Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-2_19-cv-01450/USCOURTS-caed-2_19-cv-01450-15/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 550
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Civil Rights (U.S. defendant)
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

CHARLES PLUNKETT, 

Plaintiff, 

v. 

C. PARHAM, et al., 

Defendants. 

No. 2:19-cv-1450 KJM AC P 

ORDER AND FINDINGS AND 

RECOMMENDATIONS 

 Plaintiff is a state prisoner proceeding pro se with a civil rights action pursuant to 42 

U.S.C. § 1983. Currently before the court is defendants’ motion for summary judgment. ECF 

No. 57. 

I. Procedural History 

This case proceeds on plaintiff’s original complaint, which was screened and found to 

state claims for relief against defendants Parham, Davis, and Andrade. ECF No. 10. Following 

the close of discovery, defendants filed the instant motion for summary judgment. ECF No. 57. 

Plaintiff opposed the motion (ECF No. 59) and defendants replied (ECF No. 60). 

II. Plaintiff’s Allegations 

Plaintiff, a transgender inmate, alleges that defendants violated her1 Eighth Amendment 

1

 Although plaintiff used he/him pronouns in the complaint, subsequent filings, including the 

(continued) 

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right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment on two occasions. See ECF No. 1. The 

complaint alleges that on March 31, 2017, plaintiff was frisked by defendant Andrade when 

exiting the dining hall and ordered to pull up her bra, exposing plaintiff’s private body parts to 

bystanders. Id. at 6-7. Plaintiff alleges that the nearby officers began to laugh and crack jokes. 

Id. at 6. Plaintiff also alleges that on September 24, 2018, defendant Parham forced plaintiff to 

submit to a strip search in front of other inmates and officers, without reasonable suspicion that 

plaintiff had a weapon or contraband. Id. at 4-5. Defendant Davis observed the search but did 

not comment or intervene. Id. at 5. 

III. Motion for Summary Judgment 

A. Legal Standards for Summary Judgment 

Summary judgment is appropriate when the moving party “shows that there is no genuine 

dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 56(a). Under summary judgment practice, “[t]he moving party initially bears the burden 

of proving the absence of a genuine issue of material fact.” In re Oracle Corp. Sec. Litig., 627 

F.3d 376, 387 (9th Cir. 2010) (citing Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323 (1986)). The 

moving party may accomplish this by “citing to particular parts of materials in the record, 

including depositions, documents, electronically stored information, affidavits or declarations, 

stipulations (including those made for purposes of the motion only), admissions, interrogatory 

answers, or other materials” or by showing that such materials “do not establish the absence or 

presence of a genuine dispute, or that an adverse party cannot produce admissible evidence to 

support the fact.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(1). 

“Where the non-moving party bears the burden of proof at trial, the moving party need 

only prove that there is an absence of evidence to support the non-moving party’s case.” Oracle 

Corp., 627 F.3d at 387 (citing Celotex, 477 U.S. at 325); see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(1)(B). 

Indeed, summary judgment should be entered, “after adequate time for discovery and upon 

opposition to defendants’ motion for summary judgment, use she/her pronouns. See ECF Nos. 

28, 37, 59. The court will therefore use she/her pronouns when referring to plaintiff. If plaintiff 

wishes the court to use different pronouns, she may so inform the court. 

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motion, against a party who fails to make a showing sufficient to establish the existence of an 

element essential to that party’s case, and on which that party will bear the burden of proof at 

trial.” Celotex, 477 U.S. at 322. “[A] complete failure of proof concerning an essential element 

of the nonmoving party’s case necessarily renders all other facts immaterial.” Id. at 323. In such 

a circumstance, summary judgment should “be granted so long as whatever is before the district 

court demonstrates that the standard for the entry of summary judgment, as set forth in Rule 

56(c), is satisfied.” Id. 

If the moving party meets its initial responsibility, the burden then shifts to the opposing 

party to establish that a genuine issue as to any material fact actually does exist. Matsushita Elec. 

Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 586-87 (1986). In attempting to establish the 

existence of this factual dispute, the opposing party may not rely upon the allegations or denials 

of its pleadings but is required to tender evidence of specific facts in the form of affidavits, and/or 

admissible discovery material, in support of its contention that the dispute exists. See Fed. R. 

Civ. P. 56(c). The opposing party must demonstrate that the fact in contention is material, i.e., a 

fact “that might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing law,” and that the dispute is 

genuine, i.e., “the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving 

party.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). 

 In the endeavor to establish the existence of a factual dispute, the opposing party need not 

establish a material issue of fact conclusively in its favor. It is sufficient that “the claimed factual 

dispute be shown to require a jury or judge to resolve the parties’ differing versions of the truth at 

trial.” T.W. Elec. Serv., Inc. v. Pac. Elec. Contractors Ass’n, 809 F.2d 626, 630 (9th Cir. 1987) 

(quoting First Nat’l Bank of Ariz. v. Cities Serv. Co., 391 U.S. 253, 288-89 (1968). Thus, the 

“purpose of summary judgment is to pierce the pleadings and to assess the proof in order to see 

whether there is a genuine need for trial.” Matsushita, 475 U.S. at 587 (citation and internal 

quotation marks omitted). 

