Bowers v. Cnty. of Taylor
| Decision Date | 14 April 2022 |
| Docket Number | 20-cv-928-jdp |
| Citation | 598 F.Supp.3d 719 |
| Parties | Steven BOWERS, Plaintiff, v. COUNTY OF TAYLOR, Bruce Daniels, and Melissa Seavers, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of Wisconsin |
John H. Bradley, Strang Bradley, LLC, Madison, WI, for Plaintiff.
Jonathan Edward Sacks, Ronald S. Stadler, Jackson Lewis P.C., Milwaukee, WI, for Defendants.
This case arises from a government agency's search of an online account created by one of its employees. It poses close questions of Fourth Amendment law concerning online accounts and the rights of public employees.
Plaintiff Steven Bowers was a sergeant for the Taylor County sheriff's department. In 2017, the department started working with a television show called Cold Justice , a true-crime series that investigates unsolved crimes. The department gave the crew members access to one case file, but Bowers began sharing other case files with them, even though he didn't have permission to do so. After Bowers admitted what he had done, Sheriff Bruce Daniels directed IT director Melissa Lind (formerly Melissa Seavers) to try to access Bowers’ Dropbox account, where Daniels believed that Bowers had stored the files. Lind was able to do so because the Dropbox account was linked to Bowers's work email. Lind changed Bowers's account password, accessed the account, and found the case files.
Bowers contends that Daniels and Lind violated the Fourth Amendment by failing to obtain a warrant before changing his password and accessing his account. He claims damages for "mental suffering, anguish, fear, humiliation, loss of personal freedom, and expenses." Dkt. 10, ¶ 36. Defendants move for summary judgment, contending that the search was lawful and, even if not, they are entitled to qualified immunity. Dkt. 28.
The general rule is that a warrant is required for searches of private property. But there are more lenient standards involving some searches conducted by government employers. The Dropbox account was Bowers's personal account, and it wasn't stored on county servers, factors tending to support Bowers's contention that a warrant was required. But other factors point the other way, including that Bowers linked the account to his work email and he placed work files taken from a work computer into the account. The account was password protected, but Bowers had shared access with several others.
In the court's view, defendants’ search was distinct from a typical workplace search, and the Dropbox account was sufficiently private to fall within the general warrant requirement. But the court reaches that conclusion only by extending principles from current precedent and following the reasoning of courts from other circuits. Bowers hasn't cited analogous cases from the Supreme Court or the Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit, and the more general case law he cites doesn't apply with obvious clarity to his situation. Under these circumstances, defendants did not violate any clearly established rights, and thus they are entitled to qualified immunity. The court will grant their motion for summary judgment.
The following facts are undisputed except where noted.
In January 2017, Taylor County entered a contract with the producers of Cold Justice , a reality television show that featured a former prosecutor and former investigators who attempted to solve "cold cases." In accordance with the agreement, the county gave the producers access to files about what the parties call "the Monte case," involving an unsolved murder in Taylor County.
Bowers was a sergeant for the Taylor County sheriff's department at the time. He began speaking with staff on the tv show about other cold cases. The parties refer to one of those cases as the "V murder case."
Without obtaining permission or notifying anyone at the sheriff's office, Bowers took electronic files from the V murder case and copied them to his account with Dropbox, a cloud-based storage website. Bowers provided two versions of how he accomplished this.1 But it's undisputed that he originally took the files from a county computer.
Bowers had created the Dropbox account using his work email address in 2014, but Dropbox isn't affiliated with the county. He used his work email address and a password that he created to log in to the account. He also used his own funds to pay for the account. He stored both personal and work-related files on the account.
Again without authorization, Bowers gave two of the show's employees and his girlfriend access to the Dropbox account, which allowed them to view the V murder case files. He did not share his password with them.
