United States Ninth Circuit

In an appeal by criminal defendants challenging a district-wide policy requiring that pretrial detainees making their first appearance before a magistrate judge wear leg shackles, a decision upholding the policy is affirmed where: 1) the case was not moot for purposes of review; 2) there was appellate jurisdiction to review the orders at issue; but 3) although the shackling policy results in some diminution of pretrial detainees' liberty and detracts to some extent from the dignity and the decorum of a critical stage of a criminal prosecution, the policy was adopted with an adequate justification of its necessity.

Appellate Information

• Argued 11/01/2004
• Decided 03/27/2007
• Published 03/27/2007

Judges

• SCHROEDER, Chief Judge:, Before: SCHROEDER, Chief Judge, GOULD and CLIFTON, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• Carlton Frederick Gunn, Deputy Public Defender, Los Angeles, CA, for the defendants-appellants., Patrick R. Fitzgerald and Becky S. Walker, Assistant United States Attorneys, Los Angeles, CA for the plaintiff-appellee.