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Show Supreme Court Outlaws Wire Tapping for Evidence CRuling Changes , Stand Taken in Prohibition Era Justice Black, Who Ordered Telegram Seiz- ures During Senate Probe, Votes With Majority WASHINGTON, Dec. 20 (INS) The supreme court, in a far reaching decision, today outlawed "wire tapping'.' by federal officers as a means of obtaining evidence in criminal cases. The decision was 7 to 2. The high court set aside conviction con-viction of four men tried In federal fed-eral court In New York on a charge of smuggling alcohol, on the ground that the government i Illegally used "wire tapping evidence. evi-dence. ' The decision U the first major ru.ir.gof the court on "wire tap-" tap-" ping since the famouf5 J de-i de-i cision of prohibition days, when Justice Jus-tice Brandeis. in the minority branded wire tapping as "dirty business." busi-ness." Since that time congress enacted the federal communications act with a direct prohibition against "wire tapping' or divulging contents con-tents of messages. In the current case before the court Frank Carmine Nardone was convicted and sentenced to three years' imprisonment and Hugh Brown. Robert Gottfried and Austin Aus-tin Callahan to one year and a day each. They were alleged to have . smuggled 1800 cases of alcohol into New York harbor in 1936. Justice Roberts read the majority major-ity opinion, with Justices Sutherland Suther-land and McReynolds dissenting. Justice Black, who as head of a senate lobby committee ordered wholesale seizure of telegrams of private individuals and became involved in-volved in litigation, voted with the majority. This was surprising, since Justice Jus-tice Black, as a senator, defended himself against charges that the methods he used were unconstitutional unconstitu-tional invasions of the private rights of individuals. The same arguments used against Black's action, as senator, were advanced ad-vanced in the case today in which the court outlawed similar methods. meth-ods. Justice Roberts pointed out that the federal communications act plainly forbids anyone, not authorised author-ised by the sender, from intercepting intercept-ing any communication or publishing publish-ing it. "Taken at face value, the phrase 'no person' comprehends federal agents and the ban on communication communica-tion to 'any person' bars testimony to the content of an intercepted message, said the majority opinion. Then, referring to the government's govern-ment's contention that congress did not Intend to forbid use of wire tapping tap-ping evidence in court. Justice Roberts Rob-erts pointed out that the federal prohibition was enacted after the question had been discussed for years. The government, through Solicitor General Stanley Reed. Joined with the giant Electric Bond & Share company in urging the supreme court to rule on the utility holding company act of 193S. Although the government won a' decision in the Second circuit court at New York upholding the constitutionality consti-tutionality of the law. Reed notified noti-fied the court that he would not oppose the petition for review filed by the company. He pointed out that there Is a conflict between decision of the Second and Fourth circuit courts and said that "it is a matter of urgent ur-gent public interest" for the high court to settle the constitutional question. |