 “In evaluating the evidence to determine whether there is a genuine issue of fact, [the 

court] draw[s] all inferences supported by the evidence in favor of the non-moving party.” Walls 

v. Cent. Contra Costa Transit Auth., 653 F.3d 963, 966 (9th Cir. 2011) (citation omitted). It is the 

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opposing party’s obligation to produce a factual predicate from which the inference may be 

drawn. See Richards v. Nielsen Freight Lines, 810 F.2d 898, 902 (9th Cir. 1987). Finally, to 

demonstrate a genuine issue, the opposing party “must do more than simply show that there is 

some metaphysical doubt as to the material facts.” Matsushita, 475 U.S. at 586 (citations 

omitted). “Where the record taken as a whole could not lead a rational trier of fact to find for the 

non-moving party, there is no ‘genuine issue for trial.’” Id. at 587 (quoting First Nat’l Bank, 391 

U.S. at 289). 

Defendants served plaintiff with notice of the requirements for opposing a motion 

pursuant to Rule 56 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure along with their motion for summary 

judgment. ECF No. 57-5; see Klingele v. Eikenberry, 849 F.2d 409, 411 (9th Cir. 1988) (pro se 

prisoners must be provided with notice of the requirements for summary judgment); Rand v. 

Rowland, 154 F.3d 952, 960 (9th Cir. 1998) (en banc) (movant may provide notice). 

B. Defendants’ Arguments 

Defendants contend that they are entitled to summary judgment because during the March 

31, 2017 incident, Andrade conducted a “random clothed body search[]” of plaintiff in 

accordance with California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (“CDCR”) policy and 

as part of an institutional strategy to reduce inmate access to weapons and contraband. ECF No. 

57-1 at 8, 12. Defendants also argue that Parham conducted a “routine unclothed body search” on 

September 24, 2018, which was also in accordance with CDCR policy. Id. at 9, 12-13. Finally, 

all defendants argue that they are entitled to qualified immunity. Id. at 14. 

C. Plaintiff’s Response 

At the outset, the court notes that plaintiff has only partially complied with Federal Rule 

of Civil Procedure 56(c)(1)(A), which requires that “[a] party asserting that a fact . . . is genuinely 

disputed must support the assertion by . . . citing to particular parts of materials in the record.” 

Plaintiff also did not comply with Local Rule 260(b) requiring the party opposing a motion for 

summary judgment to “reproduce the itemized facts in the Statement of Undisputed Facts and 

admit those facts that are undisputed and deny those that are disputed.” See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e). 

//// 

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“Pro se litigants must follow the same rules of procedure that govern other litigants.” 

King v. Atiyeh, 814 F.2d 565, 567 (9th Cir. 1987) (citation omitted), overruled on other grounds, 

Lacey v. Maricopa County, 693 F.3d 896, 928 (9th Cir. 2012) (en banc). However, it is wellestablished that district courts are to “construe liberally motion papers and pleadings filed by pro 

se inmates and should avoid applying summary judgment rules strictly.” Thomas v. Ponder, 611 

F.3d 1144, 1150 (9th Cir. 2010). The unrepresented prisoner’s choice to proceed without counsel 

“is less than voluntary” and they are subject to “the handicaps . . . detention necessarily imposes 

upon a litigant,” such as “limited access to legal materials” as well as “sources of proof.” 

Jacobsen v. Filler, 790 F.2d 1362, 1364 n.4 (9th Cir. 1986) (alteration in original) (citations and 

internal quotation marks omitted). Inmate litigants, therefore, should not be held to a standard of 

“strict literalness” with respect to the requirements of the summary judgment rule. Id. (citation 

omitted). 

Accordingly, the court considers the record before it in its entirety despite plaintiff’s 

failure to be in strict compliance with the applicable rules. However, only those assertions in the 

opposition which have evidentiary support in the record will be considered. Additionally, all 

unopposed assertions in defendants’ statement of undisputed facts will be taken as undisputed. 

See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e)(2). 

Plaintiff opposes defendants’ motion on the grounds that defendants’ searches, which 

required plaintiff to expose her breasts and other body parts to male staff and inmates, were 

violations of CDCR policy relating to searches of transgender inmates. ECF No. 59 at 2, 6. 

D. Plaintiff’s Request for In Camera Review 

In plaintiff’s opposition, she requests that the court conduct an in camera review of 

discovery materials. ECF No. 59 at 6, 10. However, the court will not comb through an 

unspecified number of unidentified documents looking for anything that could benefit plaintiff’s 

claims, and the request for in camera review will be denied. 

