Camreta v. Greene Ex Rel. S. G.
The Supreme Court held that officials who win a case on qualified-immunity grounds can generally still ask the Court to review an appeals court's finding that they violated the Constitution, even though they already won.
But the Court dismissed this particular case as moot, because the girl at the center of the dispute had grown up, moved away, and would never again face the school interview practice at issue -- so the Court vacated only the constitutional portion of the appeals court's opinion rather than deciding the underlying Fourth Amendment question.
“So long as it continues in effect, he must either change the way he performs his duties or risk a meritorious damages action.”
Explaining why an official can be injured by an adverse constitutional ruling even without owing damages.
How it got here: A trial court ruled for the officials; the Ninth Circuit agreed they had immunity but also ruled their conduct unconstitutional, and the officials asked the Supreme Court to review that constitutional ruling.
The Case in Depth
What happened
A child-welfare caseworker and a sheriff's deputy interviewed a nine-year-old girl at her Oregon school about suspected sexual abuse by her father, without a warrant or parental consent. Her mother sued the two officials for money damages, arguing the interview violated the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable searches and seizures.
The question before the Court
Could two officials who won a lawsuit on qualified-immunity grounds still ask the Supreme Court to overturn a lower court's ruling that they had violated the Constitution?
The Court's answer
Yes -- the Court ruled that officials who win on qualified immunity can generally still seek Supreme Court review of a lower court's finding that they violated the Constitution. Because such a ruling sets binding law that will affect the official's future conduct even though he owes no damages, he has a real stake in challenging it, satisfying the requirement that a case present an actual dispute rather than a hypothetical one.
But the Court did not resolve the Fourth Amendment question here, because the case had become moot: the girl involved had moved out of state and was about to turn 18, so she would never again be subject to the challenged school-interview practice. The Court therefore vacated only the part of the lower court's opinion addressing the constitutional merits and sent the case back.
Curious how the Court got there? See the step-by-step legal reasoning →
Why it matters
Government workers who are told their conduct was unconstitutional -- even while being cleared of paying damages -- can now try to get the Supreme Court to erase that finding before it becomes binding guidance for future cases. This affects how caseworkers, police, and other officials navigate constitutional rulings issued alongside immunity decisions in civil-rights lawsuits nationwide.
What changes now
The case returns to the lower courts, but only the qualified-immunity ruling favoring the officials remains in effect; the Ninth Circuit's constitutional holding on the Fourth Amendment question has been erased and carries no binding force. The broader question of whether the school interview was constitutional remains unresolved and could arise again in a future case with a live plaintiff. This is a final ruling on the reviewability question, but the Fourth Amendment merits were never decided.
What this does not decide
The Court did not decide whether the school interview actually violated the Fourth Amendment, nor whether lower appellate courts may hear appeals from officials who already won on immunity grounds. It also left open how future courts should treat the vacated constitutional ruling going forward.
Concurrences and dissents
Concurrence — Justice Scalia
Justice Scalia joined the majority but suggested an alternative fix: stop letting lower courts decide constitutional questions unnecessarily when officials already have immunity, which would avoid the whole problem the Court had to solve. He noted the parties hadn't asked for that approach but said he'd consider it in a future case.
Concurrence — Justice Sotomayor
Justice Sotomayor agreed the case was moot and that vacating part of the ruling was the right fix, but she thought the Court should have stopped there. She argued it was improper to decide the difficult question of whether prevailing officials can generally seek review, since the case could be resolved on mootness alone.
Dissent — Justice Kennedy
“Dictum, though not precedent, may have its utility; but it ought not to be treated as a judgment standing on its own.”Kennedy's core objection that the majority treats an unnecessary legal statement as if it were an appealable judgment.
Justice Kennedy argued the Court's decision breaks a foundational rule that only judgments, not statements in opinions, may be appealed, and that officials who got everything they asked for should not be allowed to appeal at all. He contended the majority stretched two old precedents beyond their facts and created an unbounded, awkward new exception to solve a problem it should instead fix by discouraging unnecessary constitutional rulings in immunity cases.
How the Court got there
The legal reasoning, step by step
- The Court first asked whether Article III's case-or-controversy requirement -- the rule that federal courts may only decide real, live disputes -- bars a prevailing party from seeking review at all. It concluded that a party who won on immunity can still show injury, cause, and a fix, because an adverse constitutional ruling controls his future conduct even without damages liability.
- The Court then addressed a separate, non-constitutional practice: its own long-standing reluctance to hear appeals brought by parties who already won below. It recognized an exception where there is a strong policy reason to allow the appeal.
- The Court found that reason here: qualified-immunity rulings on the constitutional merits are deliberately designed to create binding law and guide official conduct going forward, unlike ordinary stray comments in an opinion, so they function much like a real judgment even though no damages were awarded.
- Applying that reasoning, the Court held that immunized officials generally may seek its review of adverse constitutional rulings issued alongside a grant of immunity, though the Court will still pick and choose such cases using its usual certiorari standards.
- Turning to this specific case, the Court found a second, independent problem: mootness. Because the girl had moved away and neared adulthood, she could never again be subjected to the challenged school-interview practice, so there was no live dispute left for the Court to decide on the merits.
- Following its usual practice for cases that become moot on appeal, the Court concluded that fairness required erasing the unreviewed constitutional ruling so it would not carry legal weight, rather than letting it stand as though it had survived Supreme Court review.
Doctrinal impact
Cases affected by this decision
Reaffirms United States v. Munsingwear, Inc. (340 U. S. 36)
The Court relied on Munsingwear's rule of vacating rulings that a party could not get reviewed due to mootness.
Reaffirms Pearson v. Callahan (555 U. S. 223)
The Court leaned on Pearson's rule letting lower courts decide constitutional merits before addressing immunity.
Distinguishes Deposit Guaranty Nat. Bank v. Roper (445 U. S. 326)
The dissent argued this case doesn't support the majority's new rule; the majority used it only for a narrower point about standing.