Case Title: POLICE OFFICERS'GUILD v. Seattle

Citation: 494 P.2d 485, 80 Wash. 2d 307

Docket Number: 

State: washington

Court: Washington Supreme Court

Date: 1972-03-02T00:00:00Z

Document:
80 Wn.2d 307 (1972) 494 P.2d 485 SEATTLE POLICE OFFICERS' GUILD et al., Respondents, v. THE CITY OF SEATTLE et al., Appellants. No. 41762. The Supreme Court of Washington, En Banc. March 2, 1972. A.L. Newbould and J. Roger Nowell, for appellants. Clinton, Moats, Andersen & Fleck, by Richard J. Glein, for respondents. HAMILTON, C.J. This is an appeal from the action of the superior court in granting an injunction, the effect of which would prohibit the Seattle Police Department from seeking to elicit, under threat of dismissal, answers from individual police officers, either through direct questioning or through polygraph examination, to questions relating to the performance of their official duties. *308 The respondent, Seattle Police Officers' Guild, a professional association for police officers, as plaintiff, brings this action on behalf of its membership. The appellants (defendants) are the City of Seattle and the Chief of Police, under whose auspices an internal investigation into the conduct of certain police officers was being conducted. We summarize the agreed facts. During 1970 several Seattle police officers were implicated in a pay-off system. The matter was widely publicized. Public confidence in the integrity of the police department was shaken. The then Acting Chief of Police, Charles R. Gain, initiated a departmental administrative investigation. During the course of the inquiry, the Acting Chief of Police proposed to require those officers interrogated to answer questions put to them relating to their official conduct and in some instances to submit to a polygraph examination all under threat of dismissal if they refused to cooperate.[1] By way of affidavit, the Acting Chief of Police asserted that "questions to be asked of the officers will be specifically, directly and narrowly related to the past performance of their official duties" and "at no time during the said investigation or any investigation concerning misconduct will any officer be directed to waive immunity from self-incrimination and prior to directing any officer to answer questions or to submit to a polygraph test, he will be advised that information gained by reason of his answers cannot be used against him in a criminal proceeding." Contending that the proposed course of inquiry would contravene the constitutional privilege and protection against self-incrimination found in the fifth amendment to the United States Constitution, respondent instituted this action seeking a writ of prohibition. Appellants answered respondent's complaint and a hearing was held resulting in the issuance of a temporary injunction, the essence of which was to restrain appellants from disciplining any *309 officer who, when questioned, claimed his constitutional privileges or who refused to submit to a polygraph test. On appeal the Court of Appeals certified the cause to this court. We accepted jurisdiction. Basically, two questions are presented which relate to and must be considered in the context of a police department internal administrative investigation of or inquiry into alleged police misconduct. One, may a police officer interrogated in the course of such an inquiry be lawfully disciplined or discharged for claiming his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and refusing upon such ground to answer questions pertaining to the performance of his official duties? Two, may a police officer during such an inquiry be validly disciplined for refusing to submit to a polygraph test? Starting with the premise that Malloy v. Hogan, 378 U.S. 1, 12 L. Ed. 2d 653, 84 S. Ct. 1489 (1964), and subsequent cases impress the privileges of the Fifth Amendment upon state proceedings through the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment to the United States Constitution, we answer the questions presented in the affirmative. Our answer to the first question requires an examination and interpretation of four relatively recent decisions of the United States Supreme Court. The first, Garrity v. New Jersey, 385 U.S. 493, 17 L. Ed. 2d 562, 87 S. Ct. 616 (1967), concerned police officers allegedly involved in fixing traffic tickets. During the course of an official investigation and as a prelude to questioning, they were advised that anything they might say could be used against them in a criminal proceeding, that they had the privilege to refuse to answer if their answer would tend to incriminate them, and that if they refused to answer they would be subject to removal from office. They answered the questions. Some of their answers were admitted into evidence, over their objections, in subsequent criminal prosecutions flowing from the investigation. They were convicted. Conceiving