State Senate OKs Delayed Wiretap Bill

SACRAMENTO — The Senate passed and sent to Gov. George Deukmejian on Thursday major legislation sought by law enforcement for 20 years that would give California peace officers the authority to eavesdrop electronically on the telephone conversations of suspected big-league drug traffickers.

Deukmejian, who as a state senator in the 1970s unsuccessfully carried two wiretap bills, promised to sign the measure. He said the bill authorizing court-approved wiretaps gives police “a needed tool” in the fight against drugs.

Senate approval of the measure on a 31-3 vote marked the first time in two decades of trying that a wiretap bill has cleared both houses of the Legislature.

Delay ‘Inexcusable’

Although Deukmejian termed himself “pleased” by the action, he called it “inexcusable that it took this long to give law enforcement the authority to use electronic surveillance under court supervision.”

Going back at least to 1968 when Ronald Reagan was governor and made enactment of a wiretapping bill a top priority, the Senate has approved such measures. But they were routinely killed in the Assembly Public Safety Committee, which critics of the committee say has long been dominated by liberal Democrats.

Over the years, opponents of wiretapping legislation have charged that it infringes on the constitutional right to privacy and amounts to illegal search and seizure.

The latest wiretap effort was carried by Sen. Robert B. Presley (D-Riverside), a former undersheriff, and probably would have met the same fate if it had not been for Assembly Republicans and the dissident “Gang of Five” Assembly Democrats who are challenging the policies of Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco), an opponent of wiretapping.

Last month, the dissident Democrats and the GOP together seized upon an unrelated Presley bill on the Assembly floor that dealt with prisons and amended into it the contents of a Presley wiretap bill that was stuck in the Assembly Public Safety Committee. The bill then sailed to the Senate on a 48-18 vote.

Supporters of the legislation noted that federal law agents have had the authority since 1968 to tap telephones of suspects in various types of criminal behavior and that 31 other states also have wire tapping laws. The Presley bill is restricted to major drug operations.

One supporter, Sen. Ed Davis (R-Valencia), a former Los Angeles chief of police, noted that intensified pressure against big-time drug traffickers in Florida has pushed their operations into California “and Los Angeles has all the action now.”

“The problem is totally out of control,” Davis said. “This (bill) is about the least we can do in the war against drugs.”

Presley called California “a magnet for narcotics traffickers because it has not enacted the necessary investigatory and prosecutorial tools.” He cited drugs as the “No. 1 crime problem in California.”

Some law enforcement officials have cautioned that use of the legislation may be limited to a small number of investigations. They note that federal agencies have used wiretapping sparingly, partly because of the high cost of carrying out the operations and partly because of the fear of court challenges.

Report Every 72 Hours

Other law enforcement officials have criticized the legislation for being too restrictive.

Under the Presley proposal, state and local law enforcement officers would first have to obtain approval of a Superior Court judge before bugging the telephone of a suspected major drug operator and would be required to report back to the judge on their progress every 72 hours.

The electronic surveillance could be used only to obtain evidence in prosecuting major drug traffickers, those believed to be dealing with at least 3 pounds of heroin, cocaine or methamphetamines or 10 gallons of liquid PCP.

In seeking the judge’s approval, the law officers would be required to spell out whether “conventional” investigative efforts had been used and were unsuccessful or why they probably would fail.

Peace officers who conducted wiretaps would undergo special training and be certified to operate electronic eavesdropping equipment. As a safeguard to privacy, officers would be prohibited from covertly entering a private residence to install the bugs. However, officers could ask the telephone company to tap a line.

Although the bill, supported by law enforcement organizations and Atty. Gen. John K. Van de Kamp, went to Deukmejian without debate, it was opposed by the American Civil Liberties Union, the California Trial Lawyers Assn. and the California Attorneys for Criminal Justice.

The ACLU asserted that it would unconstitutionally encroach on the right to privacy of anyone carrying on a conversation through a bugged telephone, whether they were suspected drug kingpins or not.

“The surveillance constitutes a general search that treads on the privacy rights of both the person under suspicion as well as countless other callers connected with the suspect only remotely or not at all,” the ACLU said.