Government went too far in Balco sports drug case, says court

[GrantDem]

Source: Reuters

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - U.S. government agents investigating alleged steroid use among 10 Major League Baseball players went too far in seizing test results for hundreds of other people from a California lab and using them to expand the probe, an appeals court ruled on Wednesday.

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The appeals court affirmed lower court rulings that the evidence obtained through the too-expansive search should be suppressed as a violation of Fourth Amendment protections against illegal search and seizure.

The court also laid down new guidelines for conducting searches of electronic records that require government investigators to use a third party to sift through data when records of suspects are intermingled with those of individuals not implicated in criminal activity.

The 9th Circuit panel reversed a ruling by a smaller group of appellate judges which disapproved of the wholesale seizure of the records but allowed the government to use materials.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/domesticNews/idUSTRE57P5MP20090826