LANSING, MI — Michigan courts and police continue to work within a gray created by state marijuana legalization that contradicts federal law.
Not only are lines blurred by conflicting jurisdictional laws, and complicated by the division of the state’s medical and recreational statutes, but Michigan courts operate, in part, based on precedents established under the now-faulty premise that marijuana is illegal.
A court ruling could help to tidy things up a bit. The Court of Appeals in an opinion published Feb. 13, 2020 ruled that, while police must have more evidence than simply the scent of marijuana to justify a warrant-less vehicle search, lying or deceiving police may change that.
In November 2018, Trooper Allan Park of the Michigan State Police stopped medical marijuana caregiver Thomas Moorman at a gas station in the Upper Peninsula’s Alger County for speeding.
Park claimed he smelled “a strong odor of fresh marijuana emanating from the vehicle, which indicated to him that there was a ‘good quantity’ of marijuana in the vehicle,” the Court of Appeals said in their ruling.
Moorman said he had no marijuana but as questioning persisted, he admitted that he harvested some marijuana earlier in the day. He also told the trooper he was a registered medical marijuana caregiver with five assigned patients, the Court of Appeals said.
The court ruled. ” … We conclude that defendant’s behavior (denying the presence of marijuana) was inconsistent with being in lawful possession of marijuana … This behavior, in conjunction with the odor of marijuana, gave rise to probable cause …
The court did not address how possession of recreational marijuana might impact an officer’s right to conduct a vehicle search.
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Case Law Reference
People v Williams, 472 Mich 308, 315; 696 NW2d 636 (2005).
“[U]nder the automobile exception, the police may search a motor vehicle without the necessity of first obtaining a warrant if probable cause to support the search exists.”
Kazmierczak, 461 Mich at 418-419.
In Kazmierczak, this Court held that “the smell of marijuana alone by a person qualified to know the odor may establish probable cause to search a motor vehicle, pursuant to the motor vehicle exception to the warrant requirement.” Kazmierczak, 461 Mich at 413.