the choice imposed upon them, i.e., self-incrimination or job forfeiture, was tantamount to *310 coercion, thereby rendering their statements involuntary, the United States Supreme Court, in a five to four decision, reversed their convictions stating, at page 500: The Garrity decision confined its attention and holding to the single proposition that statements obtained in the course of a disciplinary investigation under threat of dismissal from office could not be used as evidence in subsequent criminal prosecutions. As pointed out by the author of the Garrity opinion, Mr. Justice Douglas, in footnote 3 on page 516 of Spevack v. Klein, 385 U.S. 511, 17 L. Ed. 2d 574, 87 S. Ct. 625 (1967), a decision which was delivered on the same day as Garrity, said: The Garrity decision thus preserved the Fifth Amendment protections for police officers during questioning under threat of dismissal in the course of disciplinary proceedings by precluding use of answers so elicited in subsequent criminal proceedings, thereby, and to that extent, stripping the answers of their incriminating nature. Although the Garrity holding would appear to be an adequate safeguard of the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination accorded police officers being questioned concerning their official conduct, the respondent contends that the decision in Spevack v. Klein, supra, should also apply to police officers. In Spevack an order disbarring an attorney was reversed. During disbarment proceedings the attorney involved refused, on the basis of the Fifth Amendment, to produce subpoenaed financial records and to testify before the inquiring *311 tribunal. As a result of his refusal he was disbarred. Four members of the court, in an opinion authored by Mr. Justice Douglas, reasoned that the Fifth Amendment extended to lawyers as well as laymen and should not be watered down by imposing the dishonor of disbarment as a penalty for asserting it. Mr. Justice Fortas concurred in the result, but expressed the view that a distinction should be made between an attorney's right to remain silent sans penalty of disbarment and that of a public employee who is asked questions specifically related to the performance of his official duties. In this respect Justice Fortas stated (385 U.S. 511, at 519): This distinction, as urged by Justice Fortas, was formally approved with respect to police officers by a majority of the Supreme Court membership (six with three concurrences) *312 in a subsequent decision, Gardner v. Broderick, 392 U.S. 273, 20 L. Ed. 2d 1082, 88 S. Ct. 1913 (1968). In Gardner a police officer was dismissed pursuant to a provision of the New York city charter which required, in pertinent part, that the employment of a city employee would terminate if he should refuse before an appropriate tribunal to answer questions in relation to his official duties on the ground that his answers might tend to incriminate him, or if he should refuse to waive immunity from prosecution on account of any such matter in relation to which he might be properly called upon to testify. The officer was dismissed on the ground that, as a witness before a grand jury investigating alleged bribery and corruption of police officers, he refused to waive immunity from prosecution. This occurred prior to the decision in Garrity v. New Jersey, supra. In holding that the requirement of a waiver of immunity vitiated the dismissal, the Supreme Court, nevertheless, with approval announced the principles which we believe to be applicable in the instant case. It was stated thusly (392 U.S. 273, at 277): (Footnotes omitted.) The principles announced in Gardner were also applied to employees of the New York City Department of Sanitation in a case decided on the same day, Uniformed Sanitation Men Ass'n v. Commissioner of Sanitation, 392 U.S. 280, 20 L. Ed. 2d 1089, 88 S. Ct. 1917 (1968). As in Gardner, the employees had been discharged because of their refusal to sign waivers of immunity from prosecution in the course of investigatory proceedings concerning alleged corruption in their department. Although reversing a judgment dismissing their claim for relief, the Supreme Court again, as in Gardner, pointed out, at page 284: Mr. Justice Harlan, who had vigorously dissented in *314 Garrity and Spevack, joined by Mr. Justice Stewart, concurred in the results of Gardner and Uniformed Sanitation, and speaking of the combination of the four decisions stated (392 U.S. 280, at 285): We are satisfied that Mr. Justice Harlan correctly assessed the thrust and effect of these four decisions. Other courts too have adopted his interpretation. Clifford v. Shoultz, 413 F.2d 868 (9th Cir.1969); In re Addonizio, 53 N.J. 107, 248 A.2d 531 (1968), Silverio v. Municipal Court, 355 Mass. 623, 247 N.E.2d 379, cert. denied, 396 U.S. 878, 24 L. Ed. 2d 135, 90 S. Ct. 151 (1969); and Kammerer v. Board of Fire & Police Comm'rs, 