Opinion ID: 462348
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Rights Under the Fourteenth Amendment Privacy Guarantee

Text: 12 While no right of privacy 1 is expressly guaranteed by the Constitution, the Supreme Court has recognized that zones of privacy may be created by specific constitutional guarantees, thereby imposing limits upon governmental power. See Paul v. Davis, 424 U.S. 693, 712-13, 96 S.Ct. 1155, 1165-66, 47 L.Ed.2d 405 (1976); Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 152-153, 93 S.Ct. 705, 726-727, 35 L.Ed.2d 147 (1973); Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 484-86, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 1681-83, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965). The Supreme Court has pointed out that rights found in the guarantee of personal privacy are limited to those which are fundamental or implicit in the concept of ordered liberty. Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. at 152, 93 S.Ct. at 726 (citing Palko v. Connecticut, 02 U.S. 319, 325, 58 S.Ct. 149, 152, 82 L.Ed. 288 (1937)). 13 To date the Supreme Court has recognized two types of interests protected by the right of privacy: an interest in avoiding disclosure of personal matters and an interest in personal autonomy in making certain kinds of important decisions. Whalen v. Roe, 429 U.S. 589, 599-600, 97 S.Ct. 869, 876-877, 51 L.Ed.2d 64 (1977). The right of privacy protects private decision-making in certain matters related to marriage, procreation, contraception, abortion, family relationships, child rearing and education. Paul, 424 U.S. at 713, 96 S.Ct. at 1166. The Supreme Court has not recognized that an interest in shielding one's naked body from public view should be protected under the rubric of the right of privacy, yet it has explicitly noted that the outer limits of fourteenth amendment privacy have not been defined. Carey v. Population Services Int'l, 431 U.S. 678, 684-85, 97 S.Ct. 2010, 2015-16, 52 L.Ed.2d 675 (1977). 14 This court has had occasion to consider the interest in shielding one's naked body from public view. In York v. Story, 324 F.2d 450 (9th Cir.1963), cert. denied, 376 U.S. 939, 84 S.Ct. 794, 11 L.Ed.2d 659 (1964), a female filed a complaint of assault. Over her protest, a male police officer photographed her in the nude, in positions which did not show her injuries, and then distributed the photographs to other personnel in the police department. This court relied upon the fourteenth amendment as the source of the woman's protection, reasoning that the security of one's privacy against 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. Id. at 455. We held that the plaintiff had stated a privacy claim under the fourteenth amendment, id. at 456, because we could not conceive of a more basic subject of privacy than the naked body. The 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. at 455. 15 Assuming that, in this circuit, the interest in not being viewed naked by members of the opposite sex is protected by the right of privacy, our inquiry must focus on whether the female guards' conduct invaded the prisoners' interest. We might simply say that the situation of the San Quentin inmates is factually distinguishable from that of the plaintiff in York because they are prisoners and she was a complaining victim of a crime, and because the prison officials' observation of inmates is essential to prison security while the photographing of the complainant was not necessary to the investigation of the alleged crime. However, we prefer to follow the analytical framework established in the Supreme Court's privacy cases and reason that since the right of privacy is a fundamental right it may be restricted only if the limitation is justified by a compelling state interest. Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113, 155, 93 S.Ct. 705, 728, 35 L.Ed.2d 147 (1973). 16 The inmates do not contest the state's interest in searching and surveilling them to maintain prison security. Rather, they challenge the constitutionality of such search and surveillance when performed by members of the opposite gender. We are satisfied that the facts of this case establish that the prison authorities have devised the least intrusive means to serve the state's interest in prison security. See Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U.S. 705, 716, 97 S.Ct. 1428, 1436, 51 L.Ed.2d 752 (1976) (state achievement of its ends must be by the less drastic means.) 17 Female guards are not assigned to positions requiring unrestricted and frequent surveillance. Rather, the positions to which they are assigned require infrequent and casual observation, or observation at a distance. Female guards working the tiers walk past the cells routinely, but do not stop for prolonged inspection. When they are not walking down the tiers, their view of the inmates in their cells is circumscribed by the cell bars and by the distance and angle of their stations. Likewise, the observations by the female correctional officers stationed on the gunrails overlooking the tiers and the yard areas are obscured by the angle and distance of their locations. 2 Female guards do not accompany male inmates to the individual or gang showers, and are not stationed on the tiers where the showers are located. Females are assigned to the more distant gunrail position overlooking showers, where, again, the surveillance is obscured. Under these circumstances, 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. Accord Lee v. Downs, 641 F.2d 1117 (4th Cir.1981); Avery v. Perrin, 473 F.Supp. 90 (D.N.H.1979). 18 Similarly, routine pat-down searches, which include the groin area, and which are otherwise justified by security needs, do not violate the fourteenth amendment because a correctional officer of the opposite gender conducts such a search. Accord Bagley v. Watson, 579 F.Supp. 1099 (D.Or.1983); Smith v. Fairman, 678 F.2d 52 (7th Cir.1982), cert. denied, 461 U.S. 907, 103 S.Ct. 1879, 76 L.Ed.2d 810 (1983). These searches do not involve intimate contact with an inmate's body, and the record indicates that the female guards have conducted themselves in a professional manner. Furthermore, female officers are not assigned positions in which they conduct or observe strip or body cavity searches. Rather, the record indicates that only in two or three emergency situations have female guards observed unclothed body searches. Even if we conclude that such a situation represents an invasion of privacy rights, we cannot conclude, on this record, that the observations by the female officers were not justified by emergent circumstances. Accord Lee v. Downs, 641 F.2d 1117, 1119-21 (4th Cir.1981); Hudson v. Goodlander, 494 F.Supp. 890, 894 (D.Md.1980).