"I'll Call the Dog Squad" — The Number That Kills the Threat

🚔 "I'll Call the Dog Squad" — The Number That Kills the Threat 📌 QUICK ANSWER "I'll just call the dog squad then." Lands like checkmate. It shouldn't. The NSW Ombudsman's own 2006 review of the drug dog programme found almost three quarters of people searched after a dog indicated on them had no drugs at all. The state's own watchdog said the dogs were an ineffective tool — years of monitoring since put the error rate at two thirds to three quarters. ⚖️ WHAT YOU ACTUALLY OWE 🔹 Stop when signalled 🔹 Licence, name, address 🔹 Blow when required 🔹 Never physically resist (s 230 permits reasonable force) That list is complete. It doesn't include waiting indefinitely for an animal. 🐕 WHAT A DOG ACTUALLY IS IN LAW Not a power — a source of information that might contribute to one. General drug detection without individual suspicion is authorised in defined places: licensed premises, festivals, public transport. A random vehicle stop on a suburban road isn't one of them, and the interior of your car isn't a public place. ⏱️ THE THING THE THREAT LEAVES OUT — TIME A traffic stop exists for a purpose, and courts have been blunt about what happens after it's finished. R v Buddy (2016): once the licence is produced and the test is done, you're free to go. Purpose finished means detention finished. Waiting for a dog past that point isn't neutral — it's a stop being stretched to manufacture the grounds that don't currently exist (R v Davis, 2023 — the court's own word was "manufacture"). 😳 HOW FAR A WRONG INDICATION CAN GO Splendour in the Grass, 2018. A dog indicated on Raya Meredith. She was strip searched. Nothing was found. Seven years later, a Supreme Court judge ruled it unlawful — a dog's indication does not make a strip search "seriously and urgently necessary." $93,000 in damages, and more than 3,000 people behind her in the largest class action ever brought against an Australian police force. 🎬 In this video: why waiting is a worse trap than talking, the sentence built for a threat that's really about a clock, and the two exact times you need to write down afterwards if any of this happens to you. 📚 CHECK ME LEPRA 2002 (NSW) ss 31–33, 36, 202, 230 · Road Transport Act 2013 (NSW) s 175 R v Rondo [2001] NSWCCA 540 · R v Buddy [2016] NSWDC · R v Davis [2023] QSC · Meredith v State of NSW [2025] NSWSC NSW Ombudsman, Review of the Police Powers (Drug Detection Dogs) Act 2001 (2006). UNSW strip search research; NSW civil settlement figures reported October 2020. Free on AustLII and the state legislation sites. Get me wrong and I'll pin the correction. 🔗 💬 Ever been made to wait for a dog that was called? Tell me how long, and whether it ever turned up. ⚠️ General legal information and education only, not legal advice. NSW law, with Vic and Qld flagged where they differ — every other state runs its own rules. Legal Aid operates nationwide. #PoliceSearch #KnowYourRights #TrafficStop #AustralianLaw #NSW #Australia #YourRights