Pubdate: Mon, 17 Jun 2002 Source: Reuters (Wire) Copyright: 2002 Reuters Limited Author: James Vicini SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS POLICE POWER ON BUS SEARCHES WASHINGTON - The U.S. Supreme Court ( news - web sites) upheld on Monday police searches of bus passengers and their luggage for drugs or weapons, rejecting the argument that such coercive tactics require that people be told of their rights. The justices, by a 6-3 vote, overturned a U.S. appeals court ruling that a bus search should be considered unconstitutionally coercive unless the police first warn passengers they have the right to refuse to cooperate. The appeals court held the consent given by two Greyhound bus passengers in 1999 in Tallahassee, Florida, was not sufficiently free of coercion and therefore amounted to an unconstitutional search and seizure. The high court's ruling was a major victory for the Bush administration. It argued the police should not be deprived of an essential crime-fighting tool needed to protect the nation's public transportation system after the Sept. 11 hijacked plane attacks on America. Justice Anthony Kennedy ( news - web sites) said for the court majority that the Constitution's Fourth Amendment does not require police officers to advise bus passengers of their right not to cooperate and to refuse consent to searches. Three officers had boarded the bus, which was bound from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to Detroit. One officer remained at the front of the bus, watching passengers without blocking the exit, while the other two officers asked the passengers about their travel plans and requested to inspect their luggage. An officer told passengers Christopher Drayton and Clifton Brown that he was looking for illegal drugs and weapons. They agreed to allow the officers to search their overhead luggage, which contained nothing illegal. Drayton and Brown then agreed to a pat-down search of their clothing. It revealed that they were carrying nearly a kilogram of cocaine. Drayton and Brown then were convicted on drug charges and received prison sentences of 10 years and 7 1/3 years, respectively. The appeals court ruled the cocaine should not have been admitted as evidence, saying the passengers were not told they were free to leave and their consent was not truly voluntary. Solicitor General Theodore Olson of the Justice Department ( news - web sites) said the appeals court was wrong. He said such searches were "an important part of the national effort to combat the flow of illegal narcotics and weapons." Kennedy agreed with the government. He said the appeals court erroneously adopted a rule that evidence obtained during such drug searches on buses must be suppressed unless the officers advised the passengers of their rights. He said Drayton and Brown were not subjected to an unreasonable search. Justices David Souter ( news - web sites), John Paul Stevens ( news - - web sites) and Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( news - web sites) dissented. Souter said extensive searches have been used on airplanes, but not on buses and trains. "Anyone who travels by air today submits to searches of the person and luggage as a condition of boarding the aircraft. It is universally accepted that such intrusions are necessary to hedge against risks that, nowadays, even small children understand," he said. "There is therefore an air of unreality about the court's explanation that bus passengers consent to searches of their luggage to 'enhance their own safety and the safety of those around them,"' Souter added. He said a passenger on the bus would not have felt free to end the encounter with the officers by saying no and ignoring them. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth