Jackson v. Byrne
| Decision Date | 20 August 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-1795,83-1795 |
| Parties | Valeria JACKSON, Tella Robinson, Lee Robinson, Valerie Jackson, Santana Jackson, Tommie Jackson, by Valeria Jackson, Special Administrator of their estates, and on their own behalf, Ann Paterson, Annette Paterson, Roy Hunt, and James W. Phelan, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Jane BYRNE, individually and as Mayor of the City of Chicago, Richard Brzeczek, individually and as Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department, Administrator of the estate of Richard Albrecht, individually and as Superintendent of the Chicago Fire Department, Frank Muscare, individually and as Lieutenant of the Chicago Fire Department and President of Local Firefighters Union # 2, John Does, whose names are not presently known to Plaintiffs who were employees of the City of Chicago, individually and in their official capacities at the time alleged in the complaint, the City of Chicago, a municipal corporation, Chicago Firefighters Local Union # 2, a labor union, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit |
Joachim J. Brown, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiffs-appellants.
Lynn K. Mitchell, Asst. Corp. Counsel, Gilbert A. Cornfield, Cornfield & Feldman, Chicago, Ill., for defendants-appellees.
Before CUMMINGS, Chief Judge, and PELL and CUDAHY, Circuit Judges.
Two children were asphyxiated during a fire in their residence. The fire broke out in the winter of 1980, at the time of a strike by municipal fire fighters in the City of Chicago. This civil rights case arises from the deaths of those children and from the destruction of property caused by the fire. Plaintiffs-appellants appeal from the district court's entering summary judgment against them. At issue on appeal is whether defendants-appellees deprived plaintiffs and plaintiffs' decedents of rights secured by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal Constitution.
The submissions of the parties to the district court reveal the following undisputed facts. In late 1979, Chicago municipal fire fighters, represented by Chicago Firefighters Local Union Number Two, entered negotiations with the City of Chicago for a collective bargaining contract. On December 16, the fire fighters authorized a strike in support of their bargaining demands, but they did not carry out their threatened work stoppage until February 14, 1980. On February 14, the city successfully moved in state court for a temporary restraining order, which enjoined Local Union Number Two from engaging in any strike activity against the City of Chicago. On the same day, the Superintendent of the Chicago Fire Department ordered all members of the Chicago Fire Department to report for regular duty, advising that members who failed to report would be subject to discipline, including dismissal. Jane Byrne, at that time Mayor of the City of Chicago, also demanded that the fire fighters return to work and caused the following notice to be printed in the February 14 issue of the Chicago Tribune newspaper:
Despite the temporary restraining order, the order of the Fire Commissioner, and the threats of the city's mayor, approximately 3500 of the city's 4000 fire fighters honored the strike. The union proposed to the city a "Realistic Strike Plan," under which the city was to turn over fire-fighting equipment to the union and permit the union unilaterally to provide fire-fighting services. The city rejected the union's plan and instead implemented its own "Task Force Plan." Under the Task Force Plan The City of Chicago and Local Union Number Two appeared to reach a settlement on February 20, 1980, but the accord dissolved on February 21, and the strike continued until March 8, 1980, when representatives of the city and the union signed a strike settlement agreement and a collective bargaining agreement. The city subsequently reinstated the striking fire fighters.
non-striking fire fighters were to report to the Chicago Fire Academy, from which they were assigned to designated operating firehouses. All other city firehouses were to be closed and guarded by Chicago policemen. The city advanced several reasons for closing all but a few designated firehouses. First, the available manpower would be more effective if it were concentrated in a few locations rather than being thinly dispersed throughout the city. Second, several firehouses had suffered damage due to sabotage. Third, the police could more easily protect the non-striking fire fighters if they were concentrated in a small number of locations. The striking fire fighters chose to picket in front of firehouses throughout the city. Mayor Byrne and Richard Brzeczek, at that time Superintendent of the Chicago Police Department, ordered city policemen to bar striking fire fighters from entering any municipal firehouse.