44 Ill. 2d 500, 256 N.E.2d 12 (1970). In the Silverio case, supra, the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, after taking note of Garrity, Spevack, Gardner, and Uniformed Sanitation cases, commented concerning the discharge of a policeman for refusing to answer questions relating to his official conduct, at page 629: We are in accord with this view. The only case which would appear to express a contrary view is Luman v. Tanzler, 411 F.2d 164 (5th Cir.1969) upon which the trial court relied. The issue in Luman, however, was different than in the instant case. Luman, a policeman, had been suspended and was facing simultaneously an administrative disciplinary proceeding and a criminal prosecution. He was seeking to enjoin the disciplinary proceeding pending disposition of the criminal prosecution. The court denied the injunction; however, in passing noted that Luman, if he testified at the disciplinary proceeding, might well prejudice his defense in the criminal action. Under these circumstances, the court felt he should not be penalized for exercising his Fifth Amendment protections. Insofar, otherwise, as the decision might be conceived as being at odds with our view of the sweep of Garrity, Spevack, Gardner, and Uniformed Sanitation it would be representative of a minority approach and one to which we would not now be willing to subscribe. A police department is a highly sensitive agency entrusted and charged with the duty of protecting the community it serves from the evils of crime and corruption. To efficiently and effectively accomplish its mission it requires the respect and regard of the public, and when it has reason to believe that some of its members may be engaging in disreputable practices, it has a valid interest in purging itself of such practices through internal departmental procedures *316 and the right to require the full cooperation of its membership to this end. [1] In the instant case, the questions to be asked the officers involved in the departmental inquiry, by the affidavit of the Acting Chief of Police, were to be specifically, directly, and narrowly related to the past performance of their official duties. The officers were not to be required to waive any immunity they might have, either under Garrity or otherwise, as to the use of their testimony or the fruits thereof in any subsequent prosecution. They were to be advised that information supplied through their answers could not be used against them in later criminal proceedings, and that their refusal to cooperate in the investigation could result in their dismissal. Under these circumstances we are convinced that within the procedural formula of the Garrity, Spevack, Gardner, and Uniformed Sanitation cases, the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination would not be a bar to discharge of an officer or officers who refused to answer questions pertaining to the use or abuse of his official duties. We conclude, therefore, that the trial court was in error when it undertook to enjoin appellants from dismissing or otherwise disciplining any member of the Seattle Police Department for refusing, on the grounds of the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination, to answer in the course of the departmental inquiry questions specifically, directly, and narrowly related to that member's performance of his official duties. We turn now to the second question, that is, whether appellants may require, under penalty of dismissal for refusal, officers questioned during an internal departmental inquiry to submit to a polygraph test. This presents an issue of first impression in this state, and has not been passed upon by the United States Supreme Court. There is a division of authority among the several states which have considered the matter. The courts of three states, California, Illinois, and Louisiana have upheld dismissals of police who refused during *317 the course of administrative investigations into alleged police misconduct to submit to a polygraph test. The courts of two states, Connecticut and Pennsylvania have reached a contrary result. We think the rationale and the reasoning of the California, Illinois, and Louisiana decisions are the more persuasive, and fully answer the contentions of respondent to the effect that the polygraph test is too fallible and amounts to an invasion of privacy. Furthermore, the Connecticut and Pennsylvania cases are distinguishable from the instant situation. Roux v. New Orleans Police Dep't, 223 So. 2d 905 (La. App.), aff'd, 254 La. 815, 227 So. 2d 148 (1969), cert. denied, 397 U.S. 1008, 25 L. Ed. 2d 421, 90 S. Ct. 1236 (1970), the most recent of the decisions, involved an internal departmental investigation of a police officer's involvement with a homicide victim. The officer refused to take a polygraph test and was dismissed. In sustaining the dismissal, the court referred to the