The probable cause was so thick you could smell it, but that still didn’t give a New Jersey state trooper authority for a warrantless search of a tractor-trailer cab for marijuana, an appeals court says.

Applying retroactively State v. Pena-Flores, 198 N.J. 6 (2009), which requires both probable cause and exigent circumstances for a warrantless search, the judges in State v. Pompa, A-0139-08, said a strong odor of marijuana could supply the former but not the latter.