WASHINGTON—On Jan. 21, the Supreme Court heard Rodriguez v. United States, the case that may settle how long and under what circumstances a law enforcement officer can reasonably delay you at a traffic stop.
The high court’s decision may also clarify some thorny issues concerning constitutional rights under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which ensures privacy and prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. The Fourth Amendment also requires that law enforcement have a warrant for a search based on “probable cause” that the law is being violated.
Here are the particulars of the case.
One evening in Nebraska in 2012, Officer Morgan Struble spotted a vehicle swerving off the shoulder of the road and jerked back. He stopped the vehicle, driven by Dennys Rodriguez, who said he was avoiding a pothole. Struble grew suspicious at the answers he was getting from Rodriguez and his passenger, and the air freshener he smelled, according to Rory Little of Scotusblog. He did the routine checks on identification and auto registration and then decided he should have his narcotics-sniffing dog check for illegal drugs. Struble is a canine police officer who, as it happened, had his dog with him. But before doing the dog sniff, he called for a backup officer for safety reasons.
Struble returned to the vehicle, handed Rodriguez a warning citation, and then asked if he could do a dog sniff check. Rodriguez said no, upon which Struble ordered him out of the vehicle. They waited about 6 minutes for the backup to arrive. Then Struble’s dog circled the car, which took no more than two additional minutes, and discovered a bag of methamphetamine. Thus, the elapsed time added on to the traffic stop was 7 or 8 minutes to an already 21 minute traffic stop.
Justice Ruminations
No one questions Officer Struble entitlement to make a traffic stop of Rodriquez, based on his erratic driving. But the issue is, “after completing the task related to a traffic stop, whether an officer without individualized suspicion, can hold the driver for a dog sniff,” said Shannon O'Connor, who spoke on behalf of Rodriguez.
