Figueroa v. Blackburn

• Decision Date: 11 January 2000
• Docket Number: No. 99-5252,99-5252
• Citation: 208 F.3d 435
• Parties: (3rd Cir. 2000) ROBERT DAVID FIGUEROA, Appellant v. AUDREY P. BLACKBURN Argued:
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

Page 435

208 F.3d 435 (3rd Cir. 2000)

ROBERT DAVID FIGUEROA, Appellant v. AUDREY P. BLACKBURN

No. 99-5252

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

Argued: January 11, 2000

Filed March 27, 2000

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY, D.C. Civ. No.: 98-3041 Magistrate Judge: The Honorable Freda L. Wolfson

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

Attorney for Appellant: Elizabeth Macron, Esquire (Argued) 1807 Grand Central Avenue P.O. Box 146 Lavallette, NJ 08735

Attorney for Appellee: Lyle P. Hough, Jr., Esq. (Argued) City of Trenton 319 East State Street City Hall Trenton, NJ 08608

Before: BECKER, Chief Judge, ALITO and BARRY, Circuit Judges

OPINION FOR THE COURT

BARRY, Circuit Judge:

This appeal requires us to decide whether judges of courts of limited jurisdiction, such as the New Jersey municipal courts, are afforded absolute immunity for their judicial acts. We hold that they are, as do all of the circuit courts which have decided the issue. We further hold that the Municipal Court Judge's actions which prompted this case were taken in a judicial capacity in a case over which she had jurisdiction. Accordingly, we will affirm.

I.

The facts underlying this appeal are brief, uncomplicated, and not in dispute. On July 8, 1996, plaintiff Robert David Figueroa ("Figueroa") appeared before the defendant, the Honorable Audrey P. Blackburn, J.M.C., a municipal court judge in Trenton Municipal Court, Mercer County, New Jersey, for what was to have been his arraignment on two counts of harassment, in violation of N.J.S.A. 2C:33-4a, petty disorderly persons offenses.¹ Figueroa was charged with the offenses after having sent a harassing letter and documents to two New Jersey Superior Court judges who had previously handled his divorce and child custody dispute.

At the outset, Figueroa told Judge Blackburn that he was there not to enter a plea but to challenge the jurisdiction of the Municipal Court over the offenses with which he was charged. Before he could begin his argument, however, Judge Blackburn directed him -and directed him three times -to turn off his tape recorder. Figueroa did not do so. As a result, Judge Blackburn ordered that Figueroa be arrested and removed from the courtroom. The entire proceeding began and ended in a matter of minutes. ²

In an order entered following Figueroa's arrest, Judge Blackburn held him in contempt of court, and sentenced him to be imprisoned for thirty days at the Mercer County Corrections Center. She reasoned that

Mr. Figueroa refused to come forward to be arraigned on the charges which had been brought against him on April 12, 1996. He refused to be quiet. He was loud and disruptive and refused to comply with the orders of the court.

App. at 37. Although mandated to stay execution of sentence by New Jersey Court Rule 1:10-1 ("Execution of sentence shall be stayed for five days following imposition and, if an appeal is taken, during the pendency of the appeal, provided, however, that the judge may require bail if reasonably necessary to assure the contemnor's appearance."), Judge Blackburn did not do so. Nor did Judge Blackburn set bail.³

Figueroa, from jail and with the assistance of counsel, twice attempted to have Judge Blackburn stay the balance of his sentence. Both times, however, his attempts were rebuffed. The second and last attempt came on July 19, 1996, when Figueroa again appeared before Judge Blackburn for the previously aborted arraignment on the harassment charges. In response to his request, Judge Blackburn simply noted that the issue would be resolved by the Superior Court.

Figueroa filed an appeal to the Superior Court for a de novo review of his conviction and sentence for contempt. On July 22, 1996, after having served fifteen days of a thirty day sentence, he was granted a stay pending appeal and released on bail. Ultimately, his contempt conviction was reversed.

On August 14, 1996, while his appeal was pending, Figueroa appeared before a different municipal court judge, the Honorable Samuel Sachs, for trial on the harassment charges. Before trial began, however, Judge Sachs discussed a directive promulgated by the Honorable Robert N. Wilentz, the late-Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court (the "Wilentz directive"), which provided for the transfer of any case involving a complaint against or on behalf of a judge or a member of his or her immediate family or any case in which a judge was to be a witness to the assignment judge of the county in which the case was docketed. Because the assignment judge of Mercer County was an alleged victim of Figueroa's harassment, Judge Sachs did not commence the trial but, rather, referred the case to the Superior Court in Mercer County so that it could be reassigned to an acting assignment judge or transferred to a different county. The harassment charges were subsequently dismissed.

