PROTECT PRIVACY: THERMAL IMAGING RULING WAS RIGHT

The U.S. Supreme Court's position last week to curtail the use of thermal
imaging by law enforcement officers is a victory for Fourth Amendment rights.

The ruling will certainly change the legal outcome of two marijuana cases
in Maine in which thermal imaging was used, and law enforcement officers in
New Hampshire will also be affected in future investigations by the court's
ruling.

No doubt, a high court decision that would have gone the other way would
have frightening implications for privacy issues in the United States.

Unchecked use of heat-sensing equipment by police officers in the United
States conjures up disturbing images of Nazi Germany when government
officials scanned neighborhoods with detectors to find contraband radios in
people's homes.

The justices were correct to take measures protecting the sanctity of the
home in the face of burgeoning technology that continues to sharpen human
senses and give us information in ways that had not been possible.

The inexorable advance of technology, of course, has created plenty of
privacy issues and concomitant challenges in the courts that no one has
ever before witnessed.

Who would have thought a decade ago that police officers would be able to
scan a home with a heat-sensing device and find evidence of someone
breaking the law by growing marijuana under artificial lighting in their home?

Technology also has been developed that would allow people to actually see
through the walls of a home every activity of its occupants.

The privacy of individuals ought to remain on the inside of the front door
of every person's home - unless officers have sufficient reason to suspect
that a law is being broken and a search warrant is obtained from a judge to
use imaging equipment.

Even Justice Antonin Scalia - the Supreme Court's conservative advocate of
law and order - saw the wisdom of protecting the sanctity of the home and
the necessity of officers to obtain warrants to use such technology in
their investigations.

In an anomalous 5-4 split of the court - truly an exercise in role
reversals - Scalia wrote the opinion requiring a warrant to use invasive
equipment while liberal Justice John Paul Stevens wrote the dissenting opinion.

The ruling didn't handcuff police officers while they do their work. They
can still use high-tech equipment to aid investigations.

What the court did was add a measure of assurance that technology won't be
used for the wrong reasons.

It protects Americans from overzealous officers who might act solely on a
hunch or just a whim.