Jones v. City Of Los Angeles

444 F.3d 1118 (9th Cir. 2006)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

Ps are homeless individuals who live on the streets of Los Angeles. D passed an ordinance that criminalizes sitting, lying, or sleeping on public streets and sidewalks at all times and in all places within Los Angeles's city limits. The ordinance at issue was adopted in 1968. D's Skid Row was home to a poor transient population, the down and out, the drifters, the unemployed, and the chronic alcoholics and drug addicts. D's Skid Row had the highest concentration of homeless individuals in the United States. D's City Attorney and Mayor from 1985 to 2001 refused to prosecute the homeless for sleeping in public unless D provided them with an alternative to the streets. An SRO room in D was $379 per month. The monthly welfare stipend for single adults in Los Angeles County is only $221. There is a shortage of available beds for such people. Ps demonstrate that they are not on the streets of Skid Row by informed choice. Purrie (P) is in his early sixties. He has lived in the Skid Row area for four decades. P sleeps on the streets because he cannot afford a room in an SRO hotel and is often unable to find an open bed in a shelter. Police officers woke him early in the morning and searched, handcuffed, and arrested him pursuant to a warrant for failing to pay the fine from his earlier citation. The police removed his property from his tent, broke it down, and threw all of his property, including the tent, into the street. P was convicted of violating section 41.18(d), given a twelve-month suspended sentence, and ordered to pay $195 in restitution and attorneys' fees. Purrie was also ordered to stay away from the location of his arrest. P returned to the corner and all of his personal effects were gone. Ps filed a complaint pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They seek a permanent injunction against D barring them from enforcing section 41.18(d) in Skid Row. Ps claimed that D is criminalizing the status of homelessness in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, and Article I, sections 7 and 17 of the California Constitution, see Cal. Const. art I, § 7 (guaranteeing due process and equal protection). The district court granted judgment in favor of D. The enforcement of the ordinance does not violate the Eighth Amendment because it penalizes conduct, not status. Ps appealed.