US Supreme Court asked to ponder drug dog's sniff

[Yes4Prop215]

well my next pad in maine will have a 2 mile driveway and gated

yea luckily my bugout property is gated and has a 100 yard off road trail....plus we rigged it with motion sensors so if somebody comes sneaking down the trail we can go out and greet them before they even get close to the door...and the outdoor pot patch is another 100 yards down the hill from the house..

 

[cannabis love]

Wow, they put a value of almost $4000 per plant down there in Florida? Too bad you can't use a plant or two for collateral on a loan 8D

 

[resinryder]

I hope the SCOTUS rules in favor of the defendant like the original judge did. This looks like nothing more than a pissed off prosecutor shopping for the results he wants. I really hope the Supreme's spank his ass. If not, they will be able to walk the dogs door to door anywhere, anytime they want to make a case. Complete common fuckers.

 

[trichrider]

...close to sending the x-ray vehicles down the streets to peek into our lives.

http://autos.aol.com/article/x-ray-truck/

putrid liberty rotting, stench betraying the festering corpse, America...lost.

 

[DiscoBiscuit]

If SCOTUS accepts the case, here's my disgruntled opinion

Roberts - state
Alito - state
Scalia - defendant
Thomas - ?
Kennedy?
Ginsberg - defendant
Sotomayor - defendant
Kagan - state

who am I forgetting here

Steven Breyer - defendant

IMO, all up to Thomas and Kennedy. I'm guessing Thomas will float with Scalia but it ain't certain. Thomas is African American and we all know more minorities go to jail. If Thomas goes with the state, I'm betting Kennedy will do the same.

One more wrong justice will make the guessing game a lot easier. Not sure we'll like the outcomes - lifetime appointments. Ginsberg has/had cancer and is said to be looking toward retirement. Could be that the very next prez gets a shot to fill that vacancy.

 

[Stoner4Life]

I hope the SCOTUS rules in favor of the defendant like the original judge did. This looks like nothing more than a pissed off prosecutor shopping for the results he wants. I really hope the Supreme's spank his ass. If not, they will be able to walk the dogs door to door anywhere, anytime they want to make a case. Complete common fuckers.

absolutely, if it's not shut down then they'll have the right to go door to door.

here's an analogy of sorts: suppose the police department had an officer that could actually see through walls, would he/she be able to use that ability to conduct unwarranted surveillance? I think not.

will the justices hold that police dog to the same standards of unwarranted search & seizure as other officers are required? as an officer of the law the dog should be held to the same. just because his abilities are fined tuned does not give him the right to violate the constitutional rights of the public.

the mere fact that 'false positive' alerts could invite wrongful warrants and intrusions by leo with the possible (probable) killing of citizens eventually should be enough reason to require more than an animals reaction to warrant a warrant.......

 

[mowood3479]

so crazy....

 

[TNTBudSticker]

Supreme Court to rule on drug-sniffing dog case

Supreme Court to rule on drug-sniffing dog case

Florida justices had ruled against the use of such dogs to detect marijuana at the door of a home without evidence of criminal activity.The high court will hear an appeal.

The Supreme Court agreed Friday to decide whether police may use a drug-sniffing dog at the front door of a house or an apartment to detect marijuana,even if the officers have no evidence of criminal conduct.

But not every search method wins approval.The justices rejected the use of thermal imagers,which can detect the heat of powerful lights used to grow marijuana.In that case,the court decided that the device allows police to look into a house, and thereby violates the privacy rights of the homeowners.

The court said Friday it would hear the case of Florida vs. Jardines in April and issue a ruling on drug-sniffing dogs by late June.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-court-dogs-sniff-20120107,0,5068226.story

 

[meduser180056]

thats nice, but pretty sure all they need is a CI[confidential informant] to say theres something going on and then they can flir and sniff all they want. It's so easy for them to get a warrant to flir. Pretty sure the they can just have have fake CIs or have CIs make bullshit up to so the judge will give em the go ahead. The judges are pretty loose about giving out those warrants call it the good ol boys network.

Cops don't play by the rules. Trust me I know my gramps was a narcotics detective.

 

[GP73LPC]

this is not good. if SCOTUS agreed to hear this case i think there is a better than average chance they will over turn the Florida Courts...

maybe i'm wrong...

