Jones v. City Of Los Angeles

Six homeless individuals, unable to obtain shelter on the night each was cited or arrested, filed this Eighth Amendment challenge to the enforcement of a City of Los Angeles ordinance that criminalizes sitting, lying, or sleeping on public streets and sidewalks at all times and in all places within Los Angeles's city limits. Appellants seek limited injunctive relief from enforcement of the ordinance during nighttime hours, i.e., between 9:00 p.m. and 6:30 a.m., or at any time against the temporarily infirm or permanently disabled. We must decide whether the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment prohibits enforcement of that law as applied to homeless individuals involuntarily sitting, lying, or sleeping on the street due to the unavailability of shelter in Los Angeles.

The facts underlying this appeal are largely undisputed. Edward Jones, Patricia Vinson, George Vinson, Thomas Cash, Stanley Barger, and Robert Lee Purrie ("Appellants") are homeless individuals who live on the streets of Los Angeles's Skid Row district. Appellees are the City of Los Angeles, Los Angeles Police Department ("L.A.P.D.") Chief William Bratton, and Captain Charles Beck ("Appellees" or "the City"). Federal law defines the term "homeless individual" to include (1) an individual who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence; and

(2) an individual who has a primary nighttime residence that is—

(A) a supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations (including welfare hotels, congregate shelters, and transitional housing for the mentally ill);

(B) an institution that provides a temporary residence for individuals intended to be institutionalized; or

(C) a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.

Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Assistance Act of 1987 § 103(a), 42 U.S.C. § 11302(a) (2000). Appellants are six of the more than 80,000 homeless individuals in Los Angeles County on any given night. See L.A. Homeless Servs. Auth., Los Angeles Continuum of Care, Exhibit 1 Narrative, at 2-17 (2001); see also Patrick Burns et al., Econ. Roundtable, Homeless in LA: A Working Paper for the 10-Year Plan To End Homelessness in Los Angeles County (2003) (estimating that more than 253,000 individuals were homeless in Los Angeles County at some point during 2002).

The term "Skid Row" derives from the lumber industry practice of building a road or track made of logs laid crosswise over which other logs were slid. Christine Ammer, The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms 382 (paperback ed.2003). By the 1930s, the term was used to describe the area of town frequented by loggers and densely populated with bars and brothels. Id. Beginning around the end of the nineteenth century, the area now known as Los Angeles's Skid Row became home to a transient population of seasonal laborers as residential hotels began to develop. See Mayor's Citizens' Task Force on Cent. City East, To Build a Community 5 (1988). For decades Skid Row has been home for "the down and out, the drifters, the unemployed, and the chronic alcoholic[s]" of Los Angeles. Id. Covering fifty city blocks immediately east of downtown Los Angeles, Skid Row is bordered by Third Street to the north, Seventh Street to the south, Alameda Street to the east, and Main Street to the west.

Los Angeles's Skid Row has the highest concentration of homeless individuals in the United States. Charlie LeDuff, In Los Angeles, Skid Row Resists an Upgrade, N.Y. Times, July 15, 2003, at A1. According to the declaration of Michael Alvidrez, a manager of single-room-occupancy ("SRO") hotels in Skid Row owned by the Skid Row Housing Trust, since the mid-1970s Los Angeles has chosen to centralize homeless services in Skid Row. See also Edward G. Goetz, Land Use and Homeless Policy in Los Angeles, 16 Int'l. J. Urb. & Regional Res. 540, 543 (1992) (discussing the City's long-standing "policy of concentrating and containing the homeless in the Skid Row area"). The area is now largely comprised of SRO hotels (multi-unit housing for very low income persons typically consisting of a single room with shared bathroom), shelters, and other facilities for the homeless.

Skid Row is a place of desperate poverty, drug use, and crime, where Porta-Potties serve as sleeping quarters and houses of prostitution. Steve Lopez, A Corner Where L.A. Hits Rock Bottom, L.A. Times, Oct. 17, 2005, at A1. Recently, it has been reported that local hospitals and law enforcement agencies from nearby suburban areas have been caught "dumping" homeless individuals in Skid Row upon their release. Cara Mia DiMassa & Richard Winton, Dumping of Homeless Suspected Downtown, L.A. Times, Sept. 23, 2005, at A1. This led Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to order an investigation into the phenomenon in September 2005. Cara Mia DiMassa & Richard Fausset, Mayor Orders Probe of Skid Row Dumping, L.A. Times, Sept. 27, 2005, at B1. L.A.P.D. Chief William Bratton, insisting that the Department does not target the homeless but only people who violate city ordinances (presumably including the ordinance at issue), has stated:

"If the behavior is aberrant, in the sense that it breaks the law, then there are city ordinances. . . . You arrest them, prosecute them. Put them in jail. And if they do it again, you arrest them, prosecute them, and put them in jail. It's that simple."

