United States v. Jacobs

The Iowa City police received a tip from a Phoenix, Arizona, police officer that a suspicious package was being shipped via Federal Express to Ronald Jacobs (defendant). A team of officers intercepted the package at the Federal Express office in Iowa City. Officer Brotherton went to the magistrate judge’s office to file a warrant application to search the package. Other officers placed the suspicious package near other packages and brought in a police drug-detection dog to conduct a canine sniff. The police dog showed interest in the suspicious package and no interest in any of the other packages but did not perform an official “alert” to the suspicious package. When this information was relayed to Brotherton, he wrote in the warrant application that the dog had shown interest in only the suspicious package, not the other packages, but did not disclose that the dog had not alerted to the package. The magistrate issued a search warrant for the package. A second police dog did not show any interest or alert to the package after the warrant had been issued. The police searched the package despite the second dog’s lack of response to the package. The package contained drugs. Jacobs was charged and eventually convicted of drug offenses. Jacobs appealed, claiming his Fourth Amendment rights were violated because the warrant application omitted relevant information.