PORTLAND (AP) – A federal judge denied a government request for an order to compel two teenagers not suspected of a crime to submit to saliva swabs and provide fingerprints to bolster their credibility as witnesses in last year’s Fryeburg Academy arson.

In a decision released Wednesday, Magistrate Judge David Cohen said the government’s request violates the teenagers’ Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable searches and seizures.

The government was seeking to take the saliva swabs and fingerprints in connection with the arson that destroyed Fryeburg Academy’s $1.7 million recreation complex on Oct. 12, 2005. The teenagers, who live in Fryeburg, told investigators that two suspects had told them the morning of the arson that they had started the fire, according to court documents.

Federal prosecutors said that in the upcoming arson trial of Maxx Noble – the other defendant pleaded guilty in January – they expect defense attorneys to attack the credibility of the teenagers, who are expected to testify.

But a match between the teenagers’ DNA and DNA found on soda bottles in a field in Fryeburg would bolster the credibility of their testimony that Noble confessed to the crime. The teenagers told investigators that Noble and Philip Thibault told them they had broken into a parked truck and stolen Hostess bakery products and then set fire to the gym, according to the ruling.

During oral arguments, a federal prosecutor questioned whether something as quick and easy as taking fingerprints or a saliva swab from somebody’s mouth could be interpreted as a “seizure.”

But Cohen said the U.S. Supreme Court has made clear that obtaining physical evidence from a person involves a potential Fourth Amendment violation on two fronts: the “seizure” of the person to bring him into contact with government agents and the subsequent search for evidence.

Thibault, a 2003 Fryeburg Academy graduate, pleaded guilty in January to arson.

Taking DNA is clearly a “seizure,” no matter how brief and minimally intrusive it is, Cohen wrote. Furthermore, there is no probable cause or even reasonable suspicion to believe that either teenager was engaged in criminal activity, he said.

Noble, who was once a student at the school but did not graduate, is scheduled to go on trial in August on charges of arson and conspiracy in connection with the fire.