Cara Mia DiMassa & Stuart Pfeifer, 2 Strategies on Policing Homeless, L.A. Times, Oct. 6, 2005, at A1 [hereinafter DiMassa, Policing Homeless] (omission in original) (quoting Chief Bratton). This has not always been City policy. The ordinance at issue was adopted in 1968. See L.A., Cal., Ordinance 137,269 (Sept. 11, 1968). In the late 1980s, James K. Hahn, who served as Los Angeles City Attorney from 1985 to 2001 and subsequently as Mayor, refused to prosecute the homeless for sleeping in public unless the City provided them with an alternative to the streets. Frederick M. Muir, No Place Like Home: A Year After Camp Was Closed, Despair Still Reigns on Skid Row, L.A. Times, Sept. 25, 1988, § 2 (Metro), at 1.

For the approximately 11,000-12,000 homeless individuals in Skid Row, space is available in SRO hotels, shelters, and other temporary or transitional housing for only 9000 to 10,000, leaving more than 1000 people unable to find shelter each night. See Mayor's Citizens' Task Force, supra, at 5. In the County as a whole, there are almost 50,000 more homeless people than available beds. See L.A. Homeless Servs. Auth., supra, at 2-14. In 1999, the fair market rent for an SRO room in Los Angeles was $379 per month. L.A. Housing Crisis Task Force, In Short Supply 6 (2000). Yet the monthly welfare stipend for single adults in Los Angeles County is only $221. See L.A. Homeless Servs. Auth., supra, at 2-10. Wait-lists for public housing and for housing assistance vouchers in Los Angeles are three-to ten-years long. See The U.S. Conference of Mayors, A Status Report on Hunger and Homelessness in America's Cities 101, 105 (2002) [hereinafter Homelessness Report];1 L.A. Housing Crisis Task Force, supra, at 7.

The result, in City officials' own words, is that "`[t]he gap between the homeless population needing a shelter bed and the inventory of shelter beds is severely large.'" Homelessness Report, supra, at 80. As Los Angeles's homeless population has grown, see id. at 109 (estimating annualized growth of ten percent in Los Angeles's homeless population in the years up to and including 2003), the availability of low-income housing in Skid Row has shrunk, according to the declaration of Alice Callaghan, director of a Skid Row community center and board member of the Skid Row Housing Trust. According to Callaghan's declaration, at night in Skid Row, SRO hotels, shelters, and other temporary or transitional housing are the only alternatives to sleeping on the street; during the day, two small parks are open to the public. Thus, for many in Skid Row without the resources or luck to obtain shelter, sidewalks are the only place to be.

As will be discussed below, Appellants' declarations demonstrate that they are not on the streets of Skid Row by informed choice. In addition, the Institute for the Study of Homelessness and Poverty reports that homelessness results from mental illness, substance abuse, domestic violence, low-paying jobs, and, most significantly, the chronic lack of affordable housing. Inst. for the Study of Homelessness and Poverty, "Who Is Homeless in Los Angeles?" 3 (2000). It also reports that between 33% and 50% of the homeless in Los Angeles are mentally ill, and 76% percent of homeless adults in 1990 had been employed for some or all of the two years prior to becoming homeless. Id. at 2; see also Grace R. Dyrness et al., Crisis on the Streets: Homeless Women and Children in Los Angeles 14 (2003) (noting that approximately 14% of homeless individuals in Los Angeles are victims of domestic violence).

Against this background, the City asserts the constitutionality of enforcing Los Angeles Municipal Code section 41.18(d) against those involuntarily on the streets during nighttime hours, such as Appellants. It provides:

No person shall sit, lie or sleep in or upon any street, sidewalk or other public way.

The provisions of this subsection shall not apply to persons sitting on the curb portion of any sidewalk or street while attending or viewing any parade permitted under the provisions of Section 103.111 of Article 2, Chapter X of this Code; nor shall the provisions of this subsection supply [sic] to persons sitting upon benches or other seating facilities provided for such purpose by municipal authority by this Code.

