JUSTICES BACK OFFICER IN DRUG STANDOFF CASE

Police Needs Balanced With Suspect's Right To Privacy

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 yesterday.

In a second case exploring the balance between law enforcement and privacy
rights, the court 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 yesterday.

"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 that 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 in June.

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