Smith v. Stoneburner

• Decision Date: 10 May 2013
• Docket Number: No. 12–1963.,12–1963.
• Citation: 716 F.3d 926
• Parties: Donnetta SMITH, Charles Smith, and Logan Smith, Plaintiffs–Appellees, v. Mark STONEBURNER and Damon Knapp, in their individual capacities, Defendants–Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

716 F.3d 926

Donnetta SMITH, Charles Smith, and Logan Smith, Plaintiffs–Appellees,

v.Mark STONEBURNER and Damon Knapp, in their individual capacities, Defendants–Appellants.

No. 12–1963.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued: April 24, 2013.

Decided and Filed: May 10, 2013.

ARGUED:Michael S. Bogren, Plunkett Cooney, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, for Appellants. William F. Piper, William F. Piper, PLC, Portage, Michigan, for Appellees. ON BRIEF:Michael S. Bogren, Mary Massaron Ross, Plunkett Cooney, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, for Appellants. William F. Piper, William F. Piper, PLC, Portage, Michigan, for Appellees.

Before: DAUGHTREY, SUTTON and KETHLEDGE, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

SUTTON, Circuit Judge.

But for the want of $14.99 or a warrant, this case would not exist. After Charles Smith shoplifted a phone charger, two police officers went to his house. In the course of arresting him, they entered his house twice (without a warrant each time), forcefully restrained him and injured his mother. In response, Smith and his mother filed this action claiming that the officers violated their Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment rights and some state law duties to boot. Accepting the plaintiffs' fact-supported allegations as true, as we must at this stage of the litigation, we affirm the district court's denial of qualified immunity to the two officers.

I.

For $14.99, one can buy a cell phone charger with a car adapter at the Walgreens in Sturgis, Michigan. That price apparently was too steep for Smith, age 20, who stopped by the store on May 25, 2010. Store employees saw Charles take a charger off the shelf, place it in his cart, walk around the store, hide the charger on a different shelf behind packages of straws and then start to leave. The store manager intercepted Charles on his way out, and Charles showed him where he hid the charger. The package had been opened, and the part of the charger that connects into the phone had been cut off and removed. The manager asked Charles to stay at the store while he called the police, but Charles refused and walked home, a home as it turns out within sight of the Walgreens.

Officers Mark Stoneburner and Damon Knapp of the Sturgis Police Department responded to the call. They interviewed the store's employees, reviewed a security videotape and decided to talk to Charles.

When the two officers pulled up in front of the Smith house, they found Charles' 19–year–old brother, Logan, outside. Stoneburner asked Logan if Charles was home, and Logan said he was upstairs. When Stoneburner asked whether the officers could enter the house, Logan told Stoneburner that he would ask his mother and that they could wait on the back deck of the house while he checked. Stoneburner and Knapp followed Logan to the back. As Logan went into the house, Stoneburner started to follow him through the door. Logan said nothing but “gave him a look like why are you coming in the house, I told you to wait on the deck.” Logan Smith Dep., R. 44 at 11. Stoneburner entered the home anyway, while Knapp stayed outside. Logan retrieved Charles from his bedroom upstairs and brought his mother, Donnetta, down too. Stoneburner asked Charles to step outside on the deck, and all three Smiths complied.

Once outside, Stoneburner asked Charles about the incident at Walgreens. Charles denied stealing or cutting the phone charger and allowed Stoneburner to pat him down. Stoneburner found only a lighter. Undeterred, Stoneburner asked Charles if he could look inside the house. Charles mumbled something and started walking back inside. Stoneburner followed, asking Charles whether the police should know about anything he had inside. Charles opened the door, re-entered the house and started to pull the door closed behind him. Stoneburner held the door open, told Charles to stop and crossed the threshold of the doorway to grab Charles by the wrist. He pulled Charles back outside. At the same time, Donnetta told Stoneburner not to touch her son and moved between Stoneburner and Charles. Stoneburner collided with Donnetta, causing her to hit the side of the house.

After pulling Charles outside, Stoneburner bent him over the railing, and Knapp told him he was under arrest. Charles stiffened his body, making it more difficult for the officers to place his hands behind his back. Stoneburner and Knapp each grabbed one of Charles' arms, bent him over the railing and pressed his head against the wall as they handcuffed him. The officers charged Charles with third-degree retail fraud, a misdemeanor, after which Charles pled guilty to a lesser misdemeanor: disturbing the peace.

