Oregon v. Sholedice

These consolidated cases involved two defendants who were separately charged with unlawfully delivering marijuana. In one case United States Postal Service (USPS) took a package out of a mail hamper and put it on the floor so that a drug-detection dog could sniff it. In the other case, another postal inspector seized the package after a drug-sniffing dog alerted to the package, and the inspector took the package to the addressee’s house and asked for consent to search it. Focusing on the first issue, the trial court ruled that no seizure had occurred because defendants had no constitutionally protected possessory interest in the package while it was in the mail. The Court of Appeals reversed, reasoning that defendants had a constitutionally protected property interest in the package, which the first postal inspector significantly interfered with when she took the package out of the mail hamper. The Oregon Supreme Court concluded the first postal inspector did not seize the package when she put it in a package lineup for the dog to sniff, and that the request for consent in the second package's seizure was reasonable. Because both officials acted consistently with Article I, Section 9, the trial courts correctly denied defendants' motions to suppress. View "Oregon v. Sholedice" on Justia Law