False positives suggest police exploit dogs to justify searches

[pnwmom]

Dogs are smart at reading people -- they know how to figure out what their handler wants them to do -- and they'll get a treat for it. But, hey, let's fill the airports up with them. Who cares about a little racial profiling, right?

:sarcasm:

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/01/false-positives-police-canines-searches/

Ex-cop: Police 'using dogs to trample our rights as citizens'

A study of "false positives" involving drug-sniffing police dogs suggests some police forces may be using canines to do an end-run around constitutional protections against search and seizure, and may be profiling racial minorities in the process.

A survey of primarily suburban police departments in Illinois, carried out by the Chicago Tribune, found that 56 percent of all police searches triggered by a drug-sniffing dog turned nothing up.

But, perhaps tellingly, that number jumped to 73 percent when the search involved a Latino subject -- meaning that nearly three-quarters of all dog alerts on Latinos turned up no contraband. The study covered a two-year period from 2007 to 2009.

SNIP

But civil liberties advocates smell a rat, and say this is evidence that police are using canines to carry out racial profiling and unjustified searches. And dog-training experts say the problem stems at least in part from an almost complete lack of standards for police dogs in the US.

SNIP

Lawrence Myers, an Auburn University professor who studies police dogs, told the Tribune that residue from long-gone drugs isn't the only way a dog can give a false positive. Dog handlers can trigger a false positive from a dog by walking it around a car too many times, or too slowly, giving the dog a cue that a certain behavior is expected.

SNIP


"We've seen a national outcry about being frisked and scanned at airports," ACLU attorney Adam Schwartz told the Tribune. "The experience of having police take your car apart for an hour is far more invasive and frightening and humiliating."

[formercia]

1. I had that happen to me coming back from Mexico

I handed the Customs agent a paper bag and told him that when he was finished unrolling the gum wrappers and other trash, to please deposit the refuse in the bag. My car was spotless when he finished.

[pnwmom]

2. Really? You're a brave person! So maybe that's

how to get my car clean . . .

:)

[formercia]

5. He was the new guy, got the shit detail.

He gave me a dirty look, but the senior agents chuckled.

[arcane1]

3. I believe Barry Cooper mentions this in one of his vids, too

http://nevergetbusted.com/2010/

[LisaL]

4. As it now stands, at the airport, you can be picked for

an x-ray scanner and/or "enhanced" pat down for no reason whatsoever. Nobody even has to pretend there is any probable cause. I suppose that makes you happier?

[pnwmom]

6. The searches are done randomly. That doesn't mean for any

reason whatsoever. It means every Xth passenger.

[LisaL]

7. As far as I can tell, TSA doesn't say that they pick every Xth passenger for a search,

so where did you get that idea?

[pnwmom]

8. They're not going to say what their formula is -- that would be idiotic --

but they must be using a formula or legally it wouldn't be random. The Courts have allowed random searches but not searches "for any reason" whatsoever.

[LisaL]

9. You are clearly speculating so I see no reason to argue about it.

Regardless, TSA decided it does not need any probable cause to pick someone for an x-ray scanner or an enhanced pat down. So using that as an example of something better than dogs is beyond my understanding.

[walldude]

10. Funny I was just reading an article,

wish I could remember where, about a school that allowed the police to bring dogs in for locker searches. Only 44% of the hits were positive. Less than half.