Justice v. City of Peachtree City
| Decision Date | 14 May 1992 |
| Docket Number | No. 91-8427,91-8427 |
| Parties | Charles JUSTICE, as Next Friend of James Justice, Keith Simon as Next Friend of Lazena Simon, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF PEACHTREE CITY, Keith Dryden, Individually and in his Capacity as a Police Officer, Chris Matson, Individually and in his Capacity as a Police Officer, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit |
James Edward Bischoff, Bischoff & White, Fayetteville, Ga., for plaintiffs-appellants.
Asa Mitchell Powell, Jr., Sanders, Mottola, Haugen & Mann, Newnan, Ga., for defendants-appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
Before HATCHETT and DUBINA, Circuit Judges, and GODBOLD, Senior Circuit Judge.
In this case which presents an issue of first impression, we hold that law enforcement officers may subject a juvenile who is lawfully in custody to a strip search based upon reasonable suspicion that the juvenile is concealing a weapon or contraband, when the strip search is conducted in the least intrusive manner, even where the juvenile is in custody after being arrested for an offense that is not a felony. In so holding, we affirm the district court.
Before February 8, 1989, the Peachtree City, Georgia Council and its mayor, Fred Brown, enacted a drug and alcohol abuse plan which the Peachtree City Manager, the Chief of Police, and the Mayor of Peachtree City developed. The plan provided for increased vehicle stops with emphasis on teenage drug offenders. At the city council meeting where Mayor Brown announced the plan, he stated:
At approximately 1:30 p.m. on February 8, 1989, Officer Chris Matson of the Peachtree City Police Department observed two cars parked in an otherwise empty parking lot behind a church. Matson turned his car into the church parking lot to investigate, and as he did so the cars attempted to leave. Recognizing that one of the cars belonged to James Justice, a sixteen-year-old teenager, Matson stopped Justice's car, and upon approaching it, saw Justice give something to the only other occupant in the car, Lazena Simon, a fourteen year old girl.
When Matson asked Justice and Simon why they were not in school, they replied that they had their parents' permission to be absent from school. Matson also inquired as to why Justice and Simon were parked in the back of the church parking lot. Justice, a member of the church, informed Matson that he was in the church's parking lot because he had stopped to check a loose tire which the driver of the other recently departed car had told him about. After hearing this explanation, Matson examined the tire, and it appeared that the tire had not been handled recently. Matson radioed his headquarters and arranged for Juvenile Officer Keith Dryden to come to the church parking lot. After arriving at the parking lot, Dryden radioed Justice and Simon's high school, and school authorities informed Dryden that Justice and Simon had told school authorities they were absent due to illness. Dryden radioed the police station and requested that a police officer contact Justice's and Simon's parents and tell the parents to pick up their children at the police station.
After Matson and Dryden informed the teenagers that they were under arrest for loitering and truancy, Matson conducted a pat-down search of Justice and placed him in the back seat of the patrol car. Additionally, Matson arranged to have Justice's car impounded, towed to the police station, and inventoried. Although Matson searched Simon's purse, neither Matson nor Dryden conducted a pat-down search of Simon before taking her to the police station. The parking lot searches did not produce any incriminating evidence.
After arriving at the police station, Dryden requested two female police officers to strip search Simon. Although Simon's mother had arrived at the police station before the strip search, the officers kept Simon from her mother. After carrying Simon to a room where no persons were present, the officers ordered Simon to strip down to her panties. Simon complied with the officers' instructions. The officers found no contraband, and released Simon into her mother's custody. The charges of loitering and truancy were later dismissed "in the best interest of justice."
