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During a sixth-grade choir class, an assistant principal allegedly ordered a mass, suspicionless strip search of the underwear of twenty-two preteen girls. All agree the search violated the girls’ constitutional rights under Texas and federal law. Even so, the district court dismissed the girls’ lawsuit against the school district for failure to state a claim. We reverse.IAFor purposes of this appeal, we take as true the amended complaint’s factual allegations. Those allegations describe how $50 went missing during a sixth-grade choir class at Houston’s public Lanier Middle School. Assistant Principal Verlinda Higgins was brought in to investigate. When no money turned up, the school police officer “suggested that girls like to hide things in their bras and panties.” Higgins took all twenty-two girls in the choir class to the female school nurse, who strip searched them, taking them one at a time into a bathroom, where she “check[ed] around the waistband of [their] panties,” loosened their bras, and checked “under their shirts.” The girls “were made to lift their shirts so they were exposed from the shoulder to the waist.” No par­ents were notified, despite the girls’ requests. No money was found.BThe Houston Independent School District allegedly permits its school of­ficials to conduct invasive searches of students’ persons—but provides no train­ing as to how to do so legally. Instead, employees are left to rely on the school district’s written search policy as set forth in three official school district doc­uments attached to the amended complaint.The first document, labeled “Legal Policy FNF,” states in abstract terms the federal legal standard governing student searches. See Safford Unified Sch. Dist. No. 1 v. Redding, 557 U.S. 364, 375 (2009); New Jersey v. T.L.O., 469 U.S. 325, 341 (1985). It instructs that searches must be “reasonable,” and that “[a] search is reasonable if it meets both of the following criteria”: The action is justified at the inception, i.e., the school official has reasonable grounds for suspecting that the search will uncover evidence of a rule viola­tion or a criminal violation. The scope of the search is reasonably related to the circumstances that justified the search in the first place, i.e., the measures adopted are reasonably re­lated to the objectives of the search and are not exces­sively intrusive in light of the age and sex of the stu­dent and the nature of the infraction. Legal Policy FNF also provides citation to the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, New Jersey v. T.L.O., and a federal district court opinion from 1980 dealing with dog-sniff searches of cars. The document gives no further explanation or detail, however, as to what its two criteria mean, or how teach­ers and administrators can tell when they are met.[1]A second document, titled “Regulation FNF2,” sets forth certain imple­menting procedures. This document provides a simpler—and broader—rule for deciding when a search is proper:Students and their personal effects are subject to be­ing searched by school officials, if a school official has reasonable cause to believe that the student is in pos­session of contraband. . . . If a school official has rea­sonable cause to believe that contraband is present, he or she may institute a search.Regulation FNF2 further defines “contraband” as “all substances or materials, the presence of which are prohibited by Board policy or state law.” And it briefly attempts to define the legal phrase “reasonable cause.”[2]The last relevant document is page four of the Student Code of Conduct. This document purports to “brief[ly] descri[be]” the school district’s legal poli­cies and regulations. Its summary of the student-search policy is further con­densed:School officials are empowered to conduct reasonable searches of students and school property when there is reasonable cause to believe that students may be in possession of drugs, weapons, alcohol, or other materi­als (“contraband”) in violation of school policy or state law. Students who bring contraband onto school grounds may be searched . . . .Apart from inserting the quoted language into these three documents, the school district allegedly does nothing to apprise its employees of the stand­ards that govern whether, when, and how public officials may constitutionally search a student’s person and/or underwear.CIn the wake of the mass strip search in this case, the school’s principal issued a memo admonishing Higgins for “[r]equesting a search of the students’ person[s] for items other than ‘contraband.’” It is unclear why the principal did not consider stolen money to qualify as “contraband” under Regulation FNF2 and/or the Student Code of Conduct, given that theft is “prohibited by . . . state law.” Regardless, the supposed lack of “contraband” appears to have been the principal’s only concern; the memo never criticized the search for invading the underwear of twenty-two preteen girls, or for doing so without particularized suspicion.The memo likewise made no mention of Legal Policy FNF or Regulation FNF2. Instead, it instructed Higgins to “follow [the school district's] policy and procedures in the Student Code of Conduct,” and to “revisit page 4 of [that Code] for policy procedures concerning school officials and reasonable search of students.” The memo further made clear that, at least in the principal’s mind, such strip searches of students are not per se improper under school dis­trict policy. Rather than forbidding all strip searches going forward, the memo requested: “In the future, if you feel a student must have a search requiring a strip search, please notify me before proceeding.”DTwo of the girls’ mothers sued the Houston Independent School District in federal district court on their daughters’ behalves. They asserted claims un­der 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and the Texas Constitution. As relief, they sought com­pensatory damages, as well as an injunction requiring the school district to clarify its search policy and provide at least some Fourth Amendment training.The school district moved to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6). While its motion was pending, the school district responded to Plaintiffs’ first set of interrogatories, and in doing so pro­vided copies of the documents described above. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 33(d). The district court subsequently granted the school district’s motion and dismissed the complaint without prejudice.Plaintiffs promptly amended their complaint, this time attaching copies of the school district’s interrogatory responses and the documents the school district had provided.[3] It was not enough. The district court granted the school district’s renewed motion to dismiss the action under Rule 12(b)(6), while deny­ing further leave to amend. This appeal followed.IIWe review a district court’s dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) de novo, “ac­cepting all well-pleaded facts as true and viewing those facts in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs.” Doe ex rel. Magee v. Covington Cty. Sch. Dist. ex rel. Keys, 675 F.3d 849, 854 (5th Cir. 2012) (en banc); see also Leatherman v. Tar­rant Cty. Narcotics Intelligence & Coordination Unit, 507 U.S. 163, 164 (1993) (no heightened pleading standard for municipal § 1983 liability). To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint need not contain “detailed factual allegations”; rather, it need only allege facts sufficient to “state a claim for relief that is plausible on its face.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 570 (2007)). “A claim has facial plau­sibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct al­leged.” Id. Significantly, a complaint may proceed even if “recovery is very re­mote and unlikely,” so long as the alleged facts “raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555-56.IIIThe central issue on appeal is whether the amended complaint states a claim for municipal liability against the school district under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.That statute makes liable “[e]very person” who, under color of state law, vio­lates federal constitutional rights. For this purpose, municipal entities like the school district qualify as “persons.” Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 690 (1978). But the school district “cannot be held liable under § 1983 on a respondeat superior theory.” Id. Rather, the school district itself must have caused the violation. Id.Thus, to state a § 1983 claim against the school district, the amended complaint must allege sufficient factual content to permit the reasonable in­ference (1) that a constitutional violation occurred and (2) that an “official pol­icy” attributable to the school district’s policymakers (3) “was the moving force” behind it. See, e.g., Magee, 675 F.3d at 854, 866-67; see also, e.g., Pena v. City of Rio Grande, 879 F.3d 613, 621 (5th Cir. 2018); Groden v. City of Dallas, 826 F.3d 280, 283-85 (5th Cir. 2016). We address each component in turn.AThat the alleged facts demonstrate a constitutional violation is presently undisputed. A brief discussion of why the alleged search was unconstitutional, however, will nonetheless prove helpful.To search a student’s person, school officials must generally have rea­sonable suspicion that the search will reveal evidence of a violation of school rules or the law. T.L.O., 469 U.S. at 341-42; accord Redding, 557 U.S. at 375; 2 Wayne R. LaFave et al., Criminal Procedure § 3.9(k) (4th ed. updated Dec. 2017). Reasonable suspicion has two dimensions. One is the “knowledge com­ponent,” which measures the strength of the evidence indicating illicit activity. Redding, 557 U.S. at 370-71. The second dimension, often called the “nexus” component,[4] measures the strength of the evidence indicating “that the specific ‘things’ to be searched for and seized are located on the property [or, in this context, the person] to which entry is sought.” Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, 436 U.S. 547, 556 (1978); accord Redding, 557 U.S. at 370. Together, these ele­ments mean that searching a student’s person requires “a moderate chance of finding evidence of wrongdoing” on the person of that specific student. Red­ding, 557 U.S. at 371.When the search is of the student’s underwear, moreover, additional re­quirements apply. Underwear searches are “embarrassing, frightening, and humiliating.” Id. at 374-75. “[B]oth subjective and reasonable societal expec­tations of personal privacy support the treatment of such a search as categori­cally distinct, requiring distinct elements of justification . . . .” Id. at 374; see also Roe v. Tex. Dep’t of Protective & Regulatory Servs., 299 F.3d 395, 404 (5th Cir. 2002) (“Strip searches implicate fundamental Fourth Amendment rights.”). Thus, the Supreme Court has “ma[d]e it clear” that a search of a stu­dent’s underwear is impermissibly intrusive unless the school officials reason­ably suspect either that the object of the search is dangerous, or that it is ac­tually likely to be hidden in the student’s underwear. Redding, 557 U.S. at 377; see, e.g., id. at 368, 374-76 (search requiring thirteen-year-old student to “pull[] her underwear away from her body” held impermissibly intrusive because no evidence suggested that the “common pain relievers” sought were either dan­gerous or likely to be found in the girl’s underwear).Applied here, this clearly established law means that Higgins violated the constitutional rights of the twenty-two girls unless Higgins reasonably sus­pected that the missing $50 cash (1) would be found on that particular girl’s person and either (2) would be found specifically in that girl’s underwear or (3) would pose a dangerous threat to students. For what are perhaps obvious rea­sons, the parties do not dispute that the alleged search failed all three condi­tions. It was