 

[HUGE]

When is the hammer supposed to drop on this decision?

 

[Chiefin]

Goddamn! WTF Florida?! Whatevs....my whole block reeks of ganja.

 

[Cheerful]

for HUGE:

The court said Friday it would hear the case of Florida vs. Jardines in April and issue a ruling on drug-sniffing dogs by late June.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-court-dogs-sniff-20120107,0,5068226.story

 

[Grass Lands]

$4.9 million in drug-contaminated money

What a fucking joke...all US paper currency has drug on it...

 

[singularity]

hopefully, one would be able to utilize a barrier around said premises; marked with ''NO TRESPASSING''.

then, deputy doofus and lassie can play fetch somewhere else, leave me to my meds.

 

[singularity]

and no one steal my new screen name:deputy doofus

its on!

 

[Hash Zeppelin]

Curtilage: the expectation of privacy in the yard

Curtilage: the expectation of privacy in the yard

There really is nothing you can do to keep them out of your place.

8 pages but worth the read. There is a supreme court precedence, UNITED STATES v. DUNN, 480 U.S. 294 (1987)

It says the search with the dogs around the house was unconstitutional and violates the 4th amendment.

This is JUST PAGE 1
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2194/is_n4_v67/ai_20576402/?tag=content;col1

The English common law tradition of protecting the home against government intrusions existed long before this great republic was founded. William Pitt's 1763 address before the House of Commons in England perhaps best expresses the special status of the home. "The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the forces of the Crown. It may be frail; its roof may shake; the wind may blow through it; the storm may enter; but the King of England cannot enter - all his force dares not cross the threshold of the mined tenement."(1)

America's founding fathers embodied this tradition in the Fourth Amendment, which recognizes the right of the people to be secure in their houses from unreasonable searches and seizures. The U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted the Fourth Amendment as providing the greatest degree of protection against government encroachment to the home. For Fourth Amendment purposes, that area immediately surrounding the home, the curtilage, has customarily been viewed as part of the home.(2) This article explores the limits of the protection afforded the curtilage.(3)

The area that is outside the curtilage of the home, Which courts refer to as an open field, is not protected by the Fourth Amendment.(4) "Open field" is a term of art; for an area to be considered an open field, it need not be in the open nor a field.(5)

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that "...in the case of open fields, the general rights of property protected by the common law of trespass have little or no relevance to the applicability of the Fourth Amendment."(6) A property owner cannot add to the constitutional protection of an open field or change its character to that of curtilage by posting "No Trespassing" signs at its boundaries.(7) The scope of the protection given an area does not depend on whether the owner has attempted to conceal some private conduct.(8) Rather, the courts inquire into whether the government has intruded upon the owner's subjective and personal expectation of privacy and whether that expectation is one that society accepts as reasonable.(9)

If an officer trespasses onto another's curtilage, that trespass would be a search if it was in an area of the curtilage where the owner has a reasonable expectation of privacy. If, however, an officer trespasses onto an open field, that will not be considered a search in a federal case, because an open field is not protected by the Fourth Amendment.(10) A few states, however, have chosen to disregard that federal rule as a matter of state law and have granted protection from police trespass in areas outside the curtilage.(11) State limitations on police conduct would apply only to that state's prosecutions; such limitations, to the extent that they differ from the federal standard, would not be relevant in federal prosecutions.

Curtilage Defined

Because curtilage is given Fourth Amendment protection, and in all federal and most state cases an open field is not, it is important to know where the curtilage ends and the open field begins. Once the boundaries of the curtilage are set, the area that is an open field also will be defined because an open field is simply that area that lies outside the curtilage. The focus of the inquiry, therefore, should be on the curtilage.

The U.S. Supreme Court has described the curtilage as "the area to which extends the intimate activity associated with the 'sanctity of a man's home and the privacies of life."'(12) The boundaries of the curtilage for most homes are readily apparent. However, not every home is surrounded by property where the private boundaries are readily apparent. In United States v. Dunn,(13) the U.S. Supreme Court set forth four factors to be considered when deciding whether an area is within the curtilage of the home: 1) what is the proximity of the area to the home, 2) is the area within the same enclosure as the home, 3) what is the nature of the use to which the area is put, and 4) what steps have been taken by the resident to protect the area from the view of passersby?

