A California state appeals court has affirmed a lower court’s grant of a preliminary injunction in a case, where a group of students and their parents successfully challenged a school district’s expansion of a random drug testing policy beyond just the district’s student athletes.
In response to the decision in School District No. 92 of Pottawatomie County v. Earls (2002) 536 U.S. 822 [153 L.Ed.2d 735] (Earls), the Shasta Union High School District expanded its random drug testing policy from covering only student athletes to covering all students who participated in competitive representational activities, such as band, choir, future farmers of America (FFA), and science bowl.
Three students and their parents successfully challenged the policy, obtaining a preliminary injunction against implementation of the program, which tests for methamphetamine, chlorochromate, amphetamine, phencyclidine, cocaine, marijuana, methadone, barbiturates, benzodiazepines, opiates, oxycodone, nicotine, and alcohol.
The school district, the superintendent, and members of the district’s board of trustees, appealed the trial court’s ruling, arguing that the random drug testing program does not violate the right to privacy, the prohibition against unreasonable search and seizures, or equal protection under the California Constitution.
Upon review, the appeals court noted that “unlike the federal Constitution, California’s Constitution grants an express right to privacy. Thus, we focus on California case law on the right to privacy rather than federal law on the Fourth Amendment. The plaintiffs put forth a showing sufficient to establish the threshold elements of a claim for invasion of the constitutional right to privacy. In balancing that invasion against the district’s justification for the expanded drug testing, the trial court could reasonably find that the plaintiffs were likely to prevail due to the district’s vague and shifting justifications for expanding drug testing to these participants in competitive representational activities and the lack of any showing that selecting only these students for testing was reasonable to further the district’s goal of deterring drug and alcohol use. We affirm the preliminary injunction and let the matter proceed to trial on the merits.”
In short, “the trial court did not abuse its discretion in finding that plaintiffs were likely to prevail on their privacy claim. Since the district does not challenge the trial court’s finding as to irreparable harm, the trial court did not abuse its discretion in granting the preliminary injunction. Because the preliminary injunction can be justified based on the privacy claim, there is no need to discuss plaintiffs’ constitutional claims relating to search and seizure and equal protection.”
Deborah Brown et al. v. Shasta Union High School District et al.; Ct. App. Calif., 3rd App. Dist.; C06197, 2010 Cal. App. Unpub. LEXIS 7051; 9/2/10
