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FAIRBANKS - The Alaska Court of Appeals has overturned the drug conviction of a woman who said an Alaska State Trooper did not have the right to search her following a stop for a minor traffic infraction - even though she gave permission to do so.

The court Friday said the privacy rights of Susan Brown were violated and the search was unreasonable because she had no way to know that she could have refused the request.

"She believed it was the wrong decision and the court said she was correct," said Sharon Barr, the assistant public defender who represented Brown. "He had no reason to think she was doing anything wrong."

The incident occurred at 3 a.m. Nov. 24, 2004, when Brown and the trooper were the only drivers on the road.

Brown was driving in North Pole when a Trooper Maurizio Salinas pulled her over because her rear license plate was not properly illuminated. The light was working but dirty and apparently not "clearly visible from a distance of 50 feet to the rear" as required.

According to court documents, Salinas took Brown's driver's license back to his patrol car and confirmed it was valid and that she had no pending warrants for her arrest. He did not tell her why she had been stopped.

The trooper decided to let Brown go with a warning, but before he left - and apparently without handing her back her license - asked if he could perform a search.

The search turned up a crack pipe in the lining of her coat. The officer also found cocaine in a cigarette box in her purse.

During court proceedings, Salinas testified that he worked traffic patrol from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. and it was his practice to conduct a few consent searches for drugs or weapons during traffic stops. Salinas had no grounds for suspecting that Brown was carrying drugs, Appeals Court Judge David Mannheimer wrote in the decision.

The court concluded that the trooper did not have reasonable suspicion to conduct such a search during a traffic stop and that the Alaska Constitution "contains an even broader guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures than is found it its federal counterpart."

The facts of Brown's case, Mannheimer wrote, present an example of an apparently ongoing and unjustified infringement of the privacy rights of Alaska citizens.

The court did not decide whether all requests for searches during routine stops, unless related to the reason for the stop or a reasonable suspicion of criminality, should be precluded.

But judges said the Brown case was "a particularly egregious example" because Brown had not been told why she was being stopped and thus could not have known if she had the right to refuse the search request.

"For all that Brown knew, the trooper might be verifying her identity in preparation for arresting her," the opinion said.

When the officer returned to Brown's car, he still did not tell her the reason for the stop. Even though he had decided to give her only a warning, he gave no indication she was free to go, or would be shortly, Mannheimer wrote.

Even if Brown had been fully conversant with search and seizure law, the court said, she had no way of knowing if she had the right to refuse the trooper's request, or if the request was just a polite phrasing of a command.

Assistant Attorney General Kenneth M. Rosenstein argued that the search was acceptable because it did not dramatically increase the length of the traffic stop. Courts have ruled that such stops are not to last longer than necessary to accomplish their goal. The North Pole search took place only about two minutes after the woman was stopped.

Rosenstein said Friday he did not yet know if he would appeal to the Alaska Supreme Court.