Grady v. North Carolina
2015 U.S. LEXIS 2124, 191 L. Ed. 2d 459, 135 S. Ct. 1368 (2015)
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Rule of Law:
The government's nonconsensual attachment of a tracking device to a person's body for the purpose of monitoring their movements constitutes a "search" under the Fourth Amendment, regardless of whether the monitoring is for civil or criminal purposes.
Facts:
- In 1997, Torrey Dale Grady was convicted in North Carolina of a second-degree sexual offense.
- In 2006, Grady was convicted in North Carolina of taking indecent liberties with a child.
- After serving his sentence for the 2006 conviction, Grady was ordered to appear in New Hanover County Superior Court for a hearing.
- Grady was informed that he would be subjected to satellite-based monitoring (SBM) as a recidivist sex offender under North Carolina law.
- The SBM program would require Grady to wear tracking devices at all times.
- The SBM program is designed to provide time-correlated and continuous tracking of a subject's geographic location and report violations of prescriptive and proscriptive schedule or location requirements.
- Grady argued that the SBM program would violate his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures.
Procedural Posture:
- Torrey Dale Grady was convicted in North Carolina trial courts of a second-degree sexual offense in 1997.
- Torrey Dale Grady was convicted in North Carolina trial courts of taking indecent liberties with a child in 2006.
- After serving his sentence for the 2006 crime, Grady was ordered to appear in New Hanover County Superior Court for a hearing to determine if he should be subjected to SBM.
- The New Hanover County Superior Court ordered Grady to enroll in the SBM program and be monitored for life.
- Grady appealed the Superior Court's order, renewing his Fourth Amendment challenge, to the North Carolina Court of Appeals.
- The North Carolina Court of Appeals rejected Grady's argument, concluding it was foreclosed by one of its earlier decisions, State v. Jones.
- Grady appealed to the North Carolina Supreme Court, which summarily dismissed his appeal and denied his petition for discretionary review.
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Issue:
Does the State of North Carolina's nonconsensual satellite-based monitoring program, which involves physically attaching a tracking device to a person's body to monitor their movements, constitute a "search" under the Fourth Amendment?
Opinions:
Majority - Per Curiam
Yes, the State of North Carolina's nonconsensual satellite-based monitoring program, which involves physically attaching a tracking device to a person's body to monitor their movements, constitutes a "search" under the Fourth Amendment. The Court reaffirmed its precedent from United States v. Jones, which held that installing and monitoring a GPS device on a vehicle was a search because the government "physically occupied private property for the purpose of obtaining information." This principle was extended in Florida v. Jardines to physical intrusions on constitutionally protected areas to gather information. The Court found that attaching a device to a person's body without consent for tracking purposes is a direct physical intrusion to obtain information, thus qualifying as a search. The Court rejected the North Carolina Court of Appeals' reasoning that the SBM program's civil nature removed it from Fourth Amendment scrutiny, stating that the Fourth Amendment's protection extends beyond criminal investigations and the government's purpose in collecting information does not control whether the method constitutes a search. It also dismissed the State's argument that there was no evidence the program actually collected information, pointing to the program's very name and the enabling statute which explicitly requires "time-correlated and continuous tracking." The Court explicitly stated that while it concluded a search occurred, it was not deciding the ultimate question of the program's constitutionality, as the Fourth Amendment only prohibits unreasonable searches, and the North Carolina courts had not yet assessed reasonableness. The case was remanded for that determination.
Analysis:
This case significantly clarified the scope of what constitutes a "search" under the Fourth Amendment, especially in the context of advanced surveillance technologies and civil regulatory schemes. By explicitly applying the physical intrusion test from United States v. Jones to a person's body, the Supreme Court emphasized that physical trespass to obtain information triggers Fourth Amendment protections regardless of the government's stated purpose (civil vs. criminal). This decision limits state governments' ability to avoid Fourth Amendment scrutiny for surveillance programs by labeling them as civil or administrative, and it sets a foundational premise for future challenges to similar technologies that involve physical attachment or close proximity to an individual. However, the Court left open the critical question of reasonableness, meaning states can still argue such searches are constitutional if they are deemed reasonable under a totality-of-the-circumstances analysis, paving the way for further litigation on that point.
