Don't Wait for the Dogs - Police Stops

It used to be that the police had the right to hold you for a little while - what the courts might call a "reasonable" amount of time, to call for a drug dog to sniff your car. The dog would then show up, work its magic, and somehow, would indicate to the police, through various forms of telepathy and peeing on your tire, that you were likely the head of a South American Drug cartel and your vehicle was chock full of cocaine and guns. You would then be arrested and spend some time in jail sorting out the allergy pills you had in your backpack - ultimately being asked to plea to some trumped up meth charges to satisfy the prosecutors need for blood.

You don't have to suffer through that any more.

The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 on Tuesday that the Constitution forbids police from holding a suspect without probable cause, even for fewer than 10 extra minutes.

Writing on behalf of the court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg declared that the constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure prevent police from extending an otherwise completed traffic stop to allow for a drug-sniffing dog to arrive. The Court held that "a police stop exceeding the time needed to handle the matter for which the stop was made violates the Constitution’s shield against unreasonable seizures."

The Defendant in the case of  Rodriguez v. United States was pulled over for driving on the shoulder of a Nebraska highway. After the police checked his license and issued a warning for his erratic driving, the officer asked for agreement by Rodriguez to walk his drug-sniffing dog around the vehicle. Rodriguez refused. The officer detained him for “seven or eight minutes” until a backup officer arrived. Then, the original officer got out his dog and walked him around the car. The officer claimed that the dog "hit" on drugs in the car.

 

Rodriguez was indicted for possessing methamphetamine. The stop lasted less than 30 minutes. According to the Supreme Court, though, that search of Rodriguez’s car was illegal, and the evidence gathered in it should not be used at trial. While officers may use a dog to sniff around a car during the course of a routine traffic stop, they cannot extend the length of the stop in order to carry it out.

“[T]he tolerable duration of police inquiries in the traffic-stop context is determined by the seizure’s ‘mission’ — to address the traffic violation that warranted the stop,” Ginsburg ruled. “Authority for the seizure thus ends when tasks tied to the traffic infraction are — or reasonably should have been — completed.”

Dissenting, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito and Anthony Kennedy argued that police can reasonably detain people to investigate other possible violations of the law. Thomas said that majority’s ruling makes “meaningless" the legal difference between “reasonable suspicion” — which does not authorize a search of someone’s property — and “probable cause," which does.“Had Officer Struble arrested, handcuffed, and taken Rodriguez to the police station for his traffic violation, he would have complied with the Fourth Amendment,” he wrote, using the majority’s argument. “But because he made Rodriguez wait for seven or eight extra minutes until a dog arrived, he evidently committed a constitutional violation. Such a view of the Fourth Amendment makes little sense.”

What Thomas, and the other hawks, miss in their argument is that in most States, a traffic offense is not a "detainable" offense. At the most extreme, a summons is issued for a future appearance in court. In this case, there would have been no arrest and no search of the car.

Police routinely attempt to bootstrap traffic stops into a search. In my years assisting defendants, I have learned that police will threaten defendants with jail if they won't consent to a search or a sniff by a dog. Multiple defendants have shared that if they have children in the car, the police will threaten the parent that unless they consent to a search or a sniff, they will take them in and call DCS to take the children - which can result in a D&N filing by DCS and a couple of years of fighting to keep your kids.

It is mostly the poor and minorities who suffer these types of threats. People less likely to try to exercise their civil rights - people used to being bullied by the police. When we get to court, the police officers deny this behavior - arguing that the defendant is making it up to try to get out of doing something wrong. At first, its easy to believe the officer - but after fifty or a hundred of the same type of report, by unrelated defendants, over a period of time, it becomes difficult to discount the stories.

I'm happy to see that the Supreme Court supported individual rights in this case. This holding protects all of us in our encounters with the police. Whether you have something to hide or not, we are all protected by the 4th Amendment of the Constitution against illegal searches and seizures. The whining of the dissent is the echo of the sentiment "don't let them off on a technicality." Over the years, the conservative part of the bench has allowed the police to invade our rights more and more - giving them magic words to utter so they can get around the protections of our rights.

This decision is a victory for the individual and for individual rights. Congratulations to the majority for its courage and willingness to protect us all.