Patrolmen's Benevolent Ass'n. v. City of New York
| Decision Date | 17 October 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. 00-9538.,00-9538. |
| Citation | 310 F.3d 43 |
| Parties | PATROLMEN'S BENEVOLENT ASSOCIATION OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK, Incorporated for itself and on behalf of its members, Gary Johnson, Police Officer, Missie Lewis-Manning, Police Officer, Robert Drayton, Police Officer, Marva Gardner, Police Officer, Demetria Singleton, Police Officer, Margo McKenzie, Police Officer, Robert Winslow, Police Officer, Kenneth Zepherin, Police Officer, Oscar Espinal, Police Officer, Dave Guevera, Police Officer, Peggy Alves, Police Officer, Robin Irvin, Police Officer, Silas Plunkett, Police Officer, Ronny Forbes, Police Officer, Alton Walker, Police Officer, Barry Hinds, Police Officer, Tselanee Kitching, Police Officer, Laverne Stuger, Police Officer, Michael Butler, Police Officer, Carole P. Sievwright, Police Officer, Inger Barron, Police Officer, Ronald S. Archer, Police Officer, Plaintiffs-Appellees, Sergeant's Benevolent Association of the City of New York, Incorporated for itself and on behalf of its members, Philip Tai and John S. Robertson, Consolidated-Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. THE CITY OF NEW YORK, Rudolph Giuliani, as Mayor of the City of New York and Individually, Howard Safir, as Police Commissioner of the Police Department of the City of New York and Individually, Patrick Brennan, New York City Deputy Police Chief Officially and Individually, Cornelius J. Dever, Deputy Police Chief, Officially and Individually and Michael A. Markman, Chief, Officially and Individually, Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
Julien L. Kalkstein (Michael D. Hess, Larry A. Sonnenshein on the brief), Corporation Counsel of the City of New York, New York, NY, for Appellants.
Linda M. Cronin (Eric S. Crusius, Rocco G. Avallone, on the brief), Cronin & Byczek, LLP, Lake Success, NY, for Appellees Patrolmen's Benevolent Association.
Peter J. Blessinger (Norman A. Olch, on the brief), Cerrone & Geoghan, New York, NY, for Appellees Tai and Robertson.
Before: LEVAL and CALABRESI, Circuit Judges, and STEIN, District Judge.1
Defendants appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Shira A. Scheindlin, Judge) upon a jury verdict in favor of plaintiffs. Appellants are the City of New York, former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, former Police Commissioner Howard Safir, and certain other police officials (collectively, "the City"). Appellees are the Patrolmen's Benevolent Association of the City of New York, on behalf of 22 individual police officers, and the Sergeant's Benevolent Association of the City of New York, on behalf of two police sergeants. Plaintiffs, all of whom are black or black-Hispanic, sued the City for transferring them into New York City's 70th Precinct on the basis of their race in the wake of the beating and torture of Abner Louima, a black man, by police officers in the 70th Precinct in August 1997. They asserted violations of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the New York State Human Rights Law, and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. At the conclusion of a three-week trial, the jury returned a verdict in favor of the City with respect to all but one of the plaintiffs on the employment discrimination claims, but found in favor of all plaintiffs on the equal protection claim, and awarded $50,000 damages to each plaintiff. After the district court denied the City's motion for judgment as a matter of law or, in the alternative, a new trial, the City filed this appeal.
The City asserts the following grounds for appeal: 1) plaintiff Oscar Espinal (the only plaintiff to prevail on the Title VII employment discrimination claim) failed to establish that he suffered an adverse employment action when he was transferred to the 70th precinct; 2) the City demonstrated that the race-based transfers, as a matter of law, were narrowly tailored to meet the compelling state interest of effective law enforcement and therefore did not violate the equal protection clause; 3) the jury charge on the "narrowly tailored" prong of the strict scrutiny test was erroneous; 4) the trial judge improperly "coerced" the jury to award damages to each plaintiff by issuing supplemental instructions on damages; 5) the jury charge on damages was erroneous; and 6) the damages awarded were excessive. We affirm the judgment of the district court.
