判例译析｜萨福德联合学区诉雷丁案Safford Unified School District v. Redding

译者 | 何汛 北京大学国际法学院J.D. & J.M.

一审 | 陈思源 北京大学

二审 | 刘汉青 BNU LL.M.

编辑 | 王冰子 烟台大学本科‍‍

         于杰 上海对外经贸大学本科

责编 | 扎恩哈尔·阿黑哈提 新疆农业大学本科‍

萨福德联合学区诉雷丁案

Safford Unified School

District v. Redding

学校搜查引发争议：脱衣搜查13岁女生侵犯第四修正案隐私权？               

    ——美国最高法院裁决解析

“Safford Unified School District v. Redding” (案号：08-479) 是一起关于学校搜查学生的重要案例。该案发生在萨福德中学，13岁的萨瓦娜·雷丁（Savana Redding）被学校助理校长怀疑携带违反校规的止痛药，经过搜查她的背包和外衣未果后，助理校长指示两名女性学校官员对 她进行脱衣搜查，但未发现任何药物。雷丁的家人随后以侵犯第四修正案权利为由，对学区和相关学校官员提起诉讼。最高法院以8-1的裁决结果，认为学校官员的搜查侵犯了 雷丁的第四修正案权利。然而，由于当时的法律并未明确规定学校脱衣搜查是否违反第四修正案，因此法院认为涉案的学校管理人员可以享有合格豁免权。金斯伯格法官在部分意见中同意多数意见，即在 New Jersey v. T. L. O. 的判决已经“明确规定”了本案的法律。这个案例的重要性在于，它进一步赋予了学生第四修正案的保护，认为除非学校官员有理由相信涉嫌的药物对学校构成危险，或者被隐藏在学生的内衣中，否则对中学生进行脱衣搜查是不合理的。

（图片来源于网络）

After escorting 13-year-old Savana Redding from her middle school classroom to his office, Assistant Principal Wilson showed her a day planner containing knives and other contraband. She admitted owning the planner, but said that she had lent it to her friend Marissa and that the contraband was not hers. He then produced four prescription-strength, and one over-the-counter, pain relief pills, all of which are banned under school rules without advance permission. She denied knowledge of them, but Wilson said that he had a report that she was giving pills to fellow students. She denied it and agreed to let him search her belongings. He and Helen Romero, an administrative assistant, searched Savana’s backpack, finding nothing. Wilson then had Romero take Savana to the school nurse’s office to search her clothes for pills. After Romero and the nurse, Peggy Schwallier, had Savana remove her outer clothing, they told her to pull her bra out and shake it, and to pull out the elastic on her underpants, thus exposing her breasts and pelvic area to some degree. No pills were found. Savana’s mother filed suit against petitioner school district (Safford), Wilson, Romero, and Schwallier, alleging that the strip search violated Savana’s Fourth Amendment rights. Claiming qualified immunity, the individuals (hereinafter petitioners) moved for summary judgment. The District Court granted the motion, finding that there was no Fourth Amendment violation, and the en banc Ninth Circuit reversed. Following the protocol for evaluating qualified immunity claims, see Saucier v. Katz, 533 U. S. 194, 200, the court held that the strip search was unjustified under the Fourth Amendment test for searches of children by school officials set out in New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U. S. 325. It then applied the test for qualified immunity. Finding that Savana’s right was clearly established at the time of the search, it reversed the summary judgment as to Wilson, but affirmed as to Schwallier and Romero because they were not independent decisionmakers.