clearly unconstitutional.BThe parties’ real dispute concerns whether Plaintiffs adequately allege an “official municipal policy” on which § 1983 liability may rest. See Monell, 436 U.S. at 691. To be clear, the argument is not that the school district’s writ­ten search policies are facially unconstitutional or that they caused the alleged constitutional violation by themselves. Rather, the “official municipal policy” on which Plaintiffs attempt to hang Monell liability is the school district’s al­leged policy of providing no training whatsoever regarding its employees’ legal duties not to conduct unreasonable searches. In other words, as currently pre­sented, this is a “failure to train” case.1The Supreme Court established the “failure to train” method of proving municipal liability in City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 386-92 (1989). Under Canton, when a municipal entity enacts a facially valid policy but fails to train its employees to implement it in a constitutional manner, that failure constitutes “official policy” that can support municipal liability if it “amounts to deliberate indifference.” Id. at 388. To prove deliberate indifference at trial, Plaintiffs must show that, “in light of the duties assigned to specific officers or employees[,] the need for more or different training is so obvious, and the in­adequacy so likely to result in the violation of constitutional rights, that the policymakers . . . can reasonably be said to have been deliberately indifferent to the need.” Id. at 390.Canton envisioned two means of proving deliberate indifference. Some­times, Canton said, municipal employees will violate constitutional rights “so often” that the factfinder can infer from the pattern of violations that “the need for further training must have been plainly obvious to the . . . policymakers.” Id. at 390 n.10. This proof-by-pattern method is “ordinarily necessary.” Bd. of Cty. Comm’rs v. Brown, 520 U.S. 397, 409 (1997).But even absent proof of pattern, deliberate indifference can still be in­ferred if the factfinder determines that the risk of constitutional violations was or should have been an “obvious” or “highly predictable consequence” of the alleged training inadequacy. Id. (construing Canton, 489 U.S. at 390 & n.10); accord Brown v. Bryan Cty., 219 F.3d 450, 459-61 (5th Cir. 2000) (same); see also, e.g., Burge v. St. Tammany Par., 336 F.3d 363, 373 (5th Cir. 2003) (“[I]n a limited set of C8.SGS, 8. plaintiff, unable to show a pattern of constitutional violations, may establish deliberate indifference by ‘showing a single incident with proof of the possibility of recurring situations that present an obvious po­tential for violation of constitutional rights,’” such that “it should have been apparent to the policymaker that a constitutional violation was the highly pre­dictable consequence of a particular policy or failure to train.”); Drake v. City of Haltom, 106 F. App’x 897, 900 (5th Cir. 2004) (reversing grant of motion to dismiss because “[w]e [were] unwilling to say, at th[e pleading stage], that it is not obvious that male jailers who receive no training and who are left virtually unsupervised might abuse female detainees”). Such an inference is possible in only very narrow circumstances: The municipal entity must have “fail[ed] to train its employees concerning a clear constitutional duty implicated in recur­rent situations that a particular employee is certain to face.” Canton, 489 U.S. at 396 (O’Connor, J., concurring); accord Pena, 879 F.3d at 624 (suggesting that, without proof of a pattern of constitutional violations, the failure to train generally must be “complete,” rather than merely deficient in a particular nar­row respect).[5]Thus, for example, if a city policymaker opts to provide no training what­soever to police officers concerning the established and recurring constitutional duty not to use excessive deadly force, a factfinder may reasonably infer that the city acted with the requisite deliberate indifference. The Supreme Court explained as much in Canton, by way of hypothetical:[C]ity policymakers know to a moral certainty that their police officers will be required to arrest fleeing felons. The city has armed its officers with firearms, in part to allow them to accomplish this task. Thus, the need to train officers in the constitutional limitations on the use of deadly force, see Tennessee v. Garner, 471 U.S. 1 (1985), can be said to be “so obvious[]” that fail­ure to do so could properly be characterized as “ delib­erate indifference” to constitutional rights.489 U.S. at 390 n.10 (majority opinion). “Under those circumstances there is an obvious need for some form of training.” Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51, 64 (2011). Otherwise, the Supreme Court has said, there would be “no way for novice officers to obtain the legal knowledge they require” to conform their be­havior to their clear and recurring constitutional obligations. Id. at 63-64.2Here, the alleged facts, taken together and assumed to be true, permit the reasonable inference—i.e., the claim has facial plausibility—that the risk of public officials’ conducting unconstitutional searches was or should have been a “highly predictable consequence” of the school district’s decision to pro­vide its staff no training regarding the Constitution’s constraints on searches. Indeed, Plaintiffs’ allegations mirror Cantons hypothetical in all material re­spects.As in Canton, “[t]he constitutional duty of the individual officer [not to conduct unreasonable searches] is clear,” with ample “constitutional guide- posts for municipalities.” 