To the extent plaintiff is trying to challenge the sufficiency of defendants’ discovery 

responses or claim that she is lacking necessary evidence to defend against the motion for 

summary judgment, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(d) provides that “[i]f a nonmovant shows 

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by affidavit or declaration that, for specified reasons, it cannot present facts essential to justify its 

opposition, the court may: (1) defer considering the motion or deny it; (2) allow time to obtain 

affidavits or declarations or to take discovery; or (3) issue any other appropriate order.” 

However, “[a] movant cannot complain if it fails diligently to pursue discovery before summary 

judgment.” Mackey v. Pioneer Nat’l Bank, 867 F.2d 520, 524 (9th Cir. 1989) (citations omitted). 

In this case, the time for filing motions to compel has long since passed and plaintiff fails 

to provide any reason as to why she was unable to file a motion to compel or otherwise obtain the 

discovery she now seeks within the time previously provided. Accordingly, plaintiff has not 

demonstrated that she was diligent in pursuing the discovery she now seeks to compel or 

otherwise pursue. The request will therefore be denied. 

E. Material Facts 

At all times relevant to the complaint, plaintiff was housed at Mule Creek State Prison. 

ECF No. 1 at 1-2; ECF No. 57-6 at 2, ¶ 1. Plaintiff is a transgender individual whose assigned 

sex at birth was male and who identifies as female. ECF No. 57-6 at 2, ¶ 2; ECF No. 57-4 at 56 

(PL’s Depo. 53:10-19). 

i. Search Policies 

Weapons and other related contraband pose the greatest threat to inmate and officer safety 

at Mule Creek, and one of the prison’s primary objectives is to limit the distribution of weapons 

and contraband. ECF No. 57-6 at 2, ¶ 3. One of the principal methods officers use to limit the 

distribution of weapons and related contraband is to conduct regular searches. Id., ¶ 4. Clothed 

body searches are conducted over an inmate’s clothes and are conducted randomly. Id. at 3, ¶ 5. 

Unclothed body searches are more thorough, and inmates assigned to designated areas, such as 

vocational programs, industries, plant operations, or outside crews, are routinely subjected to 

these searches. Id., ¶ 6. All inmates are subject to both types of search. Id., ¶ 7. 

ii. March 31, 2017 Clothed Search 

On March 31, 2017, Andrade was working on Facility A at Mule Creek. Id., ¶ 8. On that 

day, Andrade and several of his fellow officers were directed to conduct random clothed body 

searches of inmates on Facility A after their evening meal. Id. at 3-4, ¶ 9. Typically, when 

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officers would conduct random searches at that location, one officer “posts up” at the doorway to 

the dining hall and then selects inmates at random to be searched. Id. at 4, ¶ 10. The other 

officers then line up along a wall, and the chosen inmate would be searched by the next available 

officer. Id. As plaintiff was leaving the dining hall, the officer standing near the doorway chose 

her randomly to be searched and Andrade was the next available officer to conduct the search. 

Id., ¶ 11. According to CDCR policy at the time, transgender inmates who were born male were 

to be searched by male officers. Id. at 5, ¶ 13. CDCR officers performing clothed body searches 

must conduct a complete search of the inmate, from the top of their head to the bottom of their 

feet, including closely checking all pockets, seams, and personal effects. Id. at 4, ¶ 12. 

Plaintiff was directed to face the wall, and Andrade used his hands to perform a quick pat 

down search of plaintiff’s entire body, from the top of her head to the bottom of her feet. Id. at 5, 

¶ 15. The entire search did not last longer than a minute and Andrade never touched plaintiff’s 

breasts or undergarments. Id., ¶¶ 17-18. 

Plaintiff disputes whether Andrade followed CDCR policy while conducting the search. 

See ECF No. 59 at 5. The parties also dispute whether Andrade required plaintiff to expose her 

breasts during the “routine clothed body search.” ECF No. 57-2 at 3; ECF No. 59 at 5. Andrade 

asserts that he 

used the back of [his] hand to quickly swipe below [plaintiff’s] breast 

area to ensure [s]he had no weapons or contraband there, without 

ever touching [her] breasts. . . . [Andrade] told [plaintiff] to use [her] 

own hands to reach underneath [her] brassiere, and to then shake it 

to confirm there was no hidden contraband. . . . [He] specifically told 

[plaintiff] to be careful about exposing [her]self, and [he] told [her 

she] should not lift [her] bra up while [s]he was shaking it. 