The following facts are taken from the district court's opinion denying summary judgment, Patrolmen's Benevolent Ass'n of New York, Inc. v. City of New York, 74 F.Supp.2d 321, 325-26 (S.D.N.Y.1999), and the trial record. On August 9, 1997, Haitian immigrant Abner Louima was beaten and ignobly tortured by police officers in the 70th Precinct station house in Brooklyn, New York. Louima was black and the officers who assaulted him were white. Two days after the assault, leaders of the New York City Police Department ("NYPD") and the City — including Commissioner Safir and Mayor Giuliani — met with 40 to 50 leaders of the community surrounding the 70th Precinct, including Councilwoman Una Clarke, to discuss an appropriate response to the incident. Following that meeting, Commissioner Safir decided to assign additional black police officers to the 70th Precinct.
News reports of the Louima incident began to appear on August 12. The first of several public demonstrations in response to those reports of the assault was held at the 70th Precinct the next day. Police and city officials grew concerned that the protests might become violent. On August 14, Commissioner Safir and Mayor Giuliani announced that the commanding officer and executive officer of the 70th Precinct, as well as ten police officers assigned to that precinct, were being immediately reassigned.
A few days later, the new commanding and executive officers assumed control of the precinct, and new officers replaced those who had been removed. The commanding and executive officers were Hispanic and white, respectively, and the majority of the incoming officers were black or Hispanic. (A. 459-60, 1333.)2 The following week, the NYPD transferred an additional 26 black and black-Hispanic police officers into the precinct. (A. 1334-35.) The City does not dispute that race was the basis for the transfers. On August 29, some 6000 demonstrators marched from Grand Army Plaza in Brooklyn to City Hall in Manhattan in protest over the Louima assault. Following the rally, approximately 100 individuals were arrested for impeding traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge. (A. 1270.) Demonstrations continued outside the 70th Precinct for the next several days.
The Patrolmen's Benevolent Association, representing 22 of the transferred officers — who identify themselves variously as African-American, Black-Hispanic, Jamaican, West Indian, Trinidadian or Guyanese — filed this action in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York in October 1997, alleging violations of Title VII, 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000(e) et seq., N.Y. Executive Law § 296, and the officers' constitutional rights pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983 and 1985. The Sergeant's Benevolent Association, representing two transferred police sergeants, subsequently filed a complaint asserting essentially the same claims and the actions were subsequently consolidated. On cross-motions for summary judgment, the district court 1) declined to grant summary judgment dismissing the Title VII claim on the grounds that disputed issues of fact existed with respect to whether plaintiffs had suffered an adverse employment action and 2) held that the City's need for effective law enforcement could be a compelling state interest justifying a race-based measure if the City could prove at trial that such an interest existed and that the transfers were narrowly tailored to advance that interest. See Patrolmen's Benevolent Ass'n, 74 F.Supp.2d at 339.
A jury trial was held from May 25 to June 15, 2000. More than 40 witnesses testified at the trial, including all of the plaintiffs, other NYPD officers and officials, Commissioner Safir, two expert witnesses, and Councilwoman Clarke.
At the trial, defendants contended that the transfers, admittedly race-based, were necessary to prevent a delicate situation from getting out of control. Commissioner Safir stated that there was a "great potential for violence" in the 70th Precinct following the Louima incident and "we needed to act quickly and as quickly as possible to put people in the community who would have a stake in the community." (A. 468.) Safir testified that at the meeting held at police headquarters several days after the incident that was referred to above, "one of the themes that continually came out... was the theme that they needed more African-American officers ... and that if we wanted better police community relations then we needed to assign more African-American police officers to their community." (A. 475.)
Councilwoman Clarke testified that at the same meeting she told Safir "unless you do something quickly we in the community may not be able to control the rage of the community." (A. 820.) Clarke did not specifically request a transfer of black officers into the precinct, although she did call for the removal from the precinct of any officer who may have known about the incident. (A. 821.) She testified that other community members "may have" requested more black officers in the community. Defendants' expert Hubert Williams, former Director of the Newark, New Jersey Police Department, testified that he believed the race-based transfers were "a very important step in defusing the volatility that existed in the community." (A. 991.) In Williams' view, there was a danger of civil disturbance in the 70th Precinct after the Louima incident and the transfer of black officers into the precinct helped to...
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