Gadson v. State’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

7 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 7 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “Whether the Fourth amendment was even involved, so as to require satisfaction, at that particular stage of the total investigative episode depends upon whether a sniff or smell by a drug detection dog constitutes a “search” within the contemplation of the Fourth Amendment. It does not.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage
   e.g. 190 Md. App. 497 - Jackson v. State · 153 Md. App. 601 - Fitzgerald v. State

2. “The elementary physics of the olfactory sense, at least in circumstances such as these, is that the dog’s nose never intrudes into a constitutionally protected area, such as the appellant’s truck. It is rather the case that the dog’s nose remains outside, where the dog’s nose has a constitutionally unassailable' right to be, and that the suspicious and incriminating vapors come wafting out across the public air to meet the dog’s nose on the dog’s nose’s turf. We see no doctrinal difference, be the investigator man or beast, between standing outside and smelling aromas emanating from a truck, on the one hand, and standing outside and hearing sounds resonating from a truck, on the other. In each case, the sensory receptor remains outside where it has a right to be and the stimuli come out to meet it there.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 153 Md. App. 601 - Fitzgerald v. State

3. “The probable cause to believe that the truck contained contraband narcotics was supplied by “Sandy,” a member of the Maryland State Police K-9 corps, who had been licensed as a certified drug detection dog and who worked regularly with Trooper Prince. As Sandy stood outside the appellant’s truck, with its doors closed, he “alerted” to the presence of narcotics. That the “alert” to the presence of narcotics by a trained and certified drug-sniffing canine is ample to establish probable cause is well established law. Looking forward from the moment when Sandy, by “alerting,” communicated his belief to Trooper Prince that narcotics were in the truck, the Fourth Amendment was not offended by the ensuing warrantless Carroll Doctrine search of the truck for those narcotics.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage
   e.g. 153 Md. App. 601 - Fitzgerald v. State