Rosa R. v. Connelly

Decision Date09 November 1989
Docket NumberNo. 190,D,190
Citation889 F.2d 435
Parties57 Ed. Law Rep. 679 ROSA R., on her own behalf and as parent and next friend of her minor child, Edward R., Appellants, v. James A. CONNELLY, in his capacity as Superintendent of Schools for the Bridgeport, Connecticut, Public School System, and the Bridgeport Board of Education, Appellees. ocket 89-7382.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

Richard McCarthy, Fairfield, Conn., for appellants.

William H. Narwold, Hartford, Conn. (Karen L. Goldthwaite, Cummings & Lockwood, Hartford, Conn., of counsel), for appellees.

Before OAKES, Chief Judge, and PIERCE, Circuit Judge. *

OAKES, Chief Judge:

This is an appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut, Ellen Bree Burns, Chief Judge, denying the motion for summary judgment of plaintiffs-appellants, Rosa R. and Edward R., and granting summary judgment to defendants-appellees, James Connelly and the Bridgeport Board of Education ("the Board"). Finding no set of facts to support appellants' allegations that the Bridgeport Board of Education's disciplinary actions denied them due process or equal protection of the law, we affirm the district court's judgment.

FACTS

Edward R., a former student of the Bridgeport, Connecticut, public school system, was suspended for ten days from high school on March 10, 1987 for bringing a loaded gun to school in order to sell it. During the ten-day suspension, James Connelly, Bridgeport Superintendent of Schools, scheduled an expulsion hearing for March 23, 1987. Upon request by Edward R. and his mother Rosa R., Connelly and the Bridgeport Board of Education twice granted appellants postponement of the hearing. In their second request letter for postponement, appellants waived "any claim which they have against the Bridgeport Board of Education as a result of the delay which they have requested," as well as "any claim for educational services for the duration of the postponement." During the two postponements, Edward R. remained absent from school.

On July 23, 1987, the eventual date of the hearing, the Board voted to expel Edward R. for 180 school days, the maximum period of exclusion from school allowed for disciplinary purposes under Connecticut law. See Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 10-233a(e) (1989). Despite requests by Edward R.'s attorney, Connelly and the Board denied Edward R. credit for the three months of school he had missed during postponement of the expulsion hearing, thus making the 180-day exclusion effective on the first school day in September 1987, rather than on March 23, 1987, the school day that had followed the ten-day suspension.

Bypassing state remedies that allowed for appeal of the Bridgeport Board's actions to the state board of education, 1 Edward R. and Rosa R. filed suit in the District of Connecticut under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 (1982), claiming that the defendants' failure to notify them at the time of the postponement requests that the Board would not credit "time served" by Edward R. violated procedural due process. In addition, plaintiffs claimed that the Board's decision to deny credit for time served was tantamount to magnifying the length of exclusion, thus violating Edward R.'s rights to substantive due process and equal protection. Connelly and the Bridgeport Board challenged the Sec. 1983 claims, and additionally argued that the action was barred under the Eleventh Amendment and that plaintiffs had waived any potential claims in their second request letter for postponement. The district court found that although the Eleventh Amendment did not bar suit, the record failed to support the Sec. 1983 claims, and so entered summary judgment in favor of the defendants.

On appeal, plaintiffs renew their Sec. 1983 claims against the Bridgeport Board and Superintendent Connelly and, in the alternative, seek certification to the Connecticut Supreme Court of state law questions which they argue will be dispositive of the Sec. 1983 claims. Defendants-appellees seek sanctions against appellants' attorney for filing a frivolous appeal.

DISCUSSION

As a preliminary matter, we note that the district court properly dismissed James Connelly, Superintendent of Schools, as a defendant in this case. Because appellants sought to sue him in his official rather than personal capacity, the Board, and not Connelly, was the real party in interest. See Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159, 165-66, 105 S.Ct. 3099, 3104-05, 87 L.Ed.2d 114 (1985). Without any allegations that Connelly was "directly and personally responsible for the purported unlawful conduct," appellants failed to assert a distinct claim against him, rendering their complaint as to Connelly "fatally defective" on its face. Alfaro Motors, Inc. v. Ward, 814 F.2d 883, 886 (2d Cir.1987). We thus proceed to consider appellants' claims against the Bridgeport Board only.

