From 2005 to 2008, “G.C.” was enrolled as an out-of-district
student in the Owensboro [Kentucky] Public School District. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, 711
F.3d 623 (U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit 2013).
The
Owensboro district “has a reciprocal agreement with Daviess County Public
School District, the district where G.C.'s parents reside, that allows a
limited number of students to enroll in" the Owensboro schools. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. The “`enrollment of
non-resident students in the District's schools is subject to the
recommendation of the school Principal and approval of the Superintendent.’”
G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. Non-resident students are “`defined as those
whose parent or guardian resides outside the District.’” G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra
During his
freshman year at Owensboro High School, G.C. began having disciplinary problems
and told “school officials he used drugs and was disposed to anger and
depression.” G.C. v. Owensboro Public
Schools, supra. These incidents then
occurred:
On September 12, 2007, . . . G.C. was
given a warning for using profanity in class. . . . In February 2008, G.C.
visited [Assistant Principal Christina] Smith's office and expressed to Smith `that
he was very upset about an argument he had with his girlfriend, he didn't want
to live anymore, and he had a plan to take his life.’ . . .
G.C. told Smith `he felt a lot of
pressure because of football and school and smoked marijuana to ease the
pressure.’ . . . Smith met with G.C.'s parents and suggested he be evaluated
for mental health issues. . . .. G.C.'s parents took him to a
treatment facility that day. . .
. .
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
Apparently nothing happened until the next fall, when, on
November 12, 2008, G.C. was
given a warning for excessive tardies, and on November 17, G.C. was disciplined for
fighting and arguing in the boy’s locker room. . . . On March 5, 2009, G.C.
walked out of a meeting with Summer Bell, the prevention coordinator at the
high school, and left the building without permission. . . . G.C. made a phone
call to his father and was in the parking lot at his car, where there
were tobacco products in plain view. . . .
G.C. went to Smith's office, and Smith
avers G.C. `indicated he was worried about the same things we had
discussed before when he had told me he was suicidal.’ . . . She . . . `was
very concerned about [his] well-being because he indicated he was thinking about
suicide again. I, therefore, checked [G.C.'s] cell phone to see if there was any
indication he was thinking about suicide.’ . . . G.C. visited a
treatment center that day, and the counselor recommended he be admitted for one
to two weeks. . . .
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
On March 9, 2009, school officials met with G.C. and his
parents “regarding the March 5 incident” and he “was placed on probation and
assigned four days of in-school suspension.” G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. On April 8, he was
suspended “after yelling and hitting a locker” and at the end of the academic
year, Principal Anita Burnette recommended that Superintendent Larry Vick
revoke G.C.'s authorization to attend Owensboro High School. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
Vick did not follow her recommendation; instead, he met with
G.C.’s parents on June 15 to discuss what was expected of him. if he continued
to attend Owensboro. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
Among other things, Vick told them that if G.C. had “`any further disciplinary
infraction, this privilege would be immediately revoked and he would be
required to return to his home school district.” G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
On September 2, 2009, G.C. violated Owensboro’s cell-phone policy when
he was seen
texting in class. . . . G.C.'s teacher confiscated the phone, which was brought
to [Assistant Principal Melissa] Brown, who read four text messages on the phone. . . . Brown
said she looked at the messages `to see if there was an issue with which I
could help him so that he would not do something harmful to himself or someone
else.’ . . .
Brown explained that she had these worries because
she `was aware of previous angry outbursts from [G.C.] and that [he] had
admitted to drug use in the past. I also knew [he] drove a fast car and had
once talked about suicide to [Smith]. . . . I was concerned how [he] would
react to his phone being taken away and that he might hurt himself or someone
else.’
G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools,
supra.
“After this incident, Burnette recommended to Vick that
G.C.'s out-of-district privilege be revoked,” and Vick agreed. G.C. v.
