Electric bill

The militant Drug Warriors are again showing their disdain for the Bill of Rights.

A proposal being pushed in Carson City by the Nevada Department of Public Safety would greatly expand the amount of information that utilities could be forced to give police -- without a warrant or probable cause.

Senate Bill 51 would allow law enforcement officials to subpoena phone records, power usage figures and other personal information from various utilities.

Current law limits such fishing expeditions to the name and address of people listed in utility records. To get anything else, police must seek a warrant from a judge.

But such safeguards are an impediment to catching crooks, argued Scott Jackson, chief of the state Division of Investigations. In particular, he noted, those who grow marijuana tend to use a lot of electricity. But Mr. Jackson assured a legislative committee that the subpoenas would be issued only where there's a "reasonable suspicion" of criminal activity.

In other words: Trust us; we won't abuse the power.

Sure. And the Patriot Act will be used only against foreign terrorists.

Thankfully, lawmakers also heard from Orrin Johnson, a public defender in Washoe County. Not only is the "reasonable suspicion" standard much lower than the "probable cause" needed to get a warrant, "Allowing law enforcement officials to simply subpoena the information without limitation ... is an end run around the requirement to get a warrant before you search somebody's house," Mr. Johnson said.

Indeed, SB51 is a thinly disguised effort to water down the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches and seizures.

This bill should die a quick death. If law enforcement officials believe utility usage information will help them catch a bad guy, let them convince a judge that their suspicions have enough substance to merit a warrant.