NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FILED
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT MAY 16 2014
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
VAHE KHACHATOURIAN, No. 12-55364
Plaintiff - Appellant, D.C. No. 2:10-cv-08436-SJO-RZ
v.
MEMORANDUM*
HACIENDA LA PUENTE UNIFIED
SCHOOL DISTRICT,
Defendant,
And
MAUREEN SCANLON; et al.,
Defendants - Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
S. James Otero, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted January 9, 2014
Pasadena, California
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
Before: REINHARDT and CLIFTON, Circuit Judges, and RAKOFF, Senior
District Judge.**
Plaintiff-Appellant Vahe Khachatourian sued Defendants-Appellees
Maureen Scanlon, Robert Casper, Fernando Sanchez, Daniel Monarrez, William
Roberts, and Robert Barba under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that they violated his
Fourth and Fifth Amendment rights. The district court granted summary judgment
in favor of Defendants, and Khachatourian appealed.
We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo the district
court’s grant of summary judgment, Cameron v. Craig, 713 F.3d 1012, 1018 (9th
Cir. 2013), and we affirm.
I. Fourth Amendment
To show a Fourth Amendment violation, Khachatourian has to demonstrate
a reasonable expectation of privacy in the area searched. See United States v. SDI
Future Health, Inc., 568 F.3d 684, 695 (9th Cir. 2009). Viewing the evidence in
the light most favorable to Khachatourian, it could be found that he had a
subjective expectation of privacy in his classroom and desk drawers therein.
Expectations of privacy, however, are not reasonable where an employee is on
notice “that searches of the type to which he was subjected might occur from time
**
The Honorable Jed S. Rakoff, Senior District Judge for the U.S.
District Court for the Southern District of New York, sitting by designation.
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to time for work-related purposes.” Schowengerdt v. Gen. Dynamics Corp., 823
F.2d 1328, 1335 (9th Cir. 1987).
Here, it is undisputed that Khachatourian knew that canine searches for
contraband drugs and firearms were regularly conducted in his classroom, as he
had seen them take place during his tenure at the school. In the school context, a
search for drugs or firearms is necessarily work-related, because getting rid of such
contraband furthers the school’s educational objectives by facilitating “an
environment in which learning can take place.” New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S.
325, 340 (1985). Khachatourian’s expectation of privacy in his classroom was
therefore not a reasonable one, and the use of a dog to sniff around his classroom
could not violate his Fourth Amendment rights.
We nevertheless assume arguendo that Khachatourian had a reasonable
expectation of privacy in the contents of his desk drawers. Under the Fourth
Amendment, “public employer intrusions on the constitutionally protected privacy
interests of government employees for . . . investigations of work-related
misconduct[] should be judged by the standard of reasonableness under all the
circumstances.” United States v. Taketa, 923 F.2d 665, 673–74 (9th Cir. 1991)
(quoting O’Connor v. Ortega, 480 U.S. 709, 725–26 (1987) (plurality opinion))
(internal quotation marks omitted). The reasonableness standard applies to a search
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that was initially conducted as part of an investigation into work-related
misconduct, even if it later becomes an investigation of criminal misconduct. See
id. at 673–75. Applying the reasonableness standard, we conclude that the
warrantless search of the desk drawers after the dog had alerted toward them was
permissible under the Fourth Amendment.
Because we conclude that this search, which uncovered Khachatourian’s gun
and knife, was permissible under the Fourth Amendment, his arrest for violations
of California Penal Code §§ 626.9(b) and 626.10(a) was also justified under the
Fourth Amendment, as the gun and knife, along with Khachatourian’s admission
that those objects were his, provided sufficient probable cause to arrest him.
Contrary to Khachatourian’s arguments, a police officer is not required to engage
in legal analysis at the scene of arrest, and the officer’s subjective intentions in
making the arrest are irrelevant, see, e.g., United States v. Lopez, 482 F.3d 1067,
1072 (9th Cir. 2007).
II. Fifth Amendment
We assume without deciding that school officials conducting an
investigation into misconduct that is both work-related and potentially criminal
could be required to provide the subject of an interrogation warnings under
Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966). Miranda, however, applies only to
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custodial interrogations—that is, questioning conducted “after a person has been
taken into custody or otherwise deprived of his freedom of action in any significant
way.” Id. at 444.
We “examin[e] all of the circumstances surrounding the interrogation, [and]
decide ‘whether there [was] a formal arrest or restraint on freedom of movement of
the degree associated with a formal arrest.’” United States v. Kim, 292 F.3d 969,
973 (9th Cir. 2002) (third alteration in original) (quoting Stansbury v. California,
511 U.S. 318, 322 (1994)). The undisputed facts include the following: the school
setting where the interrogation was conducted was familiar to Khachatourian, there
was little coercion employed other than the presence of his supervisors and the
intermittent presence of a single police officer, and the episodes of questioning
were short and lasted less than two hours in total. Most importantly, the undisputed
facts demonstrate not only that Khachatourian remained free to leave the classroom
and office where the questioning took place, but that he actually left to consult his
union representative. In other words, Khachatourian was never restrained in a
manner equivalent to a formal arrest. We therefore conclude that Khachatourian
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was not subjected to a custodial interrogation and was thus not entitled to Miranda
warnings.1
AFFIRMED.
1
We also reject Khachatourian’s arguments attempting to assert claims
grounded on state law, in particular Lybarger v. City of Los Angeles, 710 P.2d 329
(Cal. 1985), as the complaint’s sole claim for relief is under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
6