Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Police in Minnesota will no longer be able to conduct searches during traffic stops based solely on the odor of cannabis under a new state law. The legislation, which was signed into law late last month by Democratic Gov. Tim Walz as part of a judiciary and public safety supplemental budget bill, codifies a 2023 Minnesota Supreme Court ruling that banned warrantless searches of vehicles based only on the smell of marijuana.
A new Minnesota state law bars police officers from making warrantless searches of vehicles based ...
[+] solely on the odor of cannabis. Prior to the Supreme Court ruling, law enforcement officers would often use the smell of pot emanating from a vehicle as probable cause to search the vehicle and its occupants and contents. But after Minnesota legalized recreational marijuana law last year, the court ruled in a 5-2 decision written by Justice Anne McKeig that such searches were not legal.
“Because we conclude that the odor of marijuana emanating from a vehicle, alone, is insufficient to create the requisite probable cause to search a vehicle under the automobile exception to the warrant requirement, we affirm,” McKeig wrote for the majority, according to a report from MinnPost. Bill Codifies Supreme Court Decision The legislative language in the bill approved last month is based on a broader measure by DFL Sen. Clare Oumou Verbeten that would have banned police officers from asking for consent to s.
