Facts of the Case
Mary Ann Sause, representing herself, filed a lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against members of the Louisburg, Kansas, police department, as well as the current and former mayor of the town. In her complaint she alleges that two police officers visited her apartment in response to a noise complaint, entered her apartment without consent, and “then proceeded to engage in a course of strange and abusive conduct.” She further alleges that at one point she “knelt and began to pray but one of the officers ordered her to stop.” Sause claims that the officers’ conduct violated her First Amendment right to the free exercise of religion and her Fourth Amendment right to be free of unreasonable searches and seizures. The defendants moved to dismiss Sause’s claim for failure to state a claim, asserting that they were entitled to qualified immunity. The district court granted the motion and dismissed the complaint. On appeal, Sause—now with counsel—argued only that her free exercise rights were violated by the officers’ conduct (dropping her Fourth Amendment claims). The Tenth Circuit affirmed the district court’s dismissal of the action, concluding that the officers were entitled to qualified immunity.
Question
Does the failure of the self-represented plaintiff in this case to raise her Fourth Amendment claim on appeal after bringing closely related First and Fourth Amendment claims in the original action render unnecessary the court’s resolution of her Fourth Amendment claims?
Conclusion
In a per curiam opinion, the Court held that Sause’s failure to raise her Fourth Amendment claims on appeal did not render unnecessary the lower court’s resolution of the “inextricabl[y]” linked First and Fourth Amendment claims. The district court should have interpreted the pro se complaint “liberally,” and in doing so it should find that the plaintiff’s Fourth Amendment claims cannot properly be dismissed for failure to state a claim. Although the plaintiff raised only her First Amendment claim on appeal, even that claim “demanded consideration of the ground on which the officers were present in the apartment and the nature of any legitimate law enforcement interests that might have justified an order to stop praying at the specific time in question.” Without such consideration, a finding of qualified immunity for the officers would be premature.