United States Ninth Circuit

In an action brought by three Phoenix police officers who alleged that two other officers violated the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments when, pursuant to a state court order, they obtained DNA samples from the plaintiffs to exclude them as contributors of DNA at a crime scene, the district court's dismissal of the case is affirmed where: 1) the superior court orders authorizing the collection of plaintiffs’ DNA satisfied the Warrant Clause of the Fourth Amendment; and 2) it was not unreasonable, under the circumstances, to ask sworn officers to provide saliva samples for the sole purpose of demonstrating that the DNA left at a crime scene was not the result of inadvertent contamination by on-duty public safety personnel.

Appellate Information

• Decided 08/31/2015
• Published 08/31/2015

Judges

• HURWITZ

Court

• United States Ninth Circuit

Counsel