A "search of the passenger compartment of an automobile, limited to those areas in which a weapon may be placed or hidden, is permissible if the police officer possesses a reasonable belief based on `specific and articulable facts which, taken together with the rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant'the officers in believing that the suspect is dangerous …

"[W] hen... a state court decision fairly appears to rest primarily on federal law, or to be interwoven with the federal law, and when the adequacy and independence of any possible state law ground is not clear from the face of the opinion, we will accept as the most reasonable explanation that the state court decided the case the way it did because it believed that federal …

—officer safety exception applies to a search of an automobile's passenger compartment when an officer has reasonable suspicion that an individual is dangerous and might access the vehicle to gain immediate control of weapons

"If the state court decision indicates clearly and expressly that it is alternatively based on bona fide separate, adequate, and independent grounds, we, of course, will not undertake to review the decision."

"[P] rotection of police and others can justify protective searches when police have a reasonable belief that the suspect poses a danger,... and that danger may arise from the possible presence of weapons in the area surrounding a suspect."

"For a state procedural rule to be `independent,'the state law basis for the decision must not be interwoven with federal law. "

The United States Supreme Court has repeatedly noted that traffic stops are "especially fraught with danger to police officers."

As noted above, if an officer possesses a reasonable suspicion that a suspect is armed and dangerous, he may conduct a brief protective sweep of the suspect's vehicle, so long as that search is constrained to places where a weapon may be hidden.

—holding that state courts are free and unfettered to interpret their state constitutions however the United States Supreme Court's determinations of federal constitutional questions is controlling

If " `bona fide separate, adequate, and independent [state constitutional] grounds,'"are the foundation for a decision, it is unnecessary to reach federal constitutional issues.