489 U.S. at 396-97 (O’Connor, J., concurring) (con­struing id. at 390 & n.10 (majority opinion)). Although the Canton hypothetical concerned the Fourth Amendment’s constraints on seizures, whereas this case concerns its constraints on searches, “the precise nature” of both types of obli­gations is sufficiently clear in the law. Id. at 397. Indeed, if anything, it is the duties with respect to searches that are defined with greater specificity. Stu­dent searches are governed by defined principles such as the need for individ­ualized suspicion, the nexus requirement, and the limit on unduly intrusive means. Excessive force, on the other hand, turns on a totality-of-the-evidence balancing test that “requires careful attention to the facts and circumstances of each particular case” and “is not capable of precise definition or mechanical application.” Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396 (1989). Because excessive- force law is sufficiently clear to ground failure-to-train liability—as Canton‘s hypothetical makes plain—we hold the same with respect to the law of unrea­sonable student searches.Also as in Canton, the constitutional duty not to conduct unreasonable searches is plausibly alleged to arise “in recurrent situations that a particular employee is certain to face.” 489 U.S. at 396 (O’Connor, J., concurring) (con­struing id. at 390 & n.10 (majority opinion)). The alleged facts here fairly imply that conducting a “search” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment (thereby triggering the constitutional duty) is among “the usual and recurring” tasks that at least some school district employees “must perform.” Id. at 390­91 (majority opinion). Most notably, the school district expressly vests search authority in all its “school officials,” and notifies its students that their persons “may be searched.” See supra Part I-B. And with respect to Higgins herself, the alleged fact that she “was brought in . . . to investigate,” supra Part I-A, coupled with the disciplinary memo’s anticipation that she might order addi­tional strip searches “[i]n the future,” see supra Part I-C, makes plausible that the school district expected, or even intended, that Higgins would exercise her authority to order students searched. These factual allegations must suffice at the pleading stage to show that the school district knew or should have known to a high degree of certainty that Higgins and other employees would be placed in situations requiring knowledge of Fourth Amendment search law.Like the city in Canton, moreover, the school district cannot rely on its employees to come pre-equipped with legal knowledge. Just as “[t]here is no reason to assume police academy applicants are familiar with the constitu­tional constraints on the use of deadly force,” Connick, 563 U.S. at 64, there is no reason to expect that school district employees automatically understand the constitutional constraints on searching a student’s person. After all, public school officials are generally no better equipped than police officers “to find, interpret, and apply legal principles.” Id. at 70. To the extent the school district disagrees with this assessment, of course, it is free to present contrary evidence at summary judgment or at trial. But at the pleading stage, this unremarkable conclusion finds adequate support in both “experience and common sense,” Iq- bal, 556 U.S. at 679, and in the factual allegations that not one of Higgins, the school police officer, or the nurse realized the search might be unconstitutional, and that even the school’s principal—who was tasked with disciplining Higgins for conducting an unlawful search—still failed to diagnose the search’s serious constitutional defects, compare supra Part I-C, with supra Part III-A. The amended complaint thus plausibly alleges that, “in the absence of training, there is no way for [school officials] to obtain the legal knowledge they require.” Connick, 563 U.S. at 64.In these circumstances, the Supreme Court has said, “there is an obvious need for some form of training.” Id. (emphasis added). But, critically, the school district here allegedly provides “no training whatsoever” as to how to conduct a lawful search. Pena, 879 F.3d at 624. This straightforward factual allegation carries straightforward doctrinal consequences. It means that, for purposes of resolving the school district’s motion to dismiss, we must assume that this is not a case in which “an otherwise sound [training] program has occasionally been negligently administered,” or in which an officer received appropriate training that she then failed properly to obey. See Canton, 489 U.S. at 391; Burge, 336 F.3d at 373. Nor do Plaintiffs rely on only a “nuance[d]” flaw in an existing training regime, or attempt to derive municipal liability from the mere fact that “ additional training would have been helpful.” Connick, 563 U.S. at 67-68; see supra note 5. Instead, we must credit Plaintiffs’ factual allegations and proceed on the assumption that the school district has made the conscious choice to take no affirmative steps to instruct any of its employees on the con­stitutional rules governing student searches—even though at least some of those employees are regularly called upon to conduct such searches. In short, this case presents an alleged “complete failure to train” of the kind we have found actionable. Pena, 879 F.3d at 624. Plaintiffs’ allegations of deliberate indifference survive a motion to dismiss.We emphasize, however, that our conclusion in no way ordains Plaintiffs’ ultimate success. Without a pattern of constitutional violations, deliberate in­difference can be inferred only in narrow and extreme circumstances like those of Canton‘s hypothetical. And in the thirty years since Canton issued, actual cases reaching those extremes have proved fortunately rare.