Opinion ID: 159873
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Griffin

Text: 42 As the majority acknowledges, in 1987 the Supreme Court in Griffin upheld a probation regulation against a probationer's challenge that it violated his Fourth Amendment rights. The regulation at issue there required probationers to consent to a search of their homes anytime a probation officer had reasonable grounds to believe an offense was being committed. In reaching its conclusion, the Court began its analysis with the statement that probationers do not enjoy 'the absolute liberty to which every citizen is entitled but only . . . conditional liberty,' due to the State's interests in reducing recidivism and ensuring the community is not harmed by the probationer's being at large. Griffin, 483 U.S. at 874 (quoting Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 480 (1972)). Significantly, the Court recognized that while these state interests permit[] a degree of impingement upon privacy that would not be constitutional if applied to the public at large[, t]hat permissible degree is not unlimited, . . . . Id. at 875 (emphasis added). Only after recognizing the probationer's general right to privacy did the Court turn to the question of whether this right was overly impinged by the probation regulation, a determination made by balancing the probationer's rights against the governmental interests associated there. Griffin, therefore, clearly established six years prior to the incidents here that probationers retain a right to privacy under the Constitution which is violated where the State impinges upon that right without a legitimate, governmental purpose. 43 The majority here simply relies upon the Court's approval of the regulation in Griffin to conclude that Mr. Herring's privacy right was not clearly established in this case. In so doing, the majority extrapolates from the Court's naked holding without ever acknowledging the underlying analysis and reasoning, and fails entirely to apply that analysis and reasoning to the facts of this case. The majority thus ignores the clear holding in Griffin that a probationer has a constitutional right to privacy which is only limited insofar as the limitation is justified by the 'special need[s]' of the probation system. Id. at 875. See also Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89 (1987) (holding that prison regulations impinging on prisoners' constitutional rights are only valid where reasonably related to legitimate penological interests); Doe v. Attorney Gen., 941 F.2d 780, 796 (9th Cir. 1991) (in 1988, law was clear that government may use private information only if it can show that its use of the information advances a legitimate state interest). 44 Although the legitimacy of the governmental interest was crucial to the Griffin analysis, the majority fails to address what interest is at issue here. This flaw proves fatal to its reasoning because, simply put, there was no legitimate governmental interest in Ms. Keenan's conduct. Her unauthorized actions were both erroneous and objectively unreasonable because she acted in violation of both established probation procedures and Colorado state law. 45 In making the disclosures to Mr. Herring's family and employer, Ms. Keenan acted contrary to every written guideline addressing the disclosure of confidential medical information contained in the U.S. Probation Manual, which serves as the authoritative standard for community supervision of federal offenders. Guide to Judiciary Policies and Procedures, vol. X (U.S. Probation Manual) [hereinafter Manual], ch. IV, at 1; see App. 1186. 1 The Manual clearly states the goal of protecting the confidentiality of exposed persons in their HIV status, id., and mandates that [o]fficers should not disclose HIV infection or illness information without the offender's informed written consent, id. at 16; App. at A-2. The Manual further prohibits probation officers from disclosing information to employers without written approval by the officer's supervisor or chief probation officer. Id. at 38; App. at A-7. If the probationer opposes such disclosure, it may not be made without a hearing by the court. Id. Finally, the disclosure can only be with regard to a reasonably foreseeable risk the probationer poses to the employer or the public, and the risk must be related to the offender's past criminal conduct. 2 Id. at 36-37; App. at 1189. 46 Ms. Keenan also violated state criminal law, which prohibits the disclosure of medical information to unauthorized persons. See Colo. Rev. Stat. 18-4-412 (criminalizing the disclosure of medical information to an unauthorized person without prior written authorization); Colo. Rev. Stat. 24-4-1402 (the only authorized disclosures are by medical personnel treating patients and made in the form of reports to the state or local department of public health). In fact, Ms. Keenan's Manual specifically warned her that state civil and criminal penalties could attach to the violation of a probationer's confidentiality surrounding his HIV status, and instructed her to learn the applicable state law. See Manual, ch. IV, at 16, App. at A-2. In addition, Ms. Keenan was required to consult with the probation office's expert on HIV and state confidentiality laws upon learning of Mr. Herring's possible HIV status, a regulation undoubtedly intended to avert the sort of violation which occurred here. See id. at 18; App. 1187, 1188. 47 Despite the statutes and guidelines described above, the government argues that Ms. Keenan disclosed Mr. Herring's purported HIV status to his employer and family to prevent him from breaking Colorado law while on probation, citing Colo. Rev. Stat. 25-4-108. 3 It is clear, however, that Mr. Herring was not violating section 25-4-108, which prohibits a person with a contagious disease from working in the food service industry, because this statute is inapplicable to HIV-positive individuals under Colorado's health code. See Colo. Code Regs. 11CR1, Reg. 6 (only persons prohibited from working in food service pursuant to 25-4-108 are those infected with a disease transmittable through food handling). Morever, reliance on this law was unreasonable because it was antiquated (passed in 1913 and amended once in 1921) and has never been applied in any published case. In fact, the only annotation to this statute contained in Colorado's official reporter cites to an article, published in 1988, describing the inapplicability of the statute in the context of HIV-positive employees. 4 48 The Manual's guidelines, with their reference to state statutes, reflect a reasoned governmental commitment to preserve a probationer's privacy in his confidential medical information. It is significant that in Griffin the Court was called upon to analyze the legitimacy of a governmental interest embodied in an officially established policy. There the Court assessed the probation regulation's constitutionality in light of the probation system's asserted special needs underlying it. See Griffin, 483 U.S. at 875-79. Importantly for our purposes, the Court concluded that the search of a probationer's residence was reasonable within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment because it was conducted pursuant to a valid regulation governing probationers, id. at 880 (emphasis added), which was itself justified by the special needs of the probation system making the warrant requirement impractical. 49 Here, however, we are asked to review the independent action of a probation officer which was directly contrary to the published guidelines of the U.S. Probation Office. Ms. Keenan cannot plausibly argue that her random, unauthorized and illegal conduct provides a basis for a legitimate or reasonable governmental interest sufficient to warrant the intrusion on Mr. Herring's privacy rights which occurred here. 5 50 It is true that violation of internal guidelines, or even state laws, does not undermine a qualified immunity defense where the constitutional right was not otherwise clearly established. See Davis v. Scherer, 468 U.S. 183, 194 (1984). Such violations may be considered, however, where they are relevant to the constitutional interest itself. See id. at 193 n.11 (recognizing that laws and regulations may bear upon the existence of a constitutional interest). Ms. Keenan's violation of her own guidelines and state laws serves to point up the fact that her actions served no legitimate probation interest to balance against Mr. Herring's privacy right. Without such an interest, as Griffin makes clear, the impingement on Mr. Herring's right to privacy right is impermissible under the Constitution.