
GAIL ATWATER,
ET
AL., PETITIONERS v.
CITY OF LAGO
VISTA ET AL.
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
[April 24, 2001]
JUSTICE
O’CONNOR,
with whom
JUSTICE
STEVENS,
JUSTICE
GINSBURG,
and
JUSTICE
BREYER
join, dissenting.
(EXCERPTED)
The Fourth Amendment guarantees the
right to be free from "unreasonable searches and seizures." The Court
recognizes that the arrest of Gail Atwater was a "pointless indignity"
that served no discernible state interest, ante, at 26, and yet holds that her arrest
was constitutionally permissible. Because the Court’s position is inconsistent with
the explicit guarantee of the Fourth Amendment, I dissent.
I
A full custodial arrest, such as the
one to which Ms. Atwater was
subjected, is the quintessential seizure...
II
The record
in this case makes it abundantly clear that Ms.
Atwater's arrest was constitutionally unreasonable. Atwater
readily admits—as she did when Officer Turek pulled
her over—that she violated Texas' seatbelt law. Brief
for Petitioners 2–3; Record 381, 384. While Turek was
justified in stopping Atwater, see Whren
v.
United States,
517 U. S, at 819, neither law nor reason supports his
decision to arrest her instead of simply giving her a citation. The officer's actions cannot sensibly be viewed as a
permissible means of balancing Atwater's Fourth Amendment
interests with the State’s own legitimate interests.
There is
no question that Officer Turek's actions severely infringed
Atwater's liberty and privacy. Turek was loud and
accusatory from the moment he approached Atwater's car. Atwater's young children were terrified and hysterical.
Yet
when Atwater asked Turek to lower his voice because
he was scaring the children, he responded by jabbing
his finger in Atwater's face and saying, "You’re going
to jail." Record 382, 384. Having made the decision to
arrest, Turek did not inform Atwater of her right to remain
silent. Id.,
at 390, 704. He instead asked for her license
and insurance information. Id.,
at 382. But cf.
Miranda
v.
Arizona, 384
U. S. 436 (1966).
Atwater asked if she could at
least take her children to a friend's
house down the street before going to the police station.
Record 384. But Turek—who had just castigated Atwater
for not caring for her children—refused and said he
would take the children into custody as well. Id.,
at 384,
427, 704–705. Only the intervention of neighborhood children
who had witnessed the scene and summoned one of
Atwater's friends saved the children from being hauled to
jail with their mother. Id., at 382, 385–386.
With the children gone,
Officer Turek handcuffed Ms. Atwater with
her hands behind her back, placed her in the police
car, and drove her to the police station. Id.,
at 386–387. Ironically, Turek
did not secure Atwater in a seat belt for
the drive. Id.,
at 386. At the station, Atwater was forced
to remove her shoes, relinquish her possessions, and
wait in a holding cell for about an hour. Id.,
at 387,706. A judge finally informed
Atwater of her rights and the charges
against her, and released her when she posted bond.
Id., at
387–388, 706. Atwater returned to the scene of
the arrest, only to find that her car had been towed. Id.,
at
389....
It is difficult to see how
arresting Atwater served either of these
goals any more effectively than the issuance of a citation.
With respect to the goal of law enforcement generally,
Atwater did not pose a great danger to the community. She had been driving very slowly—approximately 15
miles per hour—in broad daylight on a residential street
that had no other traffic. Record 380. Nor was she
a repeat offender; until that day, she had received one traffic
citation in her life — a ticket, more than 10 years earlier,
for failure to signal a lane change. Id., at 378.
Although Officer Turek had
stopped Atwater approximately three
months earlier because he thought that Atwater's son was not wearing a seatbelt,
id., at
420, Turek had been mistaken, id.,
at 379, 703. Moreover, Atwater
immediately accepted responsibility and apologized for
her conduct. Id.,
at 381,
384, 420. Thus, there was every
indication that Atwater would have buckled herself
and her children in had she been cited and allowed to
leave.
With respect to the related
goal of child welfare, the decision to
arrest Atwater was nothing short of counter-productive. Atwater's children witnessed Officer Turek yell
at their mother and threaten to take them all into custody. Ultimately, they were forced to leave her behind with
Turek, knowing that she was being taken to jail. Understandably,
the 3-year-old boy was "very, very, very traumatized." Id.,
at
393. After the incident, he had to see a
child psychologist regularly, who reported that the boy
"felt very guilty that he couldn’t stop this horrible thing
. . . he was powerless to help his mother or sister."
Id.,
at
396. Both of Atwater's children are now terrified at the
sight of any police car. Id.,
at
393, 395. According to Atwater, the
arrest "just never leaves us. It’s a conversation we
have every other day, once a week, and it’s —it raises
its head constantly in our lives." Id.,
at 395. Citing
Atwater surely would have served the children's interests
well. It would have taught Atwater to ensure that
her children were buckled up in the future. It also would
have taught the children an important lesson in accepting
responsibility and obeying the law. Arresting Atwater,
though, taught the children an entirely different lesson:
that "the bad person could just as easily be the policeman
as it could be the most horrible person they could
imagine." Ibid.
Respondents also contend that
the arrest was necessary to ensure
Atwater's appearance in court. Atwater, however, was
far from a flight risk. A 16-year resident of Lago Vista,
population 2,486, Atwater was not likely to abscond. See
Record 376; Texas State Data Center, 1997 Total Population
Estimates for Texas Places 15 (Sept. 1998). Although
she was unable to produce her driver’s license because
it had been stolen, she gave Officer Turek her license
number and address. Record 386. In addition, Officer
Turek knew from their previous encounter that Atwater
was a local resident.
The city's justifications fall far short of rationalizing the extraordinary
intrusion on Gail Atwater and her children. Measuring
"the degree to which [Atwater's custodial arrest was]
needed for the promotion of legitimate governmental interests,"
against "the degree to which it intrud[ed] upon [her] privacy,"
Wyoming v. Houghton,
526 U. S., at 300, it can hardly be
doubted that Turek's actions were
disproportionate to Atwater's crime. The majority’s assessment
that "Atwater's claim to live free of pointless indignity
and confinement clearly outweighs anything the City
can raise against it specific to her case," ante ,
at 26, is quite correct. In my view, the
Fourth Amendment inquiry ends there.
The Court's error, however, does not merely affect the disposition
of this case. The per se rule
that the Court creates has potentially
serious consequences for the everyday lives
of Americans. A broad range of conduct falls into
the category of fine-only misdemeanors... Such
unbounded discretion carries with it grave potential for
abuse. The majority takes comfort in the lack of evidence
of "an epidemic of unnecessary minor-offense arrests."...
The Court neglects the
Fourth Amendment’s express command in
the name of administrative ease. In so doing, it
cloaks the pointless indignity that Gail Atwater [and her children] suffered with
the mantle of reasonableness.
I respectfully dissent.
[
Complete dissent
by
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor & majority opinion by Justice
David H. Souter are
available at
The Supreme Court of the United States' Website:
www.supremecourtus.gov docket #No. 99-1408 ]
[ Erosion of freedom
may occur in both large and small increments ]
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