Supreme Court Eases Standard on Searches of Students in School

California school officials need to show only a “reasonable suspicion” of illegal activity--and not the more stringent “probable cause”--before searching students for drugs or weapons, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday.

The new standard will make it easier for school officials to seize contraband. It was established, ironically, even as the court reversed a finding against a Chatsworth youth with marijuana for sale.

The court’s new interpretation of the state Constitution parallels a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in January that school officials do not need a warrant to conduct a search, because students have only limited Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable search and seizure.

In a 5-1 ruling, the state Supreme Court emphasized that California school officials must have “articulable facts” to justify any such search. The court said they also must refrain from random or wholesale searches of large groups.

“Neither indiscriminate searches of lockers nor more discreet individual searches of a locker, a purse or a person . . . can take place, absent the existence of reasonable suspicion,” Justice Cruz Reynoso wrote for the majority. “Respect for privacy is the rule--a search is the exception.”

The state court’s ruling involves the case of William Gorchoff, who was a 16-year-old student at Chatsworth High School in the San Fernando Valley at the time of the 1979 incident.

Gorchoff and two friends were stopped by Assistant Principal Reno Lorenz as they walked through the campus. When he approached the boys, Lorenz noticed Gorchoff trying to hide something behind his back.

The assistant principal asked to see the hidden item, a vinyl calculator bag. However, Gorchoff refused to give it to him. When Lorenz grabbed the bag and opened it, he found drug paraphernalia and about half an ounce of marijuana.

At a hearing before juvenile authorities, Gorchoff and his lawyer argued unsuccessfully that the marijuana seized by Lorenz should not be admitted as evidence, because Lorenz lacked sufficient reason to suspect Gorchoff was trying to conceal an illegal activity.

As a result of the proceeding, Gorchoff was put on three-months’ probation. A state Court of Appeal agreed that the marijuana had been properly admitted as evidence.

In overturning the ruling, the Supreme Court said Thursday that when Lorenz testified at Gorchoff’s Juvenile Court hearing, he did not explain why he believed the student was engaged in a crime.

Gorchoff’s “ ‘furtive gestures’ in attempting to hide his calculator case from Lorenz’s view cannot, standing alone, furnish sufficient cause to search,” Reynoso wrote.

“If a student’s limited right of privacy is to have any meaning, his attempt to exercise that right--by shielding a private possession from a school official’s view--cannot in itself trigger a ‘reasonable suspicion,’ ” he explained.

Chief Justice Rose Elizabeth Bird concurred with the majority. However, she urged that school officials who wish to search students be required to meet the same stringent legal standard set for the police.

In dissent, Justice Stanley Mosk argued that school officials legally ought to be considered parental surrogates and thus exempt from privacy provisions of either the state or U.S. constitutions.

State Schools Supt. Bill Honig called Thursday’s decision a “reasonable position.”

“I supported the U.S. Supreme Court decision, and I support this one,” he said. “We have a problem with violence in our schools, and this is a reasonable response.”

In other decisions, the court upheld the public censure of Fresno County Superior Court Judge Robert Z. Mardikian by the state Commission on Judicial Performance. Mardikian, described as “diligent” but “overburdened,” was censured for taking up to 430 days to decide some cases, even though state law forbids a judge to collect his salary if a decision is made more than 90 days after trial.

The high court also reversed a Court of Appeal finding and affirmed the legality of the National Football League’s salary arbitration plan. After his release from the Los Angeles Rams in 1981, Fred Dryer challenged the plan, contending that arbitrators could not be impartial, because they were chosen by team owners. The court noted that the players’ union had agreed to the plan in contract talks.