Opinion ID: 776746
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Violation of Poe's Right to Privacy by Leonard's Subordinate

Text: 49 At oral argument, Leonard conceded for purposes of this appeal that Poe has sufficiently alleged a violation of her constitutional right to privacy, Tr. of Oral Argument at 9, although he had fully briefed the issue. 11 Even with this concession, we discuss this aspect of Poe's claim in order to clarify that there is a right to privacy in one's unclothed body. Although our prior cases have held that there is such a right in the context of prison confinement and search or seizure by the government, those cases did not limit the right to a Fourth Amendment setting. Accordingly, we conclude that the right to privacy in one's unclothed body extends beyond a Fourth Amendment context to the case at hand. 50 The Fourth Amendment is not the proper source of Poe's constitutional right because Pearl's objectionable conduct occurred outside of a criminal investigation or other form of governmental investigation or activity. Cf., e.g., Soldal v. Cook County, 506 U.S. 56, 66-67 & n. 11, 113 S.Ct. 538, 121 L.Ed.2d 450 (1992) (recognizing the applicability of the Fourth Amendment to a sheriff's unlawful seizure of a mobile home during eviction proceedings); Skinner v. Ry. Executives Ass'n., 489 U.S. 602, 617, 109 S.Ct. 1402, 103 L.Ed.2d 639 (1989) (holding that federal regulations requiring employees of private railroads to provide urine samples for drug testing are subject to Fourth Amendment strictures); O'Connor v. Ortega, 480 U.S. 709, 714-15, 723, 107 S.Ct. 1492, 94 L.Ed.2d 714 (1987) (plurality opinion) (holding that public employer intrusions on the constitutionally protected privacy interests of government employees for noninvestigatory, work-related purposes, as well as for investigations of work-related misconduct, should be judged by the standard of reasonableness under the Fourth Amendment); New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325, 335, 105 S.Ct. 733, 83 L.Ed.2d 720 (1985) (holding that the Fourth Amendment applies to governmental conduct whether the government's motivation is to investigate violations of criminal laws or breaches of other statutory or regulatory standards) (internal quotation marks omitted); Camara v. Mun. Court of San Francisco, 387 U.S. 523, 534, 87 S.Ct. 1727, 18 L.Ed.2d 930 (1967) (applying Fourth Amendment to governmental inspection program). In all of these cases, the challenged conduct occurred either during an investigation conducted by the government as an employer or during a law enforcement official's performance of a traditional governmental function. But there is no allegation here that Pearl videotaped Poe during the course of any investigation or other governmental endeavor of the sort implicating the Fourth Amendment. See United States v. Attson, 900 F.2d 1427, 1430 (9th Cir.) (The types of non-law enforcement conduct to which the [Supreme] Court has extended the scope of the [Fourth] [A]mendment are thus typically motivated by some sort of investigatory or administrative purpose designed to elicit a benefit for the government.), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 961, 111 S.Ct. 393, 112 L.Ed.2d 403 (1990). Although Pearl invited Poe to film a training video to benefit the police academy, his surreptitious videotaping of her during his assigned duties was for his personal reasons and not to advance any governmental purpose. The Fourth Amendment simply is not implicated by his misconduct. 51 Instead, Poe's claim is appropriately analyzed pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of substantive due process. See, e.g., Johnson, 239 F.3d at 251-52 (analyzing a student's claim that gym teacher used excessive force under the Fourteenth Amendment's substantive due process guarantee because the assault occurred in non-seizure, non-prisoner context); Haberthur v. City of Raymore, 119 F.3d 720, 723-24 (8th Cir.1997) (concluding that the plaintiff, who was not under arrest or under suspicion of criminal activity, adequately alleged that police officer's sexual assault violated her substantive due process right to bodily integrity or privacy); Jones v. Wellham, 104 F.3d 620, 628 (4th Cir.1997) (holding that claim brought by a plaintiff, who was not arrested or a criminal suspect but was raped by a police officer, was properly viewed as asserting a violation of her substantive due process right to bodily integrity under the Fourteenth Amendment, rather than as a violation of her Fourth Amendment rights); cf. County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 843, 118 S.Ct. 1708, 140 L.Ed.2d 1043 (1998) ([I]f a constitutional claim is covered by a specific constitutional provision... the claim must be analyzed under the standard appropriate to that specific provision, not under the rubric of substantive due process.) (internal quotation marks omitted). 52 We discuss cases analyzing such a privacy interest under the Fourth Amendment in addition to those cases applying the Fourteenth Amendment's substantive due process standard to demonstrate that the type of privacy claim Poe asserts has been previously raised and accepted. Although the Fourth Amendment cases are not on all fours with Poe's claim under the Fourteenth Amendment, they are instructive because they reveal that individuals retain significant privacy interests even in situations where privacy expectations are diminished. 53 Several of our cases involve viewings of unclothed or partially unclothed individuals for penological purposes. In Forts v. Ward, for example, we recognized that female inmates had a privacy interest in protecting themselves from the involuntary viewing of private parts of the body by prison guards of the opposite sex. 621 F.2d 1210, 1217 (2d Cir.1980). 