STATE v. BROWN (2020)

Defendant appeals a judgment of conviction for criminal driving while suspended or revoked, ORS 811.182(4) (2017), amended by Or. Laws 2018, ch. 76, § 13, and raises three assignments of error. We reject his first two assignments without further discussion. In his third assignment of error, defendant contends that the trial court erred in denying his motion to suppress evidence obtained after a sheriff's deputy “ran the plate” of the truck defendant was driving while both were in line at a restaurant drive-through. Defendant argued that the deputy's random running of the license plate was a warrantless search unsupported by probable cause, and, consequently, there was no “lawful cause” to stop defendant. The trial court denied the motion, relying on State v. Davis, 237 Or. App. 351, 355-58, 239 P.3d 1002 (2010), aff'd by an equally divided court, 353 Or. 166, 295 P.3d 617 (2013), which held, under similar facts, that a law enforcement officer's query of DMV records without individualized suspicion was not a search under Article I, section 9, of the Oregon Constitution.

On appeal, defendant does not dispute that Davis controls, but urges us to overrule Davis “in light of changing technology and law enforcement practices in the intervening years.” Defendant has not persuaded us that, on this record, Davis is “plainly wrong,” as he must for us to overrule that existing precedent. State v. Civil, 283 Or. App. 395, 406, 388 P.3d 1185 (2017) (explaining that we will only overturn precedent where it is “ ‘plainly wrong,’ a rigorous standard grounded in presumptive fidelity to stare decisis”). Accordingly, we conclude that the trial court did not err in denying defendant's suppression motion.

Affirmed.

PER CURIAM