cases from the other states, and then predicated its determination upon Fichera v. State Personnel Bd., 217 Cal. App. 2d 613, 32 Cal. Rptr. 159 (1963), stating, at page 911: Reaching a similar result the Appellate Court of Illinois in Coursey v. Board of Fire & Police Comm'rs, 90 Ill. App.2d 31, 234 N.E.2d 339 (1967), observed, at page 43: As we have indicated, the cases relied upon by the trial court and urged upon us by respondent Molino v. Board of Pub. Safety, 154 Conn. 368, 225 A.2d 805 (1966), and Stape v. Civil Serv. Comm'n, 404 Pa. 354, 172 A.2d 161 (1961) are distinguishable. In Molino the officers involved, and who were requested to take the polygraph tests, were not accused of criminal or anti-social behavior. Their dereliction which gave rise to the administrative investigation culminating in their refusal to take the polygraph tests was a failure to properly log and report an incident occurring while they were on patrol. Under these circumstances, the court concluded that their refusal together with their failure to properly comply with the police manual did not warrant discharge, noting that the penalty simply did not fit the case. In Stape the court held that a refusal to submit to a polygraph test did not amount to "just cause" for dismissal within the contemplation of the existing civil service regulations. Neither case completely closes the door upon the proposition that in appropriate circumstances a refusal to take a polygraph test could amount to grounds for dismissal. In the instant case, serious and notorious charges of crime and corruption had, with appreciable cause, been leveled against members of the police department. By the very nature of the charges, serious public doubt was cast upon the integrity, the morality, and the fidelity of the department and its membership. An intensive internal administrative investigation was fully justified. Questioning in the course of the investigation was to be carried on within prescribed constitutional limits. [2] Under these circumstances, we conclude and hold *320 that if, in the exercise of prudent judgment, the investigating authority determines it reasonably necessary to utilize the polygraph examination as an investigatory tool to test the dependability of prior answers of suspected officers to questions specifically, narrowly, and directly related to the performance of their official duties, then, such investigating authority may properly request such officers to submit to a polygraph test under pain of dismissal for refusal. Bearing in mind that the reasonableness of an investigating authority's request, under varying circumstances, can be subjected to judicial scrutiny and abuses of discretion thereby curbed, coupled with the fact that, in any event, the results of a polygraph test and a subject's willingness or unwillingness to take the test cannot be admitted into evidence in subsequent criminal proceedings, we see no constitutional or legal barrier to the conclusion we have reached. With the foregoing disposition of the two questions presented we do not reach the remaining contentions of the parties. Insofar as the temporary injunction issued by the trial court be inconsistent herewith, it is dissolved. Appellants shall recover their costs. I disagree with the conclusion of the majority that rights guaranteed to all other persons under the constitutions of the United States and of this state are not available to police officers. The basis upon which this distinction is made is not clear to me from a reading of the opinion and I have great trouble in conceiving a rational basis for such a distinction. Is it that a police administrator is less apt to abuse his power, to use oppressive techniques to exact confessions from his own subordinates than he is when dealing with others accused of crime? Is it that a coerced confession is more reliable when wrung from a police officer than when wrung from some other individual? Is it that where police offenses are concerned, *321 no other method of investigation will reveal the facts? In the case of the polygraph, is this "technique" more reliable, is the administering of it less of an indignity when the subject is a policeman? Is the invasion of the policeman's privacy less offensive to the court than the invasion of the privacy of an accused murderer? If all or any of these questions can be answered in the affirmative, I see no documentation of that answer in the opinion or in the record before the court. In the opinion of the United States Supreme Court in the case of Garrity v. New Jersey, 385 U.S. 493, 17 L. Ed. 2d 562, 87 S. Ct. 616 (1967), cited and quoted by the majority, it was recognized that the threat of loss of employment is economic coercion, and that a confession obtained by that means is not a voluntary confession. I realize that dictum of the Supreme Court in a subsequent case, Gardner v. Broderick, 392 U.S. 