Gonzalez v. City of Elgin

• Citation: 578 F.3d 526
• Decision Date: 20 August 2009
• Docket Number: No. 08-2658.,08-2658.
• Parties: Jose GONZALEZ, Maribel Gonzalez, Antonio Franco, Maria Gonzalez, Luis Franco, and Julio Gonzalez, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF ELGIN, Miguel Pantoja, Shaun Schroeder, Todd Pavoris, Heather Robinson, Doug Neff, Daniel McGinley, and James Kelly, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (7th Circuit)

578 F.3d 526

Jose GONZALEZ, Maribel Gonzalez, Antonio Franco, Maria Gonzalez, Luis Franco, and Julio Gonzalez, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF ELGIN, Miguel Pantoja, Shaun Schroeder, Todd Pavoris, Heather Robinson, Doug Neff, Daniel McGinley, and James Kelly, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 08-2658.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued January 21, 2009.

Decided August 20, 2009.

Samantha Liskow, Debra Loevy-Reyes (argued), Loevy & Loevy, Chicago, IL, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

James L. Deano (argued), Deano & Scarry, Wheaton, IL, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before POSNER, FLAUM, and WOOD, Circuit Judges.

WOOD, Circuit Judge.

Jose Gonzalez, Maribel Gonzalez, Antonio Franco, Maria Gonzalez, Luis Franco, and Julio Gonzalez filed this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the City of Elgin and numerous Elgin police officers. The plaintiffs allege that the defendants violated their Fourth Amendment rights by unlawfully arresting and detaining them, using excessive force against them to effectuate the arrest, and failing to intervene to prevent the excessive use of force. The complaint also alleges three claims based on Illinois law: one for malicious prosecution, one against the City of Elgin based on state-law concepts of respondeat superior, and one for indemnification. The district court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment, and the plaintiffs appeal to this court.

I

A

The facts of this case are highly contested; a person comparing the plaintiffs' version with that of the defendants would be forgiven for thinking that each was recalling an entirely different event. The standard of review governing summary judgment, however, resolves at least one question: we must accept all facts and reasonable inferences in the light most favorable to the non-moving party—here, the plaintiffs. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 255, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986); Chelios v. Heavener, 520 F.3d 678, 685 (7th Cir. 2008); cf. Reeves v. Sanderson Plumbing Prods., Inc., 530 U.S. 133, 149-51, 120 S.Ct. 2097, 147 L.Ed.2d 105 (2000) (addressing standard for motions under FED. R.CIV.P. 50 and noting that the substantive approach mirrors that for Rule 56). We do not judge the credibility of the witnesses, evaluate the weight of the evidence, or determine the truth of the matter. The only question is whether there is a genuine issue of fact. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 249-50, 106 S.Ct. 2505. We present the facts with this standard in mind, noting where relevant the divergence between the plaintiffs' and the defendants' versions of events.

In the wee hours of October 1-2, 2005, plaintiffs were gathered at the home of Antonio and Luis's parents in Elgin, Illinois. (We refer to the plaintiffs by their first names in the remainder of this opinion, since only two surnames are shared by the six plaintiffs.) The plaintiffs (with the exception of Luis) were former high school classmates now in their late twenties and early thirties. Earlier that night, they had attended a wedding and had decided to visit with each other after the wedding ended. While Jose, Julio, and Antonio drank alcoholic beverages at the wedding (the plaintiffs' evidence shows that Jose drank several light beers, Julio drank a couple of beers, and Antonio drank about three beers), they did not drink at all after the wedding ended. Neither Maribel, Maria, nor Luis drank anything alcoholic either at the wedding or at the subsequent gathering.

At around 4:30 a.m., as the plaintiffs were getting ready to leave the gathering, Rodolfo Aranda came running into the house. Earlier, Aranda had been at Luis and Antonio's parents' house with the plaintiffs, but then he, his wife, and his brother left to eat at La Rosa, a nearby restaurant. Aranda told the group that his wife and brother were being beaten up outside the restaurant and that he needed help. The group followed Aranda to the restaurant on foot, but by the time they arrived, the attack on Aranda's wife and brother was over and the attackers had left. The defendants apparently were alerted to the scene by Officers Pantoja and Schroeder, who were busy with a traffic stop near the restaurant and observed the plaintiffs moving toward the restaurant. What occurred then differs for each plaintiff, and from this point it is sensible to proceed one person at a time. Furthermore, because police cameras captured at least some of the events of the evening in question, we also take advantage of our direct observation of the scene.