[6] Perhaps at sum­mary judgment or at trial, the evidence in this case, too, will reveal the allega­tions of deliberate indifference to have been unfounded. The evidence might show, for example, that no one reasonably expects school officials to conduct “searches” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment. Or it might show that, contrary to Plaintiffs’ allegations, the school district does provide legal search training to employees who might reasonably be expected to need it.But if Plaintiffs’ allegations prove true—that is, if the school district knew or should have known that officials like Higgins would certainly be placed in situations implicating Fourth Amendment search law; if the school district knew or should have known that those officials would lack the legal knowledge necessary to handle those situations; and if the school district none­theless failed to provide those officials any legal training on the subject—then the factfinder will be entitled (but not required) to infer that the school district acted with deliberate indifference to its students’ Fourth Amendment rights. In such a case, “[t]he likelihood that the situation will recur and the predicta­bility that an officer lacking specific tools to handle that situation will violate citizens’ rights c[an] justify a finding that policymakers’ decision not to train the officer reflected ‘deliberate indifference’ to the obvious consequence of the policymakers’ choice—namely, a violation of a specific constitutional or statu­tory right.” Brown, 520 U.S. at 409 (construing Canton, 489 U.S. at 390 & n.10). Whether the evidence will bear that out, and whether that inference will prove persuasive, are factual matters incapable of resolution on a motion to dismiss.3The contrary arguments presented to us fail to engage the applicable le­gal framework. For example, the district court’s analysis turns on its erroneous assumption that, without a pattern of unconstitutional searches, the school district could not have been on notice of the need to provide at least some type of Fourth Amendment training.[7] But in light of Canton, the Fifth Circuit rec­ognizes an “exception” to the pattern method of proving deliberate indifference for cases in which “a constitutional violation was the highly predictable conse­quence” of the alleged failure to train. E.g., Burge, 336 F.3d at 373. The district court never meaningfully evaluated whether that exception might apply here. And we conclude above that Plaintiffs plausibly allege it might.The school district, meanwhile, devotes wide swaths of its brief to assert­ing the facial constitutionality of its written search policies. Because those pol­icies correctly state the law, the school district says, unlawful searches could not have been an “obvious” consequence of enacting them. The first difficulty with this argument is its premise: in fact, the school district’s written search policies are at best incomplete guides to actual Fourth Amendment law, cap­turing none of the alleged search’s constitutional defects. Compare supra Part I-B, with supra Part III-A. Although the policies describe the “knowledge com­ponent” of the reasonable suspicion standard (i.e., the requisite degree of cer­tainty that contraband “[be] present”), they make no mention of the require­ment that there be reasonable suspicion linking the contraband to a particular student. See, e.g., supra note 2. And the policies are wholly silent with respect to the additional requirements for strip searches, i.e., that there be reasonable suspicion that the object of the search will be found specifically in the student’s underwear or else be dangerous. If anything, the policies say the opposite: they appear to condone the use of strip searches to locate any “contraband,” defined as any item possessed in violation of the law or school policy.But even accepting the school district’s incorrect premise, this argument is still beside the point. The Supreme Court in Canton “reject[ed] [the] conten­tion that only unconstitutional policies are actionable under [§ 1983].” 489 U.S. at 387. Instead, Canton permits municipal liability when “a concededly valid policy is unconstitutionally applied.” Id (emphases added). In such a case, the “policy” that grounds municipal liability is the failure to train municipal em­ployees regarding their constitutional duties, if that failure amounted to delib­erate indifference and caused the plaintiffs injury. Id. at 387-88. Plaintiffs need not also demonstrate the invalidity of the written policies themselves.[8]Only two portions of the school district’s brief confront the Canton frame­work. Those portions assert that the risk of unconstitutional searches could not plausibly have been an “obvious consequence” of providing no Fourth Amendment training because (1) the missing $50 unambiguously fell outside the written policies’ definition of “contraband” and (2) Fourth Amendment caselaw is not “void for vagueness.” The relevance of the first point is unclear, but it is in any event incorrect. Because Texas law prohibits theft, see Tex. Penal Code Ann. § 31.03, the reportedly stolen $50 constituted both “materi­als . . . prohibited by . . . state law” within the meaning of Regulation FNF2, and “evidence of . . . a criminal violation” within the meaning of Legal Policy FNF. See supra Part I-B. And the school district’s second point is a non sequi- tur. Nothing in Canton suggests that a legal doctrine must be “void for vague­ness” before a municipality’s failure to train its staff to follow it can ground a failure-to-train theory. Otherwise, there could be no Canton hypothetical. After all, police officers can always conduct their own research into excessive-force law, which (one assumes) is not void for vagueness either.We hold that deliberate indifference is plausibly alleged.COf course, deliberate indifference is not the whole story. Plaintiffs’ “fail­ure to train” theory will also require proof of causation: “Would the injury have been avoided had the employee been trained under a program that was not deficient in the identified respect?” Canton, 489 U.S. at 391. Without stating its reasoning, the district court held that, even if Plaintiffs adequately allege deliberate indifference, they still fail to allege causation. We hold otherwise.Given the relatively egregious nature of the alleged constitutional viola­tion in this case, see supra Part III-A, we think it plausible that even a modi­cum of Fourth Amendment training would