I just saw a story on the local news. A survivalist named Fernando Salguero was arrested for having “incendiary devices” and some other illegal things. Salguero’s car, an ex police car apparently, was parked illegally in the lot of a New Jersey courthouse. This seemed suspicious to the cops. They brought in a bomb sniffing dog. Based on the dog indicating explosives, they got a search warrant and searched the car.
This is surprised me. I thought you needed a warrant to bring in the dogs and that having a dog sniff your vehicle constituted a search.
I’m curious where you heard that usage of bomb-sniffing dogs required a warrant, since that doesn’t seem very logical. (A police office could look through the windows of a parked car without a warrant, so why would using a tool to check for gases released by your vehicle into the public space require a warrant?).
I know of too many cases where simple logic doesn’t match the law or even reality, to say you’re wrong, but it seems improbable.
World’s easiest warrant to get:
“Judge we think there might be a bomb outside your courthouse.”
[Boom] <- sound of judges pen breaking the sound barrier as he signs warrant.
There is an “automobile” warrant exception, which basically says you have a lower expectation of privacy in a vehicle because they are heavily regulated and for public policy reasons*. Furthermore, a warrant has generally not been required for a dog sniff anywhere because it’s not a “search” for Fourth Amendment purposes.
As a result, the fuzz can sniff out vehicles parked in public places more or less at will. The Jardines case being considered by SCOTUS now isn’t really on point, because it involves the police entering private property (the curtilage of a residence), not a wholly public place.
*cars being mobile by nature, and any evidence in cars thus being at risk of disappearing.
Yes, but it would be a big surprise if they didn’t reverse. External sniffs have been pretty well established in law since a time when SCOTUS was far more liberal.