Johnetta J. v. Municipal Court

In Johnetta J. v. Municipal Court (1990) 218 Cal. App. 3d 1255, the court addressed a Fourth Amendment challenge to Health and Safety Code section 199.95 et seq. enacted by the voters in 1988 as part of Proposition 96. That section, now renumbered, is Health and Safety Code section 121050 et seq., which is at issue here. In Johnetta J., supra, the defendant argued the mandatory AIDS test, ordered after she bit an officer, violated the Fourth Amendment because it permitted bodily intrusion without probable cause to believe the AIDS virus would be found, and the statute failed to provide for a balancing test to determine the propriety of the intrusion under the circumstances. (Johnetta J. v. Municipal Court, supra, 218 Cal. App. 3d at p. 1270.) The court rejected that claim, relying on the United States Supreme Court's "special needs" rule articulated in Skinner, supra, 489 U.S. at page 619 109 S. Ct. at p. 1414. (Johnetta J., supra, at pp. 1272-1274.) Such a rule provides an exception to the warrant requirement " 'when "special needs, beyond the normal need for law enforcement, make the warrant and probable-cause requirement impractical." ' " (Id. at p. 1272.) The court in Johnetta J. found the statutory scheme enacted by Proposition 96 stemmed from the "substantial" special need of protecting the health and safety of law enforcement officers, thereby justifying the relaxation of the normal Fourth Amendment requirement of individualized suspicion that the tested person is infected with AIDS. It specifically rejected the contention that the state must have probable cause to believe the person will test HIV positive, noting that "medical opinion cannot rule out the possibility of HIV transfer to an officer suffering a bite." (Johnetta J. v. Municipal Court, supra, 218 Cal. App. 3d at pp. 1279-1284.) The court further found that the balance of interests weighed in favor of the statute because blood testing is a minor intrusion warranting limited protection (id. at pp. 1275-1277); a probable cause requirement would not be practical as there is no way for the officer to know the infection status of the person who assaulted him or her (id. at p. 1280); the statute applied to individuals accused of assaultive crimes who have limited expectation of privacy (id. at p. 1282); and the statute did not require blanket testing or exclusion from society of those tested, but required a probable cause finding of fluid transfer, a medically approved test procedure, and strict limitations on disclosure. (Id. at p. 1284.)