Florida v. Harris
The Court Rules That an Alert From a Trained Police Dog Is Grounds for a Warrantless Search
Florida v. Clayton Harris was featured in Drug-Sniffing Police Dogs, Supreme Court Debates (Jan. 2013). The following is excerpted from the summary of the unanimous opinion written by Justice Kagan, as prepared by the Court Reporter of Decisions: Because training and testing records supported [police dog] Aldo’s reliability in detecting drugs and Harris failed to undermine that evidence, [Officer William] Wheetley had probable cause to search Harris’s truck. In testing whether an officer has probable cause to conduct a search, all that is required is the kind of “fair probability” on which “reasonable and prudent [people] act.” — Illinois…
