 687 F.3d 754, 770 (6th Cir. 2012))). In that sense,
travel-plan questions comport with the “public’s expectations
regarding ordinary inquiries incidental to traffic stops.” Cortez, 965 F.3d at 839.
In short, travel-plan questions are routine inquiries that
reasonably relate to the underlying traffic violation and roadway safety. As a result, we hold that such questions ordinarily
fall within the mission of a traffic stop. This does not mean,
however, that officers have a free pass to ask travel-plan questions until they are subjectively satisfied with the answers. An
officer’s travel-plan questions, like the officer’s other actions
during the stop, must remain reasonable, and reasonableness
is an objective standard based on all the circumstances. Robinette, 519 U.S. at 39.
We are not alone in holding that travel-plan questions ordinarily fall within the mission of a traffic stop. In fact, every
14 No. 20-2105
circuit to address the issue post-Rodriguez has reached the
same conclusion. Most recently, the Eleventh Circuit rejected
a defendant’s argument that an officer’s travel-plan questions
went beyond the mission of a stop, holding that “[g]enerally,
questions related to an individual’s traffic plans or itinerary
are ordinary inquires related to a traffic stop.” United States v.
Braddy, 11 F.4th 1298, 1311 (11th Cir. 2021). Five other circuits
agree. Cortez, 965 F.3d at 838 (“An officer may … inquire about
the driver’s travel plans.”); United States v. Garner, 961 F.3d
264, 271 (3d Cir. 2020) (“[S]ome questions relating to a driver’s
travel plans ordinarily fall within the scope of the traffic
stop.”); United States v. Smith, 952 F.3d 642, 647 (5th Cir. 2020)
(observing that an officer “may … ask about the purpose and
itinerary of the occupants’ trip” (quoting Brigham, 382 F.3d at
508)); United States v. Dion, 859 F.3d 114, 125 (1st Cir. 2017)
(“[O]ur case law allows an officer carrying out a routine traffic
stop to … inquire into the driver’s itinerary.”); Collazo, 818
F.3d at 258 (“Questions relating to travel plans … rarely offend our Fourth Amendment jurisprudence.” (quoting Lyons,
687 F.3d at 770)); see also United States v. Callison, 2 F.4th 1128,
1131 n.2 (8th Cir. 2021) (noting that “[i]n some post-Rodriguez
cases we have at least suggested that travel-related questions
remain a ‘permissible’ part of routine traffic stops in the
Eighth Circuit.” (citing United States v. Murillo-Salgado, 854
F.3d 407, 415 (8th Cir. 2017))).
The dissent claims that the Tenth Circuit has taken a more
nuanced approach to travel-related questions in United States
v. Gomez-Arzate. 981 F.3d 832 (10th Cir. 2020). In Gomez-Arzate,
however, the officers’ travel-plan questions came afterthe traffic stop was completed, in contrast to the questions from
Trooper Chapman that occurred during the traffic stop. Id. at
840 n.3 (“Here, though, the traffic stop had effectively been
No. 20-2105 15
completed before the VIN search and questioning about
travel plans.”).
We, too, have approved of travel-plan questions post-Rodriguez. In Lewis, the defendant complained that an officer
spent several minutes “asking about irrelevant travel matters”
during a traffic stop, thereby prolonging the stop in violation
of the rule announced in Rodriguez. 920 F.3d at 492. We rejected the argument. To begin, we dismissed the idea that the
officer’s first question—“Where are we headed to today,
sir?”—was unrelated to the stop, remarking that “[o]fficers
across the country would be surprised if we countenanced the
characterization of this basic, routine question as irrelevant to
a traffic stop.” Id. Lewis’s response to the officer’s first question was “not entirely forthcoming,” and prompted the officer
to ask several follow-up questions. Lewis answered these
questions in a similarly evasive manner. Again, adhering to
the rule announced in Rodriguez, we squarely rejected Lewis’s
argument that the officer’s travel-plan questions were impermissible: “The Constitution allows an officer to ask these
questions during a traffic stop, especially when the answers
objectively seem suspicious.”2 Id.
