Opinion ID: 749838
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: Officer Chaidez and Sergeant Smith

Text: 31 Sergeant Smith (accompanied by Officer Chaidez) (collectively the officers) informed Henry that he was being arrested for a violation of California Vehicle Code §§ 40302(b)-(c) and for tail light and seat belt violations, both of which are non-jailable offenses for which violators are to be cited and released under California law. See generally Cal. Veh.Code §§ 24252(a), 27315(d). They also told him that he would be taken to jail. Henry claims that his arrest, transportation, and detention for these infractions violated his Fourth Amendment rights. In other words, as the district court observed, Henry brings an as-applied, constitutional challenge to the officers' conduct under the California statutes. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the officers on the basis that Henry was taken into custody and transported to the Shasta County Jail pursuant to state law. 32 The district court was correct that the officers' conduct in arresting, detaining (until they reached the jail), and transporting Henry to jail was objectively valid under California law. 15 Under California law, a Vehicle Code violator is technically under arrest when an officer has probable cause to believe that person has committed a Vehicle Code offense, and begins the process of issuing a citation to appear in court. People v. Monroe, 12 Cal.App.4th 1174, 1183 n. 5, 16 Cal.Rptr.2d 267, 274 n. 5 (Cal.Ct.App.1993). 16 Furthermore, Henry has failed to offer any evidence refuting the officers' assertion that a magistrate was not available. Once Henry demanded to see a magistrate in lieu of signing the notice to appear, therefore, the officers could, under California law, take him to the county jail. That was a proper course of action under section 40307, which provides that [w]hen an arresting officer attempts to take a person arrested for a misdemeanor or infraction of [the vehicle code] before a magistrate and the magistrate or person authorized to act for him is not available, the arresting officer must take the arrestee without unnecessary delay before the magistrate's clerk, who is to admit him to bail, or before the officer in charge of the local jail, who may either admit him to bail or release him on a written promise to appear. Cal. Veh.Code § 40307. 33 The district court, however, did not address the fundamental question whether the officers' conduct, while consistent with the California statutes, was constitutional. Thus, its analysis was incomplete. Henry, as a person invoking [an as-applied challenge,] asserts that the acts ... that are the subject of the litigation fall outside what a properly drawn prohibition could cover. Board of Trustees, State Univ. of N.Y. v. Fox, 492 U.S. 469, 482, 109 S.Ct. 3028, 3036, 106 L.Ed.2d 388 (1989). On this appeal, the issue is not whether the officers' conduct was in accord with state law, but whether their conduct [fell] outside what a properly drawn [statute] could cover. Id. The question of the constitutionality of the provisions of §§ 40302 and 40307 as applied to facts like these is a matter that we have not yet decided. 17 Because the answer depends on questions of fact and law, see, e.g., Berkemer v. McCarty, 468 U.S. 420, 439, 104 S.Ct. 3138, 3149-50, 82 L.Ed.2d 317 (1984), that the district court did not address, we prefer not to decide it initially on appeal. We prefer to leave initial decisions of questions of this type to the district court. We remand these claims to the district court for further consideration. United States v. One 1978 Piper Cherokee Aircraft, 91 F.3d 1204, 1210 (9th Cir.1996); Dodd v. Hood River County, 59 F.3d 852, 864 (9th Cir.1995).