Justices to Rule on Abducting of Suspects : Supreme Court: Case stems from kidnaping in Guadalajara of a Mexican wanted for trial in torture death of a U.S. drug agent.

WASHINGTON —  The Supreme Court, agreeing to hear the case of a Mexican doctor who allegedly helped torture U.S. drug agent Enrique Camarena, said Friday it would decide whether U.S. agents can kidnap foreign nationals and return them for trial in the United States over the objection of a foreign government.

The federal courts in California ruled last year that U.S. agents violated this nation’s extradition treaty with Mexico when they arranged the forcible abduction of Dr. Humberto Alvarez-Machain in Guadalajara.

After the government of Mexico lodged a formal protest, U.S. District Judge Edward Rafeedie in Los Angeles ruled that Alvarez-Machain must be returned to Mexico. In October, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that order.

But the Bush Administration appealed, and the justices agreed to consider the issue. Alvarez-Machain remains in custody in Los Angeles.

The case, to be argued in March, will determine whether U.S. agents can freely pursue terrorists, drug kingpins and other criminals on foreign territory, at least in those instances when the foreign government objects. However, the case should not affect the drug trial of former Panamanian dictator Manuel A. Noriega because the current Panamanian government supports the U.S. action.

In 1985, Camarena, a special agent of the Drug Enforcement Administration, was found tortured and murdered near Guadalajara. Afterward, U.S. agents vowed to bring Camarena’s killers to justice, even if it meant trampling on the sensitivities of Mexican authorities. U.S. agents did not abduct Alvarez-Machain themselves, but instead offered a $50,000 reward to several Mexican officers to kidnap the suspect.

On the evening of April 2, 1990, five armed men abducted him in his Guadalajara office and handed him over to U.S. agents in El Paso. Federal prosecutors said they would seek to prove that Alvarez-Machain, a gynecologist, had administered drugs to Camarena so that Mexican drug lords could continue to question and torture him.

But before Alvarez-Machain could be tried, Rafeedie ruled that his kidnaping was illegal. The ruling, including a similar decision involving convicted murderer Rene Verdugo-Urquidez, surprised federal prosecutors and appeared to depart from a long line of court precedents.

Though the U.S. Constitution limits what evidence can be used against a crime suspect, it does not prevent suspects themselves from being forcibly abducted and brought before a judge, according to Supreme Court precedents dating to 1886.

But the 9th Circuit Court said the 1980 extradition treaty between the United States and Mexico obliges this nation to obtain Mexico’s permission before seizing a Mexican national.

“If we are to see the emergence of a ‘new world order’ . . . we must begin by holding our own government to its fundamental legal commitments,” the 9th Circuit commented.

But Administration attorneys argue that extradition is a foreign policy matter to be handled by the President’s advisers, not the province of federal judges. If the 9th Circuit ruling stands, U.S. agents will be hampered in their war against “narcotics trafficking, hostage taking, terrorism and air piracy,” they said.

Paul Hoffman, the American Civil Liberties Union lawyer who represented Alvarez-Machain, said he was disappointed the high court agreed to review the case. He said his client’s abduction is a clear example of U.S. officials violating an understood treaty obligation.

“We’re hopeful that the U.S. Supreme Court will declare that this kind of kidnaping cannot be undertaken by our government in any circumstance,” Hoffman said.

A ruling in the case of U.S. vs. Alvarez-Machain, 91-712, can be expected by July.

The court also agreed Friday to hear several other cases that will be argued in late March. They include the following:

--Can the government ban all soliciting for donations in public airports? The justices said they would reconsider a New York City regulation that seeks to forbid solicitors from seeking money or passing out literature in the busy hallways of its airline terminals.

Four years ago, the justices unanimously struck down a Los Angeles ordinance that sought to ban “First Amendment activities” in the city’s airports. But they did so because the ordinance was so broadly worded that it could have prevented the sale of newspapers--or even conversations between two persons.

The New York ordinance, which is challenged by lawyers for the Krishna religious sect, forces the high court to consider whether the corridors of a city-owned airport should be viewed as akin to city streets or the halls of a government building. The case is International Society of Krishna Consciousness vs. Lee, 91-155.

--Can Congress force the states to create a disposal site for low-level radioactive waste from hospitals and research centers? This case, New York vs. U.S., 91-543, gives the more conservative court a chance to rewrite the constitutional boundaries between the federal government and the states.

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist believes the Constitution protects states from federal meddling, and lawyers for New York have asked the justices to rule that Congress cannot dictate to the states regarding matters such as the disposal of nuclear waste.

Times staff writer Henry Weinstein in Los Angeles contributed to this story.