The Smiths filed this lawsuit under § 1983 and state law, alleging that Stoneburner unconstitutionally entered their home two times and that the officers used excessive force against Charles and Donnetta. The district court denied qualified immunity to the officers on all of the claims and granted summary judgment in favor of Charles on one of them: Stoneburner's second entry into the house when he grabbed Charles and pulled him back outside.

II.

In this qualified immunity case, as in all qualified immunity cases, two questions arise: whether the officers violated the Smiths' constitutional rights, and if so whether those rights were clearly established at the time. See Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 236, 129 S.Ct. 808, 172 L.Ed.2d 565 (2009). In considering the officers' claim that they should prevail as a matter of law on one or both of these questions, we draw all reasonable factual inferences in favor of the plaintiffs. See Campbell v. City of Springboro, 700 F.3d 779, 786 (6th Cir.2012).

A.

First up is whether Officer Stoneburner violated the Smiths' Fourth Amendment rights when he followed Logan into the house to look for Charles. Police officers, it has long been true, may not enter a private home without a warrant absent an exigency or consent. Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 590, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980). Stoneburner does not claim that he had a warrant when he entered the home, and he does not claim any exigency justified the entry. He instead leans on the consent exception.

Police officers do not need a warrant when residents invite them into their homes. Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 219, 93 S.Ct. 2041, 36 L.Ed.2d 854 (1973). “[M]ere acquiescence,” however, does not show consent; the resident must freely invite the officer into the house. United States v. Moon, 513 F.3d 527, 538 (6th Cir.2008).

Did Logan invite Stoneburner into the house? Maybe yes; maybe no. According to Stoneburner and Knapp, Logan said something they could not understand, held the door open and never told them they could not enter. According to Logan, he told the officers they needed to “wait on the porch while I go inside,” and he gave Stoneburner a look “like why are you coming in the house” when the officer nonetheless followed him. Logan Smith Dep. at 11. That is the epitome of a triable issue of fact, see Schneckloth, 412 U.S. at 227, 93 S.Ct. 2041, one over which our authority recedes and the jury's takes over.

Stoneburner insists that, in a close call, officers should win because qualified immunity protects all but “the plainly incompetent.” Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341, 106 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed.2d 271 (1986). That may be true. But that is not the problem Stoneburner faces. The testimony shows two competing versions of what happened, only one of which can be true. If a jury credits Logan Smith's version of the events, that would mean Stoneburner ignored Logan's request to stay outside. That would not be a close call when it comes to consent, and that finding would not shield Officer Stoneburner from liability.

Gerald M. v. Conneely, 858 F.2d 378 (7th Cir.1988), changes nothing. The Seventh Circuit held that a homeowner consented to a police officer's entrance when she told the officer to “wait here” at the front door and she “did nothing to indicate to him that she disapproved” when she noticed that he was waiting inside the front door. Id. at 384. Neither factual premise of that ruling appears here. Logan did not say “wait here,” which might mean waiting inside the front door or waiting outside of it. He said that Stoneburner should “wait on the porch while I go inside.” Logan Smith Dep. at 10. Nor, once Stoneburner nonetheless entered the house, did Logan act as if nothing had happened. He gave Stoneburner a disapproving look—a “look like why are you coming in the house.” Id. at 11. That presumably is why Stoneburner acknowledges he stopped once Logan saw him inside the house. Even if the Seventh Circuit's 1988 statement of the relevant parameters of Fourth Amendment law were accurate, a point we need not decide, Smith's case does not fall within them.

B.

Second up is a related but distinct question—whether Stoneburner violated the Fourth Amendment when he entered the house a second time to arrest Charles. Stoneburner admits that, by reaching across the doorway to grab Charles, he entered the house, and he admits that no one invited him in. No factual disputes about potential consent thus cloud the resolution of this issue.

Stoneburner faces two presumptions, not one, when it comes to this entry: the customary presumption against warrantless entries, Payton, 445 U.S. at 590, 100 S.Ct. 1371,and the presumption against warrantless entries to investigate minor crimes or to arrest individuals for committing them, Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 104 S.Ct. 2091, 80 L.Ed.2d 732 (1984). In Welsh, a drunk driver swerved off the road, exited his car and walked home. At the time, driving under the influence was a noncriminal violation in Wisconsin, punishable only by a $200 fine. When police officers arrived, they entered Welsh's house and placed him under arrest. Because the government's only interest was “to arrest for a minor offense,” the presumption against entry was “difficult to rebut”—and not rebutted there. Id....