State of Minnesota, Respondent,

This opinion will be unpublished and
may not be cited except as provided by
Minn. Stat. § 480A.08, subd. 3 (2018).

STATE OF MINNESOTA
IN COURT OF APPEALS
A19-2012

State of Minnesota,
Respondent,

vs.

Lysa Kaye Conner,
Appellant.

Filed June 29, 2020
Reversed; motion granted
Connolly, Judge

Crow Wing County District Court
File No. 18-CR-17-2418

Keith Ellison, Attorney General, St. Paul, Minnesota; and

Donald F. Ryan, Crow Wing County Attorney, Stephanie Rae Shook, Assistant County
Attorney, Brainerd, Minnesota (for respondent)

Lysa Kaye Conner, Motley, Minnesota (pro se appellant)

Considered and decided by Larkin, Presiding Judge; Connolly, Judge; and
Rodenberg, Judge.

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U N P U B L I S H E D O P I N I O N
CONNOLLY, Judge
Appellant, pro se, challenges her conviction for first -degree controlled substance
crime (possession), arguing that the district court erred by denying her motion to suppress
the evidence obtained as the result of the expansion of a traffic stop. Because the district
court erred in denying appellant’s motion to suppress, we reverse.
FACTS
In May 2017, a deputy stopped a car after noticing that its windows were darkened.
Prior to the stop, the car made a few quick turns that appeared to the deputy to be evasive,
then stopped in front of a store. The deputy pulled up behind it.
As the deputy approached t he car, its driver, later determined to be appellant Lysa
Kaye Conner, held out a driver’s license and a letter from a docto r indicating that she
needed her car windows to be darkened. When the deputy asked for proof of insurance,
appellant gave him an expired insurance card. While she looked for the current card, t he
deputy went back to his squad car.
There he learned that appellant’s car was currently insured and that, in March 2016,
the car had been stopped and subjected to a K9 sniff while being driven by a person known
to the deputy to be a drug user. When the deputy went back to appellant’s car, she showed
him her current insurance card. He told her that she would not receive a citation for the
darkened window; she said she would have the window tint fixed. The deputy then
inquired if he could ask appellant a few more questions, and she replied, “Go ahead.”

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Based on the ensuing conversation, the deputy decid ed to conduct a K9 search of
appellant’s car, which revealed a total of 59.5 grams of methamphetamine, 5.5 grams of
marijuana, and $390 in cash.
Respondent State of Minnesota charged a ppellant with first-degree possession of a
controlled substance. She moved to suppress the evidence, which included the deputy’s
report and the DVD with the squad car video, arguing that the deputy lacked reasonable
suspicion to expand the scope of the traffic stop. Her motion was denied. Following a
stipulated-facts trial, she was convicted of first-degree possession of a controlled substance.
She challenges her conviction, arguing that the district court erred in denying her
motion to suppress because the deputy lacked the re asonable, articulable suspicion of
additional illegal activity necessary to expand the stop.
D E C I S I O N
“When reviewing a district court’s pretrial order on a motion to suppress evidence,
we review the district court’s factual findings un der a clearly erroneous standard and the
district court’s legal dete rminations de novo.” State v. Gauster , 752 N.W.2d 496, 502
(Minn. 2008) (quotation omitted). Appellant’ s motion to suppress was based exclusively
on the deputy’s lack of reasonable suspicion to expand the stop.
Generally, the scope and duration of a stop must be limited to the underlying
justification for the stop, absent further facts. State v. Fort, 660 N.W.2d 415, 418 (Minn.
2003). Expanding either the scope or the duration of a stop re quires an additional
reasonable, articulable suspicion. State v. Wiegand, 645 N.W.2d 125, 135 (Minn. 2002).
Articulable suspicion is an objective standard, determined from the totality of the

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circumstances. State v. Lande, 350 N.W.2d 355, 357 -58 (Minn. 1984). An expansion of
a stop “not strictly tied to the circumstances that rendered the initiation of the stop
permissible must be supported by at least a reasonable suspicion of additional illegal
activity.” State v. Smith, 814 N.W.2d 346, 350 (Minn. 2012).
Here, the deputy stopped appellant because of the tint on her windows , and she
could not immediately provide proof of current insurance . Both issues were quickly
resolved: the deputy measured the tint of appellant’s windows and told her she would no t
receive a citation; he also found that her insurance was current, first from a phone call, then
when she produced her current proof of insurance. To expand the stop beyond the window
tint and insurance issues, the deputy had to have “at least a reasonabl e suspicion of
additional illegal activity.” See id.
The deputy noticed that appellant appeared nervous, and that her nervousness
appeared to increase over time. But nervousness, even increasing nervousness, during a
traffic stop is not “illegal activit y.” See id. The deputy also believed appellant had been
less than consistent and candid in explaining why she was going to a particular store in
Brainerd when similar stores were closer to her residence. Again, choosing to drive farther
to a particular store is not illegal activity. Finally, the fact that appellant’s car had been
stopped and subjected to an apparently unproductive K9 search a year earlier while another
person was driving it did not support “a reasonable suspicion of additional illegal activity”
on appellant’s part during this stop.
The deputy had to have a reasonable suspicion of appellant’s illegal activity before
he expanded the stop by asking her if she would answer more questions. We conclude that,

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when he expanded his stop of appellant, the deputy had no basis for a reasonable suspicion
of any additional illegal activity.1
Reversed; motion granted.

1 Respondent has moved to strike portions of appellant’s brief and addendum that were not
presented to the district court. An appellate court will strike from a party’s briefs
documents and references to documents that are not properly before the court on appeal.
Fabio v. Bellomo, 489 N.W.2d 241, 246 (Minn. App. 1992), aff’d, 504 N.W.2d 758 (Minn.
1993). This court may not base a decision on matters outside the record on appeal or
consider matters not produced and received in evidence below. Thiele v. Stich, 425 N.W.2d
580, 582-83 (Minn. 1988). Appellant has not objected to the motion to st rike. We grant
the motion, noting, however, that none of the documents to which respondent objects had
any effect on our decision.