ECF No. 57-2 at 3, ¶ 6. Plaintiff asserts that Andrade required her to turn away from the wall and 

lift up her shirt and bra, exposing her breasts in front of other inmates and officers. ECF No. 1 at 

6; ECF No. 57-4 at 46-47 (PL’s Depo. 43:4-44:21); ECF No. 59 at 5. 

iii. September 24, 2018 Unclothed Search 

On September 24, 2018, plaintiff was working in the sewing shop at Mule Creek. ECF 

No. 57-6 at 6, ¶ 19. Inmates working in the sewing shop had access to needles and other 

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contraband that necessitate searches to ensure the safety of staff and inmates. Id., ¶ 20. All 

inmates, including transgender inmates, are subject to unclothed body searches as they leave their 

work assignments to ensure there is no contraband. Id., ¶ 21. At the end of each shift, the sewing 

shop manager releases the inmates so that they can be searched. Id., ¶ 23. Approximately four 

officers then wait outside the door at designated tables to conduct the searches. Id. at 7, ¶ 24. 

Inmates leaving the sewing shop line up inside the shop near the door, waiting to be released to be 

searched by the next available officer. Id., ¶ 25. 

On September 24, the manager of the sewing shop let the transgender inmates go first to 

be searched, but the other inmates pushed ahead of them so the transgender inmates were not 

searched first. Id., ¶ 26. When it was plaintiff’s turn to be searched, Parham called plaintiff over 

to be searched and plaintiff informed Parham that she was transgender and was to be treated 

differently. Id., ¶¶ 27-28. At the time, CDCR policy provided that transgender inmates born 

male were to be searched by male officers, and Parham informed plaintiff that in the absence of a 

formal memo from his superiors, plaintiff had to be searched the same way as everyone else. Id. 

at 7-8, ¶¶ 29-30. Davis informed plaintiff that if plaintiff objected to the search, she could submit 

an appeal. Id. at 8, ¶ 31. The search lasted about a minute. Id., ¶ 32. Plaintiff disputes whether 

defendants violated CDCR policy while conducting the search and appears to assert that policy 

required the search to be treated as a cross-gender search. See ECF No. 1 at 5; ECF No. 59 at 7-

9. 

F. Discussion 

i. Eighth Amendment 

a. Legal Standards 

The Eighth Amendment prohibits the imposition of cruel and unusual punishments and 

“embodies broad and idealistic concepts of dignity, civilized standards, humanity and decency.” 

Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 102 (1976) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). “The 

Constitution ‘does not mandate comfortable prisons,’ but neither does it permit inhumane 

ones . . . .” Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 832 (1994) (citation omitted). “[A] prison official 

violates the Eighth Amendment only when two requirements are met. First, the deprivation 

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alleged must be, objectively, ‘sufficiently serious’; a prison official’s act or omission must result 

in the denial of ‘the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities.’” Id. at 834 (citations 

omitted). Second, “‘only the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain implicates the Eighth 

Amendment.’ To violate the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause, a prison official must have 

a ‘sufficiently culpable state of mind,’” “one of ‘deliberate indifference’ to inmate health or 

safety.” Id. (citations omitted). 

This Eight Amendment legal standard applies to sexual abuse and harassment claims. 

Wood v. Beauclair, 692 F.3d 1041, 1045-47 (9th Cir. 2012) (citing Hudson v. McMillian, 503 

U.S. 1, 8 (1992)). “Sexual harassment or abuse of an inmate by a corrections officer is a violation 

of the Eighth Amendment.” Id. at 1046; see also Schwenk v. Hartford, 204 F.3d 1187, 1197 (9th 

Cir. 2000). Allegations of merely verbal or visual harassment do not state an Eighth Amendment 

claim. Oltarzewski v. Ruggiero, 830 F.2d 136, 139 (9th Cir. 1987) (vulgar comments do not 

violate Eighth Amendment); Austin v. Terhune, 367 F.3d 1167, 1171-72 (9th Cir. 2004) (prison 

guard’s brief exposure of own genitals to inmate does not violate Eighth Amendment). 

The Ninth Circuit has held that a prisoner states a viable Eighth Amendment claim where 

he or she “proves that a prison staff member, acting under color of law and without legitimate 

penological justification, touched the prisoner in a sexual manner or otherwise engaged in sexual 

conduct for the staff member’s own sexual gratification, or for the purpose of humiliating, 

degrading, or demeaning the prisoner.” Bearchild v. Cobban, 947 F.3d 1130, 1144 (9th Cir. 

2020). “[W]here the allegation is that a guard’s conduct began as an invasive procedure that 

served a legitimate penological purpose, the prisoner must show that the guard’s conduct 

exceeded the scope of what was required to satisfy whatever institutional concern justified the 

initiation of the procedure.” Id. at 1145. “Such a showing will satisfy the objective and 

subjective components of an Eighth Amendment claim.” Id. 