Lewis reinforces an important corollary of our holding: Officers asking travel-plan questions may also ask reasonable
follow-up questions based on a driver’s responses. Travelplan questions are not mere formalities; they serve important
2 The dissent attempts to recast Lewis, asserting that “the most important reason [we] had for affirming denial of the motion to suppress
there was that the defendant had simply failed as a matter of fact to show
that the questioning had actually prolonged the stop.” But that reading
contradicts the opinion’s unambiguous language. Lewis, 920 F.3d at 492.
16 No. 20-2105
law-enforcement purposes, and therefore an officer has an interest not only in asking such questions but also in receiving
truthful answers to them. If a driver’s responses are evasive,
inconsistent, or improbable, the officer need not accept them
at face value and move on. To the contrary, the officer may
ask reasonable follow-up questions to clarify the answers.
This was our point in Lewis, when we said the Fourth Amendment permits travel-plan questions during traffic stops “especially when the answers objectively seem suspicious.” Id.; see
also Murillo-Salgado, 854 F.3d at 415 (holding that an officer
may take the time to respond to “legitimate complications”
that arise during the “routine tasks” of a traffic stop); Dion,
859 F.3d at 124–25 (explaining that a Terry stop is not a “snapshot of events frozen in time and place” and that an officer’s
“actions must be fairly responsive to the emerging tableau”
(internal quotation and citation omitted)). It is only when an
officer’s follow-up questions go too far and become unreasonable that a stop risks becoming prolonged.
2.
Applying these principles here, we hold that Trooper
Chapman’s travel-plan questions during the initial roadside
detention fell within the mission of the traffic stop and did not
unlawfully prolong the traffic stop.
At the outset, it is important to recall the sequence of
events here. Trooper Chapman asked his travel-plan questions following Cole’s elusive and confusing account. These
travel-plan questions related closely to his questions about
Cole’s Arizona license and California registration. See Braddy,
11 F.4th at 1311 (holding that the officer’s questions about license, registration, and travel plans were within the mission
of stop). Before inquiring into Cole’s travel, Trooper
No. 20-2105 17
Chapman asked Cole about the discrepancy between his Arizona license and California registration. Cole’s response referenced three other states beyond Arizona and California. He
explained that he was a chef who split his time between Los
Angeles, Maryland, and New York, adding that he kept his
Arizona license because of the expiration date and that he
might be moving to Florida soon. When Trooper Chapman
began generally inquiring about Cole’s travel details, Cole
added two more states into the mix: He said he had stopped
in Cincinnati on his way from Maryland to Colorado. By this
point, Cole had mentioned seven different states—none of
which was Illinois—in response to Trooper Chapman’s questions about his license, registration, and basic trip details. See
id. (holding that the officer’s travel-plan questions were “ordinary inquiries related to the traffic stop, especially given the
fact that Braddy was driving a vehicle on Alabama roads with
an obstructed Florida license plate that was not registered to
him”).
Understandably, Trooper Chapman had follow-up questions. Cole evaded some of these follow-up questions. After
Cole volunteered that he worked as a chef, for example,
Trooper Chapman asked where he worked. Cole replied with
his occupation, saying he was a personal chef. Trooper Chapman tried asking the same question another way: “Who do
you work for?” This time, Cole responded that he worked for
two former professional football players and that “in between” he was a chef. Cole similarly evaded Trooper Chapman’s question about where he began his trip, prompting
Trooper Chapman to repeat the question. Cole’s explanation
for where he was currently living was also hard to pin down.
Initially, he said he spent most of his time in Los Angeles,
while noting that he might be moving to Florida. When
18 No. 20-2105
Trooper Chapman followed up, however, Cole seemed to
agree that he was currently living in Maryland. In addition to
evading questions, Cole gave confusing and improbable answers that prompted other reasonable follow-up questions.
See Dion, 859 F.3d at 125–26 (where driver with Colorado
plates produced an Arizona license and “described his travel
itinerary as a return trip from a cross-country road trip to visit
a CPA in Pennsylvania,” an officer’s follow-up questions on
the same subject were “both prompted and warranted” by
that “odd answer to a concededly appropriate question about
travel itinerary”).
