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"Ninth Circuit Denies En Banc Review in Text Message Privacy Case"

"Ninth Circuit Denies En Banc Review in Text Message Privacy Case": Steven M. Ellis of Metropolitan News-Enterprise has an article that begins, "The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, over the dissent of seven of its judges, yesterday declined to review en banc a ruling that the Ontario Police Department violated an employee's right to privacy when supervisors examined the contents of text messages sent on department pagers. A panel of the court ruled in June that the department violated the Fourth Amendment rights of Sgt. Jeff Quon and three others to whom he sent text messages when the department obtained transcripts from the service provider and examined the messages' contents to determine whether a monthly overage charge resulted from personal use."

In addition to yesterday's order of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit denying rehearnig en banc, you can also access online Circuit Judge Kim McLane Wardlaw's opinion concurring in the denial of rehearing en banc, and Circuit Judge Sandra S. Ikuta's opinion dissenting from the denial of rehearing en banc. A total of seven judges noted their dissent from the denial of rehearing en banc.

Judge Wardlaw's concurring opinion begins, "No poet ever interpreted nature as freely as Judge Ikuta interprets the record on this appeal. The dissent is not bound by the facts, even those found by the jury; nor is it confined to the actual fact-driven Fourth Amendment holding."

Full post as published by How Appealing on January 28, 2009 (boomark / email).