However, an isolated incident of sexual abuse or harassment does not rise to the level of a 

constitutional violation unless it is severe. See Watison v. Carter, 668 F.3d 1108, 1112-13 (9th 

Cir. 2012) (no Eighth Amendment violation where officer “approached [an inmate] while [the 

inmate] was still on the toilet, rubbed his thigh against [the inmate’s] thigh, ‘began smiling in a 

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sexual [context],’ and left the cell laughing.”); Somers v. Thurman, 109 F.3d 614, 616, 623-24 

(9th Cir. 1997) (no Eighth Amendment violation where female officers conducted visual body 

cavity searches of male inmates and watched the inmates shower, all while pointing at the 

inmates, gawking, and joking among themselves). 

Additionally, in certain circumstances, pat-down searches by members of the opposite sex 

have been found to violate the Constitution. Jordan v. Gardner, 986 F.2d 1521, 1525 (9th Cir. 

1993) (finding the searches inflicted pain that was unnecessary and wanton and emphasizing the 

intrusiveness of the search policy and the prison’s awareness of many female inmates’ history of 

abuse). However, without evidence of particular vulnerabilities that would contribute to 

psychological trauma, the Ninth Circuit has held pat-down searches constitutional. Id. at 1526; 

see Grummett v. Rushen, 779 F.2d 491, 493 n.1 (9th Cir. 1985). Absent particularized 

circumstances, “[c]ross-gender searches ‘cannot be called inhumane and therefore do[] not fall 

below the floor set by the objective component of the [E]ighth [A]mendment.’” Somers, 109 

F.3d at 623 (alterations in original) (citation omitted). 

b. Discussion 

1. March 31, 2017 Clothed Search 

Defendant Andrade argues that he is entitled to summary judgment because he followed 

CDCR protocol for conducting a clothed body search of a transgender person. ECF No. 57-1 at 

11-12. He declares that he did not ask plaintiff to expose her breasts during the search. ECF No. 

52-2 at 3, ¶ 6.2 However, plaintiff disputes this and avers in her complaint and testified at 

deposition that Andrade asked plaintiff to shake out her bra, which exposed her breasts to male 

inmates and officers. ECF No. 57-4 at 46-47. Plaintiff also avers that Andrade and other officers 

began to laugh and cracked jokes while plaintiff’s breasts were exposed, making plaintiff feel 

humiliated. ECF No. 1 at 6. Even taking plaintiff’s allegations as true, however, plaintiff has not 

provided sufficient evidence to support a finding that Andrade violated the Eighth Amendment. 

2

 “I told [plaintiff] to use [her] own hands to reach underneath [her] brassiere, and to then shake it 

to confirm there was no hidden contraband. I specifically told [her] to be careful about exposing 

[herself], and I told [her] [she] should not lift [her] bra up while [she] was shaking it.” Id. 

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Regarding plaintiff’s sexual harassment theory, while it is a violation of the Eighth 

Amendment for a prison official to engage in sexual conduct for the purpose of humiliating the 

prisoner, Bearchild, 947 F.3d at 1144, verbal abuse on its own does not rise to the level of an 

Eighth Amendment violation, Minifield v. Butikofer, 298 F. Supp. 2d 900, 904 (N.D. Cal. 2004). 

Here, plaintiff has stated that Andrade “began to laugh, and crack jokes,” but she has not alleged 

or proffered any evidence that Andrade touched her in a sexual manner.3 Moreover, the 

undisputed facts demonstrate that Andrade’s objectionable conduct occurred after the pat down 

portion of the search had concluded. Taking the evidence in the light most favorable to plaintiff, 

Andrade’s alleged harassment does not rise to the level of an Eighth Amendment violation. See 

Somers, 109 F.3d at 624 (“To hold that gawking, pointing, and joking violates the prohibition 

against cruel and unusual punishment would trivialize the objective component of the Eighth 

Amendment test and render it absurd.”). 

Further, defendant has presented sufficient evidence to establish that the random clothed 

body search was conducted for the legitimate penological purpose of prison safety. ECF No. 57-2 

at 2. Because it is obvious that contraband can be hidden in a brassiere, requiring an inmate to 

move their brassiere away from their body as part of a random clothed search is not per se 

unreasonable. Moreover, the evidence does not support a conclusion that Andrade’s actions—

whether he required plaintiff to merely “shake out” her bra as he declares or told her to briefly lift 

it as she avers—exceeded the scope of what was required to satisfy that institutional concern. See 

Bearchild, 947 F.3d at 1145. Even if plaintiff’s allegations are true, the consequent exposure was 

fleeting and the entire search lasted less than a minute. An isolated incident requiring plaintiff to 

briefly expose her breasts to male officers and other inmates does not rise to the level of a 

constitutional violation under Ninth Circuit precedent, even if plaintiff understandably 

experienced it as a humiliating. See Watison, 668 F.3d at 1112; Somers, 109 F.3d at 616, 623-24. 

 

3

 Andrade admits that the clothed body search involves “us[ing] the back of [his] hand to quickly 

swipe below [plaintiff’s] breast area” (ECF No. 57-2 at 3), however, plaintiff does not allege that 

Andrade touched her in a sexual manner. 