L.A., Cal., Mun.Code § 41.18(d) (2005). A violation of section 41.18(d) is punishable by a fine of up to $1000 and/or imprisonment of up to six months. Id. § 11.00(m).

Section 41.18(d) is one of the most restrictive municipal laws regulating public spaces in the United States. The City can secure a conviction under the ordinance against anyone who merely sits, lies, or sleeps in a public way at any time of day. Other cities' ordinances similarly directed at the homeless provide ways to avoid criminalizing the status of homelessness by making an element of the crime some conduct in combination with sitting, lying, or sleeping in a state of homelessness. For example, Las Vegas prohibits standing or lying in a public way only when it obstructs pedestrian or vehicular traffic. See, e.g., Las Vegas, Nev., Mun.Code § 10.47.020 (2005) ("It is unlawful to intentionally obstruct pedestrian or vehicular traffic . . . ."). Others, such as Portland, prohibit "camping" in or upon any public property or public right of way. See, e.g., Portland, Or., Mun.Code §§ 14A.50.020,.030 (2006) (prohibiting obstruction of public sidewalks in a designated area or camping on public property). Still others contain safe harbor provisions such as limiting the hours of enforcement. See, e.g., Seattle, Wash., Mun.Code § 15.48.040 (2005) ("No person shall sit or lie down upon a public sidewalk . . . during the hours between seven (7:00) a.m. and nine (9:00) p.m. in the following zones . . . ."); Tucson, Ariz., Mun.Code § 11-36.2(a) (2005) (same, except prohibition extended to 10:00 p.m.); Houston, Tex., Mun.Code § 40-352(a) (2006) (same, except prohibition extended to 11:00 p.m.). Other cities include as a required element sitting, lying, or sleeping in clearly defined and limited zones. See, e.g., Philadelphia, Pa., Mun.Code § 10-611(1)(b)-(c), (2)(g)-(h) (2005) (prohibiting sitting or lying in certain designated zones only); Reno, Nev., Mun.Code § 8.12.015(b) (2005) (similar); Seattle, Wash., Mun.Code § 15.48.040 (similar). As a result of the expansive reach of section 41.18(d), the extreme lack of available shelter in Los Angeles, and the large homeless population, thousands of people violate the Los Angeles ordinance every day and night, and many are arrested, losing what few possessions they may have.2 Appellants are among them.

Robert Lee Purrie is in his early sixties. He has lived in the Skid Row area for four decades. Purrie sleeps on the streets because he cannot afford a room in an SRO hotel and is often unable to find an open bed in a shelter. Early in the morning of December 5, 2002, Purrie declares that he was sleeping on the sidewalk at Sixth Street and Towne Avenue because he "had nowhere else to sleep." At 5:20 a.m., L.A.P.D. officers cited Purrie for violating section 41.18(d). He could not afford to pay the resulting fine.

Purrie was sleeping in the same location on January 14, 2003, when police officers woke him early in the morning and searched, handcuffed, and arrested him pursuant to a warrant for failing to pay the fine from his earlier citation. The police removed his property from his tent, broke it down, and threw all of his property, including the tent, into the street. The officers also removed the property and tents of other homeless individuals sleeping near Purrie. After spending the night in jail, Purrie was convicted of violating section 41.18(d), given a twelve-month suspended sentence, and ordered to pay $195 in restitution and attorneys' fees. Purrie was also ordered to stay away from the location of his arrest. Upon his release, Purrie returned to the corner where he had been sleeping on the night of his arrest to find that all the belongings he had left behind, including blankets, clothes, cooking utensils, a hygiene kit, and other personal effects, were gone.

Stanley Barger suffered a brain injury in a car accident in 1998 and subsequently lost his Social Security Disability Insurance. His total monthly income consists of food stamps and $221 in welfare payments. According to Barger's declaration, he "want[s] to be off the street" but can only rarely afford shelter. At 5:00 a.m. on December 24, 2002, Barger was sleeping on the sidewalk at Sixth and Towne when L.A.P.D. officers arrested him. Barger was jailed, convicted of violating section 41.18(d), and sentenced to two days time served.

