Lennon v. Miller

Decision Date12 September 1995
Docket NumberNo. 1660,D,1660
PartiesAdeline LENNON, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Chief William P. MILLER, The City of Troy, Defendants, Patrolman Donald J. Backaus, and Patrolman Peter Gordon, Defendants-Appellants. ocket 94-9189.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

Matthew J. Kelly, Albany, New York (Roemer & Featherstonhaugh, P.C., on the brief), for Plaintiff-Appellee.

Donald J. Shanley, Deputy Corporation Counsel of City of Troy, Troy, New York (Peter R. Kehoe, Corporation Counsel of City of Troy, on the brief), for Defendants-Appellants.

Before: WINTER, CALABRESI, and CABRANES, Circuit Judges.

JOSE A. CABRANES, Circuit Judge:

We review a judgment of the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York (Frederick J. Scullin, Jr., Judge ), denying appellants' motion for summary judgment on grounds of qualified immunity. The question presented is whether the appellants are entitled to summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds under the "objective reasonableness" standard stated in Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987). In Anderson, the Supreme Court held that a government actor enjoys qualified immunity if, at the time of the challenged action, it was objectively reasonable for him to believe that his behavior did not violate the appellee's clearly established constitutional rights. Id. at 639, 641, 107 S.Ct. at 3038, 3039. We reverse.

I. FACTS

There is no dispute about the material facts. On and prior to October 11, 1991, Adeline Lennon, the plaintiff, and her husband, James Lennon, were living separately due to marital problems. Mrs. Lennon, a nurse at a local doctor's office, had previously called the Central Police Station in Troy, N.Y. to report threats from Mr. Lennon, and on October 11, 1991, she requested and received a police escort by Officer Donald Backaus to the doctor's office where she worked. Later that morning, James Lennon arrived at Mrs. Lennon's office to take an automobile, a 1988 Cadillac Coupe de Ville, from her. The plaintiff called the police and requested assistance. Officers Backaus and Peter Gordon were dispatched to the scene. Backaus, who had escorted Mrs. Lennon into the building earlier, arrived first, followed shortly thereafter by Gordon.

Officer Backaus met Mr. Lennon in the garage behind the plaintiff's office. Mr. Lennon identified himself and stated his intention to take the car. He asserted that he owned the vehicle and showed Backaus the certificate of title and the registration issued by the New York State Department of Motor Vehicles ("DMV"). Backaus confirmed Mr. Lennon's ownership of the car with the DMV. Mr. Lennon informed the officers that he could not unlock or start the car because the locks and ignition had been changed. The officers told Mr. Lennon that he would have to make arrangements to have the car towed if he wished to take it.

Backaus told the plaintiff that her husband had the right to take the car. She went inside the building and returned to ask Backaus to speak with her attorney on the telephone about her rights to the car under New York State Domestic Relations Law. Backaus declined to speak with the plaintiff's attorney, and suggested that the attorney call him at the police station later. Mrs. Lennon then unlocked the car, entered the vehicle, locked the doors, and attempted to start the engine.

When Backaus asked the plaintiff to get out of the car, she refused to do so. Backaus then asked Mr. Lennon for permission to break the car's window to prevent the plaintiff from driving the car out of the garage. When Mrs. Lennon heard this, she stopped trying to start the engine and unlocked the car door. However, she remained in the driver's seat and did not emerge from the car. Backaus opened the door and informed the plaintiff that she was under arrest for obstructing governmental administration. He pulled her hand off the ignition, placed his arm around her neck, shoulder, right arm, and right hand, and forcibly removed her from the car. Mrs. Lennon was handcuffed and transported to the Central Police Station. There, she was charged with obstructing governmental administration under New York Penal Law Sec. 195.05, given an appearance ticket, and released. After her release, Mrs. Lennon was treated at a hospital for an injury to her right wrist. The record does not indicate anything further about Mrs. Lennon's diagnosis or the extent of her injuries.

