The recent decision by the U.S. District Court for the District of Minnesota in OOIDA v. Dunaski protects truck drivers from unnecessary police questioning pertaining to driver fatigue. The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association (OOIDA) and one of its drivers brought suit against several officers from the Minnesota State Patrol after the officers subjected the driver to intense questioning intended to determine whether he was fatigued even though they had no reasonable belief that he was. After a bench trial, the court ruled that states are prohibited from going beyond the standard Level III fatigue-related verification unless they have a reasonably articulable reason to suspect that a driver might be fatigued.
Background
On May 10, 2008, Stephen House was traveling through Clay County, Minnesota with his co-driver wife and adult son when he was stopped at a weigh station. Minnesota State Patrol officers determined that House’s log book was current and that he was operating within the on-duty hours of service limit. Despite this, the officers interviewed him regarding issues that were only loosely related to fatigue, even though they had no reason to believe that he was fatigued.
Over the course of sixty minutes of questioning, officers asked House questions such as his neck size, if he had Playboy magazines, books or televisions in his vehicle, his frequency of bathroom use at night, how often he opened his eyes when his wife drove, whether he had a cell phone, his health, his allergy history, and whether he could fit in the sleeper berth with his adult son who had Down Syndrome.
The questions the officers asked were in part from the “Fatigued Driving Evaluation Checklist” that were recently created by the Minnesota State Patrol. The checklist imposed no limitations on what investigating officers could ask.
A Minnesota State Patrol memo instructed officers not to explain to drivers why they were asking the questions they were asking. One of the officers told House that the questioning was for a sleep survey and another officer told House’s wife that they would not issue tickets related to the interview. In reality, they were questioning House to determine whether he was fatigued and were prepared to put him out-of-service if he was.
After the questioning, the officers determined that House was fatigued and ordered him out-of-service for 10 hours.
Unreasonable Search and Seizure
The court held that the Minnesota State Patrol officers violated House’s right against unreasonable searches guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution by questioning him when they had no reasonably articulable reason to believe that he was fatigued. Warrantless searches of a closely-regulated industry such as the trucking industry are only constitutional if (1) they meet a substantial government interest, (2) the inspection is necessary to further a regulatory scheme, and (3) the regulatory program advises the owner of the commercial vehicle of the search.
Here, the questioning was unconstitutional because inspection was not necessary to further a regulatory scheme and drivers were not advised of the purpose for the search. The search did not further a regulatory scheme because it did not limit the circumstances in which an officer could question a driver about fatigue, as officers could potentially question drivers who did not appear to be fatigued.
Additionally, the officers did not advise House of the purpose for his detention, the purpose for the questioning, or why there was such a broad scope for the questioning. One of the patrol’s purported motives for performing these evaluations was to deter fatigued driving. The court seriously questioned the deterrent effect because there was no publicity regarding the inspections.
None of the officers’ recorded observations supported “a reasonable or articulable suspicion that House was too ill or fatigued to drive” safely and the questions they asked were not reasonably related to whether House was too fatigued to drive. Because they had no suspicion of fatigue, the inspection should not have gone beyond the standard parameters of a Level III inspection, which, as it pertains to fatigue, consists of checking a driver’s log book and observing the driver.
Conclusion
The lesson from this case is that states must have a reasonably articulable reason to go beyond standard Level III verification to ask further questions when investigating driver fatigue. When investigating fatigue in a Level III inspection, investigators may only check a driver’s logbooks to ensure that they are up-to-date, check that the driver is within the hours of service requirements and observe the driver’s overall condition. Any further questioning must be supported by a reasonably articulable reason.
Therefore, even if there is a uniform state procedure for questioning, as there appeared to be with the Fatigued Driver Evaluation Checklist, this uniform procedure may not exceed the standard protocol for Level III inspections unless there is a reasonable suspicion of fatigue.
While the case is not binding on courts outside of Minnesota, the fact that the court addressed federal constitutional concerns means that this case could affect how investigating officers in other states investigate driver fatigue.
This alert was written by Bryan Boyle.