On June 12, 1989, Charles Justice, as next friend of James Justice, and Keith Simon, as next friend of Lazena Simon, filed suit against Peachtree City, Keith Dryden, and Chris Matson in their individual and official capacities (the "Peachtree group"). The complaint alleged violations of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and sought compensatory and punitive damages. Justice alleged that Matson and Dryden violated his constitutional rights when they arrested him, searched him, and impounded and inventoried his car. Simon alleged that Matson and Dryden violated her constitutional rights when they arrested her and ordered that she be stripped searched. Additionally, Justice and Simon alleged that Peachtree City, violated their constitutional rights when it adopted a policy that caused the deprivation of their constitutional rights.
The Peachtree group moved for summary judgment arguing that: (1) its actions did not violate Justice or Simon's constitutional rights; (2) the city did not have a policy, custom, or ordinance that caused a deprivation of rights; (3) qualified immunity protected Dryden and Matson; and (4) it cannot be liable for punitive damages because Matson and Dryden's conduct did not rise to the level of calloused indifference to constitutional rights. The district court granted summary judgment for the Peachtree group on all issues, except the Peachtree group's motion on the issue of whether Simon suffered compensatory damages arising out of the strip search. The district court heard this final issue on March 26, 1991, and ruled for the Peachtree group.
On appeal, Justice and Simon present the following issues: (1) whether the district court erred in ruling that the strip search was reasonable; (2) whether the district court properly ruled that the police officers did not violate Simon and Justice's clearly established constitutional rights; and (3) whether the district court properly granted the motion for summary judgment on the issue of the Peachtree group's liability for punitive damages.
The Peachtree group contends that Simon's strip search was constitutionally permissible because the police officers possessed a reasonable suspicion that Simon was concealing contraband. Additionally, the Peachtree group contends that the manner in which they conducted the strip search, the justification for initiating it, the place in which they conducted it, and the limited scope of the intrusion supports their contention that the strip search was constitutional. The Peachtree group also contends that Simon failed to prove that the police officers' actions were pursuant to a policy or custom requiring the strip searching of juvenile females charged with truancy and loitering. The Peachtree group contends that the district court properly granted the motion for summary judgment because Officers Dryden and Matson acted in good faith and did not violate the juveniles' clearly established constitutional rights. Thus, the officers are entitled to qualified immunity. In addition, the Peachtree group contends that the Supreme Court limited a city's liability under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 to compensatory damages.
Simon argues that the district court erred in failing to rule that the strip search was per se unreasonable and violative of the Fourth Amendment. She emphasizes that the officers lacked probable cause to conduct a strip search, and the circumstances surrounding the strip search did not fit into an established exception to the warrant requirement. Specifically, Simon argues that because she is a juvenile arrested for minor offenses, she could have only been subjected to a strip search if the officers had probable cause to believe she was concealing weapons or contraband which posed a threat to the safety and security of the jail.
The Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution provides, in pertinent part: "The right of the people to be secured in their persons ... against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated...." U.S. Const. amend. IV. The Supreme Court, in interpreting the Fourth Amendment, has held that "wherever an individual may harbor a reasonable 'expectation of privacy' [the Fourth Amendment entitles the person] to be free from unreasonable governmental intrusion." Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 9, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 1873, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). The Supreme Court recognized in Terry v. Ohio that Terry, 392 U.S. at 9, 88 S.Ct. at 1873 (quoting Elkins v. United States, 364 U.S. 206, 222, 80 S.Ct. 1437, 1446, 4 L.Ed.2d 1669 (1960)). Thus, the Fourth Amendment is violated when the government conducts an unreasonable search in an area where a person has a reasonable expectation of privacy.
We accept as axiomatic the principle that people harbor a reasonable expectation of privacy in their "private parts." In Doe v. Calumet City, Illinois, 754 F.Supp. 1211 (N.D.Ill.1990), the court recognized that "[d]eeply imbedded in our culture ... is the belief that people have a reasonable expectation not to be unclothed involuntarily, to be observed unclothed or to have their 'private' parts observed or touched by others." Doe, 754 F.Supp. at 1218. In this case, officers ordered Simon, a fourteen-year-old girl, to...
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