Johnson v. Newburgh Enlarged Sch. Dist.

• Citation: 239 F.3d 246
• Decision Date: 31 October 2000
• Docket Number: Docket No. 00-7535
• Parties: (2nd Cir. 2001) TIMOTHY JOHNSON, SR. and LUAINE SIMS, on behalf of their minor son, T.J., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. NEWBURGH ENLARGED SCHOOL DISTRICT; LAVAL WILSON, Superintendent; PHILLIP LEAHY, Former Superintendent; RALPH PIZZO, Former Acting Superintendent; FELIX GONZALEZ, Principal and NICHOLAS BUCCI, Defendants-Appellants. August Term 2000 Argued:
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (2nd Circuit)

Page 246

239 F.3d 246 (2nd Cir. 2001)

TIMOTHY JOHNSON, SR. and LUAINE SIMS, on behalf of their minor son, T.J., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. NEWBURGH ENLARGED SCHOOL DISTRICT; LAVAL WILSON, Superintendent; PHILLIP LEAHY, Former Superintendent; RALPH PIZZO, Former Acting Superintendent; FELIX GONZALEZ, Principal and NICHOLAS BUCCI, Defendants-Appellants.

Docket No. 00-7535

August Term 2000

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

Argued: October 31, 2000

Decided: January 31, 2001

Plaintiffs sued, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, defendant public school district, various school officials, and a gym teacher after the gym teacher allegedly brutally assaulted their minor son in school. Defendants now appeal a denial of their motion to dismiss by the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Yanthis, M.J.).

On appeal, defendants argue that the district court erred in not dismissing the action because: (1) the individual defendants are entitled to qualified immunity; (2) the complaint does not meet the pleading requirements for claims brought against municipalities under § 1983 because it does not allege facts that would tend to support an inference that a policy, custom or practice of the school district led to the unconstitutional deprivation; (3) the complaint does not meet the pleading requirements for claims brought against municipalities under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d, because it does not allege facts giving rise to an inference of intentional race-based discrimination by the school district that is causally linked to the teacher's assault; and (4) suit against the individual defendants cannot be maintained under Title VI because they are not the contracting parties receiving federal educational funds.

Affirmed in part and dismissed in part for lack of appellate jurisdiction.

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

MARK C. RUSHFIELD, Shaw & Perelson, LLP., Highland, NY for Defendants-Appellants.

MICHAEL H. SUSSMAN, Stephen Bergstein, Law Offices of Michael H. Sussman, Goshen, NY for Appellees.

Before: WALKER, Chief Judge, OAKES, and LEVAL, Circuit Judges.

JOHN M. WALKER, JR., Chief Judge:

Plaintiffs, on behalf of their minor son, filed suit pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 asserting Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process violations based on an alleged assault on their son by his public school gym teacher.

Defendants bring this interlocutory appeal from an order by the District Court of the Southern District of New York (George A. Yanthis, Magistrate Judge)¹ denying qualified immunity for the individual defendants. Defendants also contend that the district court erred when it did not dismiss: (1) a § 1983 claim against the school district for failure to plead facts giving rise to an inference of a policy, custom or practice that led to the alleged Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process violation; (2) a Title VI, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d, claim against the school district for failure to plead facts giving rise to an inference of intentional discrimination causally related to the alleged assault; and (3) a Title VI claim against the individual defendants because they were not contracting parties receiving federal educational funds.

We agree with the district court's conclusion that, on the present record, the individual defendants are not entitled to qualified immunity. The remainder of the defendants' appeal is dismissed for lack of appellate jurisdiction.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs Timothy Johnson, Sr. and Luaine Sims brought this action on behalf of their minor child, T.J.-who at the time of the events in question was an eighth grade African-American student at South Junior High School in Newburgh, New York--whom they allege was assaulted at the school by his gym teacher, Nicholas Bucci. The complaint alleges that this assault violated T.J.'s Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process rights, and constituted racial discrimination in violation of Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, 42 U.S.C. § 2000d. Plaintiffs pled the following facts.

On February 20, 1996, after T.J. and his classmates had finished playing dodge ball, Bucci asked T.J. to hand in the ball. T.J. threw the ball towards Bucci from a distance of about twenty feet. The ball landed near Bucci without hitting him.

