State v. Philip Dubord, 03-15-00553-CR

Early morning (around 1:44 a.m.) Sergeant Johnson, on DWI patrol, observed Dubord commit lane-change and other minor traffic violations on West Sixth Street and began following him.
Johnson followed Dubord onto MoPac and for about six miles (under six minutes at highway speeds), during which he observed additional erratic driving (drifting lanes, near-miss, speeding, running a red light).
Johnson testified he delayed activating lights because he was on DWI duty and wanted additional observations; he ultimately stopped Dubord on suspicion of DWI based on the totality of circumstances.
At a pretrial suppression hearing the defense argued the initial stop was unlawful because Johnson saw Sixth Street violations but did not stop immediately and instead followed for miles before detaining.
The trial court found Johnson observed violations on Sixth Street but concluded that the fact he waited six miles diminished the credibility of his claim he stopped for those Sixth Street violations, and granted suppression.
The State appealed, arguing the court misapplied the objective reasonable-suspicion test and abused its discretion by suppressing evidence based on the officer’s brief follow to gather further observations.

Issue	State's Argument	Dubord's Argument	Held (trial court)
Whether following a vehicle briefly after observing a traffic violation defeats reasonable suspicion and requires suppression	Following to observe more does not negate reasonable suspicion; objective test controls; officer may lawfully follow to corroborate; suppression was an abuse of discretion	Officer should have stopped immediately for the in-presence traffic violations; the delay (six miles) undermines claimed basis for stop	Suppression granted: the court found the six-mile follow diminished credibility that the stop was for Sixth Street violations
Whether the officer’s subjective motivation matters to the Fourth Amendment/Article I, §9 analysis	Subjective intent is irrelevant; focus is on objective facts known to officer	Argues timing/distance show pretext or unreasonable detention	Trial court treated the delay as evidentiary against the officer’s claimed basis for the stop

Whren v. United States, 517 U.S. 806 (officer’s subjective intent is irrelevant to objective reasonable-suspicion/probable-cause analysis)
Walter v. State, 28 S.W.3d 538 (traffic violation observed in officer’s presence authorizes a stop under Texas law)
State v. Dixon, 206 S.W.3d 587 (courts should not overemphasize time/distance; apply totality-of-circumstances when evaluating stops)
York v. State, 342 S.W.3d 528 (discussing objective test for Fourth Amendment claims under Texas law)
Wilson v. State, 311 S.W.3d 452 (standards of review for suppression rulings on mixed questions of law and fact)