Court Opinion

ID: 9735111
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 18:02:08.3062+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:26:55.306172
License: Public Domain

ANDERSON, Russell A.,'
Justice (dissenting).
DISSENT
I respectfully dissent. I would affirm the conviction, concluding that the information contained in the search warrant affidavit, including .the dog sniff, provided *213a substantial basis for the issuing judge to conclude that there was probable cause to search the storage unit.
We do not “ ‘cavalierly construe our constitution more expansively than the United States Supreme Court has construed the federal constitution.’ ” State v. Askerooth, 681 N.W.2d 353, 362 (Minn.2004) (quoting State v. Fuller, 374 N.W.2d 722, 726-27 (Minn.1985)). This is particularly true where, as here, the two constitutional provisions are textually identical. Fuller, 374 N.W.2d at 727. Except for two other states, we are alone in construing the state constitution to mean that a dog sniff in the semi-public area outside a self-storage unit constitutes a search. All courts that have considered the issue have concluded that under the Fourth Amendment, no search occurs in this circumstance. These decisions are based on United States v. Place, 462 U.S. 696, 707, 103 S.Ct. 2637, 77 L.Ed.2d 110 (1983), in which the United States Supreme Court held that the exposure of luggage to a trained drug-detection dog at an airport did not constitute a search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. We recently held that a dog sniff around the exterior of a legitimately stopped motor vehicle is not a search requiring probable cause under either the Fourth Amendment or, Minn. Const, art. I, § 10. State v. Wiegand, 645 N.W.2d 125, 133 (Minn. 2002). In so holding, we found no .sound basis for rejecting the United States Supreme Court’s approach, noting that Place “was not a radical or sharp departure from precedent.” 645 N.W.2d at 132.
The Fourth Amendment and Minn. Const, art. I, § 10, protect a person’s legitimate expectations of privacy against unreasonable government intrusions. United States v. Chadwick, 433 U.S. 1, 7, 97 S.Ct. 2476, 53 L:Ed.2d 538 (1977); In re Welfare of B.R.K., 658 N.W.2d 565, 578 (Minn.2003). A legitimate expectation of privacy is, in the words of Justice Harlan, “one that society is prepared to recognize as ‘reasonable.’ ” Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 361, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967) (Harlan, J., concurring). Rakas v. Illinois, 439 U.S. 128, 143-44 n. 12, 99 S.Ct. 421, 58 L.Ed.2d 387 (1978); State v. Licari, 659 N.W.2d 243, 249 (Minn.2003). Justice Harlan later suggested, and the leading commentator on search and seizure law agrees, that the question whether reliance upon privacy is legitimate or reasonable “must * * * be answered by assessing the nature of a particular practice and the likely extent of its impact on the indiyidual’s sense of security balanced against the utility of the .conduct as a technique of law enforcement.” United States v. White, 401 U.S. 745, 786, 91 S.Ct. 1122, 28 L.Ed.2d 453 (1971) (Harlan, J., dissenting); 1 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure § 2.1(d), at 440 (4th ed.2004). Under this approach, “those more extensive intrusions that significantly jeopardize the sense of security which is the paramount concern of Fourth Amendment liberties are searches.” (citing United States v. White, 401 U.S. at 786, 91 S.Ct. 1122). This approach involves a two-part inquiry: (1) what “sense of security” is important in our society, and (2) whether - the police investigative practice threatens that sense of security. Id. at 440-43.1
Applying this fundamental approach to what constitutes a legitimate expectation of privacy protected by the constitutional *214proscription against unreasonable searches and seizures, I would conclude that the use of a trained drug-detection dog outside Carter’s storage unit did not constitute a search. As the renter, Carter doubtless had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the storage unit itself. See Licari, 659 N.W.2d at 250. We are concerned, however, with whether Carter had a legitimate expectation of privacy in the air outside the unit, in a semi-public walkway. The expectation-of-privacy analysis “necessarily requires consideration of the particular privacy interests in [that]- place.” Wiegand, 645 N.W.2d at 130.
The area where the dog sniff was conducted is a semi-public walkway that is accessible to renters of other storage units, the management of the facility, and individuals there by consent. Carter had no ability to limit their access to and use of the walkway, and he has not questioned the legitimacy of police presence there. Additionally, Carter was at the unit only periodically, and he obviously did not live there. I fail to see what “sense of security,” or legitimate expectation of privacy, Carter might possibly have had in the air in the semi-public area outside his storage unit.
It is not enough to say that the privacy interest in a storage unit is heightened because it is designed as a repository for personal effects. The same is true of luggage and the trunk of an automobile, and once they are immobilized, a dog sniff of them does not constitute a search under Place and Wiegand. A stopped vehicle additionally implicates the privacy interests of its occupants, and persons, no less than their effects, are constitutionally protected from unreasonable searches.
