CHRISTOPHER Klump is a student at Nazareth Area High School, which is in northeastern Pennsylvania. The high school has a policy that permits students to carry, but not use or display, cell phones during school hours. On 17 March 2004, Christopher's cell phone fell out of his pocket during a morning class. Considering the device displayed, his teacher enforced the policy by confiscating Christopher's cell phone. Later that day, assistant principal Margaret Grube and the teacher allegedly accessed Christopher's cell phone directory, found the names of nine other students, and used its keys to call the other students to determine whether any of them was violating the school's cell phone policy. (1) They also accessed Christopher's text messages and voice mail. In doing so, they used the cell phone's America Online Instant Messaging feature to converse, without identifying themselves as anyone other than Christopher, with his younger brother. They then allegedly deleted their phone calls and messages from the cell phone's memory card. They returned the cell phone to Christopher at the end of the school day without further discussion. On March 22, Christopher's parents had a meeting with the teacher, assistant principal, and assistant superintendent about the events of the 17th. During the meeting, assistant principal Grube told them that, while she was in possession of the cell phone, Christopher received a text message from his girlfriend requesting that he get her a f***in' tampon. The term tampon, Grube later averred, is slang for a large marijuana cigarette, thus prompting her subsequent actions with the cell phone to investigate possible drug use at school. At the next meeting of the board of education, the parents inquired about Christopher's situation, but the board issued a no-comment response. The parents hired an attorney, who wrote the superintendent demanding that Grube and the teacher be disciplined. When reporters for the local newspaper and for the Philadelphia NBC affiliate television station contacted him for confirmation of the parents' story, the superintendent allegedly told them that the investigation of Christopher for drug use or distribution was ongoing. On or about 1 July 2004, Christopher's parents filed suit in state court on his behalf against the teacher, the assistant principal, the superintendent, and the district. Their suit consisted of a whole host of claims, including alleged violations of Pennsylvania's wiretapping statute and the Fourth Amendment search and seizure clause. On 29 July 2004, the district defendants had the case removed to federal court and, once there, filed a motion for dismissal. On 30 March 2006, the federal district court issued its decision in response to the dismissal motion. (2) First, the court granted the motion with regard to two of the three claims under Pennsylvania's Wiretapping and Electronic Surveillance Control Act, ruling that Christopher lacked standing under the act for the claim concerning the alleged interception and use of the instant messages. The right to sue under this provision of the act belongs only to the person with whom the communication originated (in this case, Christopher's brother), not with the recipient of the message (i.e., Christopher). On the other hand, the claim based on the alleged access to Christopher's stored voice mail and text messages survived the dismissal motion, because the court interpreted the applicable section of the act as providing standing for both the sender and the recipient. Christopher's claim premised on the alleged accessing of his cell phone directory and voice mail log failed because these sources are not communications and thus are not covered under the act. Second, the court denied the motion to dismiss the claim that the superintendent was liable for slander per se and that he had also engaged in invasion of Christopher's common law right to privacy by disseminating statements that portrayed him in a false light to his classmates and the community at large. …
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Jan 15, 2008
Stefano Miraglia + 2
Open Access