Supreme Court rules that Drug dog sniff is unconstitutional search

APRIL 8TH, 2013

The United States Supreme Court ruled that police cannot bring drug-sniffing police dogs onto a suspect’s property to look for evidence without first getting a warrant for a search, a decision which may limit how investigators use dog’s sensitive noses to search out drugs, explosives and other items hidden from human sight, sound and smell.

The high court was spilt 5-4 on the decision to uphold Florida Supreme Court’s ruling throwing out evidence seized in the search of Joelis Jardines’ Miami-area home. That search was based on an alert by Franky the drug dog from outside the closed front door.

Justice Antonin Scalia said a person has the Fourth Amendment right to be free from the government’s gaze inside their home and in the area surrounding it, which is called the cartilage.

“The police cannot, without a warrant based on probable cause, hang around on the lawn or in the side garden, trawling for evidence and perhaps peering into the windows of the home.” Justice Antonin Scalia said for the majority. “And the officers here had all four of their feet and all four of their companion’s planted firmly on that cartilage-the front porch is the classic example of an area intimately associated with the life of the home.”

He was joined by Justice Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan.

The four justices who dissented were Chief Justice John Roberts, Justice Stephen Breyer, Justice Antony Kennedy and Justice Samuel Alito.

Case: On the morning of December 5, 2006, Miami-Dade police detectives and U.S. DEA agents set up surveillance outside a house south of the city after getting an anonymous tip that it might contain a majriunana growing operation. Detective Douglas Barteit arrived with Franky and the two went up to the house, where Franky quickly detected the odor of pot at the base of the front door and sat down as he was trained to do.

That sniff was used to get a search warrant from a judge. The house was searched and its long occupant, Jardines, was arrested trying to escape out the back door. Officer pulled 179 live marijuana plants from the house, with an estimated street value of more than &700,000.

Jardines was charged with marijuana tracking and grand theft for stealing electricity needed to run the highly sophisticated operation. He pleaded not guilty and his attorney challenged the search, claiming Franky’s sniff outside the front door was an unconstitutional law enforcement intrusion into the home.

The trial judge agreed and threw out the evidence seized in the search, but that was reversed by an intermediate appeals court. In April a divided Florida Supreme Court sided with the original judge.

That ruling was upheld by the Supreme Court’s decision.

This is the second decision this year on the use of drug-sniffing dogs by police. The court unanimously ruled earlier in another Florida case that police don’t have to extensively document the work of drug-sniffing dogs in the field to be able to use the results of their work in court.