COP POWERS SCRUTINIZED

Drug-Sniffing Dog Searches At Issue

A case that began when officers showed up at a Sarnia, Ont., high
school with "Chief" the drug-sniffing dog is about to test the limits
of police powers in Canada.

The Crown appeal, to be heard today by the Supreme Court of Canada,
will help determine whether police can use sniffer dogs to conduct
random searches of schools and other public places.

At issue is whether an unannounced police visit to St. Patrick's high
school in 2002 amounted to an unreasonable search and seizure under
the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Students spent nearly two hours
locked down in their classrooms while police combed the school with
their dog, who led them to five bags of marijuana and 10 magic
mushrooms in a backpack belonging to a student known as "A.M."

"What this comes down to is whether using police and police dogs in
this way is a proper ... exercise of power," said Jonathan Lisus, a
lawyer representing the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, which is
intervening in the case. "Do we want an environment where schools and
children are policed?"

To the Ontario Court of Appeal, there was more than a whiff of
illegality about the incident.

"This was a warrantless, random search with the entire student body
held in detention," the court said in a ruling last year, upholding a
trial judge's decision to acquit A.M. of possession for the purpose of
trafficking.