When Thomas Cash was cited for violating section 41.18(d), he had not worked for approximately two years since breaking his foot and losing his job, and had been sleeping on the street or in a Skid Row SRO hotel. Cash suffers from severe kidney problems, which cause swelling of his legs and shortness of breath, making it difficult for him to walk. At approximately noon on January 10, 2003, Cash tired as he walked to the SRO hotel where he was staying. He was resting on a tree stump when L.A.P.D. officers cited him.

Edward Jones's wife, Janet, suffers serious physical and mental afflictions. Edward takes care of her, which limits his ability to find full-time work, though he has held various minimum wage jobs. The Joneses receive $375 per month from the Los Angeles County General Relief program, enabling them to stay in Skid Row SRO hotels for the first two weeks of each month. Because shelters separate men and women, and Janet's disabilities require Edward to care for her, the Joneses are forced to sleep on the streets every month after their General Relief monies run out. At 6:30 a.m. on November 20, 2002, Edward and Janet Jones were sleeping on the sidewalk at the corner of Industrial and Alameda Streets when the L.A.P.D. cited them for violating section 41.18(d).

Patricia and George Vinson, a married couple, were looking for work and a permanent place to live when they were cited for violating section 41.18(d). They use their General Relief payments to stay in motels for part of every month and try to stay in shelters when their money runs out. On the night of December 2, 2002, they missed a bus that would have taken them to a shelter and had to sleep on the sidewalk near the corner of Hope and Washington Streets instead. At 5:30 a.m. the next morning, L.A.P.D. officers cited the Vinsons for violating section 41.18(d).

The record before us includes declarations and supporting documentation from nearly four dozen other homeless individuals living in Skid Row who have been searched, ordered to move, cited, arrested, and/or prosecuted for, and in some cases convicted of, violating section 41.18(d). Many of these declarants lost much or all of their personal property when they were arrested.

On February 19, 2003, Appellants filed a complaint in the United States District Court for the Central District of California pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They seek a permanent injunction against the City of Los Angeles and L.A.P.D. Chief William Bratton and Captain Charles Beck (in their official capacities), barring them from enforcing section 41.18(d) in Skid Row between the hours of 9:00 p.m. and 6:30 a.m. Appellants allege that by enforcing section 41.18(d) twenty-four hours a day against persons with nowhere else to sit, lie, or sleep, other than on public streets and sidewalks, the City is criminalizing the status of homelessness in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, and Article I, sections 7 and 17 of the California Constitution, see Cal. Const. art I, § 7 (guaranteeing due process and equal protection); id. § 17 (prohibiting cruel and unusual punishment). Appellants abandoned their second claim pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging violations of a Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process right to treatment for chronic illnesses while in police custody, in the district court. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the district court granted judgment in favor of the City. Relying heavily on Joyce v. City and County of San Francisco, 846 F.Supp. 843 (N.D.Cal.1994), the district court held that enforcement of the ordinance does not violate the Eighth Amendment because it penalizes conduct, not status. This appeal timely followed.

The parties dispute the appropriate standard of review. Appellants argue that the district court's denial of summary judgment should be reviewed de novo, while the City argues that the abuse of discretion standard applies because the district court denied a request for equitable relief. Although we review a district court's summary judgment order granting or denying a permanent injunction for abuse of discretion, Fortyune v. Am. Multi-Cinema, Inc., 364 F.3d 1075, 1079 (9th Cir.2004), we review any determination underlying the court's decision under the standard applicable to that determination, United States v. Alisal Water Corp., 431 F.3d 643, 654 (9th Cir.2005). Therefore, we review de novo the district court's legal determination that a statute is constitutional, United States v. Labrada-Bustamante, 428 F.3d 1252, 1262 (9th Cir.2005), and we review for clear error the district court's findings of fact, Metropolitan Life Ins. Co. v. Parker, 436 F.3d 1109, 1113 (9th Cir.2006). We also review de novo the district court's decision to grant or deny summary judgment. United States v. City of Tacoma, 332 F.3d 574, 578 (9th Cir.2003).

The City challenges Appellants' standing for the first time on appeal. We nevertheless consider this challenge because the question of standing is jurisdictional and may be raised at any time by the parties, Laub v. U.S. Dep't of Interior, 342 F.3d 1080, 1085 (9th Cir.2003), or sua sponte, see RK Ventures, Inc. v. City of Seattle, 307 F.3d 1045, 1056 (9th Cir.2002) (raising issue of standing, but remanding for further development of the record). We conclude that Appellants have standing to bring this action.

