Minnesota holds that a dog sniff and alert founded on reasonable suspicion at an apartment door threshold was a valid basis for issuance of a search warrant. The apartment manager saw grow lights inside, and the defendant refused admission for them to fix a water leak. The court distinguished Kyllo because the sniff was from a common area [following other courts; see n. 16], and what was being detected was only evidence of crime and not other innocent activity. State v. Davis, 732 N.W.2d 173 (Minn. 2007):
In Wiegand, the police walked a narcotics-detection dog around the exterior of a motor vehicle that had been stopped because of a burned-out headlight. 645 N.W.2d at 128-29. Because there was “some expectation of privacy in an automobile,” and a dog sniff intrudes upon this privacy interest “to some degree,” we held that the police “cannot conduct a narcotics-detection dog sniff around a motor vehicle stopped for a routine equipment violation without some level of suspicion of illegal activity.” Id. at 134. We concluded that principles from Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1 (1968), were appropriately applied to the context of a motor vehicle stop, and we said that the Terry principles authorized the balancing of the level of intrusiveness of the use of the dog “against the importance of the governmental interest at stake.” Wiegand, 645 N.W.2d at 133-34. Based on this balancing, we adopted the reasonable, articulable suspicion standard as necessary to sustain the use of the dog sniff in Wiegand. Id. at 137. n8
n8 In Wiegand, we said that the reasoning of the Supreme Court in Kyllo “suggests that a dog sniff of a home might lead a court to conclude that a search requiring probable cause took place.” Wiegand, 645 N.W.2d at 130 (discussing Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27(2001)). But Wiegand was decided before the Supreme Court clarified the reach of Kyllo in the context of dog sniffs in Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 408 (2005) (“Official conduct that does not ‘compromise any legitimate interest in privacy’ is not a search subject to the Fourth Amendment. We have held that any interest in possessing contraband cannot be deemed ‘legitimate,’ and thus, governmental conduct that only reveals the possession of contraband ‘compromises no legitimate privacy interest.'” (citation omitted)). See Carter, 697 N.W.2d at 208 (discussing Caballes and Kyllo).
. . .
We held in Carter that reasonable, articulable suspicion struck the appropriate balance between the privacy right of individuals and the government (and society’s) interest in effective law enforcement. 697 N.W.2d at 211-12. We conclude that the same result is warranted here. When we balance the minimal intrusion on Davis’s privacy interests inside his residence against the governmental interest in the use of narcotics-detection dogs as an investigative tool to combat drug crime, we conclude that the police needed a reasonable, articulable suspicion to walk a narcotics-detection dog down the common hallway outside Davis’s apartment. Use of the reasonable suspicion standard is consistent with this court’s goals of preserving the “law enforcement utility” of narcotics-detection dogs and ensuring that the police are not allowed to use narcotics-detection dogs “at random and without reason.” Id. at 211 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Comment: This is a significant case, and it produced a dissent that is equally persuasive. I personally have trouble with a dog sniff at the door of a home, but it is easier to distinguish between an apartment from a common area with clear reasonable suspicion and a house where the police have to enter upon the property. But courts always permit police to enter from the street up the sidewalk or driveway. Whether they will also accede to a drug dog coming along for a sniff is another matter entirely. At the minimum, reasonable suspicion should be required.
Officers on bicycles were patroling outside a bar in Richmond where about 500 people were milling about when a fight broke out among about 20 females. Backup was called, and defendant in a car made a furtive gesture, and an officer ordered him out of the car, and a .357 was found, and he was a felon. The search was reasonable. United States v. Jones, 233 Fed. Appx. 273 (4th Cir. 2007)* (unpublished).
Officer developed reasonable suspicion during traffic stop, and he could run a dog around the car. United States v. Jackson, 235 Fed. Appx. 707 (10th Cir. 2007)* (unpublished).
Plaintiff driving without a license and having his vehicle towed had no Fourth Amendment claim for his arrest or its being towed. There was probable cause for his arrest, and towing the vehicle was incidental. Acevedo v. City of O’Fallon, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 38062 (E.D. Mo. May 24, 2007)*:
Even liberally construed, plaintiff’s complaint fails to assert facts indicating that his arrest, the search of his person and vehicle, and the towing of his vehicle violated plaintiff’s constitutional rights. Plaintiff does not assert that his vehicle was properly registered as required by law (either state statute or municipal ordinance) or that he had a valid, non-revoked state driver’s license. To the contrary, plaintiff seems to believe that he does not need a driver’s license to operate a motor vehicle and that he does not need to comply with vehicle registration laws – these requirements being, in plaintiff’s view, “civil matters.” Driving, however, is a privilege, not a right. Stewart v. Dir. of Revenue, 702 S.W.2d 472, 475 n.2 (Mo. 1986).
Backpack could be inventoried at the jail on defendant’s arrest. State v. McCormick, 37 Kan. App. 2d 829, 159 P.3d 194 (2007).*
