Victory: Appellate Court Blocks Release of Officer Text Messages

JOSHUA A. OLANDER
Associate Attorney
Mastagni Holstedt, APC

In a major victory upholding the right to privacy for peace officers, the Appellate Division of the Santa Clara Superior Court in Ryan Saunders v. Superior Court blocked the release of private text messages exchanged between several Santa Clara County correctional deputies. In its published decision, the Appellate Division denied the San Jose Mercury News from accessing and publishing potentially damaging text messages by overruling the trial court’s decision to release the text messages to the public. Attorney Joshua A. Olander of Mastagni Holstedt, APC vigorously fought against the San Jose Mercury News to protect Deputy Ryan Saunders’ constitutional right to privacy and ultimately prevailed in a decision with wide-ranging effects on the steady erosion of peace officer rights to privacy in their personal cellphones.

In early 2015, the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office began investigating whether Deputy Saunders was using his position as a peace officer to provide information from confidential law enforcement databases to outside groups. No evidence was uncovered that corroborated the allegation that Deputy Saunders provided any assistance to any criminal organization. However, during the course of their criminal investigation, a search warrant for Deputy Saunders’ cellphone records uncovered a series of inappropriate text messages between Deputy Saunders and other members of the Sheriff’s Office.

Claiming the text messages were unsealed and made public record by order of the court, Santa Clara County Sheriff Laurie Smith illegally released several salacious text messages seized under the search warrant. Based on the Sheriff’s claim that the text messages were public record, the San Jose Mercury News sent a California Public Records Act request to Santa Clara County for a complete copy of the seized text message records. Mr. Olander objected to the release of the text messages and argued that the text message records were seized property, not a judicial or court record, and thus not subject to disclosure. Furthermore, Mr. Olander asserted that release of the seized text message records would violate Deputy Saunders’ constitutional right to privacy in his cellphone records.

The trial court, however, ruled that Deputy Saunders failed to present a compelling justification against the release of the records and ordered them made public record. Mr. Olander immediately filed a writ of mandamus in the Appellate Division of the Santa Clara County Superior Court and received a stay prohibiting the release of the text messages pending the Appellate Division decision. On April 28, 2017, following extensive briefing and oral argument, the Appellate Division issued its decision granting Deputy Saunders’ writ petition and overruling the trial court’s decision as an abuse of discretion.

The Appellate Division held that the there is no right of public access to property seized under a search warrant and that the release of the text messages would cause irreparable harm to Deputy Saunders’ constitutional right to privacy. The Appellate Division further held that, given the private nature of the records, Deputy Saunders bore no burden to demonstrate a compelling justification for nondisclosure of the records — the only legally permissible outcome was nondisclosure.

Article 1, Section 1 of the California Constitution provides for the inalienable right to privacy, which is a fundamental interest of our society and essential to the rights guaranteed under the federal Constitution. In recognizing our inalienable right to privacy, which is broader in California than under the federal Constitution, the Appellate Division found that Deputy Saunders had a considerable and constitutional privacy interest in his personal cell records that significantly outweighed any interests in favor of public access. Rejecting the erroneous position by the trial court and the Mercury News that the common right of public access applies to seized property, the Appellate Division ordered the trial court to enter a new court order denying release of the seized records.

Protecting the rights of public safety officers has always been, and will continue to be, a top priority for Mastagni Holstedt, APC and the PORAC Legal Defense Fund. For more information on this important decision affecting peace officer privacy rights statewide, please see Ryan Saunders v. Superior Court, County of Santa Clara (2017) 12 Cal.App.5th Supp. 1.

About the Author

Joshua Olander is an associate attorney in the labor and employment department at Mastagni Holstedt, APC. He represents public sector employees in administrative and disciplinary investigations, hearings, critical incident investigations and criminal defense cases.