Court Opinion

ID: 9786279
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-30 23:52:24.292051+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:36:43.782028
License: Public Domain

FABE, Justice,
with whom BRYNER, Justice, joins, dissenting.
According to the court's decision today, the government may use hidden cameras to monitor workers without obtaining a search warrant, so long as the workers do not have private offices. This decision permits deeply intrusive police surveillance of individuals who have-and deserve-every reasonable expectation of privacy. Although the Alaska Constitution's search and seizure protection is "broader in seope than that guaranteed in the federal Constitution," 1 the court's decision defines Alaskans' constitutional protections more narrowly than has any decision of the United States Supreme Court. In so doing, it disregards ample state and federal precedent supporting the conclusions that workers should expect privacy from surreptitious police surveillance regardless of the nature of their work space; that police violate reasonable expectations of privacy by engaging in more intrusive searches than a defendant would expect from a member of the public; and that secret overhead video observation is a uniquely intrusive mode of search, thus requiring a warrant. The court also fails to support its unprecedented assertion that a defendant who works with cash has a legally diminished expectation of priva*1176cy. Because I cannot agree with the court's departure from established Alaska and federal law, I respectfully dissent.
I THE ALASKA CONSTITUTION PROTECTS INDIVIDUALS FROM SURREPTITIOUS POLICE VIDEO SURVEILLANCE.
The "primary purpose" of Alaska's constitutional guarantee against unreasonable searches and seizures2 is "the protection of personal privacy and dignity against unwarranted intrusion by the State."3 Because of this protection, law enforcement officials may not intrude upon individual privacy without a warrant. The warrant requirement is a weighty one. As Chief Justice Jay Rabinowitz wrote in Smith v. State,4 "ln my judgment, it is preferable to entrust the decision to invade citizens' privacy to the scrutiny of neutral judicial officials rather than police officers-even police officers operating under great self-restraint." Quoting the U.S. Supreme Court's opinion in McDonald v. United States,5 Chief Justice Rabinowitz continued:
We are not dealing with formalities. The presence of a search warrant serves a high function. Absent some grave emergency, the Fourth Amendment has interposed a magistrate between the citizen and the police. This was done not to shield criminals nor to make the home a safe haven for illegal activities. It was done so that an objective mind might weigh the need to invade that privacy in order to enforce the law. The right of privacy was deemed too precious to entrust to the discretion of those whose job is the detection of crime and the arrest of criminals.[6]
In State v. Glass, we held that warrantless electronic audio monitoring violated the state constitution.7 In so holding, we expressed grave concerns about electronic surveillance technologies and their effect on "the right of persons to determine for themselves when, how, and to what extent information about them is communicated to others."8 The court's decision today is at odds with both the logic and language of Glass. The Glass opinion emphasized "the high value placed on speech by our society," 9 but it did not thereby abandon our constitutionally mandated *1177concern for "the protection of personal privacy and dignity against unwarranted intrusion by the State.10 In fact, the Glass opinion built on this very concern: It spoke of "[the corrosive impact of warrantless ... monitoring on our sense of security11 and twice defined the right at issue in the case as the "right to be let alone." 12
Our opinion in Glass even intimated that Glass's specific holding should apply to video as well as audio surveillance. We suggested that Alaska's constitutional privacy provision may have been enacted "out of a concern to protect against extensive governmental use of electronic surveillance techniques."13 We also mentioned with approval Dietemann v. Time, Inc., a common-law privacy case involving both surreptitious photography and audio recording;14 the analysis in that case almost exclusively concerned visual images and "electronic devices with their capacity to . intrude upon [an individual's] most intimate activities, and expose his most personal characteristics to the public gaze."15
Warrantless secret electronic surveillance by law enforcement agents violates deeply held and constitutionally protected values. As we recognized in (Glass, "we exclude the evidence [gathered by - unconstitutional means] because the transcendent values preserved by constitutional guarantee are of greater societal moment than the use of that evidence to obtain a conviction.16 These values remain paramount regardless of the facts of the case or the character of the defendant. - As Justice Frankfurter explained, "Jt is a fair summary of history to say that the safeguards of liberty have frequently been forged in controversies involving not very nice people. And so, while we are concerned here with a shabby defrauder, we must deal with his case in the context of what are really the great themes expressed by the Fourth Amendment."17 Following those "great themes," our own precedent, and that of the U.S. Supreme Court, the government violated Lindalee Cowles's rights by subjecting her to surreptitious and war-rantless video surveillance in the workplace.
II. THE PRESENCE OF COWORKERS IN COWLES'S WORKPLACE CLEARLY DOES NOT DEFEAT HER REASONABLE EXPECTATION OF PRIVACY.
State and federal search and seizure provisions protect people, not places."18 We have recognized that "(wherever a man may be, he is entitled to know that he will remain free from unreasonable searches and seizures."19 This right does not depend on an *1178individual's physical location or on her status in the workplace. The court, however, concludes that constitutional protection depends on whether an individual shares her work space, holding that "the public nature of Cowles' office [is] the critical factor" in denying her Fourth Amendment protection.20 This holding runs afoul of clear U.S. Supreme Court precedent and insupportably discriminates between citizens based on their workplace status.
The court suggests that the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Katz v. United States21 limits search and seizure protection to private locations.22 But Katz created no such limitation-to the contrary it stated:
What a person knowingly exposes to the public, even in his own home or office, is not a subject of Fourth Amendment protection. But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected. [23]
The Katz standard does not support this court's holding. Rather, it supports a conclusion that, regardless of her location, an individual who seeks and reasonably expects privacy is protected by the Fourth Amendment. As subsequent cases applying Katz make clear, an individual such as Cowles can reasonably expect privacy in her workplace.
The U.S. Supreme Court applied the Katz standard to the workplace in O'Commor v. Ortega.24 A majority of that Court found that a defendant can reasonably expect privacy in her office, even if that office is open to other people.25 In today's decision, this court quotes O'Connor's plurality opinion as legal authority.26 But the quoted language 27 is not O'Comnor's holding; in fact, it conflicts with the only holding for which O'Con-mor legally stands: the narrow rule endorsed by Justice Antonin Scalia as the concurring fifth vote.28 Justice Scalia's concurrence expressly disputed the plurality standard quoted by this court's majority. He wrote that the standard "must be wrong if it leads to the conclusion on the present facts that if Hospital officials had extensive work-related reasons to enter Dr. Ortega's office no Fourth Amendment protection existed. It is privacy that is protected by the Fourth Amendment, not solitude."29 To illustrate the reach of the Fourth Amendment, Justice Scalia described a hypothetical defendant very much like Lindalee Cowles: "[TJhe see-*1179retary working ... in an office frequently entered by ... other employees is protected against unreasonable searches of that office by the government.30 Justice Scalia supported his position by reference to Mancusi v. DeForte, a case holding that the Fourth Amendment protected a defendant in an office shared with coworkers.31 Justice Sea-lia's narrow rule-the rule for which O'Con-mor stands-is that government employees lose Fourth Amendment protection only in "such unusual situations as that in which the office is subject to unrestricted public access." 32 Following this U.S. Supreme Court interpretation of the Federal Constitution, the presence of Cowles's coworkers did not defeat her privacy expectation.33
The legally binding rule from O'Comnor, then, is that government workers enjoy a reasonable expectation of privacy in the office regardless of the presence of coworkers; their expectation remains reasonable unless the public has unrestricted access to the office.34 The public clearly did not have unrestricted access to Cowles's office. Her office was an enclosed space, and public access was restricted by a door with a combination lock, The record does not suggest that members of the public ever physically entered the space; rather, public access was limited to a view from the box-office window.35 Under both Katz and O'Connor, Cowles's privacy at her desk is protected by the Fourth Amendment.36
This court's conclusion that only inhabitants of private offices are protected from warrantless surveillance is particularly disturbing because it effectively ties a defendant's constitutional rights to her economic status. Following the standard articulated today, executives in private offices will be protected, but clerical workers in shared work spaces will not. This rule will disproportionately affect women, who represent 99% of secretaries, 96% of receptionists, 91% of bookkeepers, and 77% of cashiers.37 The impact of this rule is still greater for African-American women, who are more likely to work in administrative support or service positions than in any other jobs.38 The court offers no principled reason why constitutional protection of privacy, which we have defined as "the individual's interest in preserving his essential dignity as a human being,"39 should depend upon an individual's status in the workplace.
Chief Justice Rabinowitz raised a nearly identical objection in his dissent from Smith v. State.40 The court held that individuals *1180who disposed of trash in a common dumpster could not reasonably expect that the police would not search their garbage.41 But Chief Justice Rabinowitz disagreed with the majority's holding "insofar as it discriminates between the right to privacy of citizens occupying a single family dwelling, and those living in multiple unit dwelling places."42 He explained:
In my opinion, such a distinction is unjustifiable as being either arbitrary or ultimately grounded upon impermissible economic discrimination.... Nowhere in the text of the fourth amendment, article I, section 14 or article I, section 22 is the proviso, "for property owners only." _... To make the protection of the fourth amendment, article I, section 14 or article I, section 22 depend upon the economic status of an individual . is, in my opinion, unacceptable. The appropriate analytical focal point should be appellant's reasonable expectation of privacy. In my view, such expectation will remain constant, regardless of whether appellant's living unit is situated by itself on a spacious multi-acre estate or stacked upon others in a ... crowded tenement in the inner city.[43]
The individual's reasonable expectation of privacy from police video surveillance should similarly remain constant whether she works in a private office or a crowded common space. "It is privacy that is protected by the Fourth Amendment [and article I, sections 14 and 22 of the Alaska Constitution], not solitude." 44 The court gravely errs by recognizing constitutional protection for executives in private offices but denying it to secretaries in typing pools.
THE PARTIAL VISIBILITY OF COWLES'S WORKPLACE THROUGH A BOX OFFICE WINDOW CLEARLY DOES NOT DEFEAT HER REASONABLE EXPECTATION - OF - PRIVACY - FROM OVERHEAD - VIDEO - SURVEILLANCE. IIL.
Cowles's desk was partially visible to the public through a customer service window.45 Based on this fact, the court concludes that Cowles had no reasonable expectation of privacy from ceiling-mounted video surveillance by the police. This conclusion is at odds with our own precedent and with that of other state and federal courts. Because video surveillance is particularly intrusive, and because it far exceeds the reasonable expectations of people in all but the most public locations, numerous courts agree that war-rantless police surveillance violates defendants' rights.
A. Police May Not, Without a Warrant, Use Means of Surveillance More Intrusive than Those Which a Defendant Reasonably Expects from Public Observers.
Even in an area completely open to the public-which Cowles's office was not-citizens are protected from intrusive, warrant-less searches. Again, the standard is the defendant's reasonable expectation of privacy *118146 Where the defendant should reasonably expect public observation, the government may engage in observation of that sort. But the presence of public observers does not give the government unlimited license to pursue more intrusive modes of surveillance. The U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly articulated this standard. Thus, in Katz a defendant inside a glass phone booth could reasonably expect to be seen, but not heard. 47 Similarly, a merchant who invites the public to view his goods is constitutionally protected from police using more intrusive techniques for "seeing them as a customer would [not] ordinarily see them."48 In its most recent term, the Court reaffirmed this principle, holding that a bus passenger who knew that other passengers or bus employees might handle his soft-sided luggage nevertheless reasonably expected privacy from a law enforcement agent "feelfling] the bag in an exploratory manner."49 These rulings reflect a single consistent rule: citizens may reasonably expect privacy from intrusive modes of government observation, even if they expect members of the public to engage in less intrusive observation.
B. Secret Overhead Video Surveillance Is a More Intrusive Mode of Observation than Cowles Could Reasonably Have Expected from the Public or Her Coworkers.
Courts have recognized two related but distinct ways in which secret video surveillance uniquely intrudes on privacy. First, police monitoring by hidden cameras poses a special threat to personal dignity, security, and privacy. Second, hidden cameras may violate reasonable expectations of privacy as a practical matter, because an individual does not reasonably expect sustained observation from a vantage point where no human would reasonably be. Courts have drawn on both conceptions of defendants' reasonable expectation of privacy to conclude that hidden video surveillance by police violates constitutional rights.
1. Seeret police video surveillance is uniquely offensive to individual dignity and privacy.
Video surveillance is a far more intrusive mode of observation than Cowles could reasonably have expected from her coworkers or the public. Our own opinion in Glass recognized that warrantless electronic surveillance has a "corrosive impact ... on our sense of security."50 In cases involving video surveillance, courts have found it "unarguable that television surveillance is exceedingly intrusive ... and inherently indiscriminate, and that it could be grossly abused-to eliminate personal privacy as understood in modern Western nations."51 In the recent words of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Cireuit, "[hlidden video surveillance is one of the most intrusive investigative mechanisms available to law enforcement."*118252 The court quoted Judge Kozinski's statement that "every court considering the issue has noted [that] video surveillance can result in extraordinarily serious intrusions into personal privacy.... If such intrusions are ever permissible, they must be justified by an extraordinary showing of need."53 Surreptitious video recording is clearly more intrusive than the ordinary public gaze which a defendant in Cowles's position might expect. As such, it is beyond the range of activities in which law enforcement agents may, without a warrant, engage.
2. Secret overhead video surveillance violates defendants' reasonable expectations of privacy because it gives police information that defendants do mot reasonably expect to expose to public observers.
Surreptitious overhead video surveillance by police violated Cowles's reasonable expectation of privacy because it exceeded her reasonably expected public observation in its duration, proximity, focus, and vantage point. Cases involving aerial observation of defendants' property confirm that a defendant may expect the public gaze without reasonably expecting the unblinking lens of a video camera close overhead.
Two U.S. Supreme Court cases, California v. Ciraolo54 and Florida v. Riley,55 hold that defendants should reasonably expect overflight observation by law enforcement officers in airplanes or helicopters, because if is routine for members of the public to see the same view during air travel.56 But it was not routine or even possible for members of the public to view Cowles's desk as did the police investigators through their video camera. The public did not have access to the box-office ceiling. The record suggests that members of the public looking in the window may not even have been able to see past piles of paper on the desk to observe all of the incriminating activities captured on tape, including desktop activities such as Cowles's writing on the cash deposit receipt.
Even if intermittent public observation from the ceiling vantage point were possible, case law applying Ciraolo indicates that war-rantless overhead video surveillance would still violate the Fourth Amendment. In United States v. Cuevas-Sanchez, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit faced this question: "Ciraolo teaches us that a fly-over by a plane at 1,000 feet does not intrude upon the daily existence of most people; we must now determine whether a camera monitoring all of a person's backyard activity does ." 57 The court of appeals opined that Ciraolo does not "authorize[ ] any type of surveillance whatever just because one type of minimally-intrusive aerial observation is *1183possible." 58 It concluded that government agents could not engage in warrantless video surveillance because this "potentially indiscriminate and most intrusive method of sur-veillanee" was not comparable to the routine public observations discussed in Céraolo.59
A California court, applying federal constitutional law, arrived at similar governing principles without specifically addressing video surveillance in People v. Romo.60 The court indicated that, under Ciraolo, a defendant's reasonable expectation of privacy might be violated by law enforcement agents hovering over her property or using electronic aids to observation.61 The reasonableness of overflight observation, the court stated, depends in part on the duration and altitude of the observation.62 Following this standard, sustained observation from close overhead is more likely to violate the Fourth Amendment than would the passing observation of a law enforcement officer in an aircraft. In this case, the government observed Cowles from a non-public vantage point immediately over her head for a period of hours, and it used uniquely intrusive surveillance technology to do so. This action was a search; in the absence of a warrant, it was unconstitutional.
IV, PERSUASIVE - FEDERAL - AND STATE AUTHORITY HOLDS THAT WORKERS - IN - SEMI-PUBLIC WORKPLACES HAVE A REASONABLE EXPECTATION OF PRIVACY FROM - SECRET - GOVERNMENT VIDEO SURVEILLANCE.
In both State v. Thomas63 and United States v. Taketa,64 courts concluded that war-rantless video surveillance in the workplace violated workers' reasonable expectations of privacy, despite the fact that the workers did not have private offices. And in State v. Bonnell, the Hawaii Supreme Court explicitly relied on the "exceedingly intrusive" nature of video surveillance in concluding that a hidden camera in an employee breakroom violated workers' reasonable expectations of privacy.65 The majority recognizes the significance of Thomas in its opinion, but misconstrues both Takete and Bommell All three cases apply the clear legal principles outlined above to conclude that surveillance of the sort used in this case is unconstitutional.
In Thomas, state officials installed a video camera above the cash register of a park concession store and recorded the clerk's cash transactions.66 The Indiana Court of Appeals applied both state and federal search and seizure law to conclude that the clerk reasonably expected privacy, and therefore the tape was inadmissible .67 In so doing, it recognized all of the points of law discussed above: workers do not lose their expectation of privacy even in a publicly accessible workplace,68 video is a uniquely intrusive mode of surveillance,69 and prolonged observation from an overhead vantage point is "grossly intrusive."70
The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reached a similar conclusion in Taketa.71 In that case, federal agents installed a hidden video camera in the ceiling of defendant Thomas O'Brien's office.72 The camera re*1184corded incriminating footage of both O'Brien and a coworker, David Taketa. The court concluded that the surveillance violated the Fourth Amendment rights of both men.73
As the majority characterizes Taketa, the Taketa court found Taketa's expectation of privacy reasonable only "because of the private nature of the place where the videotaping took place and the time when it occurred."74 But Taketa plainly does not support this reading; the Taketa court explicitly and repeatedly named as the primary bases for its decision two factors discussed at length in this dissent: the intrusive nature of video surveillance and the personal locus of privacy rights, even in non-private places. The Taketa court cited Katz for the principle that "the Fourth Amendment protects people not places"; 75 then "base[d its] holding expressly upon Katz, and upon [the court's] recognition of the exceptional intrusiveness of video surveillance." 76 This court's majority apparently ignores this unambiguous language in its discussion of Taketa.77
In analyzing Taketa's right to freedom from secret video surveillance, the Taketa court emphasized that its decision was based on Taketa's personal privacy rights, and not merely on location-based privacy.78 It noted that "persons may create temporary zones of privacy within which they may not reasonably be videotaped ... even when that zone is a place they do not own or normally control, and in which they might not be able reasonably to challenge a search at some other time or by some other means.79 This individually rooted right was violated, the Taketa court held, both because the "silent, unblinking lens of the camera was intrusive" as no human search of the office could have been, and because the "video search was directed straight at [Taketal]."80 These factors are identical in the case now before us.
Yet a third case excluding video evidence like that at issue today, State v. Bonnell, explicitly relied on the "exceedingly intrusive" nature of video surveillance and the defendants' personal, non-location-based privacy rights as bases for the ruling.81 The Hawaii Supreme Court in Bonnell also relied on the non-public nature of the surveilled space-an employee breakroom-as an element of its decision.82 But, like the Ninth Cireuit in Taketa, it strongly emphasized personal privacy rights: "A person has a 'halo' of privacy wherever he goes and can invoke a protectable right to privacy wherever he may legitimately be."83 And it discussed in no uncertain terms the suspicion with which the court viewed video surveillance, concluding that such surveillance is more intrusive than audio taping and that this intrusiveness was an essential factor for Fourth Amendment analysis.84 The court explicitly grounded its decision in "the same factors as those considered by the Taketa court."85 The court also implied that because of the individual privacy right at stake, the outcome of the case might have been the same even if the defendants were not in a private room. "Whatever the general privacy interest the defendants may or may not have had in the break room," the court wrote, "they had an actual and objectively reasonable expectation of privacy against be*1185ing taped in it." 86
Thomas, Taketa, and Bonnell all squarely support Cowles's claim that police surveillance by hidden camera violated her rights against unreasonable search and seizure. All three cases apply the straightforward legal standards established by the U.S. Supreme Court. Because the court today offers seant authority for the opposite conclusion, I cannot agree with its holding.
V, NO AUTHORITY SUPPORTS THE COURTS ASSERTION THAT COWLES'S RESPONSIBILITY FOR HANDLING CASH SHOULD HAVE DIMINISHED HER EXPECTATION OF PRIVACY.
The court states that "the fact that Cowles was entrusted with handling her employer's cash is a relevant factor bearing on the reasonableness of Cowles's expectation of privacy." 87 While this factor may certainly be relevant to the legal analysis of surveillance conducted by employers, it is not relevant when surveillance is carried out by police. Although the majority offers two legal authorities for its position, neither supports the court's assertion that workplace responsibility for cash should increase an employee's expectation of police surveillance.
First, the court cites National Treasury Employees Union v. Von Raab, a case holding that drug testing of U.S. Customs Service employees is reasonable.88 Von Raab states in dicta that operational realities of the workplace can render reasonable requirements that would elsewhere be unreasonable-such as physical fitness requirements in the military or daily personal searches for U.S. Mint workers.89 But "these operational realities will rarely affect an employee's expectations of privacy." 90 Von Raab nowhere states or even implies the sweepingly broad rule that anyone who works with cash has a diminished expectation of privacy; it certainly does not support today's specific ruling that police may surreptitiously, and without a warrant videotape anyone who handles an employer's cash.
Second, the court relies on a footnote from Professor LaFave's treatise,91 discussing United States v. Donato.92 In that case, however, a federal district court upheld the search of a federal mint employee's locker only because federal regulations permitted the search.93 No case law or other authority supports the novel proposition that an employee's fiduciary duty should reduce her reasonable expectation of privacy from police surveillance at her desk; the court's adoption of this rule is unprecedented and groundless.
VL CONCLUSION
Under Katz and O'Commor, people who work in shared quarters or who work with the public still have Fourth Amendment rights. The court offers no precedent or principled argument for stripping Alaskans of these rights. Nor does the court address other rulings limiting the scope of police searches and surveillance, and specifically holding that warrantless secret videotaping of workers is unconstitutional. Today's holding dramatically restricts the rights of Alaskans who do not occupy their own offices: It establishes that secret video monitoring by the police should be among their reasonable expectations. I cannot support this conclusion and therefore respectfully dissent.

. Woods & Rohde, Inc. v. State, Dep't of Labor 565 P.2d 138, 150 (Alaska 1977) (extending search and seizure protection to commercial property); see also Reeves v. State, 599 P.2d 727 (Alaska 1979) (expanding limits on preincarceration searches); Jackson v. State, 791 P.2d 1023 (Alaska App.1990) (limiting pat-down searches and rejecting the bright-line rule adopted by the U.S. Supreme Court in United States v. Robinson, 414 U.S. 218, 94 S.Ct. 467, 38 L.Ed.2d 427 (1973)).

. See Alaska Const. art. 1, § 14.

. Woods & Rohde, 565 P.2d at 148 (internal quotations omitted).

. 510 P.2d 793, 800 (Alaska 1973).

. 335 U.S. 451,. 69 S.Ct. 191, 93 L.Ed. 153 (1948).

. Smith v. State, 510 P.2d 793, 800 (Alaska 1973) (Rabinowitz, J., dissenting) (quoting McDonald, 335 U.S. at 455-56, 69 S.Ct. 191); see also Woods & Rohde, 565 P.2d at 149 ("The conclusion that the imposition is reasonable should not be drawn by the very persons who are the agency for the deprivation of rights.") (quoting Keller v. State, 543 P.2d 1211, 1219 (Alaska 1975)).

. 583 P.2d 872 (Alaska 1978). In Glass, we cited with approval a Montana case holding that, under Montana's state constitutional privacy provision, defendants reasonably expected privacy from audio broadcast of their conversation, despite the fact that they were in a public parking lot. Id. at 878 (citing State v. Brackman, 178 Mont. 105, 582 P.2d 1216 (1978)), overruled by State v. Brown, 232 Mont. 1, 755 P.2d 1364 (1988). More recent Montana cases have found broad protection from warrantless technologically aided surveillance under the state constitution. In State v. Solis, 214 Mont. 310, 693 P.2d 518 (1984), the Montana Supreme Court excluded from evidence videotapes of defendant's conversation with an undercover officer, and in State v. Siegal it found that warrantless thermo-imaging of an indoor marijuana-growing operation constituted an unreasonable search. 281 Mont. 250, 934 P.2d 176 (1997), overruled on other grounds by State v. Kuneff, 291 Mont. 474, 970 P.2d 556 (1998).

. Glass, 583 P.2d at 880 (quoting Alan F. Westin, Privacy and Freedom 7 (1967)).

. State v. Page, 932 P.2d 1297, 1297 (Alaska 1997) (Matthews, J., dissenting) (arguing that a concern for free speech was the central rationale in Glass). Video surveillance, too, threatens activities protected by the First Amendment, including assembly, writing, and symbolic speech. See U.S. Const. amend. I (protecting freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and the right to peaceable assembly); see also Tinker v. Des Moines Indep. Community Sch. Dist., 393 U.S. 503, 505-06, 89 S.Ct. 733, 21 L.Ed.2d 731 (1969) (First Amendment protects right to wear black armbands to school to protest Vietnam conflict); Johnson v. Tait, 774 P.2d 185, 186 n. 3 (Alaska 1989) (Hell's Angels emblem is protected symbolic speech). The concern for freedom of expression in Glass is therefore applicable to this case, as well.

. Woods & Rohde, Inc. v. State, Dep't of Labor 565 P.2d 138, 148 (Alaska 1977) (extending search and seizure protection to commercial property) (internal quotations omitted).

. 583 P.2d at 877 (quoting Holmes v. Burr, 486 F.2d 55, 65 (9th Cir 1973) (Hufstedler, J., dissenting)).

. Id. at 876, 880.

. Id. at 879 (quoting State v. Roy, 54 Haw. 513, 510 P.2d 1066, 1069 (1973)).

. Id. at 880-81.

. 449 F.2d 245, 248 (9th Cir.1971) (quoting Briscoe v. Reader's Digest Ass'n, 4 Cal.3d 529, 93 Cal.Rptr. 866, 483 P.2d 34, 37 (1971)). See also United States v. Torres, 751 F.2d 875 (7th Cir.1984). In that case, Judge Posner observed:
[SJecretly televising people (or taking still or moving pictures of them) while they are in what they think is a private place is an even greater intrusion on privacy than secretly recording their conversations.
Id. at 878.

. Glass, 583 P.2d at 878 (explaining why "more reliable" evidence of a conversation is not necessarily admissible for that reason alone).

. United States v. Rabinowitz, 339 U.S. 56, 69, 70 S.Ct. 430, 94 L.Ed. 653 (1950) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting), overruled by Chimel v. California, 395 U.S. 752, 89 S.Ct. 2034, 23 L.Ed.2d 685 (1969), quoted in McCoy v. State, 491 P.2d 127, 139 (Alaska 1971) (Rabinowitz, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part).

. See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967).

. State v. Glass, 583 P.2d 872, 875 (Alaska 1978) (quoting Katz, 389 U.S. at 359, 88 S.Ct. 507). Glass implies that protection from search and seizure in general, and electronic surveillance in particular, extends to people in purely public locations. In holding the in-house audio surveillance in that case unconstitutional, we cited with approval a Montana case holding that, under Montana's state constitutional privacy provision, defendants reasonably expected privacy from audio broadcast of their conversation, de*1178spite the fact that they were in a public parking lot. See id. at 878 (citing State v. Brackman, 178 Mont. 105, 582 P.2d 1216 (1978)). See also State v. Bonnell, 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1275 (1993) ("a person has a 'halo' of privacy wherever he goes and can invoke a protectable right to privacy wherever he may legitimately be and reasonably expect freedom from governmental intrusion").

. Op. at 1171.

. 389 U.S. 347, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967).

. See Op. at 1171-1172.

. Id. at 351, 88 S.Ct. 507 (emphasis added) (citations omitted).

. 480 U.S. 709, 107 S.Ct. 1492, 94 L.Ed.2d 714 (1987).

. See id. In Mancusi v. DeForte, 392 U.S. 364, 368-69, 88 S.Ct. 2120, 20 L.Ed.2d 1154 (1968), the court established that a defendant who shared a single large office with several coworkers had a reasonable expectation of privacy that was defeated by a police search of the office.

