Pubdate: Sat, 21 Oct 2000
Source: Denver Rocky Mountain News (CO)
Copyright: 2000 Denver Publishing Co.
Contact:  400 W. Colfax, Denver, CO 80204
Website: http://www.denver-rmn.com/
Author: Hector Gutierrez
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm meth clippings

JUDGE TELLS TATTERED COVER TO REVEAL INFO ON BOOK BUY

Drug Suspect's Purchase Was Related To Meth Lab

A Denver judge says Tattered Cover Book Store must give authorities 
information on a transaction involving a drug suspect who bought two books 
on building a methamphetamine laboratory.

However, District Judge J. Stephen Phillips kept a restraining order intact 
that barred Adams County investigators from gaining access to records of 
all the books the customer bought during a one-month period.

Tattered Cover owner Joyce Meskis successfully sought a restraining order 
in March after the North Metro Drug Task Force tried to serve a search 
warrant to get the customer's book-buying records. Meskis said she was 
worried about the First Amendment rights of her customers to buy and read 
any books they desire.

Phillips' order Friday satisfied Adams County law enforcement.

"The task force requested, as a compromise, that it would be satisfied if 
we had information on this one (purchase)," Gary Jacobson, Thornton 
assistant city attorney, said. "I think the judge recognized that it was 
appropriate given these circumstances."

Authorities are hoping the store's records on the purchase of the two books 
will include the suspect's name.

Meskis and Tattered Cover lawyer Daniel Recht held a news conference after 
the ruling to say they may appeal.

Recht maintains investigators could obtain evidence in the case through 
other means, such as interviewing witnesses who may have known about a 
methamphetamine lab that police busted late last year.

Meskis added that the judge's ruling could affect clients who rely on the 
bookstore not to divulge private information about what they read.

"We appreciate that the court has recognized the danger to free speech when 
it narrowed the scope of the information sought," Meskis said. "However, we 
believe that even turning over the information that the judge has demanded 
would have a chilling effect."

In his order the judge appeared to strongly support the Constitutional 
rights of the public to "receive information, and ideas, regardless of 
social worth, and to receive such information without government intrusion 
or observation."

However, Phillips said that witnesses who were in the trailer home at the 
time of the raid and may have known about the lab could exercise their 
Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.

The judge said the books are an important piece of the investigators' case 
and that detectives had been trying to obtain evidence through "less 
obtrusive means" by focusing only on the invoice that's connected to the 
purchase of the two books.

"The question is whether there is a less obtrusive means of obtaining this 
significant piece of information — who ordered these books?" Phillips said. 
"And, there is no other reasonably probative method of acquiring that 
precise piece of information."

The investigation into the meth lab started in 1999 when the task force 
learned someone was purchasing large amounts of iodine crystals at an Adams 
County trailer home.

Earlier this year investigators found a lab, handguns and other potential 
evidence during a search at the trailer home. Two people were inside at the 
time.

Detectives discovered two books titled The Construction and Operation of 
Clandestine Drug Laboratories, and Advanced Techniques of Clandestine 
Psychedelic & Amphetamine Manufacture.

Task force members also found a Tattered Cover envelope in a trash can. 
Investigators issued a subpoena to the bookstore requesting the name of the 
buyer and the title of the books based on an invoice number that was in the 
envelope.
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