SUPREME COURT CONTINUES ONGOING LOOK AT PRIVACY

Police Kept Man Out Of His Home Until Warrant Was Gotten

WASHINGTON - Police who are convinced that a drug suspect will destroy
evidence if left alone may hold him outside his home while they get a
warrant, the Supreme Court ruled Tuesday.

In a second case exploring the balance between law enforcement and privacy
rights, the court also heard the arguments of a man arrested after police
outside his house used a heat-measuring device to detect a marijuana
growing operation inside.

In the first case, Charles McArthur and a Sullivan, Ill., officer had a
polite standoff outside his trailer four years ago, after police confronted
him with allegations from his estranged wife that he had marijuana hidden
under his couch.

For about two hours, McArthur refused to let the officer inside without a
warrant, and the officer refused to let McArthur go inside alone.

The justices voted 8-1 that the officer acted appropriately.

Police "had probable cause to believe that a home contained contraband,
which was evidence of a crime," and every reason to think that McArthur
would destroy the stash if he got the chance, Justice Stephen J. Breyer
wrote for the majority.

Indeed, McArthur has admitted that is exactly what he would have done.

Police "imposed a restraint that was both limited and tailored reasonably
to secure law enforcement needs while protecting privacy interests," Breyer
wrote.

As in several other drug-search cases the court has heard or decided
recently, the issue pits law enforcement needs against the right to privacy.

The court explored the same equation in arguments involving the heat detector.

Last November, the court ruled that police may not erect random roadblocks
to look for drug dealers because such checkpoints subject many innocent
motorists to scrutiny.

In April, the court said authorities may not randomly squeeze luggage on
buses while hunting for drugs.

Danny Lee Kyllo claims police violated the Fourth Amendment's protections
against unreasonable searches when they used the heat detector to scan his
house from a distance.

Police did not have a search warrant, and the government argues none was
needed. The heat sensor was not "like an X-ray machine" that would allow
authorities to see inside a house, Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben
argued to the justices Tuesday.

"We are not learning what activities are going on or where they are going
on in the house," Dreeben said.

Kyllo's attorney, Kenneth Lerner, argued the heat scan was invasive enough
to violate his client's privacy.

"We may expect people to walk around with binoculars, but we don't expect
them to walk around with thermal imagers," Lerner said.

Justice Antonin Scalia challenged Lerner on that point.

"You know there are such things as thermal imagers," Scalia asked. "Why do
we have to assume we live in a world without technology?"

Narcotics detectives used the information from the heat scan, along with a
tip from an informant and electricity records, to get a warrant for Kyllo's
Florence, Ore., home.

When agents searched the house in January 1992, they found drug
paraphernalia and more than 100 marijuana plants. Kyllo was arrested.

A decision in his case is expected before the close of the court's current
term in June.

In the Illinois standoff case decided Tuesday, the high court overturned a
state appeals court's ruling that the seizure violated McArthur's Fourth
Amendment rights.

Justice John Paul Stevens was the lone dissent.

He said the tiny amount of drugs found in McArthur's home makes the case a
poor instrument for such an important constitutional test.

Lower courts, Stevens wrote, "placed a higher value on the sanctity of the
ordinary citizen's home than on the prosecution of this petty offense."

Stevens argued the court should not have tried to decide the case at all,
but if pressed he would have upheld the Illinois courts.

"They correctly viewed that interest - whether the home be a humble
cottage, a secondhand trailer or a stately mansion - as one meriting the
most serious constitutional protection," Stevens wrote.

The case now returns to Illinois courts. The case is Illinois vs.
McArthur, 99-1132.

The Court at a Glance

The Supreme Court took these actions Tuesday:

*Ruled 8-1 that police can briefly bar a suspect from the suspect's home if
they fear the suspect would destroy criminal evidence inside. The man
involved in the Illinois case admitted he would have flushed his marijuana
stash down the toilet before police could get a search warrant.

*Heard arguments over whether law enforcement officials can use a
heat-sensing device without a search warrant to find out if someone is
growing marijuana in his home. An Oregon man's lawyer said narcotics agents
violated a constitutional ban on unreasonable searches when they used such
a device.

*Ruled 5-4 in a Tennessee case that state high school athletic associations
can be sued for allegedly violating a member's rights if the association is
so closely connected with public school officials that it acts for the
state. The justices cited "the pervasive entwinement of state school
officials in the structure of the association."

*Agreed to clarify the government's procedures for firing or disciplining
some employees who have been disciplined previously. The U.S. Postal
Service argues that it can base its firing of a letter carrier on the fact
that she was disciplined before, even though the worker's challenge of the
prior discipline was pending.

*Refused to reopen debate over the Endangered Species Act's impact on
private landowners. The justices turned aside a North Carolina case testing
whether farmers may kill endangered red wolves that stray from a federal
refuge.

*Rejected an appeal by a retired aircraft worker whose U.S. citizenship was
revoked because he served as a Nazi concentration camp guard during World
War II. Michael Negele argued that a federal court improperly revoked his
citizenship.