Opinion ID: 4503539
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Fourteenth Amendment Right to Bodily Privacy

Text: “The right to bodily privacy [under the Fourteenth Amendment] was established in this circuit in 1963.” Sepulveda v. Ramirez, 967 F.2d 1413, 1415–16 (9th Cir. 1992) (citing York v. Story, 324 F.2d 450 (9th Cir. 1963)). 3 3 In York, the female plaintiff alleged that after she went to the police department to report an assault, a male officer took and later distributed photographs of her in nude positions that did not depict her injuries and were not made for any lawful or legitimate purpose. 234 F.2d at 452. We “relied upon the [F]ourteenth Amendment as the source of the woman’s protection, reasoning that the security of one’s privacy against 10 VAZQUEZ V. COUNTY OF KERN We extended “this right to prison inmates in 1985,” id. (citation omitted), and we have held that a pretrial detainee has “at least the same right to bodily privacy as a prisoner,” Byrd v. Maricopa Cty. Bd. of Supervisors, 845 F.3d 919, 923 (9th Cir. 2017). In Grummett, we considered a class action asserting that a “policy and practice of allowing female correctional officers to view male inmates in states of partial or total nudity while dressing, showering, being stripped searched, or using toilet facilities violated [the inmates’] rights of privacy guaranteed by the United States Constitution.” 779 F.2d at 492. In our analysis, we noted that female guards were “not assigned to positions requiring unrestricted and frequent surveillance”; female guards routinely walked past cells, but did not stop for prolonged inspection; female guards did not accompany male inmates to the showers; and “females [were] assigned to the more distant gunrail position, overlooking showers, where . . . the surveillance [was] obscured.” Id. at 494–95. From these circumstances, we concluded that “the inmates have not demonstrated that these restricted observations by members of the opposite sex are so degrading as to require intervention by this court.” Id. at 494. arbitrary intrusion by the police is basic to a free society and therefore ‘implicit in the concept of ordered liberty’ under the due process clause.” Grummett v. Rushen, 779 F.2d 491, 494 (9th Cir. 1985) (quoting York, 234 F.2d at 455). “We held that the plaintiff had stated a privacy claim under the [F]ourteenth [A]mendment because we could not conceive of a more basic subject of privacy than the naked body. Id. (citation omitted). We noted that “[t]he desire to shield one’s unclothed figure from [the] view of strangers, and particularly strangers of the opposite sex, is impelled by elementary self-respect and personal dignity.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). VAZQUEZ V. COUNTY OF KERN 11 Similarly, in Sepulveda, we considered the claim of a female parolee who alleged that a male officer entered the restroom while she was providing a urine sample for drug tests. 967 F.2d at 1415. The female parolee objected to his presence and asked him to leave, but the male officer laughed at her and remained in the restroom. Id. We affirmed the district court’s order that the officer was not entitled to summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity, concluding that the plaintiff’s “experience was far more degrading . . . than the situation faced by the inmates in Grummett.” Id. at 1415–16. We pointed out that, unlike in Grummett, the defendant’s view of the parolee was “neither obscured nor distant.” Id. Here, Vazquez contends that Anderson violated her right to privacy under the Fourteenth Amendment when he allegedly watched her shower multiple times and on one occasion looked into her room when her privacy sign was up. 4 First, Anderson concedes that “[t]he right to not be viewed naked by members of the opposite sex is protected under the Constitution,” but contends that “there is a compelling state interest for the safety and security of the juvenile detention facility for the guards to be present (in a separate room and behind a computer desk during the wards’ shower time.)” 5 Anderson’s argument that there is a compelling state interest for his alleged actions is not persuasive as there is 4 Indeed, Vazquez testified that Anderson told her he had seen her in the shower. 5 “[W]hen a prison regulation impinges on inmates’ constitutional rights, the regulation is valid if it is reasonably related to legitimate penological interests.” Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89 (1987); see also Byrd, 845 F.3d at 923. 12 VAZQUEZ V. COUNTY OF KERN evidence in the record that his actions, at least with respect to the shower allegations, were against institution policy. See Byrd, 845 F.3d at 924 (noting that the fact that the challenged observation violated the prison’s policy “suggests that there may be no ‘valid rational connection’ between the observation and a legitimate prison interest”). For example, another corrections officer testified that she was trained that male staff should not be in the unit while females are showering and that if she had observed Anderson at the staff counter while female wards were showering she would have reported it. A substance abuse counselor also testified that if he had observed a male staff member sitting at the staff counter while female wards were showering he would have reported it. And the director of the juvenile hall testified that the Juvenile Hall Administrative Manual required supervision of the showers to be provided by staff of the same gender as the youth, and that “except in exigent circumstances or incidental to a routine youth safety check the youth will be permitted to shower . . . without nonmedical staff of the opposite gender viewing their breasts, buttocks, or genitalia.” Second, Anderson argues that his alleged conduct, even if true, did not violate Vazquez’s right to privacy because his view into the showers was infrequent, from a distance, and did not involve an inappropriate amount of contact. Yet viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Vazquez, even if Anderson observed her from a distance, the question of whether his observation was “infrequent and casual” remains in dispute. Moreover, there is evidence that Anderson directed Vazquez to use a certain shower stall so he could obtain the best view. Given the evidence that there was no rational connection between Anderson’s conduct and a legitimate prison interest VAZQUEZ V. COUNTY OF KERN 13 and the evidence that Anderson’s view was not necessarily “obscured and from a distance,” we disagree with the district court that Anderson’s alleged viewings were not sufficiently frequent to violate Vazquez’s right to privacy under the Fourteenth Amendment. See Byrd, 845 F.3d at 922, 924 (concluding allegations that female prison guards regularly viewed a male pretrial detainee’s bathroom and shower use violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to bodily privacy could not be dismissed without an answer). Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to Vazquez, we hold that a reasonable jury could conclude that Anderson violated Vazquez’s Fourteenth Amendment right to bodily privacy.