In late February 2017, Chief Deputy Larry Woebbeking overheard crew members from the show talking about Taylor County cases other than the Monte case and about reading case files in their hotel room. Around the same time, he overheard crew members talking about receiving documents on Dropbox. Woebbeking suspected that Bowers had given the crew members confidential information and documents about other cases because no department employee other than Woebbeking and Bowers had been working with the show that day. Woebbeking told Sheriff Daniels about his suspicion.
A couple of days later, the department data records manager told Daniels that Bowers had instructed her to retrieve some case files and share them with one of the show's producers. The records manager also said that she believed files related to the V murder case were on Dropbox. Daniels confronted Bowers, who admitted that he had shared case files, including the V murder case file, with show producers. Bowers later returned paper copies of files that he had given to the show employees.
After speaking with the district attorney, Bowers asked IT Director Lind to access Bowers's county email account and the Dropbox account to look for information related to the V murder case. Lind accomplished this by: (1) going to the Dropbox website and entering Bowers's work email address to use Dropbox's "lost password" feature; (2) signing into Bowers's work email account and changing his Dropbox password; and (3) using the new password to sign in to the Dropbox account.
Once she gained access to the account, Lind discovered a folder associated with the V murder case. She opened the folder, which contained many confidential case records.
Bowers has been charged with misconduct in public office, in violation of Wis. Stat. § 946.12(2). He is on administrative leave pending resolution of the criminal proceedings.2
The court will discuss additional facts as they become relevant to the analysis.
The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution protects the "right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures." Bowers's primary claim is that defendants violated his rights under the Fourth Amendment by unreasonably searching his Dropbox account. He doesn't contend that defendants violated the Fourth Amendment by searching his work email.
Bowers also contends that defendants unreasonably "seized" his account password by changing it without his permission. As defendants point out, Bowers didn't raise that seizure claim in his complaint. Rather, Bowers originally contended that defendants seized his account by "locking [him] out" out of the account. Dkt. 10, ¶ 38. Bowers has abandoned the lockout claim and replaced it with a new one. But it is well established that a plaintiff may not amend his complaint through his summary judgment opposition brief. See Anderson v. Donahoe , 699 F.3d 989, 997 (7th Cir. 2012). In any event, even if Bowers had included the seizure claim in his complaint and even assuming that a password is an "effect" and that changing a password is a "seizure" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, changing Bowers's password was simply a precursor to the search of his account. And Bowers identifies no reason why the search would be valid, but the "seizure" wouldn't be. So the court will focus on the search.
The first substantive question in this case is whether Bowers had a reasonable expectation of privacy in his Dropbox account. If he didn't, his Fourth Amendment claim fails. If he did, the next question is whether defendants needed a warrant to search his account. If they did, then they violated the Fourth Amendment because it's undisputed that defendants didn't have a warrant. If they didn't need a warrant, the question is whether the search had a reasonable purpose and scope.
But these substantive questions don't resolve defendants’ motion for summary judgment. Even if defendants violated Bowers's Fourth Amendment rights, defendants contend that they are entitled to qualified immunity, a doctrine that shields public officials from damages under certain circumstances. Bowers isn't seeking injunctive relief, so if defendants prevail on their qualified immunity defense, his claim fails.
Generally, a defendant is entitled to qualified immunity unless the plaintiff shows not only that the defendant violated his rights, but also that his rights were clearly established at the relevant time. The plaintiff can meet this burden by pointing to either: (1) a closely analogous, binding case that was decided in his favor; (2) a more general constitutional rule that applies "with obvious clarity" to the defendants’ conduct. Cibulka v. City of Madison , 992 F.3d 633, 639–40 (7th Cir. 2021). Defendants contend that Bowers has failed to meet his burden under either approach.
Defendants also invoke an aspect of qualified immunity doctrine that applies when the law is clearly established, but the defendant can show through "extraordinary circumstances" that he neither knew nor should have known of the relevant legal standard. See Harlow v. Fitzgerald , 457 U.S. 800, 818–19, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). Defendants contend that extraordinary circumstances are...
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