Opinion ID: 3064918
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Arrest In Hopkins’ Home

Text: The Fourth Amendment protects against warrantless arrest inside a person’s home in the same fashion that it protects against warrantless searches of the home, which is to say that police officers may not execute a warantless arrest in a home unless they have both probable cause and exigent circumstances. See, e.g., Payton, 445 U.S. at 586 (“It is a ‘basic principle of Fourth Amendment law’ that searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreason12 In Fisher v. City of San Jose, 558 F.3d 1069 (9th Cir. 2008) (en banc), this court held that an “armed standoff was a single Fourth Amendment event, a continuous process of formalizing [an] arrest.” Id. at 1077. Here, by contrast, two distinct seizures took place, one occurring after the other was already accomplished. Drawing a distinction between two consecutive and overlapping “seizures” is a common and longstanding practice in Fourth Amendment jurisprudence, as in the case of so-called “Terry stops,” see Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 16-19 (1968); see also, e.g., Rohde v. City of Roseburg, 137 F.3d 1142, 1144 (9th Cir. 1998), or of unconstitutionally excessive force, see Chavez v. Martinez, 538 U.S. 760, 773 n.5 (2003) (plurality opinion); Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 388, 394 (1989); Pierce v. Multnomah County, 76 F.3d 1032, 1042 (9th Cir. 1996) (quoting Robins v. Harum, 773 F.2d 1004, 1010 (9th Cir. 1985)). These longstanding precedents demonstrate that generally an individual who has already been seized can still be further seized for purposes of the Fourth Amendment — a proposition that is not inconsistent with Fisher’s holding that Fourth Amendment infringements suffered between the initiation of a seizure and the perfection, or “formalizing,” of that same seizure may not be analyzed independently for purposes of the warrant requirement. Fisher, 558 F.3d at 1077. Here, Hopkins’ second seizure did not occur in the “process of formalizing” his first seizure, id., which was accomplished, at the latest, when he was led from his house in handcuffs. See infra 34-35. Rather, much like a Terry stop followed by a formal arrest, the first seizure here preceded the second. Accordingly, the two arrests were independent Fourth Amendment events that can independently support separate causes of action under § 1983. HOPKINS v. BONVICINO 9053 able.”); Welsh, 466 U.S. at 749 (“[W]arrantless . . . arrests in the home are prohibited by the Fourth Amendment, absent probable cause and exigent circumstances.”). In light of the above, because Hopkins was in fact seized inside his home, Officers Buelow and Bonvicino violated his Fourth Amendment rights by arresting him without a warrant for the same reasons that their emergency and exigency defenses fail to justify their warrantless entry. See supra Part III.B. An arrest — or, to use the Fourth Amendment’s terminology, a “seizure” — “occurs when a law enforcement officer, through coercion, ‘physical force[,] or a show of authority, in some way restricts the liberty of a person.’ ” United States v. Washington, 387 F.3d 1060, 1069 (9th Cir. 2004) (quoting United States v. Chan-Jimenez, 125 F.3d 1324, 1325 (9th Cir. 1997)). “A person’s liberty is restrained when, ‘taking into account all of the circumstances surrounding the encounter, the police conduct would have communicated to a reasonable person that he was not at liberty to ignore the police presence and go about his business.’ ” Id. (quoting Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 437 (1991)). Here, taking the facts in the light most favorable to Hopkins, Officers Buelow and Bonvicino entered his home with guns drawn, ordered him to show his hands, told him that he was under arrest, handcuffed him, and took him outside. Under these circumstances, it is clear that the officers restricted his liberty and seized him. See, e.g., United States v. Washington, 490 F.3d 765, 772 (9th Cir. 2007) (considering fact of police officer’s “directing [someone] where to walk” in holding that a seizure occurred); United States v. Manzo-Jurado, 457 F.3d 928, 934 n.3 (9th Cir. 2006) (holding that a police officer’s order to occupants of a truck to “show their hands” was a seizure); United States v. Bravo, 295 F.3d 1002, 1010 (9th Cir. 2002) (“Certainly handcuffing is a substantial factor in determining whether an individual has been arrested.”). [20] Numerous precedents from this court and others, including the United States Supreme Court, make it clear that 9054 HOPKINS v. BONVICINO the officers’ treatment of Hopkins inside his home constituted a seizure. There can be no doubt that the law in this respect was clearly established prior to 2003 and thus should have been known by a reasonable officer. See, e.g., Michigan v. Chesternut, 486 U.S. 567, 573 (1988); INS v. Delgado, 466 U.S. 210, 215 (1984); Bostick, 501 U.S. at 437; ChanJimenez, 125 F.3d at 1326. Accordingly, we affirm the district court’s order denying Officers Buelow and Bonvicino’s motion for summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds with respect to Hopkins’ unlawful arrest claim. However, because Officer Nguyen did not participate in the arrest inside Hopkins’ home, we reverse the district court’s denial of his motion for summary judgment with respect to this arrest. See supra Part III.C.