Ill. Supreme Court: Burnt Cannabis Smell Not Enough for Police Vehicle Search

CHICAGO — The smell of burnt cannabis alone is insufficient to justify a warrantless police search of an automobile, the Illinois Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The ruling stems from a traffic stop in 2020 of Ryan Redmond, who police said had an improperly secured registration on his license plate and was traveling 73 miles-per-hour in a 70-miles-per-hour zone on Interstate 80 near the Quad Cities in western Illinois.

State Trooper Hayden Combs said he smelled a strong odor of burnt cannabis coming from the car, prompting him to search the vehicle, where he found one gram of cannabis inside the center console in a plastic bag, according to the ruling.

The officer said he didn’t smell marijuana on Redmond, who denied smoking in the car, and didn’t see any signs of impairment. Redmond didn’t produce his license or registration, and the officer said he gave evasive answers. But he told the officer he was traveling on I-80 from Des Moines to where he lived in Chicago, along what police called a “known drug corridor.”

Prosecutors charged Redmond with unlawful possession of cannabis. Even though state lawmakers legalized the possession of small amounts of cannabis, effective beginning in 2020, drivers are not allowed to smoke in their vehicles.

But the state Supreme Court ruled 6-0 that without other suspicious circumstances, such as a driver failing to stop for some time, or a bud in plain view, the search was unjustified.

“The laws on cannabis have changed in such a drastic way as to render the smell of burnt cannabis, standing alone, insufficient to provide probable cause for a police officer to search a vehicle without a warrant,” Justice Scott Neville, Jr., wrote.

The justices cited a prior case in stating that “cannabis should be regulated in a manner similar to alcohol,” where possession is generally lawful but remains unlawful under certain circumstances.

Courts from some other states, such as Kansas, Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Pennsylvania, have also ruled that the smell of burnt pot by itself doesn’t justify a search.

But the court cautioned that police can still consider the smell of burnt marijuana as part of the general circumstances that may justify a search. The decision runs counter to a prior ruling from before Illinois legalized pot.

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