273, 20 L. Ed. 2d 1082, 88 S. Ct. 1913 (1968), also cited and quoted in the majority opinion, indicates that the court would hold that the refusal to answer questions directed to the performance of an officer's official duties, based upon the Fifth Amendment privilege, would not be a bar to his dismissal. It is true that the Fifth Amendment expressly forbids compulsory self-incrimination only in criminal proceedings. But the United States Supreme Court has applied it to the case of the lawyer faced with the "Hobson's choice between self-incrimination and forfeiting his means of livelihood." (Spevack v. Klein, 385 U.S. 511, 17 L. Ed. 2d 574, 87 S. Ct. 625 (1967).) It seems to me that if the constitutional prohibition is so strong and so pervasive that it relieves the lawyer of that choice, it also should relieve the policeman of that choice; and this court should not anticipate that the United States Supreme Court, when confronted with a case in which the point was actually at issue, would follow its dictum. The only logical conclusion to be drawn from a rule of law which says that public officers and employees must testify under economic coercion, whereas others need not, *322 is that the privilege exists not, as I had always thought, because coerced statements are not sufficiently reliable to justify the means used in obtaining them and because of the danger which they hold for the innocent, but rather it exists solely as a shield for the guilty. In other words, the court when it makes such a rule tacitly admits that it does not believe in the validity of the great privilege which our forefathers, still close enough to the abuse of power to remember its cruelties and injustices, so carefully embodied in the Bill of Rights. It seems to me that it is of far greater importance that the police officer be genuinely committed to the principles embodied in the constitution than that he be required to give evidence against himself when suspected of misfeasance or malfeasance. If he is not committed to those principles, he is not likely to be conscientious in respecting the rights of persons accused of crimes when they are in his custody. And if this court holds that those principles and those rights apply to persons accused of crimes, to lawyers in the performance of their professional duties, to the employees of all but the state and its subdivisions (see RCW 49.44.120), what real meaning can they have for him? It should not be surprising if he views with contempt a constitution whose protection is extended to all but people like him. It should be remembered that this action is not brought by policemen who have refused to answer questions. Rather, it is a class action, brought on behalf of all officers, the innocent as well as those who may be guilty. That such a group should bring this action is to me some rather sound evidence that persons whose duties include the taking of confessions and the administering of "lie-detecting" tests recognize the fallibilities of these techniques of crime solution. The innocent do not desire to be subjected to them anymore than do the guilty. What group can be in a better position to recognize the dangers of abuse, or of mistake? If the extracting of a statement by the simple means of questioning an officer, under threat of dismissal if he does *323 not answer, is objectionable, it seems to me that the use of the polygraph is even more obnoxious. The majority recognizes that the technique is not reliable[2] and that the results of such a test are inadmissible in a court of law, still they authorize its use. Here is how the test is administered: (Footnote omitted.) M. Markson, A Reexamination of the Role of Lie Detectors in Labor Relations, 22 Lab. L.J. 394 (1971).[3] As the author of this article points out, critics of the polygraph have made these points: (Footnote omitted.) 22 Lab. L.J. at 396. See an exhaustive article on this subject by Oliver E. Laymon, professor of law at the University of South Dakota. This author concludes: *325 O. Laymon, Lie Detectors Detection by Deception, 10 S. Dak. L. Rev. 1, 32 (1965). It is generally recognized, I think, that any reliability this device may have depends upon the qualifications of the operator. This operator, who is accuser, witness, judge and jury, is the actual "lie detector" not the machine which is attached to the body of the victim. The graph tells nothing. It is the operator's interpretation of it which determines whether a particular answer is true or false. The operator is, of course, a human being, and a human being does not have the disinterest, the detachment of a machine. He has motivations, prejudices, ambitions, interests to protect, including his own self-esteem. He also has foibles sometimes, such as laziness, indifference, or perhaps mere incompetence. While it is acknowledged that the best results are obtained only by highly trained operators, who