Pubdate: Wed, 20 Feb 2013
Source: Washington Post (DC)
Copyright: 2013 The Washington Post Company
Contact: http://mapinc.org/url/mUgeOPdZ
Website: http://www.washingtonpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/491
Author: Robert Barnes

SUPREME COURT SIDES WITH FLORIDA DRUG-SNIFFING DOG

The Supreme Court on Tuesday sided with a drug-sniffing German 
shepherd named Aldo in ruling that police do not have to extensively 
document a dog's expertise to justify relying on the animal to search 
someone's vehicle.

The unanimous court overturned a decision by the Florida Supreme 
Court. That court had thrown out a 2006 search of a man's truck after 
Aldo "alerted" to the smell of drugs, saying police must compile 
detailed evidence of the dog's reliability before probable cause to 
search the vehicle is established.

Justice Elena Kagan said the Florida court had gone too far, and 
suggested that proper training and certification of the dog - rather 
than how it has performed in the field - might be enough for law 
enforcement's purposes.

"The question - similar to every inquiry into probable cause - is 
whether all the facts surrounding a dog's alert, viewed through the 
lens of common sense, would make a reasonably prudent person think 
that a search would reveal contraband or evidence of a crime," Kagan wrote.

"A sniff is up to snuff when it meets that test. . . . Aldo's did."

The case was one of two the court accepted regarding drugsniffing 
dogs from Florida. It has not decided the other, which concerns 
whether police may bring a dog to someone's home and then use the 
dog's "alert" to the presence of drugs as probable cause for getting 
a search warrant.

At oral arguments, that case - involving a chocolate Lab named Franky 
- - caused considerably more debate among the justices.

Aldo's case came from the Florida Panhandle, where Officer William 
Wheetley stopped Clayton Harris because of an expired license plate. 
Wheetley found Harris nervous and shaking, and the man refused 
Wheetley's request to search his truck. Wheetley brought out Aldo, 
and the dog alerted to the smell of something on the driver's side door handle.

Wheetley used the alert as probable cause to search the vehicle and 
found the ingredients for making methamphetamine. Wheetley was 
convicted, but the Florida Supreme Court reversed the conviction.

The Florida high court, citing a growing body of evidence that dogs 
often make mistakes or are influenced by their handlers, said judges 
had to consider a long list of specific findings, including how the 
dogs perform in the field.

Kagan said that went too far, and was at odds with previous U. S. 
Supreme Court decisions that prescribed "a more flexible, all-things- 
considered" approach. She noted that defense lawyers who had specific 
concerns about a dog's qualification could still make such a case to 
a judge. The case is Florida v. Harris. The court also was unanimous 
in ruling that an American soldier could still pursue custody of his 
daughter in U. S. courts even though a lower court had allowed the 
mother to take the child to her native Scotland.

An appeals court said that the move had rendered Sgt. 1st Class 
Jeffrey Lee Chafin's lawsuit moot, because international child 
custody suits must be conducted in the child's "country of habitual residence."

But Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. said the U. S. Court of Appeals 
for the 11th Circuit was wrong to rule that Chafin's only remedy was 
in Scottish courts.

"Such return does not render this case moot; there is a live dispute 
between the parties over where their child will be raised, and there 
is a possibility of effectual relief for the prevailing parent," Roberts wrote.

Chafin and Scottish-born Lynne Chafin were married in her country in 
2006, and their daughter was born the next year. They lived together 
in Germany until he was deployed to Afghanistan, and mother and 
daughter moved to Scotland.

Chafin was transferred to Alabama in 2009 and, even though the 
marriage was in trouble, the family reunited there. The couple agreed 
to divorce in 2010. Lynne Chafin was deported after her visa expired, 
and she filed her petition to have Eris join her in Scotland.

A federal judge in Alabama agreed with Lynne Chafin and declined to 
grant a stay of the order. Mother and child departed that day. When 
Jeffrey Chafin appealed, the 11th Circuit dismissed his petition. It 
said that under the Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of 
International Child Abduction, there was nothing left for U. S. 
courts to decide.

Roberts said Jeffrey Chafin may not prevail in U. S. courts, but the 
uncertainty did not render the case moot.

The case is Chafin v. Chafin.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom