Safford Unified School District v. Redding

Safford Unified School District v. Redding, 557 U.S. 364 (2009), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that a strip search of a middle school student by school officials violated the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures. However, the Court also held that, because the law was not clearly established at the time of the search, the school officials were entitled to qualified immunity.

Safford Unified School District v. Redding
Argued April 21, 2009
Decided June 25, 2009
Full case nameSafford Unified School District #1, et al. v. April Redding
Docket no.08-479
Citations557 U.S. 364 (more)
129 S. Ct. 2633; 174 L. Ed. 2d 354; 77 U.S.L.W. 4591; 245 Ed. Law Rep. 626; 09 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 7974; 2009 Daily Journal D.A.R. 9383; 21 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 1011
ArgumentOral argument
Opinion announcementOpinion announcement
Case history
PriorSummary judgment affirmed, 504 F.3d 828 (9th Cir. 2007); rehearing en banc granted, 514 F.3d 1383 (2008); reversed, 531 F.3d 1071 (9th Cir. 2008); cert. granted, 555 U.S. 1130 (2009).
Holding
(1) The search of Redding's underwear violated the Fourth Amendment. (2) Although the strip search violated the Fourth Amendment, petitioners are protected from liability by qualified immunity. (3) The issue of the school district's liability should be addressed on remand.
Court membership
Chief Justice
John Roberts
Associate Justices
John P. Stevens · Antonin Scalia
Anthony Kennedy · David Souter
Clarence Thomas · Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Stephen Breyer · Samuel Alito
Case opinions
MajoritySouter, joined by Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, Breyer, Alito; Stevens, Ginsburg (parts I–III)
Concur/dissentStevens, joined by Ginsburg
Concur/dissentGinsburg
Concur/dissentThomas (concurring in judgment only)
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amend. IV

On October 8, 2003, the assistant principal of Safford Middle School in Safford, Arizona, called 13-year-old Savana Redding down to his office, where he informed her that another student had accused her of distributing prescription-strength ibuprofen and over-the-counter naproxen pills, which were disallowed without prior permission by school rules. Redding denied this accusation, and after a search of her belongings did not reveal any pills, school officials instructed her to remove her outer clothing and pull out her bra and underpants, which also did not reveal any pills.

Redding's mother sued the Safford Unified School District and the school officials who searched her daughter, arguing that they had violated the Fourth Amendment. The school officials moved for summary judgment, arguing that they were entitled to qualified immunity because their actions did not violate law that was clearly established at the time of the search. The district court granted this motion, holding that the school officials did not violate the Fourth Amendment, and a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed. However, on July 11, 2008, after rehearing the case en banc, the Ninth Circuit reversed, holding in a closely divided decision that the search violated the Fourth Amendment and that the assistant principal was not entitled to qualified immunity.

On June 25, 2009, the Supreme Court affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded. In an 8–1 decision authored by Justice David Souter, the Court found that the search failed to meet the standard of reasonableness for searches of students in a school setting established by the Court in New Jersey v. T. L. O. (1985), stating that the school lacked reasons to suspect either that the drugs presented a danger or that they were concealed in her underwear. However, the Court also found that because there was sufficient doubt as to whether the law was clearly established at the time of the search, the school officials were entitled to qualified immunity. Finally, the Court stated that its conclusions do not resolve the school district's liability and remanded the case for lower courts to consider that issue.

Background

Prior case law

The Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution prohibits unreasonable searches and seizures by the federal government, and the Fourteenth Amendment extends this prohibition to state governments under the incorporation doctrine. In general, the Fourth Amendment requires law enforcement officers to have probable cause in order to conduct a search. In the context of searches of children by school officials, however, the U.S. Supreme Court held in New Jersey v. T. L. O. (1985) that the public interest in maintaining the school environment "'is best served by a Fourth Amendment standard of reasonableness that stops short of probable cause'".[1]

Instead, in T. L. O. the Court held that the reasonableness standard for searches conducted by school officials in a school environment is that of "reasonable suspicion".[2] Additionally, the Court stated in T. L. O. that "a school search 'will be permissible in its scope when the measures adopted are reasonably related to the objectives of the search and not excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction'".[3] In general, the doctrine of qualified immunity protects government officials, including school officials, from facing individual liability for unreasonable searches, unless their conduct violated law that was "clearly established" at the time of the search.[4]

Facts of the case

On October 8, 2003, Savana Redding, a 13-year-old student at Safford Middle School in Safford, Arizona, was in math class when the school's assistant principal, Kerry Wilson, asked her to go to his office. In his office, Wilson showed Redding a day planner, inside of which there were "several knives, lighters, a permanent marker, and a cigarette", and asked if it was hers.[5] Redding stated that the planner belonged to her, but not any of the items inside. She also stated that she had lent the planner to her friend, Marissa Glines, a few days beforehand.[6]

Wilson then showed Redding "four white prescription-strength ibuprofen 400-mg pills, and one over-the-counter blue naproxen 200-mg pill, all used for pain and inflammation but banned under school rules without advanced permission".[6] Redding stated that she did not know anything about these pills. Wilson informed her that he had received a report that she was distributing these pills to other students, which Redding denied. Redding agreed to let Wilson and an administrative assistant named Helen Romero search her backpack, which did not reveal any pills. At Wilson's direction, Romero then took Redding to the office of Peggy Schwallier, the school nurse, where Romero and Schwallier asked Redding to remove her jacket, socks, and shoes. They then asked her to remove her t-shirt and stretch pants, neither of which had pockets. Finally, Redding "was told to pull her bra out and to the side and shake it, and to pull out the elastic on her underpants, thus exposing her breasts and pelvic area to some degree". The search did not reveal any pills.[6]

A week before Redding was searched, another student had reported to Wilson that students were bringing drugs and weapons onto campus, and furthermore, the student reported becoming sick after taking pills obtained from a classmate. Earlier on the morning of Redding’s search, the same student gave Wilson a white pill, later identified by Schwallier as prescription-strength ibuprofen, and told him that other students were going to take the pills at lunch. The student claimed that Marissa Glines had given him the pills. He also told the principal that he attended a party at Redding’s house at which alcohol was served to his peers.[7]

Wilson then took Marissa Glines out of class and, in the presence of Helen Romero, asked her to "turn out her pockets and open her wallet", which "produced a blue pill, several white ones, and a razor blade".[8] Glines identified Savana Redding as the person who had supplied her with the drugs. When Wilson asked Glines about the day planner, she denied knowledge about its contents. Wilson then instructed Romero and Schwallier to search Glines' bra and underpants, which revealed no additional pills. It was at this point when Wilson called Redding into his office.[8]

Lower court proceedings

Redding's mother sued Wilson, Romero, Schwallier, and the Safford Unified School District, arguing that they had conducted an unreasonable strip search in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The school officials moved for summary judgment, arguing that they were entitled to qualified immunity. The U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona granted this motion, holding that the school officials did not violate the Fourth Amendment, and a panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit affirmed.[9] At this point, the American Civil Liberties Union joined the case as co-counsel for Redding.[10] On July 11, 2008, after rehearing the case en banc, the Ninth Circuit reversed the panel, holding in a closely divided decision that the search violated the Fourth Amendment and that assistant principal Wilson was not entitled to qualified immunity.[11] The en banc Ninth Circuit affirmed that defendants Romero and Schwallier were entitled to qualified immunity because "they had not acted as independent decisionmakers".[12]

Supreme Court
Justice David Souter authored the majority opinion in Safford Unified School District v. Redding.

The school officials filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the Supreme Court, which granted certiorari on January 16, 2009, in order to review two questions: (1) "whether the Fourth Amendment prohibits public school officials from conducting a search of a student suspected of possessing and distributing a prescription drug on campus in violation of school policy", and (2) "whether the Ninth Circuit departed from established principles of qualified immunity in holding that a public school administrator may be liable in a damages lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for conducting a search of a student suspected of possessing and distributing a prescription drug on campus".[13]

Opinion of the Court

Justice Souter, writing for an 8–1 majority vote, held that the strip search violated Savana's Fourth Amendment rights, but that the individual school officials were entitled to qualified immunity, because the search's unconstitutionality was not clearly established at the time of the violation.

First, the court laid out the established Fourth Amendment jurisprudence: school searches, to be valid, merely require "reasonable suspicion", not "probable cause"; in terms of the knowledge required to meet that threshold, this calls for only a "moderate chance" of finding the expected evidence, not at "fair probability" or "substantial chance."
  • Law enforcement searches require "Probable cause": When searches are conducted by law enforcement officers, they must have "probable cause": i.e., the facts and circumstances within his knowledge, and of which he had reasonably trustworthy information, must be "sufficient in themselves to warrant a man of reasonable caution in the belief that an offense has been or is being committed,[14] and that evidence bearing on that offense will be found in the place to be searched.
  • School searches merely require "reasonable suspicion:" Per New Jersey v. T. L. O., there is a lower level of suspicion necessary in the school setting: searches of students by school administrators require only "reasonable suspicion," such that "the measures adopted are reasonably related to the objectives of the search and not excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction.”[15]
  • ... with a laxer (but more ambiguous) definition of reliable knowledge: This lower threshold comes with a correspondingly laxer definition of "reliable knowledge," but it has been hard to define. Cases have looked to "the degree to which known facts imply prohibited conduct,"[16] the specificity of the information received,[17] and the reliability of its source.[18] "At the end of the day, however, we have realized that these factors cannot rigidly control,[[19]] and we have come back to saying that the standards are 'fluid concepts that take their substantive content from the particular contexts' in which they are being assessed."[20] The best distinction might be that prior to conducting an evidence search, a law enforcement officer must have knowledge that raises a “fair probability,”[21] or a “substantial chance,”[22] of discovering evidence of criminal activity, while school officials need only a "moderate chance" of finding evidence of wrongdoing.

Elaboration of facts
The court then laid out facts that would determine the level of suspicion/knowledge that the school officials possessed that a school rule was being violated (explaining in a footnote why "the legitimacy of the rule usually goes without saying as it does here"[23]). This evidence was "sufficiently plausible to warrant suspicion that Savana was involved in pill distribution," a suspicion that in turn "was enough to justify a search of Savana’s backpack and outer clothing" (as neither party disputed).

These facts demonstrate a violation of Redding's Fourth Amendment rights
The court then applied these facts to the remainder of the search, concluding this search violated Savana's Fourth Amendment rights because it did not meet these requirements.
  • Adolescent strip search through the lens of T. L. O.: He explained why the search would cause particular "indignity" to an early adolescent, and that this would be relevant to the "rule of reasonableness" as defined in T. L. O. -- namely, that the search as actually conducted be "reasonably related in scope to the circumstances which justified the interference in the first place,"[24] i.e. "not excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction."[25]
  • This strip search violated the standard set in T. L. O.: The court determined that, given these particular facts, "the content of the suspicion failed to match the degree of intrusion," noting that petitioners failed to provide arguments sufficient to justify "the categorically extreme intrusiveness of a search down to the body of an adolescent" for "nondangerous school contraband". "In sum, what was missing from the suspected facts that pointed to Savana was any indication of danger to the students from the power of the drugs or their quantity, and any reason to suppose that Savana was carrying pills in her underwear."
  • Concluding this section, Souter wrote: "[T]he T. L. O. concern to limit a school search to reasonable scope requires the support of reasonable suspicion of danger or of resort to underwear for hiding evidence of wrongdoing before a search can reasonably make the quantum leap from outer clothes and backpacks to exposure of intimate parts. The meaning of such a search, and the degradation its subject may reasonably feel, place a search that intrusive in a category of its own demanding its own specific suspicions."

These school officials were entitled to qualified immunity
Finally, the court determined that the individual school officials were entitled to qualified immunity, because the search's unconstitutionality was not clearly established at the time of the violation.
  • Qualified immunity requires "notice" of illegality: The legal question is whether the official had notice of the illegality of his actions. The Supreme Court had recently held that a school official searching a student is entitled to qualified immunity "where clearly established law does not show that the search violated the Fourth Amendment.”.[26] The law can be "established clearly" even if “the very action in question has [not] previously been held unlawful.”.[27]
  • T. L. O. standard has not provided adequate notice: However, "we realize that the lower courts have reached divergent conclusions regarding how the T. L. O. standard applies to such searches."[28] "[T]he cases viewing school strip searches differently from the way we see them are numerous enough, with well-reasoned majority and dissenting opinions, to counsel doubt that we were sufficiently clear in the prior statement of law."

Justice Stevens and Justice Ginsburg

Justice Stevens, joined by Justice Ginsburg, dissented as to the question of qualified immunity. He would have denied it, as he felt that unconstitutionality of the search was obvious: "This is, in essence, a case in which clearly established law meets clearly outrageous conduct."

  • He disagreed that the unclarity of the law was shown by the various Courts of Appeals that have adopted "seemingly divergent views" about T. L. O.’s application to strip searches: "the clarity of a well-established right should not depend on whether jurists have misread our precedents."
  • "And while our cases have previously noted the “divergence of views” among courts in deciding whether to extend qualified immunity,[29] we have relied on that consideration only to spare officials from having “ ‘to predict the future course of constitutional law[.]’ ”.[30] In this case, by contrast, we chart no new constitutional path. We merely decide whether the decision to strip search Savana Redding, on these facts, was prohibited under T. L. O. Our conclusion leaves the boundaries of the law undisturbed."

In a separate opinion, Justice Ginsburg further elaborated on why she thought qualified immunity was inappropriate in this case:

In contrast to T. L. O., where a teacher discovered a student smoking in the lavatory, and where the search was confined to the student’s purse, the search of Redding involved her body and rested on the bare accusation of another student whose reliability the Assistant Principal had no reason to trust. The Court’s opinion in T. L. O. plainly stated the controlling Fourth Amendment law: A search ordered by a school official, even if “justified at its inception,” crosses the constitutional boundary if it becomes “excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction.” 469 U.S., at 342 (internal quotation marks omitted).

Here, “the nature of the [supposed] infraction,” the slim basis for suspecting Savana Redding, and her “age and sex,” ibid., establish beyond doubt that Assistant Principal Wilson’s order cannot be reconciled with this Court’s opinion in T. L. O. Wilson’s treatment of Redding was abusive and it was not reasonable for him to believe that the law permitted it.

Justice Thomas

Justice Clarence Thomas agreed with the courts below that the search did not violate the Fourth Amendment. All parties agreed that the school had "[r]easonable suspicion that Redding was in possession of drugs in violation of these policies," and whereas the majority believed this justified only the first search, Thomas concluded it "justified a search extending to any area where small pills could be concealed."[31] (Thomas, J., dissenting). In his opinion, Thomas warned that the majority's decision could backfire: "Redding would not have been the first person to conceal pills in her undergarments. Nor will she be the last after today's decision, which announces the safest place to secrete contraband in school."[32]

