COURT OVERTURNS DRUG ZONE LAW

A Cincinnati ordinance prohibiting convicted drug offenders from
entering ''drug-free'' zones was declared unconstitutional Wednesday
by a 6-1 vote of the Ohio Supreme Court.

The city has not enforced the ordinance enacted in 1996 since a
federal court last year also declared the practice unconstitutional.

The law attacks conduct that might be completely innocent, Chief
Justice Thomas Moyer wrote for the majority.

''A person subject to the exclusion ordinance may not enter a
drug-exclusion zone to speak with counsel, to visit family, to attend
church, to receive emergency medical care, to go to a grocery store,
or just stand on a street corner and look at a blue sky,'' Moyer
wrote.

He said governments are entitled to attack the problem of
drug-infested neighborhoods aggressively.

''When legislation addressing the drug problem infringes certain
fundamental rights, however, more than a compelling interest is
needed to survive constitutional scrutiny,'' he wrote.

The case involved the 1998 arrest of George Burnett on a drug-related
charge. After his conviction, he was barred from a drug-exclusion
zone in Over-the-Rhine for one year.

Burnett was arrested and charged with criminal trespass in the
neighborhood in June 1998.

He appealed, arguing the law was unconstitutional.

A trial court and state appeals court both upheld Cincinnati's law.