July 2014 - Parks & Recreation - 31

Mission-Related Detention
The federal district court also considered whether the
prolonged detention to verify Hesterberg's identity and
check for any outstanding arrest warrants " was part of
her investigation of the dog-leash violation. " According
to the court, the federal government would be entitled to
summary judgment if " Cavallaro's reasons for extending
Hesterberg's detention were related to the initial 'mission'
of the stop, " i.e., investigation of the dog-leash violation.
In the opinion of the federal district court, the undisputed
facts in this case compelled " a finding that Cavallaro's verification of Hesterberg's identity was part of her initial investigation of the leash-law violation " and, therefore, " related
to the original justification for the detention. "
[O]ne of the reasons Cavallaro requested Hesterberg's
name, address and date of birth was to include the information in the " local database " or " local file " that records leashlaw contacts for future reference. The goal of the database is
to catalogue leash-law violators who have received an oral
warning so that if they violate the same law in the future,
the officer will be aware of the prior warning.
Accordingly, while Cavallaro had " verbally warned " Hesterberg, an appropriate warning required Cavallaro to wait
for a return call from dispatch to properly identify Hesterberg
in order to place his name in the local database of leash-law
violators for future enforcement use by NPS park rangers.
The federal district court, therefore, concluded that " Cavallaro's continued detention of him pending verification of
his identity did not violate the Fourth Amendment " because
the " mission of Cavallaro's stop was not complete while
Cavallaro was attempting to verify Hesterberg's identity
with dispatch. " In other words, the court found " Cavallaro
did not prolong the detention beyond the time reasonably
required to complete Cavallaro's 'mission' as a matter of
law. " In so doing, the court found that " the warrants check
alone did not prolong the detention " because the warrants
check and the identification verification were part of a " simultaneous " process. Moreover, the court found any delay
in this simultaneous process was attributable to Hesterberg
giving Cavallaro " false identifying information. "

NPS database. Having found, " as a matter of law, the detention was not prolonged for reasons unrelated to Cavallaro's
'mission' " in issuing the warning, the court found a sufficient
" Fourth Amendment justification for continuing the stop. "
As a result, the federal district court granted partial summary judgment in favor of the federal government, effectively
dismissing Hesterberg's false arrest/imprisonment claim, but
not Hesterberg's claims of negligence and assault/battery.
While the federal district court found this particular stop
and detention to be constitutional, with 20/20 hindsight, this
unfortunate incident might prompt an agency review of the
authorized use of Tasers in subduing nonviolent violators
of park rules and regulations, including violators of the new
leash law. Moreover, a review of contemporaneous media
reports and commentary would suggest that the NPS use
of a Taser on a recalcitrant 50-year-old dog walker was not
viewed favorably in the " court of public opinion. "
James C. Kozlowski, J.D., Ph.D., is an attorney and Associate Professor
in the School of Recreation, Health and Tourism at George Mason
University (jkozlows@gmu.edu). Webpage with link to Law Review
archive (1982 to present): http://mason.gmu.edu/~jkozlows.

Conclusion
The federal district court, therefore, held " Cavallaro's initial seizure of Hesterberg was undisputedly lawful " because
" Hesterberg had violated the leash law in Cavallaro's presence. " Moreover, the court held the detention was prolonged
for reasons related to the grounds for the original detention,
i.e., identification of leash-law violators for inclusion in the

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