在陪同13岁的萨瓦娜·雷丁（Savana Redding）从中学教室到办公室后，助理校长威尔逊向她出示了一个藏有刀具和其他违禁品的日程计划本。她承认拥有该日程本，但把它借给了她的朋友玛丽莎，其中的违禁品不是她的。然后，威尔逊出示了四种处方药和一种非处方止痛药，根据学校规定，未经事先许可，这些药都是被禁止的。她否认对此知情，但威尔逊说他曾得到报告，称她把药片给了同学。她对此表示否认并同意让威尔逊搜查她的物品。他和行政助理海伦·罗梅罗（Helen Romero）搜查了萨瓦娜的背包，但并无发现。随后，威尔逊让罗梅罗将萨瓦娜带到学校护士办公室，在她的衣服里搜查药物。罗梅罗和护士佩吉·施瓦利尔（Peggy Schwallier）让萨瓦娜脱掉外衣，拉开并摇晃胸罩，并拉开内裤的松紧带，从而在一定程度上暴露了她的胸部和骨盆部位。然而，没有发现任何药物。萨瓦娜的母亲对后来提起上诉的学区（萨福德）、威尔逊、罗梅罗和施瓦利尔提起诉讼，称脱衣搜查侵犯了宪法第四修正案赋予萨瓦娜的权利。这些人（以下简称上诉人）主张其满足豁免条件，并请求法院进行简易判决。地区法院批准了该请求，认为其没有违反第四修正案，但第九巡回法院在进行全院庭审后推翻了该判决。根据Saucier诉Katz案（533 U. S. 194, 200），按照评估有条件豁免主张的方法，法院认为，根据新泽西诉T. L. O.案（469 U. S. 325）中规定的学校职员搜查儿童的第四修正案测试，脱衣搜查是不正当的。然后，在应用了附条件豁免的测试之后，法院认为萨瓦娜的权利在搜查时已明确确立，因此推翻了对威尔逊的简易判决，但确认了对施瓦利尔和罗梅罗的判决，因为他们不是独立决策者。

（图片来源于网络）

Justice Ginsburg, concurring in part and dissenting in part.

金斯伯格法官：（部分赞同，部分反对）

I agree with the Court that Assistant Principal Wilson’s subjection of 13-year-old Savana Redding to a humiliating stripdown search violated the Fourth Amendment. But I also agree with Justice Stevens, that our opinion in New Jersey v. T. L. O., 469 U. S. 325 (1985), “clearly established” the law governing this case.

我同意法院的观点，即助理校长威尔逊对13岁的萨瓦娜·雷丁进行羞辱性的脱衣搜查，违反了第四修正案。但我也同意史蒂文斯法官的观点，我们在1985年新泽西州诉T.L.O.（469 U.S.325）一案中的意见，“明确确立”了管辖本案的法律。

Fellow student Marissa Glines, caught with pills in her pocket, accused Redding of supplying them. Asked where the blue pill among several white pills in Glines’s pocket came from, Glines answered: “I guess it slipped in when she gave me the IBU 400s.” Ibid. Asked next “who is she?”, Glines responded: “Savana Redding.” Ibid. As the Court observes, ante, at 6, 10, no followup questions were asked. Wilson did not test Glines’s accusation for veracity by asking Glines when did Redding give her the pills, where, for what purpose. Any reasonable search for the pills would have ended when inspection of Redding’s backpack and jacket pockets yielded nothing. Wilson had no cause to suspect, based on prior experience at the school or clues in this case, that Redding had hidden pills—containing the equivalent of two Advils or one Aleve—in her underwear or body. To make matters worse, Wilson did not release Redding, to return to class or to go home, after the search. Instead, he made her sit on a chair outside his office for over two hours. At no point did he attempt to call her parent. Abuse of authority of that order should not be shielded by official immunity.

