JUDGE TOSSES OUT DRUG SEARCH OF APARTMENT

DURHAM -- For the second time in a month, a judge has declared a Durham
police drug raid to be unconstitutional.

Superior Court Judge Ron Stephens, a former district attorney, ruled
Thursday that police acted in a manner that was "not constitutional or
permissible" when they searched a Trinity Avenue apartment in August 2001.

According to Stephens, officers entered the apartment without permission of
the tenant and searched without her consent. A visitor let the officers in,
but the visitor was not legally authorized to do so, Stephens said.

Officers conceded they had no search warrant, but they said leaseholder
Kathy Renee Bunch game them permission to search -- something Bunch denied.

As a result of Stephens' ruling Thursday, two grams of crack cocaine seized
in the search may not be used as evidence against Bunch.

Prosecutor Michael Moore said later that felony charges against Bunch would
be dismissed. The charges accused her of possessing cocaine with the intent
to sell and maintaining a house for drug sales.

"I've got to dismiss the charges," said Moore. "Without the evidence, I
have nothing to go on."

But Moore defended the actions of police and said they did nothing wrong.
He also said he believed officers did, in fact, have Bunch's consent to
search her apartment.

Police spokesman Norman Blake, a lieutenant, said Thursday he was not
familiar with the situation. "With that in mind, I am not in a position to
comment one way or the other," he said.

Last month, Superior Court Judge Orlando F. Hudson ruled that a large
police drug raid at Cheek Road Apartments in February was unconstitutional
and partially illegal. Hudson found that officers improperly "seized" the
entire neighborhood and conducted "unreasonable" searches and seizures
while they were there.

Thirty-five arrests and 65 citations resulted from the Cheek Road raid,
which involved more than 100 Durham officers, two National Guard
helicopters, 10 State Bureau of Investigation agents and other
law-enforcement resources.

Some residents complained that police were unnecessarily brutal, and that
officers even tackled a 13-year-old boy and held a gun to his head for no
apparent reason.

On the other hand, an unidentified resident said on television that she
thought the raid was good because it might help rid her neighborhood of
drugs and guns.

Police consistently maintained they did nothing wrong or unconstitutional.

After the raid was declared unconstitutional, court officials began
dismissing charges against the suspects.

In the case decided Thursday, defense lawyer Lawrence Campbell said two
officers approached Bunch's apartment for what they called a
"knock-and-talk" visit. In other words, the officers indicated that they
merely wanted to chat with Bunch about possible problems in the neighborhood.

The officers had received complaints about "people going in and out of the
house" where Bunch lived, according to Campbell.

Even though Bunch said she did not want her apartment searched, the two
officers went inside anyway and soon were followed by 10 or 12 other
officers, Campbell said.

Bunch was told by a female officer that the officer did not have a search
warrant, she testified.

"I said, 'You cannot search my apartment or me,' " Bunch added. "I kept
repeating it constantly. Never did I say yes. I kept on saying, 'No, you
cannot search me or my apartment.. She [the officer] kept on pressuring me.
She said things like, 'We are the law and we can do it.'"

Campbell said later that "knock-and-talk" visits are potentially dangerous
because officers have no guidelines on how to conduct them. For example,
there is nothing about them in police general orders, he said.

"We're concerned that without direction, some officers are exceeding the
scope of a consensual search," Campbell added.

Campbell also said police had no excuse for not asking Bunch to sign a
consent-to-search document. A signed document would have eliminated all
debate about whether the search was consensual, he said.