This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

A couple of months ago, when the Legislature filled Utah's quota of stuff for comedy writers to make fun of, we were all assured that the state's resolution declaring pornography to be a "public health hazard" did not mean anyone was about to ban anything.

Neither the resolution's main sponsor, Sen. Todd Weiler, nor anyone else involved even tried to offer the specific legal definition that would have to be written before any act or any item could be declared criminal.

The resolution called for more study and, as we say in the editorial writing dodge, viewed with alarm the growing availability of all kinds of porn, on all manner of devices, within easy, or even accidental, reach of children.

(Editorial writers basically do two things. "We view with alarm." "We point with pride." Even if we had nothing to do with it.)

The senator's reassurance got a little wobbly, though, when it was reported the other day that a Utah police department has acquired the services of a police dog who has been trained to sniff out porn.

Well, no, not really.

URL (pronounced, of course, Earl) is a sweet-looking black Labrador who has been trained to detect hidden thumb drives, DVDs and other storage devices that can hold scads of data, photos and video but can be really easy to conceal.

And, because one of the things police might be looking for on those sticks and discs is porn, headlines here and across the country instantly dubbed the poor innocent pup the Porn Dog of Weber County.

The Tribune's article suggested two things that were a bit reassuring. The investigations URL might be used in would be those looking for the kind of porn that victimizes children ­— the stuff that is to the First Amendment what the AR-15 is to the Second.

Also, the usual practice for such a search would be that it would only come when URL's human counterparts were clutching a properly issued, probable-cause search warrant. The kind held by the minders of the pooch that sniffed out the evidence that nailed that sleazy guy who used to make TV spots for a national chain of sandwich shops.

If that were to be the legitimate target, and the due process, then we'd probably all be happy if URL were to go forth and multiply.

We'd be even happier, some of us, if such dogs were a common sight at big New York banks, Washington political action committees and the Utah Capitol. There they could dutifully bark, scratch and point at the scent of phony financial statements, lists of secret donors and records of who paid for what play. Some much more admirable wolves of Wall Street.

Until we see these noses blow the covers off the dirty deeds the rich get up to, the poor dogs are likely to either remain punch lines or become another weapon in the arsenal of a police culture that is not only overly militarized but way too — with apologies to Charlie Brown — Snoopy.

There have already been many complaints that the more common cousins of URL, the dogs trained to sniff out drugs, are digging under the Fourth Amendment's guard against unreasonable search and seizure by being trained on people, cars, luggage, school lockers, etc., of people who have raised no suspicion — other than that they may be young, Hispanic and have too many fast food wrappers in their car.

When the dog indicates a hit — maybe because he smelled something, maybe because he has figured out that certain behaviors elicit more Scooby Snacks — that questionable result becomes the probable cause that wasn't there the moment before.

Nipping at the heels of Monday's U.S. Supreme Court ruling, in a South Salt Lake case, that police have almost no limits in who they can detain and search, the knowledge that law enforcement is employing a new tool in the search for, well, whatever it might find, is not all that comforting.

Until, of course, one of those dogs finds an illegal gun on the person of someone headed into a school, a movie theater or a bar. At which time we can all switch sides.

George Pyle, a Tribune editorial writer, doesn't hear very well any more. And smells worse. gpyle@sltrib.com