. See Op. at 1171.

. "[Slome government offices may be so open to fellow employees or the public that no expectation of privacy is reasonable." O'Connor, 480 U.S. at 718, 107 S.Ct. 1492 (plurality opinion}.

. - "When a fragmented court decides a case and no single rationale explaining the result enjoys the assent of five Justices, 'the holding of the court may be viewed as that position taken by those Members who concurred in the judgment on the narrowest grounds.'" Marks v. United States, 430 U.S. 188, 193, 97 S.Ct. 990, 51 L.Ed.2d 260 (1977) (quoting Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 169 n. 15, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976) (opinion of Stewart, Powell, and Stevens, JJ.)). See also Feliciano v. City of Cleveland, 661 F.Supp. 578, 587 (N.D.Ohio 1987) (noting that only those aspects of O'Comnor in which Scalia joined the plurality have "the weight of a decision of the Court"), abrogated on other grounds by National Treasury Employees Union v. Von Raab, 489 U.S. 656, 671, 109 S.Ct. 1384, 103 L.Ed.2d 685 (1989).

. O'Connor, 480 U.S. at 730, 107 S.Ct. 1492 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment) (internal quotations and citations omitted).

. Id.

. 392 U.S. at 368-69, 88 S.Ct. 2120.

. 480 U.S. at 731, 107 S.Ct. 1492 (emphasis added).

. The leading treatise on Fourth Amendment law reinforces this analysis, pointing out that "[it is very important to recognize that a majority of the [U.S. Supreme Court] subscribes to a somewhat broader notion of a public employee's justified privacy expectations in the workplace [than that expressed by the plurality]." 4 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure: A Treatise on the Fourth Amendment § 10.3(d), at 482 (3d ed.1996).

. See O'Connor, 480 U.S. at 718, 107 S.Ct. 1492.

. As discussed below, the partial visibility of Cowles's desk from the public area outside the box office does not defeat her reasonable expectation of privacy from the type of surveillance employed in this case.

. The court cites without discussion Vega-Rodriguez v. Puerto Rico Telephone Co., 110 F.3d 174 (1st Cir.1997). Op. at 1172 n. 14. Interestingly, the Vega-Rodriguez holding depended on the fact that the surveillance was disclosed-'"the affected workers were on clear notice from the outset" of the video surveillance. Id. at 180. The court "caution[ed], however, that cases involving the covert use of clandestine cameras, or cases involving - electronically-assisted - eavesdropping, may be quite another story." Id. at 180 n. 5.

. Women's Bureau, U.S. Dep't of Labor, Twenty Leading Occupations of Employed Women (1999) (March 14, 2001) <http://www.dol.gov/dol/wb/public/wb-pubs/ 20lead99.htm>.

. Women's Bureau, U.S. Dep't of Labor, No. 97-1, Facts on Working Women, Black Women in the Labor Force (1997).

. Glass, 583 P.2d at 880 (quoting Alan F. Westin, Privacy and Freedom 7 (1967)).

. 510 P.2d 793 (Alaska 1973). The New Jersey Supreme Court cited Chief Justice Rabinowitz's dissent in its holding that curbside trash searches violate the New Jersey Constitution. See State v. Hempele, 120 N.J. 182, 576 A.2d 793, 805 (1990).

. See Smith, 510 P.2d at 798.

. 510 P.2d at 805 (Rabinowitz, C.J., dissenting).

. Id.

. O'Connor, 480 U.S. at 730, 107 S.Ct. 1492 (Scalia, J., concurring).

. The court below found that Cowles's incriminating activities were visible to the public. Cowles v. State, 961 P.2d 438, 443 (Alaska App.1998). But the record indicates that the detail captured by the camera surpassed that which any member of the public could have seen. This intrusive focus is relevant to Fourth Amendment analysis even if the public's less-intrusive gaze would also have discerned the incriminating acts. See United States v. Taketa, 923 F.2d 665, 677 (9th Cir.1991) (treating intrusiveness against personal dignity as reason for finding search unreasonable in video surveillance case); State v. Bonnell, 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1277 (1993) (same).
A police witness testified that Cowles's desk was 12-13 feet from the window and her desktop was partially obscured from view. He indicated that a member of the public could not see everything recorded by the camera without simultaneously looking through both the box office window and the door around the corner from the window. The record does not reflect whether the door and window were open when the surveillance was conducted, although they were typically open during business hours.

. See City and Borough of Juneau v. Quinto, 684 P.2d 127, 129 (Alaska 1984).

. See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 352, 88 S.Ct. 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967).