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See also

References
Sources
  • Safford Unified School District v. Redding, 557 U.S. 364 (2009), slip op.
References
  1. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 4 (quoting New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U. S., at 341).
  2. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 4 (quoting New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U. S., at 342, 345).
  3. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 4 (quoting New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U. S., at 342).
  4. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 11.
  5. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 1, 2.
  6. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 2.
  7. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 5–6.
  8. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 6.
  9. Redding v. Safford Unified School District, 504 F. 3d 828 (2007).
  10. "ACLU Challenges Unlawful Strip Search Over Ibuprofen Allegation In School" (Press release). American Civil Liberties Union. March 3, 2008. Archived from the original on May 27, 2020. Retrieved May 27, 2020.
  11. Redding v. Safford Unified School District. 531 F. 3d 1071, 1081–1087 (2008).
  12. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, slip op. at 3.
  13. "08-479 Safford Unified School District v. Redding, Questions Presented" (PDF). Supreme Court of the United States. January 16, 2009. Archived (PDF) from the original on May 31, 2010. Retrieved May 27, 2020.
  14. Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 175–76 (1949) (quoting Carroll v. United States, 267 U.S. 132, 162 (1925)).
  15. New Jersey v. T. L. O., at 342.
  16. see, e.g., Adams v. Williams, 407 U.S. 143, 148 (1972); id., at 160, n. 9 (Marshall, J., dissenting)
  17. see, e.g., Spinelli v. United States, 393 U.S. 410, 416–17 (1969).
  18. see, e.g., Aguilar v. Texas, 378 U.S. 108, 114 (1964).
  19. Here the court cites Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 230 (1983).
  20. Here the court cites Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 696 (1996).
  21. Gates, 462 U.S. at 238.
  22. Gates, 462 U.S. at 244, n. 13.
  23. Stevens elaborates in Footnote 1:
    When the object of a school search is the enforcement of a school rule, a valid search assumes, of course, the rule’s legitimacy. But the legitimacy of the rule usually goes without saying as it does here. The Court said plainly in New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U.S. at 325, n. 9 (1985), that standards of conduct for schools are for school administrators to determine without second-guessing by courts lacking the experience to appreciate what may be needed. Except in patently arbitrary instances, Fourth Amendment analysis takes the rule as a given, as it obviously should do in this case. There is no need here either to explain the imperative of keeping drugs out of schools, or to explain the reasons for the school’s rule banning all drugs, no matter how benign, without advance permission. Teachers are not pharmacologists trained to identify pills and powders, and an effective drug ban has to be enforceable fast. The plenary ban makes sense, and there is no basis to claim that the search was unreasonable owing to some defect or shortcoming of the rule it was aimed at enforcing.
  24. 469 U.S. at 341 (internal quotation marks omitted).
  25. 469 U.S. at 342.
  26. Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 243-44 (2009).
  27. Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 615 (1999).
  28. A number of judges have read T. L. O. as the en banc minority of the Ninth Circuit did here. The Sixth Circuit upheld a strip search of a high school student for a drug, without any suspicion that drugs were hidden next to her body. Williams v. Ellington, 936 F.2d 881, 882–883, 887 (1991). And other courts considering qualified immunity for strip searches have read T. L. O. as “a series of abstractions, on the one hand, and a declaration of seeming deference to the judgments of school officials, on the other,” Jenkins v. Talladega City Bd. of Ed., 115 F.3d 821, 828 (CA11 1997) (en banc), which made it impossible “to establish clearly the contours of a Fourth Amendment right … [in] the wide variety of possible school settings different from those involved in T. L. O.” itself. Ibid. See also Thomas v. Roberts, 323 F.3d 950 (CA11 2003) (granting qualified immunity to a teacher and police officer who conducted a group strip search of a fifth-grade class when looking for a missing $26).
  29. Stevens includes the following citations:
    e.g.,Pearson v. Callahan, (2009) 555 U. S., ___, ___ (slip op., at 20) (noting the unsettled constitutionality of the so-called “consent-once-removed” doctrine); Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. at 618 (considering conflicting views on the constitutionality of law enforcement’s practice of allowing the media to enter a private home to observe and film attempted arrests)
  30. Stevens includes the follow citations:
    Id., at 617 (quoting Procunier v. Navarette, 434 U.S. 555, 562 (1978) (emphasis added).
  31. Slip op. at 17
  32. Savana Redding Strip Search Was Illegal, Supreme Court Says
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