1. Jose Gonzalez

At his deposition, Jose testified that once the group reached La Rosa, they found Aranda's wife and brother on the ground in the restaurant's parking lot. Jose went over to the brother to see whether he was all right. After that, a group of about five people, including Antonio, Jose, Luis, and the restaurant owner, stood talking outside the restaurant. Officer Pantoja approached the group and spoke with Antonio and the owner of the restaurant, and then snapped, "Oh you know, just everybody get the fuck out of here. Everybody gotta go." Jose asked Officer Pantoja why, because he thought that the plaintiffs had done nothing wrong. Officer Pantoja responded, "I did say for you guys to leave, to get the fuck out of here." At that point, Jose noticed more police cars arriving at the restaurant, and so he grabbed Luis's arm and said, "Let's walk away."

Jose and Luis then walked out of the restaurant parking lot onto the sidewalk and around the newly arrived police vehicles; they were heading east on Villa Street toward Luis's parents' house. At that point, Officer Pantoja screamed out for another officer to arrest Jose and Luis. Jose turned and responded by asking, "Arrest who?" An officer then grabbed him around the neck from behind before other officers ran at him. The officers punched and kicked him for a few minutes before pushing him to the ground and kicking him some more. The officers then pepper-sprayed Jose, and they finally handcuffed him. The officers left Jose in this state on the ground on his knees for approximately five minutes, during which time Jose's wife, Maribel, spoke to him, asking him whether he was okay and telling him to stop cursing because it would "make it worse." Jose's testimony was corroborated by a number of the defendants' depositions. Jose was charged with mob action and resisting a peace officer; the prosecutor later dismissed the mob action charge and reduced the resisting charge to misdemeanor disorderly conduct.

The defendants offer a markedly different account of this scene—one that a jury might believe, but not one that we can accept for purposes of summary judgment review. We outline it here (just as we do for the other plaintiffs below) simply to show the wide gap between the two sides' stories. The defendants assert that once Officer Pantoja asked the plaintiffs to leave the restaurant parking area, Jose began yelling, arguing, and swearing at Officer Pantoja. Officer Pantoja recalled that Jose was agitated, smelled of alcohol, had clenched fists, and poked him in the chest. Officer Pantoja said that he (Pantoja) then displayed his pepper-spray but did not use it. Instead, he told Jose that he was going to be put under arrest for refusing to leave the restaurant. The defendants then asserted that Officer Pantoja informed the newly arrived Officer Pavoris that Jose was to be arrested, and Officer Pantoja, along with Officer Schroeder, began to place a struggling Jose under arrest. By this account, Officer Neff soon arrived on the scene and ran to assist Officers Pantoja and Schroeder in Jose's arrest. The defendants stated that Jose then accidentally fell over a low rise fence, and only when he continued to struggle did officers pepper-spray him in order to place him in handcuffs.

Both parties believe that the video from squad car 857 ("Video 857") supports their version of events. That video starts at 4:55:42 a.m. on October 2, 2005. (All times recorded on the cameras were in the morning; we therefore omit the designation "a.m." from this point onward.) Initially, it shows the squad car parked at the side of a road. The car begins to move at 4:56:30, and reaches speeds of up to 79 miles per hour before coming to a stop at 4:58:00 by the side of a road. Once the squad car comes to a stop, it shows a group of people calmly walking down the street, showing no apparent agitation.

While the quality of the video is not particularly clear, it appears to show, at approximately 4:58:15, a man in a white shirt, presumably Jose (though this is just an inference we are drawing) being tackled by a police officer. The video then shows that a number of police officers converge on Jose, punching and kicking him while he remains bent over in a defensive position. Jose then falls to the ground and when he gets up, hands held in what seems to be a "surrender position," an officer tackles him to the ground and grabs him by the neck, pushing on him. The officer remains straddled over Jose, holding onto him until 4:59:54, when the officer seems to handcuff him and then leave him alone on the ground. Jose remains alone on the ground while police officers calmly walk around the restaurant parking lot until approximately 5:02:15, when a number of officers gather around him. Jose is picked up by an officer at 5:02:37 and is walked to the police van positioned directly in front of squad car 857.

2. Maribel Gonzalez

Maribel testified that when the plaintiffs reached the restaurant, she observed a group of customers outside the doors, along with Aranda's wife and the owner of the restaurant. Maribel estimated that there were no more than ten people in the group. Maribel walked over to the group to console Aranda's wife, and it was at that point that Officer Pantoja asked the group to disperse and leave the premises. Maribel then left the scene with three others and started walking away from the restaurant down Villa...