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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (June 13, 1984)
AGGIE CLEANERS Wed. Special Blue Jeans- Laundered or Dry Cleaned $1.50 846-4116 - Northgate- 111 College Hours: M-F 7:30-5:30 Sat. 8-3 pm Page 4/The Battalion/Wednesday, June 13, 1984 Supreme Court Seniority given priority over minorities in layoff disputes United Press International Gallery Datsun COOLING SYSTEM PRESSURE TESTING ■Inspect all Belts & Hoses— $ 15 00 mmh parts and installation of parts extra Ken Speaks-service manager 1214 Texas Ave. 775-1500 WASHINGTON — Workers with seniority have top job priority when cities are forced to slash their pay rolls — even if that means massive layoffs for newly hired minorities, the Supreme Court ruled Tuesday in a key civil rights case. The 6-3 ruling — a crucial deci sion on reverse discrimination — will affect cities across the country that are being forced to lay off police of ficers, firefighters and other work ers because of dwindling revenues. But workers who are part of a “bona fide seniority system” — one that does not have a discriminatory purpose — must be insulated from economically motivated layoffs, the Supreme Court majority declared. “It is inappropriate to deny an in nocent employee the benefits of his seniority in order to provide a rem edy in the pattern of practice (of dis crimination) suit such as this,” Jus tice Byron White wrote for the majority. Black firefighters in Memphis, Tenn., where the case originated, re acted angrily. They have been fight ing since 1977 to bring more blacks into the fire department, which was almost exclusively white until the 1970s. “The ruling is not only affecting blacks but all minorities, including women. It virtually set everybody back at least 50 years,” said Ulysses Jones, president of the black fire fighters union. The Reagan administration had pushed the high court for a sweep ing ruling favoring seniority rights and limiting layoff protection to “ac tual victims of discrimination.” Jones’ counterpart, Kuhron Hud dleston, president of the Memphis Firefighters Local, said the ruling “preserves our seniority rights.” The court’s decision overturns a court order that the fire department could make layoffs using the “last- hired first-fired” principle. Instead, the department had to retain a per centage of blacks, forcing them to lay off some veteran white workers, ajudge ruled in 1981. White wrote that the city did not intend, in a 1980 settlement of a race discrimination case brought by black firefighters, to place black firemen higher on the seniority ladder. “It is clear the city had a seniority system, that its proposed layoff plan conformed to that system, and that in making the settlement thecitylui not agreed to award competitivest niority to any minority whom the city proposed tolayolf he wrote. White also ruled that there court finding that any of the involved in the layoff had been actual victim of bias “Even when an individual sta; that the discriminatory practice la had an impact on him, heisnou tomatically entitled to have a minority employee laid off to mi room for him. He may have to until a vacancy occurs,” Whitewn* Leading the dissenters, Juslie Harry Blackmun wrote that" conscious remedies” are not b; by federal bias law. Justices Wib Brennan and Thurgood Manti joined him. Some illegally gained evidence OK’d United Press International DresSports The Running Shoe DieguieeJ as a Dress Shoe The lightweight materials and running shoe technology of the RocUport Walk. Support System^make DresSports comfortable as a running shoe . Blending innovative design with traditional styling makes DresSports the perfect shoe for a day at the office or a night on the town. Stop by and try a pair of DresSports soon. Your feet will be convinced thev’re in a pair of running shoes. RockpOrt® DresSports™ WASHINGTON — The Su preme Court, easing restrictions on police, gave its approval Monday for courtroom use of illegally obtained evidence if it would eventually have been discovered anyway. The justices, ruling 7-2 in an Iowa case, sanctioned the widespread practice of allowing use of illegally obtained evidence that inevitably would have been uncovered by legal means. The decision leaves intact the murder conviction of Robert An thony Williams, found guilty of mur dering a 10-year-old Des Moines girl who disappeared from a YMCA on Christmas Eve 1968. The high court reversed a ruling that police illegally coaxed Williams to reveal the loca tion of the body of Pamela Powers by telling him she needed a “decent Christian burial.” The ruling has nationwide impact because it rolls back the reach of the controversial “exclusionary rule,” which forbids the use of illegally ob tained evidence at trial. The court is expected to further limit the doctrine later this term when it decides whether evidence gained illegally by police acting in good faith may be used in court. In the Iowa case, Chief Justice Warren Burger wrote that certain evidence was properly admitted in Williams’ second murder trial be cause it would have been discovered eventually. Burger sanctioned the “inevitable discovery” exception. He said the practice of suppres sing evidence — in this case the loca tion of the child’s body — to deter unlawful police conduct should not be used to exclude evidence that would inevitably be discovered by le gal means. “If the prosecution can establish by a preponderance of the evidence that the information ultimately or inevitably would have been discov ered by lawful means — here the volunteers’ search — then the deter rence rationale has so little basis that the evidence should be received. Anything else would reject logic, perience and common sense." Iowa Attorney General Miller hailed the ruling as “a victory for law enforcement. Tk common sense principle thatautk ities shold not be penalized for ted nical errors has been reinforced b the decision.” In dissent, Justices William Bret nan and Thurgood Marshall sail that in "its zealous efforts toemascu late the exclusionary rule court loses sight of the crucial difie ence between the ‘inevitable discoi ery’ doctrine and the ‘independei source’ exception from which derived.” Public safety takes precedence Exceptions made to Miranda ruling United Press International Whole Earth Provision Company Wnere QuAlity Makes the Difference X M 105 Boyett College Station 846-8794 tartatKimu' —^frari'r firry WASHINGTON — A legal battle that began in a supermarket when police asked a suspected rapist “Where’s the gun?” ended Tuesday with the Supreme Court, for the first time, making an exception to its landmark Miranda rule. The court, in a 5-4 decision, said police should not be forced to make split-second choices between public safety and following procedures laid out in the 1966 Miranda decision for advising suspects of their rights. “We conclude that the need for answers to questions in a situation posing a threat to public safety outw eighs the need for the ... rule pro tecting the ... privilege against self incrimination,” Justice William Rehnquist wrote for the majority. The decision allows New York City prosecutors to proceed with the trial of rape suspect Benjamin Quar les and to use as evidence a gun taken from the scene of his arrest and a statement he made about the gun before he was advised of his rights. Quarles was arrested shortly after midnight on Sept. 11, 1980, in an A&P supermarket in Queens after a woman stopped several officers and said she had been raped by a man who then went into the store with a gun. "The gun is over there,” Quarla replied. Officers Frank Kraft and Sal Scar ring went into the store and located a man who fit the description of the alleged rapist. The suspect ran when he saw the officers but was appre hended by Kraft a few aisles away. That statement began a tie over the Miranda rule. Kraft frisked Quarles and located an empty gun holster. Without first warning him of his right to remain silent, Officer Kraft asked Quarles: “Where’s the gun?” At a pretrial hearing, ajudgesii the gun and Quarles’ statenrt “The gun is over there,” could be used as evidence because Quark had not been advised ofhisrighis remain silent and to have an add ney present during questioning. The nation’s highest court, withik narrowest possible margin, held fa the first time that some exceptim must be allowed to the Mirandarnk ‘S AL bacco Texas outsic reven Whitt highw Tb and packa by W1 lative will h bacco trade. 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