Justices Look Again at How Police May Search Homes

New York Times ^ | January 12, 2011 | Adam Liptak

[triumphant values]

WASHINGTON — More than 60 years ago, the Supreme Court ruled that the police were not entitled to enter a residence without a warrant merely because they smelled burning opium. Related

Times Topic: U.S. Supreme Court On Wednesday, at the argument of a case about what the police were entitled to do on smelling marijuana outside a Kentucky apartment, two justices voiced concerns that the court may be poised to eviscerate the older ruling.

“Aren’t we just simply saying they can just walk in whenever they smell marijuana, whenever they think there’s drugs on the other side?” Justice Sonia Sotomayor said, considering what a decision against the defendant would signal to the police. “Why do we even bother giving them a warrant?”

The old ruling, Johnson v. United States in 1948, involved the search of a hotel room in Seattle. The smell of drugs could provide probable cause for a warrant, Justice Robert H. Jackson wrote for the majority, but it did not entitle the police to enter without one.

“No suspect was fleeing or likely to take flight,” Justice Jackson wrote. “The search was of permanent premises, not of a movable vehicle. No evidence or contraband was threatened with removal or destruction.”

In the new case, police officers in Kentucky were looking for a suspect who had sold cocaine to an informant. They smelled burning marijuana coming from an apartment, knocked loudly and announced themselves.

Then they heard sounds from inside the apartment that they said made them fear evidence was being destroyed. They kicked the door in and found marijuana and cocaine but not the original suspect, who was in a different apartment.

[Secret Agent Man]

They’ll have every person on their team packing a different kind of “ham sandwich”.

One “ham sandwich” being a throwaway gun. Another being a baggie of pot they can plant. Another, a knife. Then whatever the situaton requires, can just be tossed in and wham! three or four police testifying the same lie versus one alleged criminal.

[Ken H]

I generally don't have a problem with most of the "war on drugs".

So you don't have a problem with the elastic New Deal Commerce Clause?

[Neidermeyer]

You forgot the “ham sandwich” that is their current favorite ,, a memory stick with kiddie porn on it..

[BlueDragon]

He might have been better off saying it looked funny. At least it would have been more honest.

With the city I was in (a small one where most who had been there for years either knew, or knew of most others) not all the cops were jerks, some of them were real stand up guys.

Before I left a about a year ago, one of the best told me he was going to retire. He'd had too much grief from trying to keep the jerks on the force in line. At least the chief had the sense to keep him as a Sargeant for as long as he could.

Oh well. All good things come to an end.

[clee1]

That’s when I smile sweetly and say, Officer, I am recording this encounter to use as evidence against YOU in the false arrect case I’ll be filing in 20 minutes.....”