Also known as: physical restraints · physically restrain · physically restrained · physically restraining · bodily restraint
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
An act that confines another within fixed boundaries through direct physical means such as barriers or bodily force. The confinement supports liability for false imprisonment when the victim knows of it or suffers harm from it.
Preston Pratt escorted Phoebe Park into a side corridor during a protest and lowered metal security gates at both ends. Phoebe remained unaware that the gates blocked her exit because she was absorbed in her phone and suffered no harm. Under the governing rule there is no liability for the intentional confinement because Phoebe neither knew of it nor was harmed by it.
Paul Peterson was stopped by officers who placed hands on his arms and prevented him from walking away while they investigated a suspected package. The brief physical contact constituted a seizure that required reasonable suspicion from the outset. The restraint supplied the basis for analyzing whether the stop remained within constitutional limits.
Respondent Raymond J. Place arrived at Miami International Airport on August 8, 1980, aboard a nonstop flight from New York City. Two DEA agents, alerted to his arrival, approached him in the baggage claim area after observing his behavior while purchasing a ticket. The agents requested his airline ticket and identification, which Place provided, and he consented to a search of his two checked suitcases. Because his flight was about to depart, the agents decided not to search the luggage at that time. Prompted by Place's remark that he recognized them as police, the agents examined the address tags on his luggage and discovered discrepancies. Further investigation showed that the addresses did not exist and that the telephone number belonged to a different address. The Miami agents relayed this information to DEA authorities in New York. At La Guardia Airport, two DEA agents approached Place after he claimed his bags. Place refused consent to a search of his luggage. The agents informed him they would take the luggage to obtain a search warrant, and Place declined to accompany them. The agents transported the bags to Kennedy Airport for a sniff test by a trained narcotics detection dog. Approximately 90 minutes after the seizure, the dog alerted positively to one bag. Due to the late Friday afternoon timing, the agents held the luggage until Monday, when they obtained a warrant and discovered 1,125 grams of cocaine inside. Place was indicted under 21 U.S.C. § 841(a)(1). The District Court denied his motion to suppress, he pleaded guilty reserving the right to appeal, and the Court of Appeals reversed the conviction.
View casePaige Porter and her accomplice tied a bank teller's hands during a robbery and held the teller in place while taking cash. The physical restraint of the teller triggered a two-level sentencing increase under the applicable guideline. The court applied the enhancement because the restraint went beyond the force inherent in the robbery itself.
In 1998, Ralph Howard Blakely abducted his estranged wife Yolanda from their orchard home in Grant County, Washington. He bound her with duct tape and forced her at knifepoint into a wooden box in the bed of his pickup truck while imploring her to dismiss divorce and trust proceedings. When their 13-year-old son Ralphy returned from school, Blakely ordered him to follow in another car under threat of harming Yolanda with a shotgun. Ralphy escaped at a gas station and sought help, but Blakely continued with Yolanda to a friend's house in Montana before his arrest. The State initially charged Blakely with first-degree kidnapping but reached a plea agreement that reduced the charge to second-degree kidnapping involving domestic violence and use of a firearm. Blakely entered a guilty plea admitting the elements of the reduced charge along with the domestic-violence and firearm allegations, but no other relevant facts. Washington law classified the offense as a class B felony carrying a statutory maximum of ten years, yet specified a standard sentencing range of 49 to 53 months for this offender score and offense level. At sentencing the State recommended a term within the standard range. After hearing Yolanda's account of the incident, the judge rejected the recommendation and conducted a three-day bench hearing that included testimony from Blakely, Yolanda, Ralphy, a police officer, and medical experts. The judge issued 32 findings of fact detailing the defendant's motivation, methods, and violation of a restraining order, then concluded that Blakely had acted with deliberate cruelty, a statutorily enumerated aggravating factor. The judge imposed an exceptional sentence of 90 months, 37 months above the standard maximum. Blakely appealed, contending that the sentencing procedure deprived him of the right to jury determination of facts essential to his sentence. The Washington Court of Appeals affirmed, relying on the state supreme court's earlier rejection of a similar challenge, and the Washington Supreme Court denied discretionary review. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to examine the sentencing procedure under the Sixth Amendment.
View casePriscilla Parks challenged a state regulation that limited her ability to direct her child's education. The Court recognized that the liberty protected by due process extends beyond freedom from physical restraint to include parental rights. The regulation therefore received heightened scrutiny even though no bodily confinement occurred.
