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LA Skid Row Searches Ruled Unconstitutional

By Jeralyn, Section Civil Liberties
Posted on Thu Apr 26, 2007 at 01:10:00 AM EST
Tags: homeless, Bill Bratton (all tags)
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A federal judge in Los Angeles has ruled police skid row searches unconstitutional:

U.S. District Judge Dean D. Pregerson found that officers question — and at times search — parolees and probationers without evidence that they might have committed a crime, which the judge said was unconstitutional. He ordered the LAPD to change its practices.

This is the second victory for those on skid row:

A federal appeals court last year found the city's anti-camping ordinance to be unconstitutional, scuttling LAPD efforts to prevent the homeless from sleeping on downtown sidewalks at night.

TChris reported on that here.

More...

The suit was brought by the ACLU:

The American Civil Liberties Union.... maintained that police officers routinely stopped people and questioned them about their parole or probation status. Officers often handcuffed them and searched them without any reasonable suspicion of a crime, the organization charged in court papers.

Even though the ACLU got an injunction, it charges the searches continued.

LA Police Chief Bill Bratton (with whom I often agree, just not this time) says:

"The streets of skid row are much safer today, thanks to the dedication of the men and women of Central Area," Bratton said in the statement. "The LAPD has a clear policy, based on constitutional requirements, on the rules and regulations relating to citizen stops, which are being followed. The department constantly trains officers and supervisors on those rules and regulations and will continue to do so."

Also, last year in Fresno, the ACLU won a victory for the homeless in a suit in which they charged:

.... police and sanitation workers violated the rights of the homeless for the past three years by defining their property as trash and bulldozing their encampments.

Then there's this abominable policy...dumping those released from the hospital on skid row.

Officials say a number of hospitals, police agencies and jails in the Los Angeles area have been guilty of dumping — they take the homeless who are seeking treatment or crowding jail cells and release them on the streets of Skid Row.

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    LA Skid Row Searches Ruled Unconstitutional | 8 comments (8 topical)

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    Parole Searches (none / 0) (#1)
    by Patrick on Thu Apr 26, 2007 at 12:39:42 PM EST
    Do not require evidence that the parolee committed a crime.  At least not according to the Supreme Court in (Samson v. California (2006) 165 L.Ed.2nd 260.) and the 9th in United States vs. Lopez (9th Cir. Feb. 5, 2007) 424 F.3rd 1208.

    There is still a question as to whether probationers would require some suspicion, but currently in California suspicionless probation searches are still legal.


    The case a bit more complex (none / 0) (#2)
    by Deconstructionist on Thu Apr 26, 2007 at 02:31:15 PM EST
    than the Times story explains.

     This order is the result of a motion to extend a previously issued TRO and that previously issued TRO was based upon a settlement agreement to which the city agreed.

     In the earlier agreement, LA AGREED not to conduct Terry stops without reasonable suspicion, presumably because it did not wish to litigae the allegation that it was emplying bogus claims of parole/probation searches as a pretext to intimidate and harass residents of "skid row."

       The plaintiff argued that the extension was warranted because LAPD was continuing to search people using the probation/parole inquiry as a pretext without any prior knowledge the people being subjected were even on prpbation or parole (and this when it had agreed not to search people on probation or parole without reasonable suspicion).

       It was furtheer alleged that LAPd would follow through with these searches even when people expressly denied they were on probation and parole (and at least in some cases when that was true).

      Finally you are correct about Samson holding it is lawful to conduct "suscpicionless searches of people on probation or parole (and i believe that is the rule in every jurisdiction) but here we have an order resulting from a settlement to which the city agreed forbidding that practice AND it is still generally held that while a suspicionless search of a probationer o