Supreme Court Hearing Case On Drug-Sniffing Dog "Fishing Expeditions" 451
sgunhouse writes "Wired is running an article on a Supreme Court challenge (well, actually two of them) to the use of drug-sniffing dogs. The first case discussed involved Florida police using a drug-sniffing dog as a basis for searching a suspected drug dealer's home. The court in Florida excluded the evidence obtained from the search, saying a warrant should be required for that sort of use of a dog. Personally, I agree — police have no right to parade a dog around on private property on a 'fishing expedition', same as they need a warrant to use a thermal imaging device to search for grow houses. I have no use for recreational drugs, but they had better have a warrant if they want to bring a dog onto my property."
Warrant for looking at your house with IR? (Score:4, Interesting)
Really? I see you are right [wikipedia.org], but that does sound strange to me, living in the Netherlands. Here it's a standard way for the police to track down the growers (even though selling small quantities is half-legal here).
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:5, Interesting)
The thing is, dogs are eager to please. You dont even have to try to train them to alert whenever their handler is suspicious - they do that naturally. So the way this works is, the cop's 'gut' isnt sufficient to get a warrant, he needs some evidence not just a hunch. So he just gets the dog, who naturally picks up on the handlers state of mind and will alert as a result, neatly giving that initial hunch credibility and transforming it into 'evidence' which can justify a search.
It's a neat solution to those for whom the Constitution and the fundamentals of our legal system are 'problems' I suppose. Now the only question is whether the Supremes will give this workaround their stamp of approval immediately or send it back down the ranks for some tweaking.
Better have a a warrent or what? (Score:5, Interesting)
Seriously, and cops come onto your property with a dog, and don't have a warrant, what are you going to do? If you shoot them, they'll shoot you. If you sue them, you'll lose. If you put up with it it, well, that's what you'll have to do.
It's rigged against you. Everything is. In Britain (at least England & Wales) a cop has never been found guilty of illegally killing someone during the course of their job. So, if you want a license to kill, just join an English police force. But in most other places (including the USA and Australia), cops also literally get away with murder.
And you think that a little bit of searching without a warrant is going to bother them? Even if the case against a suspect is thrown out because the evidence was collected illegally, the filth involved will not have any sanctions against them. Think about that. They can bust down your door, shoot your dog, and plant drugs, with no repercussions.
And no use for recreational drugs? So no alcohol? You don't smoke a ciggie every now and again? Or a pipe or a cigar? (Personally I don't use illegal drugs, but that's only 'cause I'm too lazy to seek them out. If they were on sale down at the local bottlo along with the whisky, brandy and fine liqueurs I'd buy some.)
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:police should be reactive (Score:2, Interesting)
You're not being cynical enough: You're assuming the function of the police is to fight crime. The function of the police is social control.
You may not be able to bring a mugger to justice, but if enough muggings happen in an area... Setting up something like a speed trap, or some other "reactive" measurement, will give a presence that can deter future crime. Police do small time drug busts, not only to shake down additional federal war on drug funding, but to get CIs. Of course, its bullshit logic as the only reason the CIs have valuable information on organized crime is because the drugs are illegal to begin with.
(Less cynically,) People like armed burglars are likely to be breaking multiple laws at a time. Enforcement of small nonsense like vehicle registration (or your bong) not only functions as social control but can serve as a platform for investigating larger crimes.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:2, Interesting)
Who said anything about trespassing? The dogs can smell shit from outside your property.
Studies show that the dog is more likely to react on the handlers behaviour than the actual scent. [tillmanbraniff.com]
This is not really that different than a police officer going to a fortune teller to get a basis for a warrant. Just like the dog, the fortune teller will try to pick up some clue from the police officer of what kind of response he expects and respond accordingly.
Yes, you will get a lot of correct positives, just like you get with a trained dog. You will also get a lot of false positives, just like you get from a trained dog. (Considering that drug sniffing dogs have more than 50% false positives it is not unlikely that the fortune teller will be better at picking up when the police officer is acting out of racism or some other BS than an actual hunch and provide a more accurate result.)
Re:police should be reactive (Score:5, Interesting)
In my experience the police don't bother to go out and preemptively fight even the easy crimes. They just sit at the station and wait for someone to come in a report a crime, then they spend 20 minutes trying to trick that person into admitting guilt (even if that person hasn't committed any crimes)
On 2 occasions I have gone with people to the police station to report thefts (a stolen car in one case) and after the police listened to the whole story, their first question was "so, you stole a car?" (in the other case it was a stolen helmet, and the first question was "so, you stole a helmet?")
