MATTER OF GREGORY M ., 82 N.Y.2d 588, 627 N.E.2d 500, 606 N.Y.S.2d 579
Decided December 20, 1993
Gregory was a 15 year old high school student. He arrived at his school in The Bronx without his student identification card. In accordance with school policy, the security guard told Gregory to leave his cloth book bag with the guard and report to the Dean’s office to obtain a new card. The security guard heard an “unusual” metallic thud when Gregory tossed his book bag on the metal shelf. When the guard ran his fingers over the outer surface of the bag he felt the outline of a gun. He summoned the Dean who similarly felt a gun through the bag. The Dean brought the bag to his office where the head of security opened the bag revealing a small hand gun.
Gregory was adjudicated a juvenile delinquent in Family Court. He appealed the adjudication claiming that the “frisk” of the outside of the bag, which eventually led to the discovery of the gun, was a violation of his right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure under the United States and New York State constitutions. Therefore, he claimed, the evidence of the gun should not be used against him.
The New York State Court of Appeals disagreed with Gregory and in a 6-1 decision upheld the initial “frisk” of the bag as constitutional and affirmed his adjudication as a juvenile delinquent. The Court found that there must be a balance between the student’s legitimate expectation of privacy and the need to enforce school rules. In this case, there was only a minimal expectation of privacy that Gregory had with regard to the outer touching of his school bag by security personnel when he left the bag with the security guard. On the other side of the balance, the school rule preventing guns in schools was of the highest urgency. Therefore, the "frisk" was constitutional.
The Court relied on the United States Supreme Court decision in New Jersey v. T.L.O. as well as a number of previous Court of Appeals decisions on search and seizure. Under T.L.O., searches of students by non-law enforcement officers in school require a lesser showing of suspicion than searches by law enforcement outside of school. While the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable search and seizure specifically requires a showing of probable cause and a warrant before a search can take place, the U.S. Supreme Court held in T.L.O. that in schools “searches by school authorities of the persons or belongings of students may be made upon ‘reasonable grounds for suspecting that the search will turn up evidence that the student has violated…either the law or the rules of the school.’”
The Court of Appeals conceded that the “metallic thud” did not give the security guard “reasonable suspicion” to search the bag. But, because he restricted his search to the outer surface of the bag, the search was less intrusive than the search of the inside of the student’s handbag in T.L.O. and therefore less than reasonable suspicion justified the “frisk” of the bag.
The dissenting judge believed that there was no justification in T.L.O. or elsewhere for any search with less than reasonable suspicion. The intrusiveness of the search was not a factor in any previous decision and should not be here.
Learning Activities
Terms to Know
· adjudication
· probable cause
· reasonable suspicion
· unreasonable search and seizure
Compare and Contrast
In T.L.O the student whose bag was searched was the target of an investigation into a particular violation of school rules – smoking in the bathroom. In addition the student’s bag was taken from her to be searched. In Gregory M., the student was not suspected of any violation of rules or law and the bag was not taken from him – he had given it to the security guard to be placed on the shelf. Should any of these distinctions make a difference when applying the balancing test that the Court applied in Gregory M., i.e. the balance between the student’s legitimate expectation of privacy and the need to enforce school rules?
The Court found that Gregory had a lesser expectation of privacy than T.L.O. because he intended to leave his bag with the guard while T.L.O. was holding her bag before she gave it to the principal to search. In addition, Gregory M. involved the outside of Gregory’s soft bag, which he can expect others to feel, either purposely or accidentally, while T.L.O. can expect that the inside contents of her bag will remain private. With regard to the school rules at issue, the student will compare the smoking prohibition with the guns prohibition.
Debate
Take the following scenario and create two teams, one to argue the student's side and the other supporting the school. Be sure that students apply T.L.O. and Gregory M. by using the balancing test and the reasonable suspicion standard.
School A decided to bring in drug and gun sniffing dogs to search all students’ bags. All students kept their bags at their desks in class and the school security guard brought the dog around to the bags. Student X was found to have marijuana in her bag after the dog alerted the security officer as to the presence of a drug. After the dog signaled his discovery a school security guard opened her bag and found the drugs. Be sure to focus on the initial “search” by the dogs, rather than the follow-up search by the security guard who opened the bag.