| United States v. Place | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Argued March 2, 1983 Decided June 20, 1983 | |
| Full case name | United States of America v. Raymond J. Place |
| Citations | 462 U.S. 696 (more) 103 S. Ct. 2637; 77 L. Ed. 2d 110; 1983 U.S. LEXIS 74; 51 U.S.L.W. 4844 |
| Case history | |
| Prior | Defendant's motion to suppress denied, 498 F. Supp. 1217 (E.D.N.Y. 1980), rev'd, 660 F.2d 44 (2d Cir. 1981), cert. granted, 457 U.S. 1104 (1982) |
| Holding | |
| A dog sniff is not a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. | |
| Court membership | |
| |
| Case opinions | |
| Majority | O'Connor, joined by Burger, White, Powell, Rehnquist, Stevens |
| Concurrence | Brennan, joined by Marshall |
| Concurrence | Blackmun, joined by Marshall |
| Laws applied | |
| U.S. Const. amend. IV | |
United States v. Place, 462 U.S. 696 (1983), is a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States in which the Court held that it does not violate the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution for a trained police dog to sniff of a person's luggage or property in a public place.
On August 17, 1979, suspected drug trafficker Raymond Place had his luggage seized at LaGuardia Airport by agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration, which they kept for several days and exposed to a drug-sniffing dog without a search warrant. Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote for the unanimous Court that the sniff of a dog is sui generis, or "uniquely pervasive", and thus police do not need probable cause for their dogs to sniff a person's belongings in a public place. The Court did rule, however, that detaining a person's belongings while waiting for a police dog to arrive did constitute a "seizure" under the Fourth Amendment.[1]
The decision was the first case to uphold the constitutionality of police use of drug-sniffing dogs, and the Court would revisit the decision several times in the following decades.[2] In Illinois v. Caballes (2005), the Court held that it did not violate the Fourth Amendment to use a drug-detection dog during a legal traffic stop, as long as it did not unreasonably prolong the duration of it.[3] In 2013, the Court held that the police may not bring a police dog to the front door of a private residence without reasonable suspicion (Florida v. Jardines), but upheld that police dogs are generally accurate enough of the time for evidence gathered from them to stand in court (Florida v. Harris).
- ^ Kerr, Orin (June 18, 2014). "Court adopts a Fourth Amendment right to the deletion of non-responsive computer files". The Washington Post. Retrieved June 15, 2022.
- ^ "BRIEF OF AMICUS CURIAE (Police K-9 Magazine and Canine Development Group)" (PDF). Supreme Court of Florida. June 2009. Retrieved August 17, 2022.
- ^ Illinois v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405 (2005).