NCJ Number
96496
Journal
Criminal Justice Journal Volume: 7 Issue: 1 Dated: (Fall 1983) Pages: 141-152
Date Published
1983
Length
12 pages
Annotation
The 1983 United States Supreme Court decision in United States v. Place appeared to leave no room for the application of the fourth amendment to dog sniffs of luggage in a public place. However, the Ninth Circuit Court's decision in United States v. Beale stated that a dog sniff is a fourth amendment intrusion, although limited to requiring only articulable suspicion rather than probable cause.
Abstract
The Ninth Circuit Court interpreted the issues of Place to be different from those in the Beale case. The Place case involved the seizure and detention of a traveler's luggage located in an airport. In Beale, the court focused on whether the fourth amendment would demand any prior suspicion of contraband, assuming that the dog sniffing would not require any detention of the luggage. In reviewing the Place decision, the Beale court continued to go against the bulk of authority that canine investigation does not fit within the parameters of the fourth amendment. The rationale behind the Ninth Circuit decision appeared to be the mistaken belief that Place advocated dog sniff investigations with few judicial guidelines. The Beale court considered only privacy regarding the item searched and did not consider the social disruption of the flow of narcotics into the country. Although courts should recognize that a brief dog sniff investigation is a minimal intrusion and not a search, the courts must also carefully consider the narrow exceptions to the fourth amendment so as not to expand law enforcement practice beyond what is reasonable. Society's interests regarding illicit drug trafficking must be included in judicial considerations. Fifty-one footnotes are supplied.