In response, Bucci threw two balls back at T.J. and then yelled "you think that's funny, you think that's funny!" as he walked over to T.J. Bucci grabbed T.J. by the throat, shouted "I'll kick the shit out of you!," lifted him off the ground by his neck and dragged him across the gym floor to the bleachers. Bucci then choked T.J. and slammed the back of T.J.'s head against the bleachers four times. Bucci also rammed T.J.'s forehead into a metal fuse box located on the gym wall and punched him in the face. During much of the attack, Bucci prevented T.J. from escaping by placing one of his arms across the boy's chest. Bucci only stopped his assault after another student threatened to intervene.

According to the complaint, this was Bucci's fifth assault on students--four of whom were African-American--in ten years. In 1994, Bucci allegedly hit Jonathan Bryant and twisted his arms causing injury to Bryant's "arm and shoulder that required medical treatment." In 1988, Bucci allegedly slapped Herman Patrick and "a fight ensued," injuring Patrick. In 1987, Bucci allegedly slapped George Blake and, in 1986, he was allegedly involved in a physical altercation with Derrick Walters. Each of these incidents was reported to school officials. Of the five assault victims, only Blake was not African-American.

DISCUSSION

I. Qualified Immunity

The central issue before us is whether the district court erred in denying the individual defendants qualified immunity from the substantive due process claims brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Because the district court addressed this question on a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss, we review the district court's denial de novo, accepting as true the material facts alleged in the complaint and drawing all reasonable inferences in plaintiffs' favor. See, e.g., Charles W. v. Maul, 214 F.3d 350, 356-57 (2d Cir. 2000); Connell v. Signoracci, 153 F.3d 74, 80 (2d Cir. 1998); Kaluczky v. City of White Plains, 57 F.3d 202, 206 (2d Cir. 1995).

Section 1983 authorizes civil suits for equitable relief and money damages against government officials acting under the color of government authority who subject individuals to "deprivation[s] of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws." 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Plaintiffs here seek only money damages, both compensatory and punitive.

The ability to sue for money damages under § 1983 serves both as an incentive for government agents to operate within the confines of their prescribed authority and as a remedy for vindicating federal civil rights. See Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 638 (1987) ("When government officials abuse their offices, 'action[s] for damages may offer the only realistic avenue for vindication of constitutional guarantees.'" (quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 814 (1982))). Where the boundary between authorized official action and the deprivation of an individual's rights is unclear, however, the threat to government actors of personal monetary liability poses risks to effective government operations. As the Supreme Court recognized in Anderson, "permitting damages suits against government officials can entail substantial costs, including the risk that fear of personal monetary liability and harassing litigation will unduly inhibit officials in the discharge of their duties." Anderson, 483 U.S. at 638.

To accommodate the conflict between the goals of § 1983 in deterring governmental abuse and remedying unlawful governmental transgressions on the one hand, and the societal interest in not unduly burdening legitimate government operations on the other, the Supreme Court established qualified immunity as an affirmative defense to § 1983 claims. See Harlow, 457 U.S. at 814; Rodriquez v. Phillips, 66 F.3d 470, 475 (2d Cir. 1995). A government actor performing a discretionary task is entitled to immunity from § 1983 suits if either "(a) the defendant's action did not violate clearly established law, or (b) it was objectively reasonable for the defendant to believe that his action did not violate such law." Salim v. Proulx, 93 F.3d 86, 89 (2d Cir. 1996); see Warren v. Keane, 196 F.3d 330, 332 (2d Cir. 1999). The availability of qualified immunity in such instances "reduces the general costs of subjecting officials to the risks of trial--distraction of officials from their governmental duties, inhibition of discretionary action, and deterrence of able people from public service"--by shielding them from suits "seeking to impose personal liability for money damages based on unsettled rights or on conduct that was not objectively unreasonable." Connell, 153 F.3d at 79 (internal quotation marks omitted).

In this action, the defendants assert only the first basis-- that no clearly established right was violated--in arguing for qualified immunity.² Of course, determining whether a right is "clearly established" is not subject to mathematical precision. "A right is 'clearly established' if '[t]he contours of the right [are] sufficiently clear'" in the context of the alleged violation such "'that a reasonable official would understand that what he is doing violates that right.'" LaBounty v. Coughlin, 137 F.3d 68, 73 (2d Cir. 1998) (citing Anderson, 483 U.S. at 640). The recurring difficulty with this general directive, however, lies in reasonably articulating the right in relation to the factual situation at hand. See id. Characterizing the right too narrowly to the facts of the case might permit government actors to escape personal liability, while doing so too broadly risks permitting unwarranted imposition of monetary liability.

Two principles guide...