Diruzza v. County of Tehama

• Citation: 323 F.3d 1147
• Decision Date: 21 March 2003
• Docket Number: No. 01-17461.,01-17461.
• Parties: Sherol DIRUZZA, aka Sherl Janc, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COUNTY OF TEHAMA; Robert Heard; Jerry Floyd, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (9th Circuit)

323 F.3d 1147

Sherol DIRUZZA, aka Sherl Janc, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COUNTY OF TEHAMA; Robert Heard; Jerry Floyd, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 01-17461.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted November 5, 2002.

Filed March 21, 2003.

Allison Fairchild, Alameda, CA, and David A. Prentice, Prentice & Schaap, Sacramento, CA, for the appellant.

J. Scott Smith and Laurence L. Angelo, Angelo, Kilday & Kilduff, Sacramento, CA, for appellee, County of Tehama.

Stephen E. Horan, Porter, Scott, Weiberg & Delehant, Sacramento, CA, for appellees, Robert Heard and Jerry Floyd.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California; William B. Shubb, District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. CV-96-00596-WBS/PAN.

Before McKEOWN and PAEZ, Circuit Judges, and POLLAK,^* District Judge.

OPINION

POLLAK, District Judge.

With this case, this court has inherited a rather complicated procedural history, comprising parallel litigation in state and federal tribunals situated in California. Today, we are asked to disentangle the threads woven by these separate court systems as they have independently sought to resolve the same core conflict. Specifically, our task in the current chapter of the dispute is to determine the combined preclusive effect, in federal court, of a California trial court judgment and the California appeals court decision affirming that judgment. Complicating the inquiry is that the state appellate opinion, while arriving at the same ultimate conclusion as the state trial court, employed different reasoning in doing so. We conclude that the holding of the California trial court has a collateral estoppel effect that precludes the plaintiff from continuing to pursue her action in federal court.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

At the root of all the court battles involved in this case is friction between Plaintiff/Appellant Sherol DiRuzza and certain members of the Sheriff's Department of Defendant/Appellee Tehama County. Before her eventual discharge, DiRuzza was employed by the Sheriff's Department as a Deputy Sheriff. In 1994, during DiRuzza's tenure at the department, Defendant/Appellee Robert Heard became a candidate for the elective position of Tehama County Sheriff. DiRuzza chose to lend her support to the incumbent sheriff, Mike Blanusa, and participated in a televised commercial for Blanusa's campaign. On Election Day, 1994, Heard was victorious, as was Defendant/Appellee Jerry Floyd, who had run for Undersheriff.

On December 10, 1994 (after the election, but before Heard took office), DiRuzza was allegedly assaulted by her fiance. During the confrontation, DiRuzza discharged eight rounds from her service weapon out a window, apparently seeking to alert neighbors to her plight. As a consequence of her unauthorized use of her service weapon, DiRuzza was the subject of a disciplinary hearing conducted by Blanusa that resulted in her being suspended for thirty days without pay. As a further consequence, DiRuzza was charged with a felony count of "gross negligent discharge of a firearm" and a misdemeanor count of "exhibiting a firearm in a rude and threatening manner."

On January 3, 1995, Heard and Floyd took office. DiRuzza alleges that, upon her return from suspension, the newly ensconced Sheriff and Undersheriff subjected her to a hostile and oppressive work environment because she had backed Blanusa in the election. She claims that she was relegated to less desirable job assignments, was not allowed to be ceremonially re-sworn as a peace officer, and was denied the right to carry a department-issued firearm. DiRuzza asserts that she was one of those on the Heard/Floyd "hit list" — persons who had supported Blanusa and so were to be punished and eventually removed from the Sheriff's Department. According to DiRuzza, Heard and Floyd enlisted the assistance of an investigator to "dig up the dirt" on Blanusa supporters.

In April 1995, approximately four months after the new Sheriff and Undersheriff had assumed office, the Tehama County District Attorney offered DiRuzza a plea bargain for the criminal charges pending against her. The pending criminal charges were to be dropped if DiRuzza would plead guilty to the infraction of disturbing the peace and resign from the Sheriff's Department. Knowing that her law enforcement career would be scuttled by a felony conviction, DiRuzza accepted the plea bargain and resigned, affirming that she was acting "voluntarily and with full knowledge of the consequences." DiRuzza later characterized the events leading up to her resignation as tantamount to "constructive termination."

