Law Enforcement Authority and Equal Application of Law
Laws are meant to protect citizens from offenders and criminals by minimizing crime. However, as law-abiding citizens of the US, police officers are as accountable under the law as any other citizens. This principle was demonstrated by Highway Patrol Trooper Donna Jane Watts. She stopped a police officer who was driving at 120 mph to an off-duty job while wearing his police uniform and driving a police car. The officer was Fausto Lopez from the Miami Police Department. At first, Lopez ignored her presence on the highway and continued speeding, but Watts chased him, and after four minutes, he pulled over. She arrested him there. However, the incident created problems for Watts. She received prank calls, and after looking into the matter, she found that 88 law-enforcement officers from 25 agencies had accessed Watts’ driver’s-license information more than 200 times in three months. She sued the 25 departments for accessing her data for illegitimate reasons. Because the police officers looked up her license information and harassed her, she was justified in suing the officers. However, police officers may have qualified immunity under certain circumstances. Regardless of immunity, Watts had not done anything against the law that justified harassment, and she had grounds to sue officers who violated her privacy. (Watts v. City of Hollywood, 2015; Watts v. Camacho, 2017).
Florida laws limit highway speeds, and driving above the applicable speed limit is illegal. However, there are exceptions for police officers who can exceed speed limits when they are chasing criminals or rushing to save someone in an emergency. Although Fausto Lopez argued that he was in a hurry and had to reach an off-duty job, that reason did not fall under the type of emergency exception recognized for police officers. Also, he was misusing his authority as an officer by speeding above the legal limit. He was stopped and arrested for what he had done wrong. Watts was doing her duty, and she did it properly. Although she saw that it was a police car and that the person was in police uniform, she did not overlook the violation as some police officers might under an informal practice of professional courtesy. Such courtesy can allow officers to break rules without consequences. However, Watts was willing to stop and arrest him. Moreover, it would have been difficult for her to assume that the driver was acting lawfully merely because he was in a police car, as criminals might also steal police vehicles. Regardless of whether she initially recognized the man as a police officer or suspected that he might be a thief, she stopped him. The police officer was later dismissed for breaking traffic laws. (Fla. Stat. § 316.187)
However, it is surprising that she was harassed by police officers for stopping a man who was violating state laws. One officer stopped another officer from breaking the law, and some of her colleagues, instead of praising her dedication to her job, harassed her. She received prank calls, and human feces were even thrown on her car. She was harassed so much that she became scared of opening her mailbox. In addition, 88 police officers had looked up her driver’s-license information around 200 times. Some of the officers said that they were curious and wanted to see who Watts was. They might have been curious about Watts because she did not follow an informal police protocol or take the side of the police officer. However, curiosity cannot justify illegally accessing her data or harassing her. Moreover, she was relocated from Dade County to Broward County. Although it was only a relocation, the question remains why she needed to be relocated for doing her job correctly. Hence, many police officers were probably offended by what she did, which may explain why she was harassed.
Police Misconduct and Ethical Accountability
Additionally, police officers are there to enforce the laws that the state makes; if they break those laws without a legitimate reason, they undermine respect for the law. Moreover, if police officers protect one another and allow each other to break laws, it can increase police misconduct. If there is no one to stop them from committing unlawful acts, they may feel less need to be careful. Although professional courtesy is important, it should not be applied in every case. Lopez might have received professional courtesy if the speed had been only slightly above the limit, but a person cannot disregard the law entirely in the name of professional courtesy. This might be one reason for the harassment that Watts faced. However, it should not have happened because there might have been serious consequences for both officers if Lopez had been involved in an accident at that speed. Thus, the protection of public safety and law enforcement is more important than professional courtesy.