On November 1, 1991, Mrs. Lennon's defense counsel moved to dismiss the charge against her. On December 17, 1991, Judge Patrick McGrath of the Troy City Criminal Court entered an order dismissing the charge against Mrs. Lennon. Judge McGrath found that the officers had no authority to order her out of the car, and thus, they could not charge her with obstructing governmental administration for failure to comply with that order:

If the officer believed that the defendant's possession of the vehicle was wrongful he should have arrested the defendant for Unauthorized Use of a Vehicle or Larceny of the Vehicle.... Since the officer did not arrest the defendant for any crime in connection with her possession of the vehicle, the officer had no authority to remove the defendant from the vehicle and the charge of Obstructing Governmental Administration cannot stand.

Judge McGrath concluded, in other words, that had the officers arrested Mrs. Lennon for some other offense, such as larceny of the vehicle, then it would have been appropriate to arrest her for obstructing governmental administration under New York Penal Law Sec. 195.05 when she ignored their orders to get out of the car. However, because the officers had not arrested Mrs. Lennon for any other offense, the judge held that they were not performing an "official government function" within the meaning of Sec. 195.05 when they ordered her to exit the vehicle. See New York Penal Law Sec. 195.05 (McKinney's 1988). Thus, according to Judge McGrath, Mrs. Lennon was not obstructing governmental administration when she ignored those orders.

On April 10, 1992, the plaintiff brought the present action, which included claims against Backaus and Gordon under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 for false arrest, malicious prosecution and excessive force; an additional Sec. 1983 claim against the City of Troy and Police Chief William P. Miller for failure to train Backaus and Gordon properly; supplemental state claims against Backaus and Gordon for unlawful imprisonment and malicious prosecution; and a supplemental state claim of assault against Backaus. The district court dismissed the plaintiff's Sec. 1983 claim against Chief Miller and the City of Troy. The court dismissed the state claims against Gordon on statute of limitations grounds. 1 The court denied motions for summary judgment filed by Backaus and Gordon on the Sec. 1983 claims, and on the supplemental state law claims pertaining to Backaus. The officers appeal the order denying their motions for summary judgment.

II. DISCUSSION
A. Jurisdiction

We first address our jurisdiction over this appeal. In order to decide the jurisdictional question, we must examine both the summary judgment standard in qualified immunity cases and recent Supreme Court precedent on the appealability of denials of summary judgment on grounds of qualified immunity.

1. The Summary Judgment Standard in Qualified Immunity Cases

Qualified immunity shields government officials from liability for civil damages as a result of their performance of discretionary functions, and serves to protect government officials from the burdens of costly, but insubstantial, lawsuits. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 817-18, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2737-38, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). Government actors performing discretionary functions are "shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Id. at 818, 102 S.Ct. at 2738. Even where the plaintiff's federal rights and the scope of the official's permissible conduct are clearly established, the qualified immunity defense protects a government actor if it was "objectively reasonable" for him to believe that his actions were lawful at the time of the challenged act. Anderson, 483 U.S. at 641, 107 S.Ct. at 3039; Robison v. Via, 821 F.2d 913, 921 (2d Cir.1987) (citing Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 340-41, 106 S.Ct. 1092, 1095-96, 89 L.Ed.2d 271 (1986)). The objective reasonableness test is met--and the defendant is entitled to immunity--if "officers of reasonable competence could disagree" on the legality of the defendant's actions. Malley, 475 U.S. at 341, 106 S.Ct. at 1096; accord Golino v. City of New Haven, 950 F.2d 864, 870 (2d Cir.1991), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 3032, 120 L.Ed.2d 902 (1992).

Although this inquiry requires a focus on the particular facts of the case, in Robison we held that a defendant is entitled to summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds when

"no reasonable jury, looking at the evidence in the light most favorable to, and drawing all inferences most favorable to, the plaintiffs, could conclude that it was objectively unreasonable for the defendant[ ]" to believe that he was acting in a fashion that did not clearly violate an established federally protected right.

821 F.2d at 921 (quoting Halperin v. Kissinger, 807 F.2d 180, 189 (D.C.Cir.1986)); see also Wachtler v. County of Herkimer, 35 F.3d 77, 80 (2d Cir.1994) (same). In other words, if any reasonable trier of fact could find that the defendants' actions were objectively unreasonable, then the defendants are not entitled to summary judgment. An officer's actions are objectively unreasonable when no officer of reasonable competence could have made the same choice in similar circumstances. See Malley, 475 U.S. at 341, 106 S.Ct. at 1096. Thus, if the court determines...

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