Tony Lavan v. City of Los Angeles

I. FACTS AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

The facts underlying this appeal are largely undisputed.2 Appellees are homeless persons living on the streets of the Skid Row district of Los Angeles. Skid Row’s inhabitants include the highest concentration of homeless persons in the City of Los Angeles; this concentration has only increased in recent years.3 See Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, 2011 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count Report, available at http://www.lahsa.org/docs/2011-Homeless-Count/HC11- Detailed-Geography-Report-FINAL.PDF. Appellees occupy the sidewalks of Skid Row pursuant to a settlement agreement we approved in 2007. See Jones v. City of Los Angeles, 444 F.3d 1118 (9th Cir. 2006), vacated due to settlement, 505 F.3d 1006 (9th Cir. 2007). The settlement agreement limits the City’s ability to arrest homeless persons for sleeping, sitting, or standing on public streets until the City constructs 1250 units of permanent supportive housing for the chronically homeless, at least 50 percent of which must be located within Skid Row or greater downtown Los Angeles. See Settlement Agreement, Jones v. City of Los Angeles, No. 03-CV-01142 (C.D. Cal. Sept. 15, 2008).

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Opinion by Judge WARDLAW; Dissent by Judge CALLAHAN.

OPINION

Appellees, nine homeless individuals living in the “Skid Row” district of Los Angeles, charge that the City of Los Angeles *1024 (the “City”) violated their Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights by seizing and immediately destroying their unabandoned personal possessions, temporarily left on public sidewalks while Appellees attended to necessary tasks such as eating, showering, and using restrooms. Finding a strong likelihood of success on the merits of these claims, the district court enjoined the City from confiscating and summarily destroying unabandoned property in Skid Row. The narrow injunction bars the City from:

Lavan v. City of Los Angeles, 797 F.Supp.2d 1005, 1020 (C.D.Cal.2011).

The district court expanded upon the great leeway the City retains to protect public health and safety, noting: “The City [is] able to lawfully seize and detain property, as well as remove hazardous debris and other trash; issuance of the injunction ... merely prevents the City] from unlawfully seizing and destroying personal property that is not abandoned without providing any meaningful notice and opportunity to be heard.” Id.…

dissenting:

I respectfully dissent. I disagree that Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their claims that the City of Los Angeles (the “City”) violated their protected interests under the Fourth Amendment and under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The pivotal question under both Amendments is not whether Plaintiffs had a property interest in the items seized — they may very well have had such an interest — but whether that interest is one that society would recognize as reasonably worthy of protection where the personal property is left unattended on public sidewalks. Because under the due process standard, society does not recognize a property interest in unattended personal property left on public sidewalks, the City’s health and safety concerns allow it to seize and dispose of such property.

In this case, Plaintiffs left their personal property unattended on the sidewalks. They did so despite the numerous 10593 signs blanketing Skid Row that specifically warned that personal property found on the sidewalks in violation of the Los Angeles Municipal Code section 56.11 (the “Ordinance” or “LAMC § 56.11”) would be seized and disposed of during…