Castle Rock v. Gonzales, 545 U.S. 748 (2005)

Jessica Gonzales obtained a restraining order against her estranged husband that prohibited him from seeing Gonzales or their three daughters outside prescheduled visits. He abducted the three children shortly afterward, and the police responded to her requests for help by telling her to wait and see whether the husband returned the children. Her husband opened fire inside the police station six hours later, and he was killed by the police. During the previous night, he had killed all three of their children. Gonazales argued that the police had violated her due process rights by willfully or negligently declining to enforce the restraining order that the court had granted her. The lower court determined that this complaint failed to state a claim, but the Tenth Circuit ruled that she had a claim limited to procedural rather than substantive due process. It based the decision on mandatory language in the Colorado law on restraining orders, finding that this entitled someone protected under a restraining order to receive protective services from the police. The court also noted that the failure of the police to attempt to arrest her husband might well have violated the procedural due process rights that were implied under this state law.

Whether an individual who has obtained a state-law restraining order has a constitutionally protected property interest in having the police enforce the restraining order when they have probable cause to believe it has been violated.

The judgment is reversed.

This decision seemed disheartening for advocates of the movement to stop violence against women. It appears to render restraining orders relatively ineffective by providing no penalties for perfunctory enforcement. The substantial amount of discretion given to police in these situations means that they are not required to take any particular action.