In Dunn, several DEA special agents and officers from the Houston Police Department crossed a perimeter fence that surrounded two barns and a house. They then walked onto the defendant's property and smelled the odor of precursor chemicals used in the manufacture of illegal drugs coming from one of the barns. based on that and other information, they obtained a search warrant and found sufficient evidence in the barn to convict the defendant of manufacturing illegal drugs.

The Dunn Court ruled that the barn was not within the curtilage of the house. Located on a 198-acre ranch, the barn was 60 yards from the house and 50 yards from a second fence surrounding the house. There was no indication that the barn was being used for those intimate activities normally associated with the home, and the defendant had not taken sufficient steps to protect the barn area from those standing in the open field. Finally, the fences were of the type to corral cattle and not those normally used to block the view of the public.(14)

Because the barn was in an open field, the officers did not violate the Fourth Amendment when they walked onto the defendant's property to get to the barn.(15) The inside of the barn, however, was protected by the Fourth Amendment.(16) based on the facts in this case, it was necessary for the officers to obtain a search warrant before they could lawfully enter the barn.

Under Dunn, in order for property to be considered curtilage it must be appurtenant to a residential building. If there is no residence on the property, then the property will be considered an open field. For example, in Foley v. Kentucky,(17) the police, acting on a tip and without a warrant, dug up a large septic tank that was buried on the defendant's father's property. In the tank they found the bodies of four murder victims. The Supreme Court of Kentucky upheld the warrantless unearthing of the septic tank and affirmed the defendant's murder conviction and death sentence. Although the septic tank was located close to a neighbor's cabin, the property on which the tank was found did not have a dwelling. The court ruled, therefore, that the tank was in an open field and not protected by the Fourth Amendment.

In Foley, the property was in a sparsely populated rural area, but at least one court has held that a fenced vacant lot in a densely populated urban area will also be considered an open field. In O'Neal v. Florida,(18) the police opened a gate and walked onto a fenced vacant lot and discovered a stolen vehicle and other stolen property. The court ruled that the fenced lot was an open field because it did not have a residence on it.

Commercial Property

The U.S. Supreme Court has recognized that "[t]he businessman, like the occupant of a residence, has a constitutional right to go about his business free from unreasonable official entries upon his private commercial property."(19) While this statement of general principle applies to the interior of a business, the courts have not given the same protection to the land surrounding a business as they traditionally have given to the curtilage of a home. Implicit in the Dunn decision is the conclusion that a barn used in a commercial enterprise has no curtilage of its own.(20) The property around a business is not like the area around a home; it does not harbor those intimate activities associated with the privacies of life and the sanctity of the home. As a matter of federal constitutional law, most courts have limited the application of the curtilage principles to homes and do not recognize commercial curtilages.(21)

What protection, if any, is given to the area surrounding a business if it is not considered a curtilage? In Illinois v. Janis,(22) the Supreme Court of Illinois ruled that although the outdoor area surrounding a commercial establishment does not constitute a curtilage, the business' expectation of privacy in that area will be protected by the Fourth Amendment if the business takes affirmative steps to bar the public from that area.(23)

 

[BlindDate]

There is another lesson in this story: DON'T STEAL ELECTRICITY!!!!! I'll bet that is what brought the dog in the first place.

 

[Hydro-Soil]

It blows my mind that these people could care less about our constitutional rights and their own. I have no doubt the Supreme Court will find in the favor of the constitution.

Did you just move to the U.S. or something? Have you read the NDAA that just passed?

As has been repeated/quoted by many people and EVEN SUPREME COURT JUSTICES THEMSELVES.... "We don't live in a constitutional america anymore." Yes... those words have dropped from the very mouths of the justices that will be looking at this case.

Give it up folks... Nobody is on your side but myself and a few clued in people. *shrug* Believe what you've been told.

Stay Safe!

 

[IE2KS_KUSH]

Re: US Supreme Court asked to ponder drug dog's sniff

The constitution nor bill of rights apply anymore to anyone in FL. The feds do not need any probable cause, no warrant, nothing. They can take you out of your bed and make you disappear permanently. State and local different story. That being said the SCOTUS has already said the constitution and bill of rights apply to NOBODY in FL if the feds are involved ..you know "national security".