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Plaintiff has not identified any evidence that the search was conducted for Andrade’s 

sexual gratification or other improper purpose. She has not identified any evidence that she had a 

history of abuse that would be exacerbated by the search. While plaintiff alleges that she suffers 

from “overwhelming anxiety” (ECF No. 1 at 6), she has not provided evidence to show that 

Andrade was aware of this or that her anxiety would be foreseeably aggravated by the search. 

Plaintiff’s complaint and opposition to the motion for summary judgment claim that defendants 

did not follow CDCR policy, but even if true, a violation of prison policy does not equate to a 

violation of the Eighth Amendment. See Cousins v. Lockyer, 568 F.3d 1063, 1071 (9th Cir. 

2009) (“state departmental regulations do not establish a federal constitutional violation”); Lewis 

v. Corcoran State Prison Food Servs. Dept., No. 11-cv-00369 AWI GBC P, 2011 WL 3438419, at 

*3, 2011 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 86153, at *8-9 (E.D. Cal. Aug. 3, 2011). 

In sum, a brief search conducted for a legitimate penological purpose and without 

explicitly sexual contact or other attendant misconduct does not rise to the level of a 

constitutional violation. See Sweet v. Ruiz, No. ED CV 19-663 JVS MRW, 2020 WL 4919683, 

at *5, 2020 U.S. Dist. Lexis 153340, at *11-14 (C.D. Cal. July 20, 2020) (summary judgment 

appropriate where pat-down search of transgender inmate allegedly included groping of inmate’s 

brassiere and buttocks, but search was undisputedly brief and plaintiff presented no evidence that 

officer acted for his own sexual gratification or committed other misconduct). Accordingly, the 

motion for summary judgment should be granted as to defendant Andrade. 

2. September 24, 2018 Unclothed Search 

Defendants Parham and Davis argue that they are entitled to summary judgment because 

they followed CDCR policy when performing an unclothed body search of plaintiff. ECF No. 57-

1 at 12-13. Plaintiff argues that she was supposed to be searched differently than other inmates 

because she is transgender. ECF No. 59 at 7-8. She contends that she was improperly subjected 

to a strip search in front of male inmates and officers, and that defendants made harassing 

comments. ECF No. 59 at 8; ECF No. 1 at 4, 6. 

Here, based on the facts alleged, defendants’ search of plaintiff served the legitimate 

penological purpose of making sure contraband or weapons did not leave the sewing room and 

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enter the prison. Even though plaintiff alleged in her complaint that there was no valid reason for 

the search, she later testified during her deposition that she had access to contraband in the sewing 

shop, that sewing shop workers were routinely strip searched at the end of their shift, and that it 

was her understanding the purpose of the search was to make sure the prisoners did not leave the 

sewing shop with contraband. ECF No. 57-4 at 63-65 (60:22-61:7, 62:9-24). Further, even 

though Parham and other officers “made verbal comments about plaintiff’s body parts,” verbal 

abuse is not enough to show a constitutional violation. See Somers, 109 F.3d at 624; see also 

Burton v. City of Spokane, No. 06-cv-0322 RHW, 2009 WL 772929, at *4-5, 2009 U.S. Dist. 

LEXIS 23185, at *12, 15 (E.D. Wash. Mar. 18, 2009) (officers executing search warrant entitled 

to qualified immunity because alleged comments that “[t]here is no crack in this crack” and “I 

wonder if he has ever been molested” made during strip search of arrestee did not rise to the level 

of a constitutional violation and render search unreasonable), aff’d sub nom. Burton v. Spokane 

Police Dep’t, 383 F. App’x 671, 673 (9th Cir. 2010). While the courts have “consistently 

recognized the frightening and humiliating invasion occasioned by a strip search, even when 

conducted with all due courtesy,” Byrd v. Maricopa County Sheriff’s Dep’t, 629 F.3d 1135, 1143 

(9th Cir. 2011) (citations and internal quotation marks omitted), courts have also found routine 

visual strip searches constitutional where they serve a legitimate penological purpose, see 

Michenfelder v. Sumner, 860 F.2d 328, 333 (9th Cir. 1988). Plaintiff does not allege that Parham 

or Davis touched her during the search, and visual body cavity searches conducted as a means of 

preventing prisoners from possessing weapons and contraband have been found to be 

constitutional. Id. at 332; see Thompson v. Souza, 111 F.3d 694, 700 (9th Cir. 1997) (finding 

strip search constitutional where it was visual and did not involve touching). Furthermore, there 

is no requirement that strip searches be conducted in a private location. See Thompson, 111 F.3d 

at 701.4 

4

 To the extent plaintiff argues that an unclothed search of a transgender female should not have 

been conducted by male officers at all, defendants have established beyond dispute that they 

followed the CDCR policy in effect at the time. This issue is discussed more fully below, 

regarding qualified immunity. 

