Bama/OU
2/17/2006, 10:05 PM
Should the police be able to use drug-sniffing dogs to search your car, without any individual suspicion, during a routine traffic stop?
The Supreme Court says yes.
Illinois vs. Caballes
Police can use dogs in traffic stops
By Joan Biskupic, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that police may use drug-sniffing dogs during routine traffic stops, even when officers have no reason to suspect the vehicle is carrying narcotics.
By a 6-2 vote, the justices reversed an Illinois Supreme Court ruling that said the use of a dog wrongly converts a routine traffic stop into a drug investigation. The high court said a dog's sniff is not intrusive enough to amount to a search that violates the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches. The majority said that a motorist does not have a legitimate expectation of privacy for contraband hidden in a trunk or other location that would be detected by a dog.
Dissenting Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter said the ruling could lead to dog-accompanied drug sweeps of cars that are parked along sidewalks or in parking lots, and they questioned whether it could give police more latitude to use dogs to look for drugs among travelers' belongings.
Barry Sullivan, a Chicago lawyer who filed a brief in the case on behalf of the ACLU, added that the ruling could make motorists vulnerable to drug searches when they are stopped for minor traffic violations.
But Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, whose appeal to the court was backed by 28 states and the U.S. Justice Department, hailed the decision. She called the use of canine units "indispensable," and said the ruling would help reduce drug trafficking.
The Supreme Court has long allowed police to stop a vehicle if an officer believes some wrongdoing is underway. But the court has required searches to be linked to the reasons that led to the stop. Monday's case presented a different twist because it tested whether police must have a reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing related to drugs before using a dog.
The case began in 1998, when an Illinois trooper stopped Roy Caballes for going 71 mph in a 65 mph zone. While the trooper was writing a warning ticket, another trooper walked a drug-sniffing dog around the car. The dog signaled at the trunk, and after a search, the troopers found marijuana. Caballes was sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined $256,136.
Writing for the court's majority, Justice John Paul Stevens stressed that Caballes was stopped lawfully and that the entire episode lasted less than 10 minutes. He said that an unreasonably prolonged traffic stop might have been unconstitutional.
Stevens rejected arguments that Caballes' situation should be covered by a 2001 ruling in which the court said that a police department's use of a thermal-imaging device to detect lights used to grow marijuana inside a home amounted to an illegal search. "Critical to that decision was the fact that the device could detect lawful activity — in that case, intimate details in a home, such as at what hour each night the lady of the house takes her daily sauna and bath," Stevens said. He said drug-sniffing dogs detect only illegal activity.
In his dissent, Souter questioned whether dogs turn up only illegal activity. He then joined a dissent by Ginsburg that said the ruling could lead to actions more intrusive than a dog's walk around a stopped car. They emphasized, however, that the case involved drug detection, not dogs used to find explosives as part of public-safety efforts.
Sullivan said that although Stevens said the ruling applied only to car stops, its rationale could encourage police to walk drug-sniffing dogs around homes.
Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who is being treated for cancer, did not participate in Illinois vs. Caballes and some other cases the court heard in November.
If that is the case, then would it be legal to walk dogs through traffic at a stop light?
The Supreme Court says yes.
Illinois vs. Caballes
Police can use dogs in traffic stops
By Joan Biskupic, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that police may use drug-sniffing dogs during routine traffic stops, even when officers have no reason to suspect the vehicle is carrying narcotics.
By a 6-2 vote, the justices reversed an Illinois Supreme Court ruling that said the use of a dog wrongly converts a routine traffic stop into a drug investigation. The high court said a dog's sniff is not intrusive enough to amount to a search that violates the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches. The majority said that a motorist does not have a legitimate expectation of privacy for contraband hidden in a trunk or other location that would be detected by a dog.
Dissenting Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and David Souter said the ruling could lead to dog-accompanied drug sweeps of cars that are parked along sidewalks or in parking lots, and they questioned whether it could give police more latitude to use dogs to look for drugs among travelers' belongings.
Barry Sullivan, a Chicago lawyer who filed a brief in the case on behalf of the ACLU, added that the ruling could make motorists vulnerable to drug searches when they are stopped for minor traffic violations.
But Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, whose appeal to the court was backed by 28 states and the U.S. Justice Department, hailed the decision. She called the use of canine units "indispensable," and said the ruling would help reduce drug trafficking.
The Supreme Court has long allowed police to stop a vehicle if an officer believes some wrongdoing is underway. But the court has required searches to be linked to the reasons that led to the stop. Monday's case presented a different twist because it tested whether police must have a reasonable suspicion of wrongdoing related to drugs before using a dog.
The case began in 1998, when an Illinois trooper stopped Roy Caballes for going 71 mph in a 65 mph zone. While the trooper was writing a warning ticket, another trooper walked a drug-sniffing dog around the car. The dog signaled at the trunk, and after a search, the troopers found marijuana. Caballes was sentenced to 12 years in prison and fined $256,136.
Writing for the court's majority, Justice John Paul Stevens stressed that Caballes was stopped lawfully and that the entire episode lasted less than 10 minutes. He said that an unreasonably prolonged traffic stop might have been unconstitutional.
Stevens rejected arguments that Caballes' situation should be covered by a 2001 ruling in which the court said that a police department's use of a thermal-imaging device to detect lights used to grow marijuana inside a home amounted to an illegal search. "Critical to that decision was the fact that the device could detect lawful activity — in that case, intimate details in a home, such as at what hour each night the lady of the house takes her daily sauna and bath," Stevens said. He said drug-sniffing dogs detect only illegal activity.
In his dissent, Souter questioned whether dogs turn up only illegal activity. He then joined a dissent by Ginsburg that said the ruling could lead to actions more intrusive than a dog's walk around a stopped car. They emphasized, however, that the case involved drug detection, not dogs used to find explosives as part of public-safety efforts.
Sullivan said that although Stevens said the ruling applied only to car stops, its rationale could encourage police to walk drug-sniffing dogs around homes.
Chief Justice William Rehnquist, who is being treated for cancer, did not participate in Illinois vs. Caballes and some other cases the court heard in November.
If that is the case, then would it be legal to walk dogs through traffic at a stop light?