At approximately 3:30 p.m. on February 22, 1980, while the strike was still in effect, a fire broke out at three residential buildings, 646, 648, and 652 North Ridgeway in Chicago. A city firehouse that was not manned by assigned fire fighters was located across the street from the residential buildings. Four striking fire fighters picketed in front of that firehouse as the Chicago police stood guard. The four picketing fire fighters detected the fire and tried to gain access to the guarded firehouse, but the police barred their way. The fire fighters did assist residents to safety from the first floor of the building at 646 North Ridgeway and tried to reach the second floor of that building but were driven back by smoke and heat. Fire Department records show that at 3:35 p.m. a fire call was placed from the firehouse and at 3:43 p.m., thirteen minutes after the fire was detected, a fire truck dispatched from one of the manned firehouses arrived at the scene of the fire. The four striking fire fighters assisted the dispatched crew in extinguishing the blaze, but despite the efforts of the fire fighters the children Santana Jackson and Tommie Jackson lost their lives.
Plaintiffs in this case are the parents of the deceased children. In addition, residents and landlords of the residential buildings, seeking redress for their loss of property, have joined as plaintiffs. Defendants are, among others, the former mayor of Chicago Jane Byrne, the former police superintendent Richard Brzeczek, the president of the fire fighters union local Frank Muscare, the City of Chicago, and unnamed police officers. Plaintiffs alleged a federal cause of action under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, claiming that defendants deprived plaintiffs of rights guaranteed under the Fifth, Eighth, and Fourteenth Amendments to the federal Constitution. Plaintiffs also asserted pendent wrongful death and civil rights claims under the laws of Illinois. The district court dismissed the federal cause of action on summary judgment and then exercised its discretion not to hear the remaining state law claims. This appeal is taken from the district court's dismissal of the suit.
This court has repeatedly stated that plaintiffs who have suffered tortious injury are not entitled to Section 1983 relief merely because the defendant is a government official. See, e.g., Jackson v. City of Joliet, 715 F.2d 1200, 1203 (7th Cir.1983), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 104 S.Ct. 1325, 79 L.Ed.2d 720 (1984); Bowers v. DeVito, 686 F.2d 616, 618 (7th Cir.1982). Section 1983 imposes liability only for violations of rights secured by the Constitution or federal law. See Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 146-47, 99 S.Ct. 2689, 2695-96, 61 L.Ed.2d 433 (1979). Accordingly, the starting Appellants claim that the facts in this case implicate the Fourteenth Amendment's protection against deprivation of life or property without due process, but that position is untenable. Although there were deaths in this case, the state did not, within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment, "deprive" plaintiffs' decedents of life. The fire killed Santana and Tommie Jackson, government officials did not. Our analysis would no doubt be different if government officials set the fire or placed forces in motion which ignited the fire that claimed the lives of the Jackson children. Cf. Martinez v. California, 444 U.S. 277, 285, 100 S.Ct. 553, 559, 62 L.Ed.2d 481 (1980). Government involvement in the setting of the fire, however, has never been part of plaintiffs' theory of the case. A similar analysis demonstrates that the Fourteenth Amendment's protection against deprivation of property without due process is not implicated in this case.
point in an analysis of a Section 1983 claim is the isolation of the specific federal right that plaintiff claims defendant violated when acting under color of state law. Here plaintiffs allege violations of rights secured under the Fifth and Eighth Amendments and under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, but as the district court correctly determined, the former two Amendments are not implicated by the facts of this case. Plaintiffs have alleged no action by the federal government, as the Fifth Amendment requires, and the Eighth Amendment is not implicated because no governmental unit imposed penalties on plaintiffs. Accordingly, only the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment could give rise to a successful Section 1983 claim in this case.
Appellants respond with a second theory under which the city deprived Santana and Tommie Jackson of life. They contend that even if government officials did not put a match to the North Ridgeway residences, the city did fail adequately to protect plaintiffs' decedents from a fire of independent origins. Hence the district court, appellants maintain,...
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