SUPREME COURT TO DECIDE IF DRUG CHECKPOINTS VIOLATE THE FOURTH AMENDMENT

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Supreme Court will decide in its next term, which
begins in October, whether a 1998 Indianapolis traffic roadblock program,
under which police officers searched 1,161 vehicles for drugs, violated
motorists' Fourth Amendment right to be free from "unreasonable searches and
seizures."

The Indiana Civil Liberties Union, which filed a class-action lawsuit
against the city in October 1998, argues the roadblock program was
unconstitutional because officers did not have "probable cause" to stop or
search motorists as required by the Fourth Amendment.

If the high court disagrees, "We could theoretically have pedestrian
checkpoints in high-crime neighborhoods," said ICLU lawyer Kenneth Falk, who
sued the city and will argue City of Indianapolis v. Edmond before the high
court on October 3.

"We can invade the privacy of hundreds of thousands of innocent people in
the name of trying to catch a few criminals," he said in an interview. "That
would radically change how people view the Fourth Amendment and their own
privacy interests."

City attorney A. Scott Chinn said such comments show that the ICLU
"misunderstands the context of the checkpoints." He also said Indianapolis
police officers searched vehicles only if they had probable cause.

"The context is brief stops of cars on the public roadways. That is much
different than stopping a person walking down the road," said Chinn, who
will present the city's case before the high court.

He said 75 years of Supreme Court cases have held that people are guaranteed
full Fourth Amendment rights if the authorities seek to invade their homes
or businesses or stop and search them on the streets without a clear reason.

But in some roadblock cases, the court has tipped the scales in favor of the
police, saying the interest in preserving public safety and other societal
imperatives outweighs an individual's Fourth Amendment right, Chinn said.

"It's that contextual difference that provides the limitations so that we
would not have the problems that Mr. Falk says we will have," Chinn said.

Thomas Goldstein, a Washington attorney who specializes in Supreme Court
litigation and has closely monitored the Indianapolis case, said a handful
of communities nationwide have roadblocks similar to the Indianapolis model.

Though the court has ruled on immigration and sobriety checkpoints, the
specific issue of drug-interdiction roadblocks has never reached the Supreme
Court until now, he said. Such roadblocks are illegal in many parts of the
country and federal and state courts have been divided over the
constitutionality of drug checkpoints, he said.

Details of the program

The drug-roadblock program lasted from August to November 1998. That
October, the ICLU filed the lawsuit, which names motorists James Edmond and
Joell Palmer and applies to the whole "class" of people who were stopped and
searched. The city stopped the program in 1998, but wants to revive it if
the high court approves, Chinn said.

The U.S. Border Patrol does not violate Fourth Amendment rights in searching
immigrants because the agency tries to curb illegal entry into the country

City officials posted notices on roadways announcing the checkpoints and the
police set them up at six high-crime areas. Though officers primarily
focused on arresting motorists transporting drugs, they also looked for
other violations such as driving while drugged or expired licenses and
registrations, Chinn said.

Officers stopped 1,161 vehicles, making 109 arrests -- 55 for carrying drugs
and 54 for other violations, according to Chinn and court papers filed by
the city.

To prevent traffic jams, officers were under orders to select five to seven
cars in a row and allow the rest to pass through the checkpoints, Chinn
said. That policy ensured the police did not arbitrarily target motorists,
something the courts have frowned on, he said.

Officers checked the license and registration of each motorist and walked
drug-sniffing dogs outside the vehicle. Each "minimally intrusive" stop took
two to three minutes, Chinn said.

Officers did not search any vehicle unless the dogs alerted them to the
presence of drugs or officers had other means to establish probable cause --
if the officer saw drugs in the car, for instance, or the driver admitted to
transporting drugs, Chinn said.

Prior cases involving similar roadblocks

The city argued in court papers that the program was constitutional under
guidelines drawn by two prior high court rulings -- U.S. v. Martinez-Fuerte
of 1976 and Michigan Department of State Police v. Sitz of 1990.

In Martinez-Fuerte, the court said a checkpoint is legal as the authorities
have higher purposes beyond pure criminal law enforcement for stopping or
searching someone, according to the city's filings.

In particular, the court ruled that because the U.S. Border Patrol's primary
interest was to preserve this country's sovereignty by curbing illegal
immigration, checkpoints where Mexican immigrants were searched did not
violate the Fourth Amendment.

In Michigan, which involved driver's license and sobriety checkpoints, the
court affirmed the Martinez-Fuerte ruling, adding that checkpoints are legal
as long as the officers do not target particular motorists, according to the
filings.

Because the Indianapolis program served a greater police interest --
preventing drug-related crimes -- it satisfied the balancing test contained
in Martinez-Fuerte the city argued.

The program met the Michigan test because officers checked for licenses
while looking for evidence of drugs and did not arbitrarily select which
motorists to search, the city argued.

Fifteen states, governmental organizations such as the U.S. Conference of
Mayors, and the Justice Department have filed briefs supporting the city,
indicating widespread support for drug roadblock programs, Chinn said.

Justice officials said in their filing they have a "substantial interest" in
the Indianapolis program because such federal agencies as the Border Patrol
and the Drug Enforcement Administration conduct similar checkpoints.

The ICLU dissent

The ICLU countered in legal papers that the Martinez-Fuerte and Michigan
cases did not apply because the Indianapolis program was designed to catch
criminals, not to serve any higher societal purpose.

"The Indianapolis roadblocks are concerned with one thing, and only one
thing -- the discovery of evidence of criminal activity," the civil rights
group argued. "The roadblocks do not protect the public safety on the
roadways as to vehicle inspections and sobriety checkpoints. The purpose of
the roadblocks is to find probable cause to conduct searches to discover
unlawful drugs."

By treating "everybody like a criminal," the city trampled on the rights of
the innocent majority of those stopped to catch the criminal minority, Falk
said in an interview.

The prior cases "featured suspicionless searches and are therefore limited
exceptions to the general rule that searches and seizures must be supported
by individual cause" and the Indianapolis program did not meet either test,
the ICLU argued.

Previous court rulings

An Indiana federal trial court rejected the ICLU's argument, agreeing with
the city that the roadblocks were constitutional.

But the ICLU was successful before a three-judge panel at the Seventh U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, Illinois. In a 2-1 decision issued in
July 1999, the appeals court issued an injunction blocking the program.

"Indianapolis does not claim to be concerned with protecting highway safety
against drivers high on drugs," Judge Richard Posner wrote. "Its program of
drug roadblocks belongs to the genre of general programs of surveillance
which invade privacy wholesale in order to discover evidence of crime."

But Judge Frank Easterbrook dissented, saying the Michigan and Indianapolis
programs were essentially the same.

"If the Constitution allows a roadblock to intercept alcohol users, how can
it condemn a roadblock to intercept marijuana and cocaine users?" he wrote.

After the appeals court rejected the city's request for a rehearing, the
city turned to the Supreme Court.

The high court accepted the case in February and is expected to rule next
year.