have alerted Higgins that the search she ordered was unconstitutional. We also think it plausible that Hig- gins would not have undertaken the search had she known it was illegal. Thus, to the extent the amended complaint plausibly alleges deliberate indifference, it also plausibly alleges causation. We cannot affirm the district court’s alter­native basis for dismissing Plaintiffs’ federal claims. The order dismissing those federal claims must, accordingly, be reversed.IVIn addition to asserting federal claims, Plaintiffs seek injunctive relief under article 1, section 9 of the Texas Constitution (which prohibits unreason­able searches). They ask the district court to order the school district to clarify its search policy and provide minimally adequate search training.The parties and the district court have implicitly assumed throughout this litigation that Texas law recognizes an implied cause of action under which plaintiffs can sue to enjoin municipal policies that cause constitutional violations (e.g., a policy of failing to train), even if those policies are not them­selves unconstitutional. Cf. City of Beaumont v. Bouillion, 896 S.W.2d 143, 148-49 (Tex. 1995). Without passing judgment on the matter, we adopt that assumption for the limited purpose of this appeal.[9]Even with that assumption in place, however, the district court dis­missed Plaintiffs’ Texas-law causes of action for failure to state a claim. It did so for two independent reasons, both of which were error.AFirst, the district court dismissed the Texas-law claims based on its pre­vious determination that, under the standards of causation applicable to § 1983 suits for municipal liability, “Plaintiffs fail to allege sufficient facts to indicate that [the school district's allegedly] deficient training of its employees was the ‘moving force’ behind the constitutional violations.”We have already rejected the district court’s conclusion on this point. In fact, we have held, Plaintiffs do allege sufficient factual content to permit the reasonable inference that, but for the alleged failure to train, the alleged con­stitutional violations would not have occurred. See supra Part III-C. And, to the extent the district court intended to rely on its conclusion that Plaintiffs fail adequately to allege deliberate indifference, we have rejected that conclu­sion, too. See supra Part III-B. This stated rationale from the district court cannot justify dismissing Plaintiffs’ state-law claims.BSecond, the district court dismissed the Texas-law claims because, in its view, “what Plaintiffs appear to be asking for is an ‘obey-the-law’ injunction,” which the district court thought “would be too vague . . . to give a reasonable person notice” of what it would require. For support, the district court cited Rule 65(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, which defines the required scope and content of district court injunctions. Under Rule 65(d), “[a] general injunction which in essence orders a defendant to obey the law is not permit­ted.” Meyer v. Brown & Root Const. Co., 661 F.2d 369, 373 (5th Cir. 1981).We reverse this determination. As an initial matter, it is far from clear that Rule 65(d) can ever justify dismissing a cause of action at the pleading stage. Rule 65(d) governs the scope and content of injunctions; it does not pur­port to set a pleading standard. Neither the district court nor the school district cites any case suggesting that a complaint’s failure to propose sufficiently spe­cific injunction language is grounds for a Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal.[10]To the extent Rule 65(d) can theoretically justify a pleading-stage dis­missal, moreover, we expect that it can do so only if there is no conceivable way to frame the requested relief in adequately specific terms. That is not the case here. Far from merely requesting that the school district be enjoined from vio­lating the Fourth Amendment, the amended complaint seeks, in its words,injunctive relief . . . prohibiting the use of strip searches of students at [Houston Independent School District] schools unless and until: The [written] Student Search Policy is clearly de­fined; including who can be searched, under what cir­cumstances a student can be subjected to a search, what can be searched for, when a search is reasonable, and the procedures for implementing said search; A procedure for implementing a search of a stu­dent’s person is clearly documented, including but not limited to proper ways to obtain consent, who is to be notified and when they are to be notified that a search is occurring; and [The school district] implements a training pro­gram for all employees so that student’s Constitu­tional Rights are protected. It is not difficult to imagine reforms to the school district’s allegedly nonexist­ent Fourth Amendment training program that the district court could conceiv­ably order without running afoul of Rule 65(d). To take some easy examples: the district court might order that the written policy be modified to mention the “nexus” requirement, see Zurcher, 436 U.S. at 556; supra Part III—A; or it might order that some type of in-person training occur at least once for certain classes of employees. The district court’s characterization of Plaintiffs’ re­quested relief as a mere “obey-the-law” injunction is incorrect.This is not to say that the language in the amended complaint would pass muster if copied verbatim into an injunction. In the event that Plaintiffs demonstrate their entitlement to such an order (presumably after a trial), there will be opportunity for the parties and the court to resolve which partic­ular requirements are justified by the established facts. But at the pleading stage, the rule that injunctions must do more than “order the defendant to obey the law” cannot justify the dismissal the district court entered here.VThe district court’s judgment is reversed. This case is remanded for fur­ther proceedings consistent with this opinion.

