## Facts

- Rosann Scheetz reported to Allentown police in 1988 that her husband, Officer Kenneth Scheetz, struck her; police generated a public incident report and confidential supplemental investigative reports under department policy.
- After Kenneth was later named “officer of the year,” a reporter for a local newspaper requested the offense and investigative reports concerning the domestic incident; the police chief denied the request.
- The reporter nonetheless obtained the reports, including the confidential supplements, through an unknown source.
- The newspaper published articles describing details taken from the investigative materials, including Rosann’s reported injuries, statements about prior assaults, and counseling-related information.
- The articles criticized the department’s handling of alleged domestic abuse by one of its officers.
- The Scheetzes sued the newspaper, the reporter, and an unknown state employee under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging a conspiracy to violate their constitutional right to privacy by disclosing information from confidential police reports.

## Issues

1. Whether disclosure and publication of information from police reports about a reported domestic dispute implicates a constitutionally protected right to informational privacy enforceable under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
2. Whether a newspaper and reporter can be treated as acting under color of state law based on an alleged conspiracy with an unidentified government employee who leaked confidential police reports.

## Decision

- The Third Circuit affirmed summary judgment for the newspaper and reporter.
- The court held the Scheetzes lacked a constitutionally protected privacy interest in the information published from the police reports about the domestic dispute.
- The court further held the record did not show a conspiracy or joint participation with a state actor sufficient to convert the private media defendants into state actors for § 1983 purposes.

## Legal Principles

- Constitutional informational privacy protects only a narrow class of highly personal confidential information; the existence and scope of protection turn on the nature of the information and reasonable expectations of privacy.
- Reporting an incident to police diminishes reasonable expectations that related information will remain confidential, particularly where criminal charges could be pursued and proceedings could become public.
- A government entity’s internal “confidential” label for records does not, by itself, create a federal constitutional privacy entitlement.
- § 1983 requires action under color of state law; private parties are not liable absent evidence of an agreement or joint participation with a state actor to commit the constitutional violation.
- Mere receipt and publication of leaked government information, without proof of a conspiratorial agreement, is insufficient to establish state action by the press under § 1983.

## Conclusion

The Third Circuit held that publication of details from police reports about a reported domestic incident involving a police officer did not violate a constitutional right to informational privacy and that, without evidence of an agreement with a government leaker, the newspaper and reporter could not be liable under § 1983 as state actors.


Scheetz v. Morning Call, Inc., 946 F.2d 202 (3d Cir. 1991)