The state Supreme Court said in a unanimous ruling Thursday that police officers improperly used the smell of marijuana to search a man’s car on the New Jersey Turnpike in 2016, a decision that allows the man to withdraw his guilty plea to a weapons offense.
The ruling comes more than two years after Gov. Phil Murphy signed a law that bars police from using the odor of cannabis as probable cause to search someone or their car. That law, which was irrelevant to the case at hand because of the timing, means cases involving police using the smell of marijuana to search cars will “likely be few and far between,” Thursday’s ruling says.
Raymond Hamlin, the attorney who represented the defendant in this case — Cornelius Cohen — cheered the decision.
“It’s significant for us that we were ultimately vindicated, and that’s unbelievably satisfying,” said Hamlin.