同校学生玛丽萨·格林斯（Marissa Glines）被发现口袋里有药片，她指责雷丁提供了药片。当被问及口袋里几粒白色药片中的蓝色药片来自何处时，格林斯回答说：“我猜她在给我IBU 400时滑了进去。” 同上。威尔逊没有通过询问格林斯，雷丁什么时候给她吃药，在什么地方，出于什么目的，来检验格林斯的指控是否属实。当对雷丁的背包和夹克口袋的检查一无所获时，任何合理的药物搜索都将结束。根据之前在学校的经验或本案中的线索，威尔逊没有理由怀疑雷丁在她的内衣或身体里藏了相当于两片Advils或一片Aleve的药丸。更糟糕的是，威尔逊没有在搜查结束后释放雷丁，让她回到课堂或回家。相反，他让她在办公室外的椅子上坐了两个多小时。他没有试图打电话给她的父母。滥用该命令的权力不应受到官方豁免的保护。 

（图片来源于网络）

In contrast to T. L. O., where a teacher discovered a student smoking in the lavatory, and where the search was confined to the student’s purse, the search of Redding involved her body and rested on the bare accusation of another student whose reliability the Assistant Principal had no reason to trust. The Court’s opinion in T. L. O. plainly stated the controlling Fourth Amendment law: A search ordered by a school official, even if “justified at its inception,” crosses the constitutional boundary if it becomes “excessively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the student and the nature of the infraction.” 469 U. S., at 342 (internal quotation marks omitted).

与T. L. O.案不同的是，在该案中，教师发现一名学生在盥洗室吸烟，而且搜查仅限于该学生的钱包，而对雷丁的搜查涉及她的身体，而且是基于另一名学生的指控，校长助理没有理由相信该学生的可靠性。最高法院在T. L. O.一案中的意见明确指出了应用的第十修正案：由学校官员下令进行的搜查，即使“在开始时是正当的”，但如果 “鉴于学生的年龄和性别以及违法行为的性质而变得过于侵扰”，就超越了宪法的界限。469 U. S., at 342 (内部引号省略)。 

Here, “the nature of the [supposed] infraction,” the slim basis for suspecting Savana Redding, and her “age and sex,” ibid., establish beyond doubt that Assistant Principal Wilson’s order cannot be reconciled with this Court’s opinion in T. L. O. Wilson’s treatment of Redding was abusive and it was not reasonable for him to believe that the law permitted it. I join Justice Stevens in dissenting from the Court’s acceptance of Wilson’s qualified immunity plea, and would affirm the Court of Appeals’ judgment in all respects.

在这里，“（假定的）违规行为的性质”、怀疑萨凡娜·雷丁的微弱依据，以及她的“年龄和性别”，同上，毫无疑问地证明，助理校长威尔逊的命令不能与本法院对T.L.O.威尔逊对待雷丁的意见相一致，威尔逊对待雷丁是虐待行为，他认为法律允许这样做是不合理的。我和史蒂文斯法官一样，反对法院接受威尔逊的有限豁免权抗辩，并将确认上诉法院在所有方面的判决。

根据金斯伯格大法官在 "Safford Unified School District v. Redding" 案件中的意见，我认为这个案件揭示了对未成年人隐私权的重视和保护的必要性。金斯伯格大法官在口头辩论中明确表示，她无法认同其他男性大法官对脱衣搜查的轻描淡写。她认为，男性大法官们不能理解脱衣搜查对于一个13岁的女孩来说是多么的恐怖和羞辱。这种看法可能源于她的孙女克拉拉此时正处于雷丁的年纪，使她对雷丁的遭遇产生了深深的同情。

金斯伯格大法官的这种立场，打破了最高法院的一个不成文的惯例，即在案件判决之前，大法官不会公开发表对该案的个人看法。然而，她在采访中公开批评了最高法院的男性大法官们对青少年女性群体的现状和未成年人的心理活动的理解不足。这一行为，无疑表明了她对未成年人隐私权的重视，并强调了保护未成年人免受不必要和过度搜查的重要性。

总的来说，金斯伯格大法官的这一立场，为我们提供了一个重要的视角，即在处理涉及未成年人的案件时，我们必须充分考虑和尊重他们的隐私权，避免进行不必要的和过度的搜查。同时，她的言论也提醒我们，法律的执行和解释，必须基于对所有人群，包括青少年女性群体的深入理解和尊重。这一观点对于我们理解和保护未成年人的权利，尤其是隐私权，具有重要的指导意义。