Williams v. Horvath

• Decision Date: 04 May 1976
• Court: California Supreme Court
• Parties: , 548 P.2d 1125 Charles WILLIAMS, a minor, etc., et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. M. J. HORVATH et al., Defendants and Respondents. L.A. 30460.

Page 453

129 Cal.Rptr. 453

16 Cal.3d 834, 548 P.2d 1125

Charles WILLIAMS, a minor, etc., et al., Plaintiffs and Appellants, v. M. J. HORVATH et al., Defendants and Respondents.

L.A. 30460.

Supreme Court of California In Bank.

May 4, 1976.

Hugh R. Manes, Hollywood, for plaintiffs and appellants.

Michael B. Weisz, Marysville, and Richard A. Weisz, Long Beach, as amici curiae on behalf of plaintiffs and appellants.

Burt Pines, City Atty., John T. Neville, Asst. City Atty., Robert E. Shannon, Burk M. Wiedner, and Philip Shiner, Deputy City Attys., for defendants and respondents.

Evelle J. Younger, Atty. Gen., Jack R. Winkler, Chief Asst. Atty. Gen., Edward P. O'Brien, Asst. Atty. Gen., Clifford K. Thompson, Jr., and Charles R. B. Kirk, Deputy Attys. Gen., Richard L. Knickerbocker, City Atty., Santa Monica, Rondrew A. Outlaw, Deputy City Attorney, John H. Larson, County Counsel, Los Angeles, Robert C. Lynch, Asst. Chief Deputy County Counsel, Frederick R. Bennett, Deputy County Counsel, Los Angeles, John B. Clausen, County Counsel, Contra Costa, James A. Klinkner, Deputy County Counsel, Martinez, Stephen Warren Solomon, Los Angeles, and Ronald L. Gould, Santa Monica, as amici curiae on behalf of defendants and respondents.

MOSK, Justice.

Plaintiff minors, by their guardians ad litem, filed an action for damages in the superior court against two named and ten unnamed Los Angeles police officers. The complaint alleged that defendant deprived plaintiffs of civil rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution by 'deliberately assaulting and battering plaintiff(s) without just cause or provocation, by imprisoning plaintiff(s) without reasonable cause or warrant, and by willfully threatening to shoot and injure plaintiff(s).' The action was grounded exclusively on the federal Civil Rights Act. (42 U.S.C. § 1983.) ¹

Defendants demurred on two grounds: (1) the superior court lacked jurisdiction to entertain an action under the federal Civil Rights Act, and (2) the complaint failed to allege compliance with a California statutory provision which requires that claims for personal injury against a governmental employee be presented to the public entity employer not later than 100 days after accrual of the cause of action (Gov.Code, § 911.2). The court sustained the demurrer on the second ground, and dismissed the action after plaintiffs declined to amend the complaint. (Code Civ.Proc., § 581, subd. 3.)

With regard to the authority of the superior court to entertain an action brought under section 1983, it is now clear that absent an exclusive grant of jurisdiction to the federal courts in the congressional act, state courts of general jurisdiction have concurrent authority to adjudicate federally created causes of action. (Testa v. Katt (1947) 330 U.S. 386, 389--393, 67 S.Ct. 810, 91 L.Ed. 967.) In Brown v. Pitchess (1975) 13 Cal.3d 518, 520--523, 119 Cal.Rptr. 204, 531 P.2d 772, we reaffirmed this principle and declared, 'The majority of courts considering the question concur in our conclusion that state courts do have concurrent jurisdiction over actions arising under section 1983.' (Id. at p. 523, 119 Cal.Rptr. at p. 207, 531 P.2d at p. 775.) Accordingly, defendants now concede the jurisdictional point.

There remain for decision, however, two significant questions of first impression in this court: (1) whether a complaint filed in state court under section 1983 must allege compliance with the 100-day claim requirement of the Government Code; and (2) whether the employee police officers are entitled to counsel and ultimate indemnification from the employer governmental entity under state indemnification statutes (Gov.Code, § 825 et seq.) when the action is grounded in federal law. The first issue entails analysis of the state claim requirement in light of the supremacy clause of the United States Constitution (U.S.Const., art. VI, cl. 2) in order to determine whether the state law purports to alter or restrict federally created rights. The second issue is purely a matter of statutory construction and requires us to determine whether the Legislature intended that the government's role as guarantor of tort claims against its employees extend to claims based on federal law. We shall discuss these points in the sequence indicated.

