"[2] In Los Angeles County v. Humphries, the Court ruled that this "policy or custom" requirement applied regardless of whether the relief the plaintiff sought was monetary or prospective.

[3] Section 1983 provides in part: Every person who, under color of any [state] statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage .

[1]In Monroe v. Pape, the Supreme Court had held that municipal entities were not "person[s]" under § 1983, based on its reading of the history of the Civil Rights Act of 1871.

However, the Act did not provide procedures for reviewing whether a previously filed report was unfounded or for allowing individual people to challenge their inclusion in the index.

They consequently filed a §1983 case against the Attorney General of California, the Los Angeles County Sheriff, two detectives in the sheriff's department, and the County of Los Angeles, seeking damages, an injunction, and a declaration that the defendants had deprived them of their constitutional rights by failing to create a procedural mechanism through which one could contest inclusion in the Index.