1. Eleventh Amendment

To determine whether a local board of education is an arm of the state and thus entitled to Eleventh Amendment protection from suit in federal court, this court must examine the degree to which the entity is supervised by the state and the entity's source of funds for satisfying judgments rendered against it. See Mt. Healthy City School Dist. Bd. of Educ. v. Doyle, 429 U.S. 274, 280-81, 97 S.Ct. 568, 572-73, 50 L.Ed.2d 471 (1977). Such an inquiry into Connecticut's education system supports the conclusion that local school boards are municipal bodies for purposes of the Eleventh Amendment and thus subject to suit in federal court.

Under Connecticut law, local school boards are endowed with broad authority and discretion. Although the state board of education is charged with "general supervision and control of the educational interests of the state," Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 10-4(a) (1989), "being a steward of state education policy does not make the school district an alter ego of the state." Fay v. South Colonie Cent. School Dist., 802 F.2d 21, 27 (2d Cir.1986). This is true particularly in Connecticut, where actual implementation of the goals and maintenance of the public schools are the responsibilities of local boards, see Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 10-220 (1989), whose members are chosen by municipal election. See id. Sec. 9-203.

Of greater significance than the scope of authority enjoyed by local school boards, however, is their source of funding. See Holley v. Lavine, 605 F.2d 638, 643-44 (2d Cir.1979), cert. denied, 446 U.S. 913, 100 S.Ct. 1843, 64 L.Ed.2d 266 (1980). Although local boards receive much of their financing from the state, "[i]nferior government bodies do not share in Eleventh Amendment immunity simply because they receive state funds." Fay, 802 F.2d at 27. Because in Connecticut "funding education ... remains primarily the function of the towns," Lostumbo v. Board of Educ., 36 Conn.Supp. 293, 295-96, 418 A.2d 949, 951 (1980); see also Horton v. Meskill, 195 Conn. 24, 40 n. 17, 486 A.2d 1099, 1108 n. 17 (1985) (stating that, by 1984, local communities still financed 49.8% of state educational costs, whereas the state's share of funding amounted to 42.9%), any judgments rendered against the Bridgeport Board of Education would come primarily from local funds. 2 We therefore hold that the local board is not entitled to Eleventh Amendment protection from suit in federal court. 3

2. Appellants' Constitutional Claims
A. Procedural Due Process

Appellants contend that they were entitled, at the time they requested postponements of the expulsion hearing, to notice of the possibility that such requests would result in Edward R. being excluded from school past March 1988. They further argue that the Board's failure to provide such notice rendered Edward R.'s expulsion beyond March 1988 an unconstitutional deprivation of property without due process of law.

For appellants to establish a procedural due process violation, they must: (1) identify a property right, (2) establish that governmental action with respect to that property right amounted to a deprivation, and (3) demonstrate that the deprivation occurred without due process. See Fusco v. Connecticut, 815 F.2d 201, 205 (2d Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 849, 108 S.Ct. 149, 98 L.Ed.2d 105 (1987). The district court, while concluding that Edward R. did have a property right to education after March 1988, in essence found proof of the second and third elements to be lacking.

Although the district court and the parties focus on whether Edward R.'s absence from school beyond March 1988 was the result of his own or governmental action, this inquiry misses the mark. It is true that Edward R.'s postponement requests resulted in his prolonged absence from school; by the same token, however, the Board's decision not to credit the three-month postponement period contributed to Edward R.'s absence beyond 180 days. Thus even if appellants were largely responsible for Edward R.'s prolonged exclusion, the Board's decision to deny credit for time served may very well have constituted sufficient action to amount to governmental deprivation of a property right.

Nevertheless, the district court properly held that the deprivation was not visited upon plaintiffs without due process of law. In arguing that notice of the possible denial of credit for time served should have been provided when they requested postponements of the hearing, appellants misstate the essence of procedural due process. Due process requires that individuals have "notice and opportunity for hearing appropriate to the nature of the case" prior to a deprivation of life, liberty, or property. Mullane v. Central Hanover Bank & Trust Co., 339 U.S. 306, 313, 70 S.Ct. 652 656-57, 94 L.Ed. 865 (1950). The notice requirement of due process does not require that school administrators provide a detailed listing of all possible courses of action for which discipline might be imposed or of all possible penalties. See Bethel School Dist. No. 403 v....

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