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As for defendant Davis, supervisors may be held liable only if they “participated in or 

directed the violations, or knew of the violations and failed to act to prevent them.” Taylor v. 

List, 880 F.2d 1040, 1045 (9th Cir. 1989). “The requisite causal connection may be established 

when an official sets in motion a ‘series of acts by others which the actor knows or reasonably 

should know would cause others to inflict’ constitutional harms.” Corales v. Bennett, 567 F.3d 

554, 570 (9th Cir. 2009) (citations omitted). Here, plaintiff alleges that defendant Davis observed 

the September 24, 2018 search and when plaintiff objected to the search, Davis told her to appeal 

it. ECF No. 57-6 at 8, ¶ 31. While it appears that Davis “knew of” the search and could have 

stopped it, the search did not exceed constitutional limits and so was not a “violation” that he had 

a constitutional duty to stop. Accordingly, Davis is not liable as a supervisor. 

For these reasons, defendants’ motion for summary judgment as to the September 24, 

2018 search should be granted. 

G. Qualified Immunity 

i. Legal Standard 

Qualified immunity is a defense that must be pled by a defendant official. Harlow v. 

Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 815 (1982). It is an “entitlement not to stand trial or face the other 

burdens of litigation.” Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 200 (2001) (quoting Mitchell v. Forsyth, 

472 U.S. 511, 526 (1985)), overruled on other grounds by Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 236 

(2009)). Even if a constitutional violation occurred, prison officials are entitled to qualified 

immunity if they acted reasonably under the circumstances. See Friedman v. Boucher, 580 F.3d 

847, 858 (9th Cir. 2009); Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 646 (1987). When government 

officials are sued in their individual capacities for civil damages, a court must “begin by taking 

note of the elements a plaintiff must plead to state a claim . . . against officials entitled to assert 

the defense of qualified immunity.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 675. 

The doctrine of qualified immunity “protects government officials from ‘liability for civil 

damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional 

rights of which a reasonable person would have known.’” Tibbetts v. Kulongoski, 567 F.3d 529, 

535 (9th Cir. 2009) (quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 818). The qualified immunity analysis involves 

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two parts, determining whether (1) whether the facts that a plaintiff has alleged or shown make 

out a violation of a constitutional right; and (2) whether the right at issue was clearly established 

at the time of the defendant’s alleged misconduct. Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201; see Pearson, 555 

U.S. at 232, 236; see also Bull v. City and County of San Francisco, 595 F.3d 964, 971 (9th Cir. 

2010). A right is clearly established only if “it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his 

conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted.” Saucier, 533 at 202; Norwood v. Vance, 

591 F.3d 1062, 1068 (9th Cir. 2010). These prongs need not be addressed in any particular order. 

Pearson, 555 U.S. at 236. 

ii. Discussion 

Defendants argue that they are entitled to qualified immunity because “no reasonable male 

correctional officer could have known that either a clothed or unclothed body search of [plaintiff] 

could have violated [plaintiff’s] rights.” ECF No. 57-1 at 14. As discussed above, plaintiff has 

not established that her constitutional rights under the Eighth Amendment were violated. 

However, the undersigned now considers in the alternative whether—even if the searches at issue 

violated the Eighth Amendment in the opinion of this court—defendants’ conduct violated clearly 

established law. 

To determine whether a right is clearly established involves considering whether it would 

be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted. See 

Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 615 (1999) (“[A]s we explained in Anderson[v. Creighton, 483 

U.S. 635 (1987)], the right allegedly violated must be defined at the appropriate level of 

specificity before a court can determine if it was clearly established”); Saucier, 533 U.S. at 202. 

“The ‘clearly established law’ test requires more than an alleged ‘violation of extremely 

abstract rights.’” Tribble, 860 F.2d at 324 (quoting Anderson, 483 U.S. at 639). Rather, “[t]he 

contours of the right must be sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would understand that 

what he is doing violates that right.” Id. (quoting Anderson, 483 U.S. at 640). “In other words, 

‘in the light of preexisting law the unlawfulness must be apparent.’” Id. (citation omitted). 

“Clearly established” means the statutory or constitutional question was “beyond debate” such 

that every reasonable official would understand that what he is doing is unlawful. See District of 

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Columbia v. Wesby, 583 U.S. 48, 63 (2018); Vos v. City of Newport Beach, 892 F.3d 1024, 1035 

(9th Cir. 2018). To be “clearly established,” a rule must be dictated by controlling authority or a 

robust consensus of cases of persuasive authority. Wesby, 583 U.S. at 63; Vos, 892 F.3d at 1035; 

see also Perez v. City of Roseville, 882 F.3d 843, 856-57 (9th Cir. 2018) (holding that Ninth 

Circuit precedent is sufficient to meet the “clearly established” prong of qualified immunity). 