Figueroa filed this action on July 29, 1998 in the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey. In the one-count complaint, in which Judge Blackburn is named as the sole defendant, Figueroa seeks damages for the deprivation of his constitutional rights under the First, Fourth, Sixth, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, and Article I, paragraphs Sixth, Seventh, Tenth, and Twelfth of the New Jersey State Constitution. The complaint alleges that Figueroa's arrest for contempt was contrary to the statutes and rules by which Judge Blackburn was bound and that at no time did she have jurisdiction to do what she did.

Judge Blackburn moved for summary judgment on the ground that she was entitled to judicial immunity. With the consent of the parties, and pursuant to 28 U.S.C.S 636(c) and Fed.R.Civ.P. 73, the motion was adjudicated by Magistrate Judge Freda L. Wolfson.

On March 10, 1999, in a comprehensive opinion, the Magistrate Judge granted the motion for summary judgment. See Figueroa v. Blackburn, 39 F.Supp.2d 479, 483 (D.N.J. 1999). She found, first, "that Judge Blackburn's order for Mr. Figueroa's immediate arrest and her subsequent contempt order which sentenced [him] to thirty days in prison were indeed judicial acts." Id. at 486. Next, she determined that although Judge Blackburn was a judge of a court of limited jurisdiction, overwhelming authority supported a finding that she was entitled to judicial immunity. She determined, as well, that Judge Blackburn did not act in the clear absence of jurisdiction and rejected Figueroa's argument that the Wilentz directive had divested her of jurisdiction. Although a copy of the directive had not been produced, the Magistrate Judge assumed for purposes of decision that the directive existed and found:

[E]ven if the New Jersey Supreme Court prevented Judge Blackburn from hearing the merits of the two harassment charges, she retained the inherent authority both over her docket and the persons appearing before her to ultimately decide the jurisdiction issue raised by plaintiff.

Id. at 492. Finally, she found that although the contempt citation was procedurally deficient, "the issue is not before this Court because the existence of procedural errors plays absolutely no part in the judicial immunity analysis." Id. at 493, 495 (noting that "the public policy favoring the judicial immunity doctrine outweighs any consideration given to the fact that a judge's errors caused the deprivation of an individual's basic due process rights").⁴

Figueroa filed a timely notice of appeal. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. S 1291.

II.

We review a grant of summary judgment de novo , viewing all facts and reasonable inferences drawn there from in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. See Arnold M. Diamond, Inc. v. Gulf Coast Trailing Co., 180 F.3d 518, 521 (3d Cir. 1999). A motion for summary judgment should only be granted when "there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and . . . the moving party is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). Our task is to determine whether the moving party -here, Judge Blackburn -has shown " `that there exists no genuine issue of material fact that would permit a reasonable jury to find for the nonmoving party.' " International Union, United Auto., Aerospace & Agric. Implement Workers of America v. Skinner Engine Co. , 188 F.3d 130, 137 (3d Cir. 1999) (quoting Miller v. Indiana Hosp., 843 F.2d 139, 143 (3d Cir. 1988)). We also review de novo the Magistrate Judge's determination that Judge Blackburn, as a judge of a court of limited jurisdiction, could be accorded judicial immunity, a purely legal question. See Carver v. Foerster, 102 F.3d 96, 99 (3d Cir. 1996).

Figueroa asserts, first, that municipal court judges are not entitled to judicial immunity. Judicial immunity, the argument goes, is exclusive to judges of superior or general jurisdiction and judges of limited or inferior jurisdiction, if they are protected at all, are protected only when acting within their jurisdiction.

Even if municipal court judges can receive the protection of judicial immunity, Figueroa continues, Judge Blackburn was not entitled to immunity because she acted in the absence of subject matter jurisdiction over the offenses with which he was charged. Figueroa invokes, first, the Wilentz directive and asserts, second, that N.J. Ct. R. 1:10-1, as amended in 1994, eliminated a municipal court's power to immediately execute a sentence for contempt of court.⁵ Thus, he submits, Judge Blackburn did not have jurisdiction to order his immediate arrest without granting a five-day stay of sentence and her act in so doing was, therefore, a nonjudicial act.⁶

A.

It is a well-settled principle of law that judges are generally "immune from a suit for money damages." Mireles v. Waco, 502 U.S. 9, 9 (1991) (per curiam); see also Randall v. Brigham, 74 U.S. (7 Wall.) 523, 536 (1868) ("This doctrine is as old as the law, and its maintenance is...