It is unethical for law-enforcement officers to break the law. If police break the law, it might lead to discrimination and obstruction of justice. It creates a barrier to justice reaching the people. If a person cannot respect the law, why should that person tell others to respect it, and why should others follow that person’s lead? It is crucial for law-enforcement officers to respect the laws that they expect other people to follow. Additionally, police misconduct scares people, and they may lose trust in police departments because of the misconduct of some officers. In this case, Watts’s colleagues should have supported and appreciated her, but some took the wrong side. They harassed the person who was upholding the law. It sends the message that upholding the law and charging police officers who break it might cause isolation and ostracism by others. It may discourage other police officers from standing up, upholding the law, and charging those who are wrong. It also encourages officers who break the law to continue doing so because other people may side with them. Therefore, police officers must support those who are upholding the law; it is part of their duty. If officers become involved in breaking laws or protecting those who do, there must be laws to protect people who are trying to perform their duties properly. Hence, Watts had the right to sue people who allegedly violated the law.
Privacy Rights, Qualified Immunity, and Legal Remedies
The federal Driver’s Privacy Protection Act restricts the disclosure and use of personal information obtained from motor-vehicle records for illegitimate reasons. (18 U.S.C. § 2721) In Watts’s case, there was allegedly no legitimate reason for looking up her information, which could make the access unlawful. Legitimate reasons to obtain and access such information include performing authorized police work, investigating claims, verifying the identity of a person, handling certain lawsuits, and acting with the consent of the person. However, these were allegedly not the reasons for obtaining information about Watts. The officers were accused of obtaining her information out of curiosity or to harass her, and therefore she filed a lawsuit against them. Moreover, civil remedies may be available under federal law for violations involving protected information. (18 U.S.C. § 2724) Because she alleged that her rights were violated, she had the right to bring the case.
However, some argued that the lawsuit was invalid because of qualified immunity. Qualified immunity may protect officials when the law was not clearly established or when the plaintiff fails to show a violation of federal law. In Watts’s case, 88 officers allegedly accessed her data for non-law-enforcement purposes, which she argued was illegal. Moreover, some of them allegedly harassed her after obtaining her address and phone number. However, a decision involving five officials stated that Watts “did not show that the officers…violated federal law” because she failed to show that the officers’ purpose was one prohibited by the DPPA. Hence, the court concluded that those officers had qualified immunity(Watts v. Camacho, 2017). Other groups involved in the litigation settled their disputes with Watts.
To conclude, policing is difficult because it is a job that requires courage and strong professional values. Ms. Watts fulfilled that responsibility. She did not prioritize professional courtesy or friendships over her duty. She focused on her responsibilities, and that earned her animosity from some colleagues, but she was not deterred by it. However, the law sometimes protects officials against liability under doctrines such as qualified immunity. In this case, the police officers who allegedly accessed her information and harassed her were accused of wrongdoing in several ways. For instance, they allegedly violated an officer’s privacy and used information to threaten her for performing her duties properly. This sends a negative message that if a person goes against colleagues, even when those colleagues are wrong, the person may have to bear consequences. It can also protect officers who break the law. It is unethical to side with people who violate the law and to harass an officer who enforces it. Nevertheless, Watts’s actions represented a powerful step by a police officer willing to enforce the law. Regardless of whether she prevailed on every claim, the lawsuit raised awareness and showed that police officers are not automatically immune from consequences when they break the law.
References
18 U.S.C. § 2721 (Driver’s Privacy Protection Act—prohibition on release and use of personal information). https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2721
18 U.S.C. § 2724 (Civil action and remedies under the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act). https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/2724
Fla. Stat. § 316.187 (Establishment of state speed zones). https://www.leg.state.fl.us/Statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&URL=0300-0399/0316/Sections/0316.187.html
Watts v. Camacho, No. 16-15383 (11th Cir. Feb. 8, 2017). https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/ca11/16-15383/16-15383-2017-02-08.html
Watts v. City of Hollywood, 146 F. Supp. 3d 1254 (S.D. Fla. 2015). https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/district-courts/florida/flsdce/0:2014cv61123/443645/202/
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