The Pennsylvania Abortion Control Act of 1982, as amended in 1988 and 1989, established several requirements governing the performance of abortions within the Commonwealth. The Act required a woman seeking an abortion to provide informed consent after receiving specific information from a physician or counselor at least twenty-four hours before the procedure. It mandated that a minor obtain the informed consent of one parent, subject to a judicial bypass option. It further required a married woman to sign a statement confirming that she had notified her husband of her planned abortion, unless certain exceptions applied. The Act also imposed reporting obligations on facilities providing abortion services and defined a medical emergency exception to the various requirements. Before any of these provisions took effect, the petitioners brought suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. The petitioners were five abortion clinics and one physician representing himself as well as a class of physicians who provide abortion services. They sought declaratory and injunctive relief and challenged each provision as unconstitutional on its face. The District Court entered a preliminary injunction. After conducting a three-day bench trial, the District Court held all the provisions unconstitutional and entered a permanent injunction against their enforcement by Pennsylvania. The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed in part and reversed in part. It adopted the District Court's factual findings and legal analysis except with respect to the spousal notification requirement. The Court of Appeals upheld the spousal notification requirement as constitutional and applied the undue burden standard in evaluating the provisions. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to consider the constitutionality of the challenged provisions of the Pennsylvania statute.
View casePearl Porter sought a declaration that the state ban on physician-assisted suicide violated her liberty interest. The Court held that the Due Process Clause protects more than freedom from physical restraint yet declined to recognize a fundamental right to assistance in ending life. The absence of a tradition supporting the claimed right defeated the constitutional challenge.
Washington has prohibited assisting suicide since its territorial days. In 1854, the first Territorial Legislature outlawed assisting another in the commission of self-murder. The current statute, Wash. Rev. Code § 9A.36.060, provides that a person is guilty of promoting a suicide attempt when he knowingly causes or aids another person to attempt suicide, and classifies it as a class C felony punishable by up to five years imprisonment and a $10,000 fine. Washington's Natural Death Act, enacted in 1979, states that the withholding or withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment at a patient's direction shall not constitute a suicide, but the state has consistently rejected efforts to legalize physician-assisted suicide, including a 1991 ballot initiative defeated by voters. The respondents in this case are four physicians who practice in Washington and treat terminally ill patients, three terminally ill patients who sought to end their lives with physician assistance and have since died, and Compassion in Dying, a nonprofit organization that counsels people considering physician-assisted suicide. The physicians declared that they would assist their patients in ending their lives if not for the assisted-suicide ban. Petitioners are the State of Washington and its Attorney General. In January 1994, the respondents filed this action in the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. They sought a declaration that Wash. Rev. Code § 9A.36.060 is unconstitutional on its face and an injunction against its enforcement. The District Court held that the statute was unconstitutional. A panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed that decision, but the full court sitting en banc reversed the panel and affirmed the District Court. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the case.
View casePulse Media employee Preston Pratt was taken to the station without probable cause and held for questioning. The physical restraint and removal from the street amounted to an arrest that required probable cause. Because the officers lacked that justification the detention violated the Fourth Amendment.
On March 26, 1971, the proprietor of a pizza parlor in Rochester, New York, was killed during an attempted robbery. On August 10, 1971, Detective Anthony Fantigrossi learned of a possible lead implicating petitioner Irving Dunaway in the crime from an informant. Fantigrossi questioned a jail inmate but obtained no information sufficient to secure a warrant for Dunaway's arrest. Nevertheless, on the morning of August 11, 1971, three detectives located Dunaway at a neighbor's house and took him into custody. Although not told he was under arrest, Dunaway would have been physically restrained if he had attempted to leave. He was driven to police headquarters in a police car and placed in an interrogation room. After receiving Miranda warnings, Dunaway waived his right to counsel and made statements and drew sketches that incriminated him in the crime. He was then formally arrested and charged with murder and attempted robbery. Dunaway's motion to suppress the statements and sketches was denied at trial, and he was convicted by a jury. Following initial affirmances and a remand from the Supreme Court in light of Brown v. Illinois, the County Court found the detention illegal and granted the suppression motion, but the Appellate Division reversed that determination. The New York Court of Appeals dismissed Dunaway's application for leave to appeal.
View caseNo. The defendant need only intend to confine the plaintiff and cause confinement by any effective means, including physical barriers or orders carried out by others. Direct bodily contact is not required.
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No. The tort protects freedom of movement. Awareness of the confinement or any resulting harm is sufficient. Bodily injury is not an element.
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When the defendant knowingly restrains the victim during the commission of the felony and death occurs in the course of that felony, the intent to commit the felony supplies implied malice even if the precise mechanism of death was accidental.
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…of liberty protected by the Due Process Clause. The liberty guaranteed by the Due Process Clause is not limited to freedom from bodily restraint. It is a broad concept that includes the right to be free from unwarranted governmental intrusion into matters so fundamentally affecting a person as the decision whether to bear or beget a…