. Lo-Ji Sales, Inc. v. New York, 442 U.S. 319, 329, 99 S.Ct 2319, 60 L.Ed.2d 920 (1979) (where town justice issuing warrant did not pay for films he viewed and removed wrappers from print material, he "was not seeing them as a customer would ordinarily see them," and therefore violated the Fourth Amendment); see also Maryland v. Macon, 472 U.S. 463, 470, 105 S.Ct. 2778, 86 L.Ed.2d 370 (1985) (in vice investigations, "[a] government agent, in the same manner as a private person, may accept an invitation to do business and may enter upon the premises for the very purposes contemplated by the occupant") (quoting Lewis v. United States, 385 U.S. 206, 211, 87 S.Ct. 424, 17 L.Ed.2d 312 (1966)).

. Bond v. United States, 529 U.S. 334, 339, 120 S.Ct. 1462, 146 L.Ed.2d 365 (2000).

. Glass, 583 P.2d at 877 (quoting Holmes v. Burr, 486 F.2d 55, 66 (9th Cir.1973) (Hufstedler, J., dissenting)).

. State v. Bonnell, 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1277 (1993) (quoting United States v. Torres, 751 F.2d 875, 882 (7th Cir.1984); see also United States v. Cuevas-Sanchez, 821 F.2d 248, 252 (5th Cir.1987) (adopting constitutional standards governing valid warrants for video surveillance)); State v. Thomas, 642 N.E.2d 240, 245 (Ind.App.1994) (Department of Natural Resources's right to inspect concessionaire's premises did not confer right to install hidden video surveillance).

. United States v. Nerber, 222 F.3d 597, 603 (9th Cir.2000).

. Id. (quoting United States v. Koyomejian, 970 F.2d 536, 551 (9th Cir.1992) (Kozinski, J., concurring) (alterations in original)). See also George Orwell's description of video surveillance from 1984:
The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it; moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being waiched at any given moment.
George Orwell, 1984 4 (1949) (quoted in Cuevas-Sanchez, 821 F.2d at 251 n. 3).

. 476 U.S. 207, 106 S.Ct. 1809, 90 L.Ed.2d 210 (1986). -

. 488 U.S. 445, 109 S.Ct. 693, 102 L.Ed.2d 835 (1989).

. See id. at 450-51, 109 S.Ct. 693 (plurality holding, four votes) and 452-55 (O'Connor, J., concurring); Ciraolo, 476 U.S. at 213-14, 106 S.Ct. 1809; see also Katz, 389 U.S. at 359, 88 S.Ct. 507 (a defendant loses Fourth Amendment protection only for activities he "knowingly exposes to the public.... But what he seeks to preserve as private, even in an area accessible to the public, may be constitutionally protected.") (citation omitted). Thus, exposing an activity to the sky or ceiling overhead constitutes knowing exposure to the public only if the public can reasonably be expected to occupy that vantage point.

. 821 F.2d 248, 251 (5th Cir.1987) (holding that video surveillance was a search for Fourth Amendment purposes, but that the warrant obtained by police was valid). In Florida v. Riley, the court approved closer observation from only 400 feet, but as in Ciraolo, the ruling depended on the fact that a member of the public could see the same view. See Riley, 488 U.S. at 449-50, 109 S.Ct. 693.

. 821 F.2d at 251.

. Id. at 250-51.

. 198 Cal.App.3d 581, 243 Cal.Rptr. 801 (1988) (holding that overflight observation was not a search because the aircraft had a right to occupy its public vantage point, and the flight was neither unreasonable nor intrusive).

. See id. at 805.

. See id.

. 642 N.E.2d 240 (Ind.App.1994).

. 923 F.2d 665 (9th Cir.1991).

. 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1277 (1993).

. 642 N.E.2d at 242.

. See id. at 247.

. See id. at 244-45.

. See id. at 245.

. Id. at 245.

. 923 F.2d 665 (9th Cir.1991).

. See id. at 669.

. See id. at 678.

. Op. at 1174.

. Id. at 676 (quoting Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 350, 88 S.Ct 507, 19 L.Ed.2d 576 (1967)).

. Id. at 677.

. Two cases which draw on Taketa support the discussion above and conflict with the majority's interpretation. See United States v. Nerber, 222 F.3d 597, 602 (9th Cir.2000); State v. Bonnell, 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1266-67 (1993).

. 923 F.2d at 677.

. Id. at 677.

. Id. at 677.

. 75 Haw. 124, 856 P.2d 1265, 1276-77 (1993).

. See id. at 1275.

. Id. (quotation omitted).

. See id. at 1277.

. Id.

. Id. (internal quotations omitted).

. Op. at 1173.

. 489 U.S. 656, 677, 109 S.Ct. 1384, 103 L.Ed.2d 685 (1989); see Op. at 1173 n. 23.

. See id. at 671.

. Id.

. 3 Wayne R. LaFave, Search and Seizure: A Treatise on the Fourth Amendment § 8.6, at 823 n. 86 (3d ed.1996).

. 269 F.Supp. 921 (E.D.Pa.1967).

. See id. at 923-24.