Owensboro Public Schools, supra. On October 15, 2009, he and other school
officials met with G.C.'s parents and their attorney. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. Vick told them G.C. "had violated the condition of his out-of-district privilege to attend
Owensboro High School by texting in class”, which seems to have meant he was
dismissed. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
On October 21, G.C. filed suit in federal district court
against Vick, Burnette, Brown and Smith, in which he alleged various violations
of his constitutional rights. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
One of his claims, the only one examined in this post, was that his 4th
Amendment rights were violated by school officials “when they read text
messages on his phone without the requisite reasonable suspicion”. G.C. v.
Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
-->
(The opinion does not say this, but I assume his
4th Amendment claim, at least, was brought under the federal civil
rights statute.)
The defendants responded by filing a motion for summary judgment on all his claims which, as Wikipedia explains, lets a judge enter a judgment “before trial, effectively holding that no trial will be
necessary.” As Wikipedia notes,
summary judgment can only be entered when the judge finds that
- there are no disputes of "material" fact requiring a trial to resolve, and
- in applying the law to the undisputed facts, one party is clearly entitled to judgment.
In other words, summary judgment cannot resolve factual
issues. It is proper only when a claim
is legally defective, so the opposing party wins on the law. G.C. appealed the
district court judge’s grant of summary judgment on his 4th
Amendment claim, so the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit is, in this
opinion, deciding whether the judge erred in making that decision. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
The Court of Appeals began its analysis of G.C.’s appealing
the grant of summary judgment on his 4th Amendment claim by noting
that the Supreme Court “has implemented a relaxed standard for searches in the
school setting”. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. It explained that in New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325 (1985), the Court held that
the legality of a search of a student
should depend simply on the reasonableness, under all the circumstances, of the
search. Determining the reasonableness of any search involves a twofold
inquiry: first, one must consider whether the action was justified at its
inception; second, one must determine whether the search as actually conducted
was reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the
interference in the first place.
New Jersey v. T.L.O,
supra.
The Court of Appeals then elaborated on precisely what this
means in practice:
`[a] student search is justified in its
inception when there are reasonable grounds for suspecting that the search will
garner evidence that a student has violated or is violating the law or the
rules of the school, or is in imminent danger of injury on school premises. Brannum
v. Overton County Sch. Bd., 516 F.3d 489 (U.S. Court of Appeals for
the 6th Circuit 2008). `Such a search will be permissible in its scope when the
measures adopted are reasonably related to the objectives of the search and not
excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature
of the infraction.’ New Jersey v. T.L.O.,
supra.
`In determining whether a search is
excessive in its scope, the nature and immediacy of the governmental concern
that prompted the search is considered. Brannum v. Overton County,
supra. `In order to satisfy the constitutional requirements, the means
employed must be congruent to the end sought.’ Brannum v. Overton County,
supra
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
Since this Court of Appeals had not addressed “how the T.L.O. inquiry applies to the search of
a student’s cell phone”, the plaintiff and defendants cited two federal
district court cases that had addressed this issue. G.C. v.
Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
The defendants relied on J.W.
v. Desoto County School District, 2010 WL 4394059 (U.S. District Court forthe Northern District of Mississippi 2010), in which a teacher, who saw a
student using his cell phone in class, took the cell phone and opened it to
view “the personal pictures on it” that were taken by the student while at his
come.
The federal district court judge who had the case held that
in deciding the reasonableness of the teacher’s actions, a “crucial factor” was
that the student was caught using the phone at school. J.W. v.
Desoto County School District, supra.
This judge found that “[u]pon witnessing a student improperly using a
cell phone at school, it strikes this court as being reasonable for a school
official to seek to determine to what end the student was improperly using that
phone.” J.W. v. Desoto County School
District, supra.
The Court of Appeals did not agree with this reasoning,
noting that a search is
justified at its inception if there is
reasonable suspicion that a search will uncover evidence of further wrongdoing
or of injury to the student or another. Not all infractions involving cell
phones will present such indications.
Moreover, even assuming a search of the
phone were justified, the scope of the search must be tailored to the nature of
the infraction and must be related to the objectives of the search. Under our
two-part test, using a cell phone on school grounds does not automatically
trigger an essentially unlimited right enabling a school official to search any
content stored on the phone that is not related either substantively or
temporally to the infraction.
