D.D.C.: GPS on taxicabs doesn’t violate Fourth Amendment

Requiring D.C. taxis to have GPS that transmits detailed information about their location and fares being charged does not violate the Fourth Amendment (following the NYC case). Azam v. D.C. Taxicab Comm’n, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 74353 (D.D.C. June 2, 2014):

Plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment claim fails because requiring licensed taxicab drivers in the District to install a MTS with a GPS tracking device does not constitute a Fourth Amendment search. A search within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment occurs when the government trespasses on private property, United States v. Jones, 132 S. Ct. 945, 949, 181 L. Ed. 2d 911 (2012), or when it infringes on an individual’s “reasonable expectation of privacy.” See Katz v. United States, 389 U.S. 347, 351, 88 S. Ct. 507, 19 L. Ed. 2d 576 (1967); Maryland v. Macon, 472 U.S. 463, 469, 105 S. Ct. 2778, 86 L. Ed. 2d 370 (1985); see also Jones (“the Katz reasonable-expectation-of-privacy test has been added to, not substituted for, the common-law trespassory test”). Here there has been no trespass and no infringement of a reasonable expectation of privacy. As recently explained by another federal district court, confronted with a Fourth Amendment challenge to similar taxicab requirements, “mandating the installation of [a taximeter system with GPS tracking] and installing the system in compliance with regulations do not constitute a common-law trespass: taxi drivers are aware of the system, the system is installed pursuant to regulations, and the taxicabs in which the system is installed are not truly private vehicles.” See El-Nahal v. Yassky, No. 13-cv-03690, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13522, 2014 WL 333463, at *4 (S.D.N.Y. Jan. 29, 2014). In addition, neither the taxicab drivers nor passengers have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the pick-up and drop-off data collected by the GPS tracking aspect of the MTS. In 1983, the Supreme Court held that “[a] person traveling in an automobile on public thoroughfares has no reasonable expectation of privacy in his movements from one place to another.” See United States v. Knotts, 460 U.S. 276, 281, 103 S. Ct. 1081, 75 L. Ed. 2d 55 (1983). Applying Knotts, other courts have held, and this Court agrees, that requiring a taxicab driver to install a GPS tracking device that records the start and end of each trip does not infringe on any reasonable expectation of privacy. See El-Nahal, 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13522, [WL] at *5-*6 (no reasonable expectation of privacy in trip data given long history of regulation of taxicab industry and prior requirement to create “trip sheets” containing the same information); see also Buliga v. New York City Taxi and Limousine Comm’n., 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 94024, 2007 WL 4547738, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. 2007) (“well established that there is no Fourth Amendment protection accorded information about the location and movement of cars on public thoroughfares”), aff’d, 324 F. App’x 82 (2d Cir. 2009); Alexandre v. New York City Taxi and Limousine Comm’n, 2007 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 73642, 2007 WL 2826952, at *9 (S.D.N.Y. Sep. 28, 2007) (“Where, as in the taxicab context presented here, there is likely no legitimate expectation of privacy, there is also no search or seizure within the ambit of the Fourth Amendment.”)11 Absent a Fourth Amendment “search,” there can be no Fourth Amendment violation, and plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment count must be dismissed.