CAN POLICE SEARCH IF THE WIFE SAYS YES AND THE HUSBAND SAYS NO?

WASHINGTON - Scott Randolph didn't want police to search his home after
officers showed up to answer his wife's domestic disturbance call. She had
no such reservations.

Janet Randolph not only let them in -- she led officers to evidence later
used to charge Randolph with drug possession.

The Supreme Court said Monday it will use the case to clarify when police
can search homes. The high court previously has said searches based on a
cohabitant's consent is OK, but it's not clear whether that applies when
another resident is present and objects.

Lower courts are divided on the issue, with most holding that consent from
one person is sufficient.

In another case the high court agreed to hear in the term beginning next
October, justices will consider the scope of police questioning.

Under Chief Justice William Rehnquist, the court has generally expanded
government powers for police searches. Most recently, it ruled 6-2 that
police may use drug dogs to sniff outside a car when a motorist is lawfully
stopped, even if officers had no particular reason to suspect drug activity.

Mrs. Randolph called police on July 6, 2001, to report a disturbance and
asked them to come to their house in Americus, Ga. The two had separated,
but she moved back in two days earlier with Randolph's consent.

When police arrived, she complained that Randolph had taken away their son
and had been using cocaine. A few minutes later, Randolph returned home and
told police the son was at a neighbor's house.

Officers asked to search the couple's home, but Randolph objected. Mrs.
Randolph, however, consented and led police to the couple's bedroom where
officers saw a straw with white powder.

Mrs. Randolph later withdrew her consent, but police obtained a search
warrant based on what officers saw earlier, seized 25 "drug related" items
and charged Scott Randolph with drug possession. A trial court upheld the
searches, but a Georgia appeals court reversed it in a ruling the state
Supreme Court affirmed in November.

In siding with Scott Randolph, the courts ruled police must defer to an
objecting occupant's position when two people have equal use and control of
the home. They said police could not violate Randolph's privacy rights,
particularly in a case where a feuding wife had consented over his objections.

"When possible, Georgia courts strive to promote the sanctity of marriage
and to avoid circumstances that create adversity between spouses," the
appeals court stated. "Allowing a wife's consent to search to override her
husband's previous assertion of his right to privacy threatens domestic
tranquility."

In their Supreme Court filing, Georgia prosecutors said the ruling "focuses
arbitrarily on the rights of the objecting occupant, to the detriment of
the consenting occupant who was trying to report a crime and who had just
as much access and control over the home as her husband."

Randolph counters that states have the authority to give their citizens
privacy rights that go beyond the U.S. Constitution. A husband's interest
in privacy outweighs the wife's property right to allow a search, he argues.

According to court filings, three other states also have ruled that all
cohabitants present must consent before police may search a home. They are
Florida, Minnesota and Washington.

The case is Georgia v. Randolph, 04-1067.

Separately, the court said it will consider whether police went too far in
questioning when officers taunted a murder suspect with the possibility of
the death penalty after he invoked his right to an attorney.

A Maryland state court dismissed the case against Leeander Blake, saying
his "Miranda" rights were violated.

Blake and Terrence Tolbert were charged with murder in the death of
Straughan Lee Griffin, who was shot in the head Sept. 19, 2002, in Annapolis.

Blake, who was 17 at the time, initially refused to talk to police when he
was arrested and taken to jail. When a police officer delivered a copy of
the charging documents listing death as a possible penalty, another officer
told Blake, "I bet you want to talk now, huh?"