12 In Security and Law Enforcement Employees v. Carey, 737 F.2d 187, 192, 204-09 (2d Cir. 1984), we examined the constitutionality of two forms of warrantless disrobe searches of correctional officers for contraband. Although holding that most of the policies governing the warrantless strip and visual body-cavity searches 13 of correctional officers violated the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments, we concluded that if prison officials had reasonable suspicion to conduct a strip search of a correctional officer, that search would not violate the Constitution. Id. We recognized that correctional officers, just like visitors to a prison, retain an expectation of bodily privacy. Id. at 202. That expectation was diminished in that case by the notice to the officers of the Department of Correctional Services' policy and the legitimate penological needs of a correctional facility. Id.; see also Covino v. Patrissi, 967 F.2d 73, 78 (2d Cir.1992) (holding that inmate subject to visual body cavity searches retained a limited right of bodily privacy even in the prison context). We have also recognized a privacy interest in cases where arrestees charged with misdemeanors were strip-searched without reasonable suspicion. See, e.g., Walsh v. Franco, 849 F.2d 66, 69 (2d Cir.1988); Weber v. Dell, 804 F.2d 796, 802 (2d Cir.1986). Poe, however, is not a correctional officer, whose duties include confiscating contraband and providing prison security and who is informed that, when at work, she could be searched. Thus, she has no reason to be aware of the potential for such a search. Nor is she a misdemeanor arrestee housed with a general jail population or with arraigned inmates. She is a private individual, not suspected of any criminal activity, who was invited by a police officer to assist in filming a police academy training video. Her expectation of bodily privacy, were we applying Fourth Amendment standards, would be high. 54 We have also indicated, although we have not held, that the publication of a photograph of a criminal suspect in the nude would violate the suspect's constitutional right to privacy. See Rosenberg v. Martin, 478 F.2d 520, 525 (2d Cir.) (Friendly, J.), cert. denied, 414 U.S. 872, 94 S.Ct. 102, 38 L.Ed.2d 90 (1973). In support of this proposition, we cited to the Ninth Circuit's decision in York v. Story, which held that a plaintiff, who went to the police department to file assault charges and was photographed by a police officer who told her that she would have to be photographed while in the nude, stated a violation of her right to privacy as guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment. 324 F.2d 450, 455 (9th Cir.1963), cert. denied, 376 U.S. 939, 84 S.Ct. 794, 11 L.Ed.2d 659 (1964). Notably, the Ninth Circuit concluded that 55 We cannot conceive of a more basic subject of privacy than the naked body. The desire to shield one's unclothed figure from view of strangers, and particularly strangers of the opposite sex, is impelled by elementary self-respect and personal dignity.... We do not see how it can be argued that the searching of one's home deprives him of privacy, but the photographing of one's nude body, and the distribution of such photographs to strangers does not. Nor can we imagine a more arbitrary intrusion upon the security of that privacy than for a male police officer to unnecessarily photograph the nude body of a female citizen who has made complaint of an assault upon her.... 56 Id. at 455. We find that these cases, read together, are sufficiently clear in establishing that there is a right to privacy in one's unclothed or partially unclothed body, regardless whether that right is established through the auspices of the Fourth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment. 57 Moreover, even if we did not have these cases on which to rely, we would find that Poe has independently asserted a violation of her substantive due process rights because Pearl's behavior, if proven, shocks the conscience. The core protection provided by the Due Process Clause is protection against arbitrary government action. Thus, the touchstone of due process is protection of the individual against ... the exercise of power without any reasonable justification in the service of a legitimate governmental objective. County of Sacramento, 523 U.S. at 845-46, 118 S.Ct. 1708 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). We must determine, therefore, whether Pearl's behavior is so egregious, so outrageous, that it may fairly be said to shock the contemporary conscience. Id. at 848 n. 8, 118 S.Ct. 1708. 58 Taking the facts most favorably to Poe, as we are required to do on a motion for summary judgment, it seems clear that Pearl manipulated the situation to ensure that Poe would be videotaped unclothed from the waist up: he told Poe to wear provocative clothing for her role in order to distract the trooper candidates and create a better training video; he encouraged her to bring several different outfits; even though she was already dressed provocatively, he encouraged her to change outfits; he told her to lose the bra; and he instructed her to change clothes in his office and then directed her to a precise spot to stand while doing so. Pearl did all this while purporting to act for the benefit of the police academy. Pearl's conduct certainly qualifies as conduct intended to injure in some way unjustifiable by any governmental interest, which rises to the conscience-shocking level. County of Sacramento, 523 U.S. at 849, 118 S.Ct. 1708; see also Johnson v. Newburgh Enlarged Sch. Dist., 239 F.3d 246, 252 (2d Cir.2001) (holding that a gym teacher's violent physical assault of a student was sufficiently conscience-shocking to constitute a violation of the student's substantive due process right to be free of excessive force). 59 We hold that Poe has alleged sufficient facts to raise a triable issue whether Pearl violated her constitutional right to privacy in her unclothed body and that her right to privacy in her unclothed body was clearly established at the time Pearl videotaped her. Although our prior cases have not presented exactly the same facts and the Supreme Court has advised that for qualified immunity purposes the right must be established in a more particularized, and hence more relevant sense, Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 640, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987), we conclude, as we did in Johnson, that for claims based on intentionally tortious harmful conduct employed in the absence of any legitimate government interest, the requisite degree of particularity is lessened, Johnson, 239 F.3d at 253. Our cases have sufficiently detailed the existence of such a privacy right and we independently find that Pearl's alleged behavior is shocking enough to qualify as a violation of Poe's substantive due process rights. Thus, it would be objectively unreasonable for a police officer to believe that Pearl's misconduct did not violate Poe's clearly established rights. Let us be clear: a police officer violates a person's constitutional right to bodily privacy when that officer manipulates the circumstances to view, to photograph, to videotape or otherwise to record that person's unclothed or partially unclothed body without his or her consent where, as here, there is no conceivable investigative or otherwise proper law-enforcement interest advanced by such a viewing.