Constitutional Law
Chapter 1 -
Part 3
Assignments and Projects
1. The following is a partial brief of a case found in the chapter. Fill in the missing parts.
Ontario v. Quon
560 U.S. (2010)
Judicial History
The U.S. District Court for the Central District of California held that the city (petitioners) did not violate the Fourth Amendment. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed their judgment in part and held that the search was not reasonable in scope. The Supreme Court of the United States held that the search was reasonable and did not violate Quon’s Fourth Amendment rights and reversed and remanded the case for further proceedings.
Facts
Quon, a police officer with the City of Ontario, was issued a work pager. At the time it was issued, all employees were told that the city had the right to review all activity conducted on the pagers to ensure they were being used for work purposes only. After exceeding the texting character limit for the pager multiple times, an audit was conducted on Quon’s pager. It was discovered that he had sent and received multiple personal text messages, some of which were sexually explicit, during work hours. After allegedly being disciplined for incorrect usage of the pager, Quon alleged the city had violated his Fourth Amendment right to privacy through an unreasonable search of his text messages. Issue: Does a government employer violate the Fourth Amendment when a government employer reads text messages sent and received on a pager the employer owned and issued to an employee in an effort to determine if an appropriate usage plan was in effect and when the employee, a police officer, was advised that text messages were not private?
Holding: A government employer does not violate the Fourth Amendment when a government employer reads text messages sent and received on a pager the employer owned and issued to an employee in an effort to determine if an appropriate usage plan was in effect and when the employee, a police officer, was advised that text messages were not private
Rationale: Under the circumstances of this case, the government employer acted reasonably in reading respondent Quon’s text messages. The employer had a legitimate business reason for determining how many work-related messages were sent and received. The employer conducted a limited search to make this determination. The respondent was a police officer and should have known that his employer could read text messages if it acted reasonably.