Courts must define the law with a “high degree of specificity” when applying qualified immunity. 

Wesby, 583 U.S. at 63. The key question is “whether the violative nature of particular conduct is 

clearly established” in the specific context of the case. Vos, 892 F.3d at 1035. 

While “cross-gender strip searches in the absence of an emergency violate an inmate’s 

right under the Fourth Amendment to be free from unreasonable searches,” Byrd, 629 F.3d at 

1146 (emphasis added), plaintiff has not presented, nor is this court aware of, any authority 

clearly establishing that such searches violate the Eighth Amendment. Even if the court assumes 

that a cross-gender strip search violates the Eighth Amendment as well as the Fourth, the court is 

unable to identify any authority clearly establishing the right of transgender inmates to be 

searched by an officer of the gender with which they identify. At the time of the searches at 

issue, the law was not clearly established regarding whether a male officer conducting a strip 

search of a transgender female constituted a cross-gender search within the meaning of Ninth 

Circuit precedent, or whether a male officer was required to treat a transgender female any 

differently than a cisgender male during a search. Accordingly, the violative nature of the 

searches at issue here was not “clearly established” in the specific context of this case: the patdown or unclothed visual search of a transgender female inmate by male officers. 

There have been some recent cases in this circuit that have considered searches of 

transgender plaintiffs to constitute cross-gender searches, however these cases were decided after 

the two incidents at issue in this case. See, e.g., Erbacher v. Robles, No. 1:23-cv-01194 JLT 

BAM P, 2023 WL 6201535, at *6, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169430, at *15-16 (E.D. Cal. Sept. 22, 

2023); Sweet, 2020 U.S. Dist. Lexis 153340, at *11-14. Moreover, in neither of the cited cases 

did the designation of the search as “cross-gender” result in a finding that it was per se 

unconstitutional. In Erbacher, the court treated the strip search of a transgender female by male 

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officers as a cross-gender search, but concluded that the inmate failed to state a claim for relief 

where there were no allegations that she had been touched, that the scope of the search exceeded 

the penological justification for the search, or that she was particularly vulnerable to a severe 

psychological injury from a search by a male officer. Erbacher, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 169430, 

at * 17. In Sweet, a pat-down case, the court also assumed without discussion that standards for 

cross-gender searches apply, but nonetheless recommended summary judgment for defendants 

because there was no evidence of touching, sexual motivation, or misconduct. Sweet, 2020 U.S. 

Dist. Lexis 153340, at *11-14. Neither case supports a finding that the searches at issue here 

were clearly unconstitutional. 

Given the absence of precedent establishing the unlawfulness of the searches beyond 

debate, defendants are entitled to qualified immunity. This would be so even if this court were to 

conclude, in light of recent developments in the understanding of gender, that the Constitution 

requires that transgender female inmates be patted down or subject to unclothed visual searches 

only by female officers.5

 The question for purposes of qualified immunity is where a reasonable 

officer in each defendant’s positions at the times of the searches in question would be expected to 

understand that “what he was doing was wrong.” The answer is no. Defendants are therefore 

entitled to summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds. 

IV. Plain Language Summary of this Order for a Pro Se Litigant 

The magistrate judge recommends that defendants’ motion for summary judgment be 

granted and this case be closed, because the evidence shows that the searches on March 31, 2017 

and September 24, 2018 did not rise to the level of sexual harassment or an unconstitutional 

search. Even if CDCR policy was violated, or if the searches did not respect your dignity, that 

does not amount to a constitutional violation. Also, the defendants are entitled to qualified 

immunity because it wasn’t clear in 2018 that it violated the Constitution for male officers to 

search a transgender female inmate. Qualified immunity would apply even if your rights had 

been violated. The district judge will make the final decision whether to grant summary 

5

 More recent CDCR policies permit transgender inmates to specify whether they wish searches 

to be conducted by male or female officers. See Erbacher, supra. 

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judgment to defendants, and you may submit written objections to this recommendation which 

that judge will consider. 

CONCLUSION 

 Accordingly, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that plaintiff’s request for in camera review or 

further discovery (ECF No. 59 at 6, 10) is DENIED. 

IT IS FURTHER RECOMMENDED that defendants’ motion for summary judgment 

(ECF No. 57) be GRANTED. 

 These findings and recommendations are submitted to the United States District Judge 

assigned to the case, pursuant to the provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(l). Within twenty-one days 

after being served with these findings and recommendations, any party may file written 

objections with the court and serve a copy on all parties. Such a document should be captioned 

“Objections to Magistrate Judge’s Findings and Recommendations.” Any response to the 

objections shall be served and filed within fourteen days after service of the objections. The 

parties are advised that failure to file objections within the specified time may waive the right to 

appeal the District Court’s order. Martinez v. Ylst, 951 F.2d 1153 (9th Cir. 1991). 

DATED: July 17, 2024 

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