The City's contention that standing requires Appellants to have been convicted under the ordinance ignores established standing principles. The City also argues Appellants lack standing because, after being arrested, jailed, and losing their belongings, Appellants could theoretically raise a necessity defense if they were prosecuted. This argument is legally, factually, and realistically untenable.3

Article III of the Constitution requires a plaintiff seeking to invoke the jurisdiction of the federal courts to allege an actual case or controversy. To satisfy the case or controversy requirement, the party invoking a court's jurisdiction must "show that he personally has suffered some actual or threatened injury as a result of the putatively illegal conduct of the defendant, and that the injury fairly can be traced to the challenged action and is likely to be redressed by a favorable decision." Valley Forge Christian Coll. v. Ams. United for Separation of Church and State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 472, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted). In a suit for prospective injunctive relief, a plaintiff is required to demonstrate a real and immediate threat of future injury. City of Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 101-02, 103 S.Ct. 1660, 75 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983) (holding that the threat must be "`real and immediate'" as opposed to "`conjectural' or `hypothetical'"). The key issue is whether the plaintiff is "likely to suffer future injury." Id. at 105, 103 S.Ct. 1660; see also O'Shea v. Littleton, 414 U.S. 488, 496, 498, 94 S.Ct. 669, 38 L.Ed.2d 674 (1974).

Where the plaintiff seeks to enjoin criminal law enforcement activities against him, standing depends on the plaintiff's ability to avoid engaging in the illegal conduct in the future. See Hodgers-Durgin v. de la Vina, 199 F.3d 1037, 1041 (9th Cir.1999) (en banc) (citing Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 15, 118 S.Ct. 978, 140 L.Ed.2d 43 (1998)). The plaintiff need only establish that there is a reasonable expectation that his conduct will recur, triggering the alleged harm; he need not show that such recurrence is probable. See Honig v. Doe, 484 U.S. 305, 318 & n. 6, 108 S.Ct. 592, 98 L.Ed.2d 686 (1988); id. at 320, 108 S.Ct. 592 (distinguishing, inter alia, Lyons, 461 U.S. at 105-06, 103 S.Ct. 1660). Avoiding illegal conduct may be impossible when the underlying criminal statute is unconstitutional. See O'Shea, 414 U.S. at 496, 94 S.Ct. 669 (noting that plaintiffs may have had standing had they alleged that the laws under which they feared prosecution in the future were unconstitutional); Perez v. Ledesma, 401 U.S. 82, 101-02, 91 S.Ct. 674, 27 L.Ed.2d 701 (1971) (Brennan, J., concurring in part and dissenting in part) (noting prior aggressive prosecution under an allegedly unconstitutional law as a factor for finding sufficient controversy for declaratory relief). Past exposure to allegedly unlawful state action, while not alone sufficient to establish a present case or controversy, is "evidence bearing on whether there is a real and immediate threat of repeated injury." Lyons, 461 U.S. at 102, 103 S.Ct. 1660 (internal quotation marks omitted).

Appellants seek only prospective injunctive relief, not damages. They do not ask for section 41.18(d) to be declared facially unconstitutional; they seek only to have its enforcement enjoined in a small area of the city during nighttime hours. Appellants have demonstrated both past injuries and a real and immediate threat of future injury: namely, they have been and are likely to be fined, arrested, incarcerated, prosecuted, and/or convicted for involuntarily violating section 41.18(d) at night in Skid Row. These law enforcement actions restrict Appellants' personal liberty, deprive them of property, and cause them to suffer shame and stigma. In the absence of any indication that the enormous gap between the number of available beds and the number of homeless individuals in Los Angeles generally and Skid Row in particular has closed, Appellants are certain to continue sitting, lying, and sleeping in public thoroughfares and, as a result, will suffer direct and irreparable injury from enforcement of section 41.18(d). As L.A.P.D. Chief Bratton has promised, they will be arrested, prosecuted, and put in jail repeatedly, if necessary. See DiMassa, Policing Homeless, supra. Appellants have therefore alleged an actual case or controversy and have standing to bring this suit.

In arguing that Appellants lack standing, the City misrelies upon dicta in Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977), for the proposition that the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause attaches only postconviction. It contends that Appellants have suffered a constitutionally cognizable harm only if they have been convicted and/or face an imminent threat of future conviction. The City asserts that Appellants have not adequately demonstrated that they have been convicted and/or are likely to be convicted in the future under section 41.18(d).

