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Desertrain v. City of Los Angeles | 754 F.3d 1147 (2014)

Under the vagueness doctrine, a law violates the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment if it fails to provide ordinary individuals with fair notice of what is prohibited, or is so standardless that it allows arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement. In the 2014 case Desertrain versus City of Los Angeles, the Ninth Circuit considered whether this doctrine applied to a Los Angeles ordinance that prohibited homeless individuals from living in their vehicles.

In 1983, Los Angeles enacted Municipal Code Section 85.02, which prohibited the use of a vehicle as, quote, “living quarters either overnight, day-by-day, or otherwise,” unquote. Nearly thirty years later, Los Angeles officials held a town hall meeting on homelessness to address complaints of homeless individuals living in their vehicles on the streets of Venice.

During the meeting, city officials repeated that their concern was not homelessness generally, but the illegal dumping of trash and human waste on city streets that was endangering public health. As a result, officials announced a renewed commitment to enforcing Section 85.02. The Los Angeles Police Department then began looking for vehicles containing possessions normally found in a home, such as food, bedding, and clothing.

Six homeless individuals, including Cheyenne Desertrain, were arrested or cited for violating Section 85.02 based on various activities that police observed. Some of the activities included eating food inside a vehicle, having a sleeping bag inside a vehicle, talking on a cell phone inside a vehicle, and staying in a vehicle to get out of the rain. In addition, many of the individuals hadn’t been cited for past conduct that could’ve fallen under the purview of Section 85.02.

Subsequently, Desertrain and others filed a Section 1983 action against Los Angeles in federal district court, challenging the law’s constitutionality. Specifically, they argued that Section 85.02 was unconstitutionally vague on its face because it didn’t provide fair notice of the conduct it prohibited and promoted arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement. Both parties then filed cross-motions for summary judgment, claiming they were entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The court granted Los Angeles’s motion, and Desertrain and others appealed to the Ninth Circuit.

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