Opinion ID: 1208626
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Of the Threshold Inquiry

Text: Until the issuance of the Supreme Court's opinion in Pearson v. Callahan, ___ U.S. ___, 129 S.Ct. 808, 172 L.Ed.2d 565 (2009), the following threshold inquiry was mandatory: A court required to rule upon the qualified immunity issue must consider, then, this threshold question: Taken in the light most favorable to the party asserting the inquiry, do the facts alleged show the officers' conduct violated a constitutional right. This must be the initial inquiry. .... If no constitutional right would have been violated were the allegations established, there is no necessity for further inquiries concerning qualified immunity. Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151, 150 L.Ed.2d 272 (2001). While it is now true that the Saucier protocol should not be regarded as mandatory in all cases, [the Supreme Court] continue[s] to recognize that it is often beneficial. Pearson, 129 S.Ct. at 818. Accordingly, we are no longer required to make a threshold inquiry as to the violation of a constitutional right in a qualified immunity context, but we are free to do so. Id. at 821. The inquiry is said to be appropriate in those cases where discussion of why the relevant facts do not violate clearly established law may make it apparent that in fact the relevant facts do not make out a constitutional violation at all. Id. at 818. This is such a case. The Supreme Court's current teaching is that the Saucier Court was certainly correct in noting that the two-step procedure promotes the development of constitutional precedent and is especially valuable with respect to questions that do not frequently arise in cases in which a qualified immunity defense is unavailable. Id. The development of constitutional precedent is especially important here, where (1) this Court has not spoken on the issue of the constitutionality of clothing exchange procedures in jails although the issue has been presented in district courts in this circuit, see, e.g., Marriott v. County of Montgomery, 227 F.R.D. 159, 169-70 (N.D.N.Y.2005) (holding that a jail facility's change-out procedure was a strip search and in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution); see also Williams v. County of Niagara, No. 06-CV-291A, 2008 WL 4501918, at  (W.D.N.Y. Sept.29, 2008) (involving a class action certification question where the defendants argued, inter alia, that a `clothing change-out' procedure in a jail does not constitute a strip search and is constitutional); and (2) the constitutionality of clothing exchange procedures in jails may never be developed if this Court were to dispose of all challenges relating to the procedures simply because the procedure is not clearly established as a strip search violative of the Fourth Amendment. It is also said that addressing the constitutional issue first may not only avoid the possibility of drawn-out litigation and the imposition of unwarranted liability, but may also serve to clarify official conduct standards. See Sound Aircraft Servs., Inc. v. Town of E. Hampton, 192 F.3d 329, 334 (2d Cir.1999). We think that all these purposes are served by undertaking the constitutional inquiry first in this case. When the facts, viewed in light most favorable to the plaintiff, do not demonstrate that an officer's conduct violated a constitutional right, the court need not further pursue the qualified immunity inquiry, and the officer is entitled to summary judgment. Gilles v. Repicky, 511 F.3d 239, 244 (2d Cir.2007).