Under these circumstances, Trooper Chapman’s travelplan questions were reasonable. Trooper Chapman questioned Cole about the basic details of his travel—which were
relevant to the traffic violation and roadway safety—and
asked reasonable follow-up questions based on Cole’s elusive
answers. See Lewis, 920 F.3d at 492. As Trooper Chapman testified, his questions were aimed at “piec[ing] together” Cole’s
“inconsistent” answers to basic travel-plan questions. He was
not, as Cole suggests, conducting a “fishing expedition” for
information that might generate reasonable suspicion to prolong the stop. Dion, 859 F.3d at 128 n.12 (citing United States v.
Pruitt, 174 F.3d 1215, 1221 (11th Cir. 1999)); cf. Cortez, 965 F.3d
at 840 (holding that “repetitive” and “in depth” questions
about travel details were unrelated to traffic stop because
such questions “neither helped investigate the original infraction—speeding—nor could they reasonably be characterized
as relating to officer safety”); United States v. Macias, 658 F.3d
509, 519 (5th Cir. 2011) (holding that officer’s detailed questions about driver’s mother, children, and past encounters
with law enforcement went beyond mission of stop because
they bore no relation to driver’s failure to wear a seatbelt).
No. 20-2105 19
Cole complains that Trooper Chapman’s questions went
beyond the details of his travel and into unrelated matters,
such as his occupation. But Cole initially volunteered his occupation almost three minutes into the stop in response to a
question about his license and registration and repeatedly returned to it when explaining his travel and living situation, so
it was reasonable for Trooper Chapman to ask a few followup questions about it. Cole also complains about the length of
Trooper Chapman’s travel-plan questions (just under five
minutes). But “we repeatedly have declined to adopt even a
rule of thumb that relies on the number of minutes any given
stop lasts.” Gholston, 1 F.4th at 496 n.4. Reasonableness is the
touchstone, and what is reasonable depends on the circumstances of a case. Lange, 141 S. Ct. at 2017. Here, Trooper Chapman’s questioning stayed within reasonable limits given
Cole’s responses.
Because Trooper Chapman’s questioning was reasonable,
we need not speculate about scenarios in which travel-plan
questions might go too far. For now, it is enough to say that
travel-plan questions go too far when they are no longer reasonably related to the stop itself (and related safety concerns)
but rather reflect an independent investigation of other criminal activity. See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 356–57.
3.
We do not address whether Trooper Chapman’s additional questions at the gas station stayed within the mission
of the stop because he developed reasonable suspicion of
other criminal activity less than nine minutes into the stop,
before he told Cole he would issue him a warning and before
they drove to the gas station.
20 No. 20-2105
Reasonable suspicion exists when, considering the totality
of the circumstances, an officer has “a particularized and objective basis for suspecting the particular person stopped of
criminal activity.” Navarette, 572 U.S. at 396–97 (quoting
United States v. Cortez, 449 U.S. 411, 417–18 (1981)). A hunch is
not enough, but “the likelihood of criminal activity need not
rise to the level required for probable cause, and it falls considerably short of satisfying a preponderance of the evidence
standard.” United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 274 (2002). The
standard “allows officers to draw on their own experience
and specialized training to make inferences from and deductions about the cumulative information available to them that
‘might well elude an untrained person.’” Id. at 273 (quoting
Cortez, 449 U.S. at 418).
This standard was met here. Cole was driving on an Illinois interstate with an Arizona driver’s license and a California registration, and his explanation for this discrepancy was
confusing at best. According to Cole, he was a traveling personal chef who split his time between California, Maryland,
and New York, traveling to each destination by car so that he
could bring his pots and bicycle with him. He claimed to have
had a job at one point in Arizona, and he added that he might
be moving to Florida soon, again for job-related reasons. Even
if this story was not inconceivable, Trooper Chapman reasonably suspected that it was false. See Walton, 827 F.3d at 688–89
(finding reasonable suspicion based in part on defendant’s
“implausible” answers).