Ingraham addressed a claim that the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause bars the use of disciplinary corporal punishment in public schools. Id. at 668, 97 S.Ct. 1401. The Court explained that the Clause places three distinct limits on the state's criminal law powers:

First, it limits the kinds of punishment that can be imposed on those convicted of crimes; second, it proscribes punishment grossly disproportionate to the severity of the crime; and third, it imposes substantive limits on what can be made criminal and punished as such.

Id. at 667, 97 S.Ct. 1401 (citations omitted). Reviewing the history of the Eighth Amendment, the Ingraham Court concluded that the Clause does not regulate state action "outside the criminal process." Id. at 667-68, 97 S.Ct. 1401. It reasoned that because the context of disciplining school-children is "wholly different" from that of punishing criminals, disciplinary corporal punishment is not subject to Eighth Amendment scrutiny. Id. at 669-71, 97 S.Ct. 1401.

Ingraham rests on the distinction between state action inside and "outside the criminal process," id. at 667, 97 S.Ct. 1401, not on any distinction between criminal convictions and preconviction law enforcement measures such as arrest, jailing, and prosecution. See id. at 686, 97 S.Ct. 1401 (White, J., dissenting) (explaining that the Court's reasoning depends on the "distinction between criminal and noncriminal punishment"). Thus, contrary to the City's and the dissent's argument, Ingraham does not establish that the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause only attaches postconviction. In fact, the Ingraham decision expressly recognizes that the Clause "imposes substantive limits on what can be made criminal," id. at 667, 97 S.Ct. 1401 (Powell, J., majority opinion), a protection that attaches before conviction, and the very one Appellants seek in this case.

The City and the dissent advance out of context the following dicta from Ingraham to support their contention that a conviction is necessary before one has standing to invoke our jurisdiction: "[the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause] was designed to protect those convicted of crimes," id. at 664, 97 S.Ct. 1401; and "the State does not acquire the power to punish with which the Eighth Amendment is concerned until after it has secured a formal adjudication of guilt in accordance with due process of law," id. at 671 n. 40, 97 S.Ct. 1401. However, that language is relevant only to the first two of the three circumscriptions on the criminal process identified by the Ingraham Court: limits on the kind and proportionality of punishment permissible postconviction. That language is inapplicable when the challenge is based on the third category of limitations, "on what can be made criminal and punished as such." Id. at 667, 97 S.Ct. 1401.

The Clause's first two protections govern the particulars of criminal punishment, "what kind" and "how much," covering only those who have been convicted of a criminal violation and face punitive sanctions. A plaintiff alleging violations of the first or second protections, therefore, has not suffered constitutionally cognizable harm unless he has been convicted. See, e.g., City of Revere v. Mass. Gen. Hosp., 463 U.S. 239, 243-44, 103 S.Ct. 2979, 77 L.Ed.2d 605 (1983) (holding that the Eighth Amendment does not apply to a claim involving deliberate indifference by government officials to the medical needs of an injured suspect before his arrest). Thus, in Hawkins v. Comparet-Cassani, we relied upon the above Ingraham dicta in holding that plaintiffs who had not been convicted lacked standing under the Eighth Amendment to challenge the use of electric stun belts during court proceedings, a claim that arose under the first two protections of the Clause. 251 F.3d 1230, 1238 (9th Cir.2001).

The Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause's third protection, however, differs from the first two in that it limits what the state can criminalize, not how it can punish. See Ingraham, 430 U.S. at 667, 97 S.Ct. 1401. This protection governs the criminal law process as a whole, not only the imposition of punishment postconviction. See, e.g., Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 666, 82 S.Ct. 1417, 8 L.Ed.2d 758 (1962) ("[A] law which made a criminal offense of . . . a disease would doubtless be universally thought to be an infliction of cruel and unusual punishment . . . ."); see also Ingraham, 430 U.S. at 664, 666, 97 S.Ct. 1401 (explaining that the Eighth Amendment concerns "the criminal process" and seeks "to limit the power of those entrusted with the criminal-law function of government"). If the state transgresses this limit, a person suffers constitutionally cognizable harm as soon as he is subjected to the criminal process. This may begin well before conviction: at arrest, see, e.g., McNabb v. United States, 318 U.S. 332, 34