Opinion ID: 391003
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Nature of the Church's Interests

Text: 12 We think the kinds of interests raised by the Church in its effort to protect the confidentiality of documents seized from its premises are sufficiently strong to mandate the identification of some procedural mechanism by which those interests can be presented contemporaneously to the court that controls public access to the records of which the documents became a part. Our evaluation of the strength of the interests sought to be asserted by the Church derives from an analysis of the Church's asserted property rights in the seized documents and from our recognition of the intrusion by government officials upon the Church's privacy which a compulsory search of Church premises may represent and the compounding of this intrusion that is worked by public access to the contents of the documents seized. 13 Although we decline the Church's invitation expressly to ground the Church's protectible interests in the Constitution's provisions, we find the kinds of interests asserted to have some constitutional footing, both cognate to and supportive of, constitutional rights. 23 This understanding has framed our consideration of both the procedural and the substantive questions raised in these appeals and has contributed substantially to the conclusions we have reached. 14 Prior decisions of this court have made clear that the party from whom materials are seized in the course of a criminal investigation retains a protectible property interest in the seized materials. (T)he Government's right to seize and retain certain evidence for use at trial, we have said,  'does not in itself entitle the State to its retention' after trial, . . . . 24 Rather, as we have declared, it is fundamental to the integrity of the criminal justice process that property involved in the proceeding, against which no Government claim lies, be returned promptly to its rightful owner. 25 Lawful seizure of the property, of itself, may affect the timing of the return, 26 but never the owner's right to eventual return. (T)he district court, once its need for the property has terminated, has both the jurisdiction and the duty to return the . . . property . . . regardless and independently of the validity or invalidity of the underlying search and seizure. 27 15 Both in the district court here and in the Central District of California the Church has asserted entitlement to lawful possession of the documents seized and a corresponding right to their return. 28 In the court below this claim was coupled with a request for injunctive relief retaining the documents under seal pending their return. Otherwise, the Church argued, the ultimate granting of (the) motion (for return of property) will be a meaningless achievement. 29 The Church continued, The publication of the documents invades the right of privacy of the petitioner and its members, violates the petitioner's Fourth Amendment rights, and chills the rights of and free exercise of religion. This damage cannot be undone by the eventual return to petitioner of its property. 30 16 The privacy interests asserted by the Church in its application for injunctive relief pending the documents' return were also asserted in its motion to intervene in the criminal case. In those papers the Church relied not only on the property interests which it retained in the seized documents but on the violation of its right of privacy which release of the seized documents would effect. 31 Although adverting to the confidential nature of the information contained in certain of the seized documents, the Church asserted a privacy interest not in particular documents but in the documents as a whole, 32 relying, inter alia, on the fact that the materials seized were documents, on the circumstances under which they were seized, on the measures theretofore taken by the parties to preserve the documents' confidentiality, and on the fact that the defendants were certain to appeal their criminal convictions on the grounds of the lawfulness of the search and seizure. 33 17 That the fourth amendment which is now recognized to protect legitimate expectations of privacy 34 can be invoked by corporations to suppress the fruits of a search of corporate premises 35 demonstrates an understanding that a compulsory search of even corporate premises may constitute an intrusion upon privacy. 36 Furthermore, the Supreme Court has recognized an obligation on the part of the courts to take some measures to protect even a suspected criminal's privacy. The special difficulties of document searches in this connection have been noted. In Andresen v. Maryland, 37 the Court stated: 18 We recognize that there are grave dangers inherent in executing a warrant authorizing a search and seizure of a person's papers that are not necessarily present in executing a warrant to search for physical objects whose relevance is more easily ascertainable. In searches for papers, it is certain that some innocuous documents will be examined, at least cursorily, in order to determine whether they are, in fact, among those papers authorized to be seized. Similar dangers, of course, are present in executing a warrant for the seizure of telephone conversations. In both kinds of searches, responsible officials, including judicial officials, must take care to assure that they are conducted in a manner that minimizes unwarranted intrusions upon privacy. 19 However, the value assigned by our society to protection against governmental invasions of privacy is not measured solely by the fourth amendment's exclusionary rule. The fourteenth amendment's protection against arbitrary or unjustifiable state deprivations of personal liberty also prevents encroachment upon a constitutionally recognized sphere of personal privacy. 38 The fifth amendment's protection of liberty from federal intrusion upon this sphere can be no less comprehensive. 39 20 Minimizing the initial intrusiveness of necessary governmental activity is one means of serving fundamental privacy interests, but controlling broadside disclosure of materials or information obtained by intrusive means is another. 40 For example, on at least two recent occasions Congress has recognized that the dissemination of information compounds whatever infringement of privacy occurs when materials or information are obtained through compulsory means. 41 The need for both kinds of protection has been perceived by state legislatures as well as by the Congress. 42 21 Finally, although the scope of the privacy interests protected by the Constitution differ from the privacy interests protectible under state law, 43 the concept of a protectible right of privacy has found widespread acceptance in the state law of this country, 44 and has been embraced both in the District of Columbia 45 and in California. 46 ] Whether and to what extent the privacy interests protected by state law may be asserted by corporate bodies is still unsettled. 47 However, we think one cannot draw a bright line at the corporate structure. The public attributes of corporations may indeed reduce pro tanto the reasonability of their expectation of privacy, 48 but the nature and purposes of the corporate entity and the nature of the interest sought to be protected will determine the question whether under given facts the corporation per se has a protectible privacy interest. 49 Moreover at least certain types of organizations corporate or non-corporate should be able to assert in good faith the privacy interests of their members. 50 Finally, whether acting for itself or on behalf of its members, surely the privacy interests of a church must be assessed somewhat differently from the privacy interests of other sorts of corporations. 51 22 Because state law privacy rights are seldom litigated, 52 their contours remain unclear and application of these still-evolving concepts to the claims here stated cannot be determined by reference to already decided cases. However, in our judgment the combination of property and privacy interests asserted were significant enough to warrant an opportunity for the Church to state its interests in the only forum where meaningful relief could expeditiously have been had 53 and within whose supervisory discretion a decision to foreclose public access resides. 54 23