I

Deciding 'whether a state statute is in conflict with a federal statute and hence invalid under the Supremacy Clause is essentially a two-step process of first ascertaining the construction of the two statutes and then determining the constitutional question whether they are in conflict.' (Perez v. Campbell (1971) 402 U.S. 637, 644, 91 S.Ct. 1704, 1708, 29 L.Ed.2d 233.) We begin that process with a brief synopsis of relevant portions of the state statutory scheme known as the Tort Claims Act. (Gov.Code, tit. 1, div. 3.6.) This body of legislation was enacted following our decision in Muskopf v. Corning Hospital Dist. (1961) 55 Cal.2d 211, 11 Cal.Rptr. 89, 359 P.2d 457, which abolished the doctrine of governmental tort immunity. Government Code section 815 restores sovereign immunity in California except as provided in the Tort Claims Act or other statute. Thus the intent of the act is not to expand the rights of plaintiffs in suits against governmental entities, but to confine potential governmental liability rigidly delineated circumstances: immunity is waived only if the various requirements of the act are satisfied.

One key prerequisite to waiver of immunity is contained in Government Code section 911.2, which provides in relevant part that 'A claim relating to a cause of action for death or for injury to person or to personal property or growing crops shall be presented (to the public entity) . . . not later than the 100th day after the accrual of the cause of action. . . .' Section 945.4 implements this requirement by declaring that absent such a timely claim no action for damages can be filed against the public entity. In turn, section 950.2 prescribes that 'a cause of action against a public employee or former public employee for injury resulting from an act or omission in the scope of his employment as a public employee is barred if an action against the employing public entity for such injury is barred under Part 3 (commencing with Section 900) of this division . . ..' Accordingly, submission of a claim within 100 days is a condition precedent to a tort action against either the employee or the public entity.

By contrast, section 1983 of the federal Civil Rights Act has no comparable requirement for the filing of claims; indeed, there is no limitation period provided in the federal statute. In the absence of a uniform statute of limitations in the congressional act, the courts, whether state or federal, typically apply the state limitations statute which governs actions to redress the wrong most closely analogous to that described in the complaint. (See, e.g., O'Sullivan v. Felix (1914) 233 U.S. 318, 34 S.Ct. 596, 58 L.Ed. 980; Campbell v. Haverhill (1895) 155 U.S. 610, 618, 39 L.Ed. 280; Baker v. F. & F. Investment (7th Cir. 1970) 420 F.2d 1191, 1195; see generally Note, A Limitation on Actions for Deprivation of Federal Rights (1968) 68 Colum.L.Rev. 763.) Thus defendants first argue that the 100-day claim requirement of section 911.2 is nothing more than a state statute of limitations, which remains operative whether the action against the governmental employee is grounded on state or federal law. Plaintiffs reject defendants' characterization of the claim requirement; they contend it is nothing less than a remnant of sovereign immunity and a substantive impediment to the exercise of a federally created right, and as such is void under the supremacy clause.

In the federal arena, where section 1983 actions usually surface, the position here urged by plaintiffs has prevailed whenever appellate courts have been faced with a conflict between the Civil Rights Act and California law relating to tort liability. In Smith v. Cremins (9th Cir. 1962) 308 F.2d 187, decided after Muskopf but before the enactment of the Tort Claims Act, the court determined that the true statute of limitations for cases arising under section 1983 in California was the general three-year period for actions based on 'a liability created by statute.' (Code Civ.Proc., § 338, subd. 1.) The court reasoned that while certain of the acts proscribed under section 1983 have a readily discernible analogue in state tort law, there are others--for example, prisoners' rights suits challenging conditions of confinement--for which there is no counterpart. Accordingly, because the demands of uniformity require that there be a single statute of limitations for all section 1983 actions in a given state, the court concluded that the three-year period would apply regardless of the particular facts alleged in any individual complaint.

After the passage of the Tort Claims Act, federal appellate cases reaffirmed Smith against the claim that section 911.2 provided a specific period of limitations for suits against governmental employees. In Willis v. Reddin (9th Cir. 1969) 418 F.2d 702, the plaintiff alleged a deprivation of constitutional rights in that the defendant police officers removed $178 from his person after arresting him, assertedly to insure he would be unable to make bail. The district court dismissed the action on the ground the notice and time requirements of the Tort Claims Act were not met.

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed, reasoning that 'In California statutes or ordinances which condition the right to sue the sovereign upon timely filing of claims and actions are more than procedural requirements. They are elements of the plaintiff's cause of action and conditions precedent to the maintenance of the action. When the action is against the public employee rather than the public entity such statutes are given the same effect. 'While it may be completely appropriate for...