Seaton v. Mayberg’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

1 federal appellate · 1 district · 2 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 21 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “We have recognized a constitutional right to the privacy of medical information that Whalen did not, but in contexts different from this case. We held in Tucson Woman’s Clinic v. Eden, [ 379 F.3d 531 (9th Cir.2004) ], that there was such a right, but the context was burdening of abortion, which Whalen expressly distinguished. [Whalen, 429 U.S. at 600 n. 26, 97 S.Ct. 869 ]. Arizona required physicians who performed abortions to allow warrantless, unbounded inspections of their office and access by the state to their patient rec oxds.[Tucson Woman’s Clinic, 379 F.3d at 537.] Physicians also had to send to a state contractor copies of fetal ultrasounds of subsequently aborted fetuses. [/&] We held that summary judgment was precluded because there was a genuine issue of material fact as to “whether the scheme creates an undue burden on the right to seek an abortion.” [Id. at 538.] We held in this context that there was “a constitutionally protected interest in avoiding disclosure of personal matters including medical information” [Id. at 551] and offered a list of five factors[ ] to be considered among others to decide “whether the governmental interest in obtaining information outweighs the individual’s privacy interest.” [Id.] We commented that disclosure of the abortion information to government employees might violate individuals’ rights even without public disclosure. [Id.] We have held that the constitutional right to medical privacy “is a conditional right which may be inf”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 869 F. Supp. 2d 1139 - Huling v. City of Los Banos

2. “We have found only one Supreme Court decision addressing whether the constitution protects medical privacy, Whalen v. Roe [ 429 U.S. 589 , 97 S.Ct. 869 , 51 L.Ed.2d 64 (1977) ]. The case for privacy was considerably stronger in Whalen , because the state law at issue invaded the medical privacy of people who had not been convicted of any crimes, and any prediction of possible criminality did not have a history of past criminality to support the prediction. Under New York law, a physician could not prescribe opiates and other drugs subject to criminal abuse without sending a form to the state giving the name, address and age of the patient. [Id. at 593, 97 S.Ct. 869 .] About 100,000 such forms per month were collected by the state and the information was stored on computers. [Id. at 593-94, 97 S.Ct. 869 .] Physicians claimed in the lawsuit that the law deterred them from providing medically desirable prescriptions, and patients that they feared stigmatization as drug addicts, both claiming that the statute invaded constitutionally protected privacy. [Id. at 595, 97 S.Ct. 869 .] The doctors and patients lost their case. The Court distinguished such cases as Roe v. Wade [ 410 U.S. 113 , 93 S.Ct. 705 , 35 L.Ed.2d 147 (1973)], limiting government power to regulate “marriage, procreation, contraception, family relationships, and child rearing and education,” [Whalen, 429 U.S. at 600 n. 26, 97 S.Ct. 869 ], and held that the compelled disclosure of prescriptions did not “pose a suffi”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 869 F. Supp. 2d 1139 - Huling v. City of Los Banos

3. “Loss of privacy is an inherent incident of confinement. A right of privacy in traditional Fourth Amendment terms is fundamentally incompatible with the close and continual surveillance of inmates and their cells required to ensure institutional security and internal order. We are satisfied that society would insist that the prisoner’s expectation of privacy always yield to what must be considered the paramount interest in institutional security. We join our sister circuits in holding that prisoners do not have a constitutionally protected expectation of privacy in prison treatment records when the state has a legitimate penological interest in access to them. The penological interest in access to whatever medical information there is regarding Seaton is substantial. Prisons need access to prisoners’ medical records to protect prison staff and other prisoners from communicable diseases and violence, and to manage rehabilitative efforts.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 869 F. Supp. 2d 1139 - Huling v. City of Los Banos