## Facts

- Puerto Rico Telephone Company (PRTC), treated as a state actor, operated a restricted-access Executive Communications Center in a Guaynabo office complex.
- The Center was a large, open, shared L-shaped room with work consoles and no private offices or cubicles; it operated 24 hours a day.
- Plaintiffs, security operators, monitored alarms from PRTC facilities and contacted authorities when alarms sounded.
- After an earlier surveillance system was removed following complaints, PRTC installed a new video system in 1993 with multiple fixed, visible cameras covering the workspace and a continuous videotape recording system.
- The cameras recorded video only (no audio) and did not monitor traditionally private areas such as restrooms or locker rooms.
- PRTC notified employees of the surveillance and stated it served security and supervisory purposes, including property protection, incident documentation, and performance monitoring; tapes were reused unless an incident required retention.
- Plaintiffs claimed continuous monitoring, including during meals and breaks taken in the open area, violated constitutional privacy rights and constituted an unreasonable search.

## Issues

1. Whether continuous, overt video-only surveillance of employees in an open, restricted-access work area constitutes an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment.
2. Whether such surveillance violates a constitutionally protected right to privacy under the Due Process Clause (decisional or informational privacy).

## Decision

- The First Circuit affirmed summary judgment for PRTC.
- The court held the surveillance did not violate the Fourth Amendment because plaintiffs lacked an objectively reasonable expectation of privacy in the open, shared workspace given notice, visibility of cameras, and the setting’s security function.
- The court held the surveillance did not violate constitutional privacy because it did not implicate fundamental decisional autonomy interests or involve collection/disclosure of highly personal, confidential information.

## Legal Principles

- Fourth Amendment protection in the workplace turns on whether the employee has a subjective expectation of privacy that society recognizes as reasonable in the circumstances.
- In an open, shared government workplace—especially a secure facility—employees’ privacy expectations are diminished, and overt, notified video-only monitoring of the work area is less likely to constitute an unreasonable search.
- The Due Process Clause protects only limited categories of privacy: (1) decisional autonomy in fundamental personal matters and (2) informational privacy concerning highly personal information; routine visual monitoring of on-duty conduct in a common workspace generally falls outside those categories.
- The constitutionality of workplace surveillance is fact-dependent; visibility/notice, absence of audio recording, confinement to non-intimate spaces, and legitimate security/supervisory objectives weigh against finding a constitutional violation.

## Conclusion

The First Circuit held that continuous, visible, video-only surveillance of employees in an open, restricted-access security workspace, implemented with notice and for legitimate security and supervisory reasons, did not constitute an unreasonable search under the Fourth Amendment and did not infringe constitutional privacy rights protected by substantive due process.


Vega-Rodriguez v. P.R. Tel. Co., 110 F.3d 174 (1st Cir. 1997)