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

And so commenced the trail of litigation. DiRuzza filed a complaint in federal district court in March of 1996 alleging twelve causes of action. Many of the claims were dismissed, but the parties proceeded with discovery on the retaliation claims DiRuzza had brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 and 1985, as well as certain claims based on state law. On March 4, 1998, the district court granted summary judgment for the defendants on the §§ 1983 and 1985 claims, based on the Supreme Court's jurisprudence regarding the free-speech rights of persons holding public office. In its memorandum, the court explained that although most public employees enjoy the protection of the First Amendment when they speak, see Pickering v. Bd. of Educ., 391 U.S. 563, 574, 88 S.Ct. 1731, 20 L.Ed.2d 811 (1968), those employees involved in the making of agency policy have no First Amendment protection against dismissal for expressions of opinion incompatible with the policy agendas of their superiors, see Elrod v. Burns, 427 U.S. 347, 367, 96 S.Ct. 2673, 49 L.Ed.2d 547 (1976). Noting that a public employee is considered a policymaker if "the hiring authority can demonstrate that party affiliation is an appropriate requirement for the effective performance of the public office involved," Branti v. Finkel, 445 U.S. 507, 518, 100 S.Ct. 1287, 63 L.Ed.2d 574 (1980), the district court granted summary judgment against DiRuzza upon determining that deputy sheriffs are properly characterized as policymakers. DiRuzza v. County of Tehama, No. S-96-596 (E.D.Cal. Mar. 4, 1998). The court declined to retain jurisdiction over the supplemental state claims.

DiRuzza appealed the district court's 1998 decision to this court. In March 2000, we reversed the grant of summary judgment, finding that the "defendants [had] failed to show as a matter of law that DiRuzza was a policymaker and that political loyalty was therefore an appropriate requirement for her job." DiRuzza v. County of Tehama, 206 F.3d 1304, 1306 (9th Cir.2000). We declined to endorse a per se rule that all deputy sheriffs were or were not policymakers; instead, we held that "[t]he critical inquiry is the job actually performed." Id. at 1310. The case was then remanded for further findings as to whether DiRuzza's role at the Sheriff's Department was in fact that of a policymaker. Id. at 1313.

The district court's task on remand was complicated significantly by separate litigation that had taken place in the state courts while the federal case pressed forward. While her first federal appeal was pending, DiRuzza had re-filed her statelaw claims in the Tehama County Superior Court, alleging the same facts and circumstances as in the federal complaint. DiRuzza charged that the defendants violated the free speech, equal protection, and due process clauses of the California constitution, as well as other state-law provisions. Later, she voluntarily dismissed the due process and equal protection claims, leaving only the claims for violation of the California constitution's free speech provision and California Government Code § 3204.¹

On September 23, 1999, the Superior Court granted summary judgment for the defendants, holding that "when Plaintiff resigned her position as one of the conditions of her plea bargain, the resignation was an independent act which destroyed the cause of action." DiRuzza v. County of Tehama, No. CI44322 (Cal.Super.Ct. Sept. 23, 1999). The state court also observed that the district attorney, not the sheriff, is ultimately responsible for charging crimes and negotiating plea bargains, stating that "the Sheriff may have a lot of power, but he does not control the District Attorney." Moreover, DiRuzza, the court said, received the benefit of her bargain — she did not have to risk a felony conviction. In short, "she cannot resign as part of the plea agreement that was to her favor and then turn around and sue because she allegedly was forced out."

On appeal, the California Court of Appeals for the Third District affirmed, ruling that DiRuzza's claims were "entirely without merit." DiRuzza v. County of Tehama, No. 44322 (Cal. Ct.App. June 26, 2001). The complexities present in the instant appeal arose because the California Court of Appeals affirmed on grounds other than those spelled out by the Superior Court. Rather than examining the grounds supporting the Superior Court's grant of summary judgment, the state appellate court focused its analysis on an antecedent question — namely, the defendants' entitlement to judgment on the pleadings — and, therefore, inquired whether there was a "reasonable possibility the plaintiff [could] amend the complaint to state a viable claim." With regard to DiRuzza's claim of a violation of the state constitutional right of free speech, the court held that "the terms of the free speech provision do not include any guidelines, mechanisms, or procedures from which a damages remedy could be inferred." Given this "jurisprudential dead end," the court determined that there was no viable way in which DiRuzza could amend the aspect of her complaint alleging infringement of her rights under the California constitution. The court further ruled that DiRuzza's claim under California Government Code § 3204 was also unavailing.²

By the time the California Court of...