 
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Gain access to some of the most knowledgeable and experienced attorneys with our 2 bundle options! Our Compliance bundles are curated by CLE Counselors and include current legal topics and challenges within the industry. Our second option allows you to build your bundle and strategically select the content that pertains to your needs. Both options are priced the same.
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September 18, 2024 - September 19, 2024
Dallas, TX

Join General Counsel and Senior Legal Leaders at the Premier Forum Designed For and by General Counsel from Fortune 1000 Companies


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October 15, 2024
Dallas, TX

The Texas Lawyer honors attorneys and judges who have made a remarkable difference in the legal profession in Texas.


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April 29, 2024 - May 01, 2024
Aurora, CO

The premier educational and networking event for employee benefits brokers and agents.


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Atlanta s John Marshall Law School is seeking to hire one or more full-time, visiting Legal WritingInstructors to teach Legal Research, Anal...


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Shipman is seeking an associate to join our Labor & Employment practice in our Hartford, New Haven, or Stamford office. Candidates shou...


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Evergreen Trading is a media investment firm headquartered in NYC. We help brands achieve their goals by leveraging their unwanted assets to...


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04/15/2024
Connecticut Law Tribune

MELICK & PORTER, LLP PROMOTES CONNECTICUT PARTNERS HOLLY ROGERS, STEVEN BANKS, and ALEXANDER AHRENS


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04/11/2024
New Jersey Law Journal

Professional Announcement


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04/08/2024
Daily Report

Daily Report 1/2 Page Professional Announcement 60 Days


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