have a thorough knowledge and understanding of human psychology, the fact is that most operators have received no more than a crash course at some school conducted by the industry. It must be remembered that the manufacture and sale of the polygraph is an industry, and the claims that are made for it are made by persons who have an interest in that industry's success. The court in this case accepts the appellants' statement that inquiries will be "specially, directly and narrowly related to the past performance of [the officers'] official duties." But the technique of the operator is to ask irrelevant questions, to find something that the subject will lie about, to establish his "control question." Irrelevant questions are also used to throw the subject off his guard. It would be interesting to see how the appellants' operator conducts his polygraph examination while adhering to the restriction which the appellants have imposed upon him by their affidavit signed by the police chief. The court seems not at all disturbed that the police officer will have no opportunity to confront or cross-examine this witness against him, or to take from this judge's *326 rulings, or this jury's verdict any appeal to a higher tribunal. The operator's verdict is final. I also am dismayed that the court sees no reason to require some showing that the tests will be administered by a qualified operator, or that the officers questioned will have an opportunity to challenge his qualifications or his findings. In my view of the matter, the court should never place its stamp of approval upon such a procedure. And even assuming that it can be shown that the operator is highly qualified, the objections to the use of the machine still outweigh the arguments in its favor. As I read the majority opinion, anything goes, as long as it goes under the guise of "lie detector," however unreliable the court may have acknowledged the polygraph to be. The legislature has seen fit to forbid the use of these devices upon employees, except certain public employees like the respondents. I do not construe RCW 49.44.120 to authorize tests for such employees; the legislature simply has not seen fit to forbid them. But obviously the legislature has taken cognizance of the evils attendant upon the use of such devices in industry and has declared that it is the public policy that they should not be used. The reasons behind that determination are just as applicable to public employees as to private employees, in my opinion. It is interesting to note that the Atomic Energy Commission in 1953 decided to discontinue the use of lie detectors at Oak Ridge, the report stating in part: *327 (Footnote omitted.) 10 S. Dak. L. Rev. at 22. In my opinion, the requirement that any employee submit to such a test or forfeit his employment invades his right of privacy and violates his right not to give evidence against himself. The test being so notoriously unreliable, and the "testee" having no opportunity or means of challenging the result, requiring an officer to submit to such a test is not a reasonable requirement. His refusal to submit should not be held by this court to constitute "just cause" for his dismissal. I would affirm. HUNTER and WRIGHT, JJ., concur with ROSELLINI, J. Petition for rehearing denied June 2, 1972. [1] Seattle Police Department General Order 70-20 pertains to and requires the cooperation of officers in internal departmental investigations. [2] For examples of the reliability of the performance of this device, see J. Coghlan, Sr., The Lie Box Lies, 7 Trial Lawyer's Guide 173 (1963). Here is one, at page 184: The McCall case is within the memory of many members of the bar. A young woman was raped in a Chicago hotel. Immediately adjoining the hotel was a parking lot. The day following the occurrence all the lot personnel, including one of the attendants named Nixon, were required to take the test. The machine proclaimed their innocence. Some time later the hotel elevator operator, McCall, was arrested. Apparently convinced by the investigating officers that McCall was guilty of the rape, the polygraph operator gave him the full treatment and found him guilty of the rape. Since it was established by this scientific device that McCall was guilty, a confession was obtained from him. Fortified with this evidence, a jury returned a verdict of guilty. Some months later, the carhop, Nixon, became involved in another crime, and in a recitation of his accomplishments not only confessed to the rape for which McCall was found guilty but was able to fortify the assertions with many other facts, leaving no doubt that McCall had been wrongfully convicted. [3] See also D. Hermann, III, Privacy, The Prospective Employee, and Employment Testing: The Need to Restrict Polygraph and Personality Testing, 47 Wash. L. Rev. 73 (1971); J. Coghlan, The Lie Box Lies, 7 Trial Lawyer's Guide 173 (1963).