The majority implies that Carter had a legitimate expectation of privacy outside his storage unit on indications that drug-detection dogs may be more fallible than previously supposed. Whether a particular dog has unacceptably high error rates should go to probable cause for issuance of a search warrant, not an individual’s expectation of privacy in a particular place. See LaFave, supra, § 2.2(g), at 538 (if dogs are not as accurate as assumed in Place, this bears not so much on the question whether a dog’s sniffing is a search as it does on the question whether a dog’s alert standing alone constitutes probable cause for warrant); Illinois v. Caballes, — U.S. -, 125 S.Ct. 834, 838, 160 L.Ed.2d 842 (2005) (no suggestion that erroneous alert, in and of itself, reveals any legitimate private information). Whether fallible or not, dog sniffs still constitute a limited intrusion, revealing nothing else inside the structure that might implicate a legitimate expectation of privacy.
Quoting Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27, 34, 121 S.Ct. 2038, 150 L.Ed.2d 94 (2001), the majority also bases its holding on the ground that drug-detection dogs provide information that was “previously unknowable without physical intrusion.” Kyllo, however, involved a thermal-imaging device that could detect lawful activities within a home in which individuals have an obviously legitimate expectation of privacy. By contrast, a dog sniff is limited to revealing only the presence of contraband. Because any interest in possessing contraband is not one that society considers legitimate, a sense-enhancing technique that only reveals the presence of contraband “ ‘compromises no legitimate privacy interest.’ ” Caballes, 125 S.Ct. at 837 (quoting United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109, 123, 104 S.Ct. 1652, 80 L.Ed.2d 85 (1984)). As the Supreme Court stated in Caballes: “Critical to [the Kyllo] decision was the fact that the device was capable of detecting lawful activity— in that case intimate details in a home *215* * *. The legitimate expectation that information about perfectly lawful activity will remain private is categorically distinguishable from [a person’s] hopes or expectations concerning the nondetection of contraband * * Caballes, 125 S.Ct. at 838;
I am also concerned over what today’s decision portends for “plain smell” observations made in public or semi-public areas generally. Examples include the use of bomb-detection dogs to sniff for explosives, and humans detecting the odor of a decaying body or a methamphetamine laboratory. Under the approach taken by the majority, an individual may have a legitimate expectation of privacy in a particular space for some purposes but perhaps not for others, and the police and lower courts are provided little guidance in determining whether a particular intrusion into that space constitutes a “search” or not under the Minnesota Constitution.
Additionally, we need to be mindful that except in very limited circumstances, the Fourth Amendment and Minn. Const, art. I, § 10 require probable cause for a search. Terry frisks and other intrusions upon an individual’s personal security based on less than probable cause have been allowed not as a middle ground, but instead due to the “special needs” of law enforcement. Skinner v. Ry. Labor Executives’ Ass’n, 489 U.S. 602, 619, 109 S.Ct. 1402, 103 L.Ed.2d 639 (1989); New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325, 351, 105 S.Ct. 733, 83 L.Ed.2d 720 (1985) (Blaekmun, J., concurring). The special-needs doctrine requires the court “to balance the governmental and privacy interests to assess the practicality of the warrant and probable-cause requirements in the particular context.” Skinner, 489 U.S. at 619, 109 S.Ct. 1402.
Finally, even applying the majority’s rationale, I would conclude that the police had reasonable suspicion to justify a dog sniff of Carter’s storage unit. The police were conducting an ongoing investigation into suspected drug dealing and firearms possession by Carter and his brother, both of whom had prior convictions -and arrests for controlled substance and weapons offenses. Both of the brothers rented units at the storage facility; -they sometimes were there several times a day; and sometimes Carter and his brother were seen together at .Carter’s storage unit. A few weeks beforehand, a BCA agent observed suspicious activity at the facility involving two cars, one of which was registered to Carter’s brother. And only a few days before the dog sniff, Carter had again been allowed use of his storage unit after paying arrearages in rent.
For all of these reasons, I would affirm the conviction.

. We recently used similar language in holding that under Minn. Const, art. I, § 10, the reasonableness test involves "a balancing of the government’s need to search or seize ‘and the individual's right to personal security free from arbitrary interference by law officers.’ Askerooth, 681 N.W.2d at 365 (quoting United States v. Brignoni-Ponce, 422 U.S. 873, 878, 95 S.Ct. 2574, 45 L.Ed.2d 607 (1975)).