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
G.C. relied on Klump
v. Nazareth Area School District, 425 F.Supp.2d 622 (U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania 2006), in which “a student was seen
using his cell phone, followed by two school officials accessing [his]
text messages and voice mail; searching [his] contacts list; using the
phone to call other students; and having an online conversation with [his] brother.” G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. The Klump
court found that the school officials were “justified in seizing the cell
phone, as [the student] had violated the school's policy prohibiting use or
display of cell phones during school hours.” Klump v. Nazareth Area
School District, supra.
The Klump judge also, though, found the school officials were not “ justified in calling other
students, as `[t]hey had no reason to suspect at the outset that such a search
would reveal that [the student] was violating another school policy.’’ Klump
v. Nazareth Area School District, supra. The judge discussed the text messages read by the school officials,
concluding that although they ultimately found evidence of drug activity on the
phone,
for the purposes of a 4th Amendment
claim, the court must consider only that which the officials knew at the
inception of the search: `the school officials did not see the allegedly
drug-related text message until after they initiated the search of [the] cell
phone. Accordingly, . . . there was no
justification for the school officials to search [the] phone for evidence of
drug activity.
Klump v. Nazareth Area School District, supra.
The Court of Appeals noted that the Klump court’s “fact-based approach” more accurately represented its
standard “than the blanket rule set forth in DeSoto.” G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra. It then
explained that G.C.’s objection to the
September 2009 search centers on the
first step of the T.L.O. inquiry -- whether
the search was justified at its inception. G.C. argues that the school
officials had no reasonable grounds to suspect that a search of his phone would
result in evidence of any improper activity.
The defendants counter that the search
was justified because of G.C.'s documented drug abuse and suicidal thoughts. .
. . Therefore, they argue, the school officials had reason to believe they
would find evidence of unlawful activity on G.C.'s cell phone or an indication
that he was intending to harm himself or others. . . .
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
The Court of Appeals was not convinced:
We disagree . . . that general
background knowledge of drug abuse or depressive tendencies, without more, enables a school official
to search a student's cell phone when a search would otherwise be unwarranted.
The defendants do not argue, and there is no evidence in the record to support
the conclusion, that the school officials had any specific reason at the
inception of the September 2009 search to believe that G.C. then was engaging
in any unlawful activity or that he was contemplating injuring himself or
another student.
Rather, the evidence in the record
demonstrates that G.C. was sitting in class when his teacher caught him sending
two text messages on his phone. . . . When his phone was confiscated by his
teacher pursuant to school policy, G.C. became upset. . . .
The defendants have
failed to demonstrate how anything in this sequence of events indicated to them
that a search of the phone would reveal evidence of criminal activity,
impending contravention of additional school rules, or potential harm to anyone
in the school. On these facts, the defendants did not have a
reasonable suspicion to justify the search at its inception.
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
In a footnote, the court also pointed out that the “ordinary
nature” of the September 2009
infraction is
highlighted further when contrasted with the March 2009 search, which G.C. has
conceded was justified at its inception. Immediately prior to the March 2009
search, G.C. admitted to making a call on his cell phone in the school parking
lot after having walked out of a meeting with the school prevention
coordinator. . . .
Upon his return, G.C. told Bell he was having suicidal
thoughts, and the security officer reported to Bell that there were tobacco products
in plain view in G.C.'s car. There was thus reason to believe -- based on that
day's sequence of events -- that G.C. was contemplating injuring himself or
breaking additional school rules. The defendants, however, can point to no such
indications in the hours, weeks, or months leading up to the September 2009
search.
G.C. v. Owensboro
Public Schools, supra.
The Court of Appeals therefore reversed the district court
judge’s grant of summary judgment to the defendants on G.C.’s 4th
Amendment claim and remanded the case to the district court for further
proceedings. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra. That does not, as I have
noted before, mean that G.C. prevailed and will prevail on the claim. It means that the case goes forward, at least
as to this cause of action. G.C. v. Owensboro Public Schools, supra.
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