COURT: ALL ITEMS IN AUTO ARE OPEN TO POLICE SEARCH

Passengers' belongings are fair game when police officers search a car for
criminal evidence against the driver, the Supreme Court ruled Monday.

The 6-3 decision reinstated a Wyoming drug conviction and expanded the
already considerable police power to stop and search vehicles without a
court warrant. Police officials praised the ruling, but defense lawyers
condemned it.

"Officers must be free of unreasonable, confusing and unworkable
restrictions on what may be searched," said Robert Scully of the National
Association of Police Organizations. He thanked the court for "giving
officers the tools they need to do their jobs."

But Lisa Kemler of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers
called the decision "an abomination," adding: "You get in a car and, as a
passenger, you basically have no rights. Almost anything goes, as long as
police can come up with some reason to say they expected to find evidence of
a crime."

The Constitution's Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable
search and seizure, generally requires police to obtain court warrants.
Since 1925, the Supreme Court has carved out exceptions when suspects are in
vehicles.

In a key 1996 ruling, the justices said police can stop motorists for
routine traffic violations even if the officers really want to search for
drugs. Monday's ruling means officers during such stops can search all
containers in the car if something gives them reason to believe they will
find drugs.

The court's latest ruling stems from a routine traffic stop, a situation
that arises countless times daily across the nation.

A car driven by David Young was stopped for speeding on Interstate 25 in
Natrona County, Wyo., on July 23, 1995. After a Highway Patrol officer saw a
hypodermic syringe in Young's pocket, Young acknowledged that he had used it
to take drugs.

During the ensuing search, two other officers asked the car's two female
passengers to get out of the car. One of them, Sandra Houghton, left her
purse on the car's back seat. Inside it, police found drug paraphernalia and
liquid methamphetamine.

She was convicted on a felony charge but appealed.

The Wyoming Supreme Court threw out her conviction last year, ruling that
police search could not extend to Houghton's purse.

Writing for the nation's highest court, Justice Antonin Scalia said the
Wyoming court was wrong.

"Effective law enforcement would be appreciably impaired without the ability
to search a passenger's personal belongings when there is reason to believe
contraband or evidence of criminal wrongdoing is hidden in the car," Scalia
said.

The decision does not allow police to pat down or search the pockets of a
passenger when seeking evidence linked to the driver. Such tactics were
banned by a 1948 Supreme Court ruling.

IN OTHER ACTION MONDAY

Ruled that judges cannot impose stiffer punishments on defendants who plead
guilty but refuse to give details about the crime. The 5-4 ruling in a
Pennsylvania drug case said holding such defendants' silence against them
would impose "an impermissible burden on the exercise of the constitutional
right against compelled self- incrimination."

Ruled that prosecutors don't violate lawyers' rights by having them searched
and by interfering with their ability to advise a client appearing before a
grand jury. The unanimous decision said such a search in a California case,
"whether calculated to annoy or even to prevent consultation with a grand
jury witness," did not violate a lawyer's constitutional rights.

Refused to review a South Carolina judge's order that barred pretrial
reporting on a secretly recorded conversation between a murder defendant and
his lawyer. The justices turned down a Columbia, S.C., newspaper's arguments
that the judge's 1997 "prior restraint" on publication was unconstitutional.

Clarified the deadline for transferring cases from state court to federal
court, saying the 30-day clock begins to run when someone is formally served
and receives a copy of a lawsuit. Even though an Illinois company was faxed
a copy of a lawsuit two weeks before it was formally served, the 30-day
clock did not begin to run until formal service was completed, the justices'
6-3 ruling said.

Refused to revive a Waco, Texas, television reporter's libel lawsuit over
coverage of a federal raid on the Branch Davidian compound in 1993. John
McLemore's lawsuit accused Dallas-Forth Worth station WFAA-TV of airing
reports that implied McLemore had tipped the religious sect about the raid.