Why bother putting in the effort to investigate existing crimes when you can just invent a reason to arrest the person standing in front of you. As far as the police are concerned, guilt or innocence doesn't matter as long as SOMEONE goes to jail. After that it becomes the court's problem, the police still meet their monthly arrest quota (and they do have a quota, however much they deny it: http://blog.motorists.org/if-you-didnt-believe-ticket-quotas-existed-before-you-will-now/ [motorists.org])
USA Land of Crime (Score:2, Interesting)
In the rest of the world, justice comes before anything else. No matter how evidence is obtained, it is still evidence, and will be used in court.
In the US, if an unskilled policeman makes a small mistake, all evidence will be thrown down the sink, and the criminals who would be convicted on that evidence in every other country of the world, will walk free. I don't understand this protection of people where there is evidence that they are criminals.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:5, Interesting)
Cops NEVER get fired. NEVER. Not unless there is a ton of publicity and the mayor is forced to demand it. You cant get fired from the worlds largest gang.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:5, Interesting)
An illustrative case: Seattle Policeman Ian Birk approaches a 50-year-old man named John T Williams in broad daylight on a public street. Williams' crime? Carrying a woodcarving knife, shuffling along and minding his own business. No witness other than Birk thought Williams presented any kind of threat. Birk spends approximately 3-4 seconds yelling at Williams to drop the knife (never identifying himself as police), then shoots Williams 4 times in the back from about 15 feet away as the mostly deaf Williams had stopped to try to figure out what was going on.
In the aftermath, Birk was cleared of all charges. However, after lots of public outcry and the police department saying that he violated regulations, Birk decided to quit.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:2, Interesting)
You are somewhat right. The Florida case doesn't actually deal with issues of "standing outside someone's property", though. The dog was lead to the defendant's front door and alerted after sniffing it. So there is an issue of whether police can lead an animal on to someone's property to sniff without a warrant, which I would argue they should no be allowed to do.
Obviously a police officer standing in a public area who sees something that amounts to probable cause can act on it. I don't really see why a police officer with a dog in a public area shouldn't be treated the same way. I do think that when it comes time to trial the prosecution should have to give evidence showing the dog's and handler's training and I think police departments should have to keep record of the dog's and handler's track records (false positives versus actual finds). From that a judge should determine whether evidence gained through their work is admissable. A legislative framework from each state outlining what kind of training and tack record should be considered reliable would go a long way towards making that determination easier.
You can compare the use of drug sniffing dogs to the use of devices but I would not compare dogs to infrared sensors; I'd compare them to something like binoculars. In a way, a dog enhances a police officer's sense of smell by proxy. Likewise, binoculars enhance a police officers sight whereas infrared sensors allow officers to see heat, which they cannot naturally do.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:3, Interesting)
Really? Didn't seem like it when I was getting back off my honeymoon. I wasn't searched, but the the cop at the airport really wanted "snoopy" to investigate me further.
I will say that I am sure that I stood out from the crowd. Hair bleached from 2 years of Mexico sun, face and arms equally tanned. I was also dressed head to toe in traditional white cotton Jarocho clothing. I probably was extra haggard from a severe second degree sunburn all across my back and shoulders.
If the handler was trained to avoid a false positive, why was he so sure that the dog needed to have a go at me? He was dragging the dog by the leash to have a go at my suitcase and carry on. The pooch was clearly disinterested and I am 100% certain I wasn't carrying anything that would have triggered a reaction.
Re:Did the cop got fired? (Score:5, Interesting)
This is bullshit I am sick of this cops put their life on the line crap, the data does not support it. In 2010 according to the bureau of labor statistics workplace fatalities report there were 545 work related deaths of workers classified as Management occupations, 261 work related deaths of Protective service occupations (inc fire, police, security guards, etc.) One could argue that the rate per 100k is high for Protective service occupations (7.4%) vs management (3.4%) but that ignores the 7% for repair and maintenance occupations, 11% death rate for construction occupations, 14.2% for transportation occupations, and 25.3% for Farming, fishing, and forestry occupations. We can dig deeper and see that all government occupations have workplace fatalities at a rate of 2.2%.
Police and fire jobs are not dangerous, they just pound their chest and proclaim that they are heroes and deserve to be worshiped. If risk of death is what makes you a hero in our society, lets worship the farmers, fishers, and foresters. Without them we really would be dead.
Source: http://www.bls.gov/iif/oshwc/cfoi/cfoi_revised10.pdf [bls.gov] (all rates are per 100k)