The details of Cole’s current trip were equally dubious and
seemed to evolve throughout the conversation. In Cole’s telling, he had driven from Maryland to Cincinnati to multiple
locations in Colorado and then to Illinois on his way back to
No. 20-2105 21
Maryland—all in just four or five days. He originally said he
spent two of the four days in Cincinnati for work, but he
quickly changed his answer and said he just passed through
Cincinnati. His story about Colorado also seemed to evolve.
Initially, he said he met friends and family in “the springs.”
Then, he said he met some friends at the Springs and went to
Boulder to visit a buddy. After that, he said he met some
friends in Colorado because one of them was getting a divorce. Cole’s improbable and inconsistent answers about his
trip details reasonably increased Trooper Chapman’s suspicions. See Lewis, 920 F.3d at 493 (finding reasonable suspicion
based in part on defendant’s “suspiciously inconsistent” answers).
Cole’s extreme nervousness reinforced the suspicion. See
United States v. Rodriguez-Escalera, 884 F.3d 661, 669 (7th Cir.
2018) (“[N]ervousness is certainly a factor that can support
reasonable suspicion.”). Trooper Chapman testified that Cole
was “extremely nervous” throughout the stop, adding that
his neck was sweaty and that he was breathing heavily. Cole
suggests that the dash camera video refutes this testimony,
but the dash camera was not pointed at Cole during the conversation. Moreover, the dash camera records Cole himself
commenting on how nervous he was, so if anything, it supports Trooper Chapman’s testimony. Cole cannot show that
the district court’s finding of extreme nervousness was clearly
erroneous. See id. (holding that the district court did not have
to credit officer’s testimony that defendant was nervous
“when the court’s own review of the traffic stop footage led it
to the opposite conclusion”).
Additional factors further supported Trooper Chapman’s
belief that Cole was engaged in criminal activity. Cole’s car
22 No. 20-2105
was newly registered and insured. Trooper Chapman found
this suspicious because he knew that drug traffickers often
traded and reregistered cars and purchased insurance for specific trips rather than maintaining permanent insurance. Cole
disputes the district court’s finding that Trooper Chapman
possessed this knowledge. But Deputy Suttles’s message to
Trooper Chapman provided the car’s most recent registration
date, and Cole, himself, told Trooper Chapman that he recently acquired the “insurance, registration, and all that
stuff.” So here too, Cole has not shown clear error. In addition
to the recent registration and insurance purchase, Trooper
Chapman knew from Deputy Suttles that Cole had a covering
over his rear cargo area, which was common among persons
engaged in criminal activity. Finally, Trooper Chapman noticed that Cole had limited luggage in his car—one small
backpack—which was hard to square with Cole’s cross-country road trip.
Taken together and assessing the totality of the circumstances known to Trooper Chapman, these factors created
reasonable suspicion that Cole was engaged in criminal activity. We need not consider the other factors that the government relies on—e.g., the make of Cole’s car (a Volkswagen),
Cole’s origin in Los Angeles (a supposed drug source location), his travel on Interstate-55 (a supposed drug corridor),
and his slow speed and rigid driving posture—though we remind the government to refrain from using criteria so broad
as to subject “a very large category of presumably innocent
travelers” to “virtually random seizures.” Reid v. Georgia, 448
U.S. 438, 441 (1980); see also United States v. Street, 917 F.3d 586,
594 (7th Cir. 2019) (“Without more, a description that applies
to large numbers of people will not justify the seizure of a particular individual.”).
No. 20-2105 23
Because Trooper Chapman developed reasonable suspicion less than nine minutes into the stop, during the initial
roadside detention, he had a lawful basis for prolonging the
stop to conduct a dog sniff at the gas station, where Cole’s
increasingly incoherent answers and criminal history further
increased his suspicions. See Rodriguez, 575 U.S. at 355.

Outcome: The trooper’s actions in this case complied with the Fourth
Amendment, so we AFFIRM the district court’s denial of Cole’s
motion to suppress.

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