Nieto v. San Perlita Independent School Dist.

• Decision Date: 16 February 1990
• Docket Number: No. 89-2417,89-2417
• Parties: 58 Ed. Law Rep. 457 Frank NIETO, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. SAN PERLITA INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT, Jimmy Crow, Raul Chapa, Brenda Fort, Vickie Shewmaker, Jeannine Tankersley, Billy Bob Todd and Carl Medley, In Their Official and Individual Capacities, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

Page 174

894 F.2d 174

58 Ed. Law Rep. 457

Frank NIETO, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. SAN PERLITA INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DISTRICT, Jimmy Crow, Raul

Chapa, Brenda Fort, Vickie Shewmaker, Jeannine Tankersley,

Billy Bob Todd and Carl Medley, In Their Official and

Individual Capacities, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 89-2417.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

Feb. 16, 1990.

Travis Hiester, Atlas, Hall, McAllen, Tex., for defendants-appellants.

Horacio L. Barrera, Martinez & Barrera, Brownsville, Tex., for plaintiff-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas.

Before DAVIS and SMITH, Circuit Judges, and LITTLE, ¹ District Judge.

W. EUGENE DAVIS, Circuit Judge:

Frank Nieto filed a Sec. 1983 action against a number of defendants, including appellants, who are members of the San Perlita Independent School District Board of Trustees, the school district superintendent, the high school principal, and the basketball coach. Appellants moved for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity and the district court denied their motion. We reverse.

I.

Plaintiff Frank Nieto was employed as a maintenance supervisor by the San Perlita Independent School District, a small south Texas school district with approximately 260 students and 30 employees. Mr. Nieto primarily performed janitorial or custodial duties at the schools and supervised other custodians. In late 1986 Mr. Nieto apparently became concerned with what he considered inappropriate conduct of the high school basketball coach Carl Medley. Mr. Nieto began pulling students out of class at San Perlita High School to question them about Medley, as well as questioning students at lunch and on the school campus.

Nieto complained to the high school principal, Raul Chapa, that Medley had used profanity in front of students, and had physically abused students. According to Chapa's affidavit, his investigation showed that Medley had occasionally used inappropriate language, but that the complaints of physical abuse were denied by all the students reportedly involved.

Teachers at San Perlita High School complained about the disruptive effect of Mr. Nieto's actions in pulling students out of class. Several teachers also complained that Mr. Nieto listened to their class discussions and their private conversations in the teachers' lounge to gather information about coach Medley and about other teachers. Other school employees stated that Mr. Nieto spent so much time and energy on his investigation of coach Medley he was unable to properly perform his work, and that he discouraged other custodians from performing their work or misinformed them as to what was requested of them.

Mr. Chapa stated he had conferences with Mr. Nieto on several occasions concerning the teachers' complaints, and repeatedly directed Mr. Nieto to stop his investigative activities.

In March 1987, Mr. Nieto appeared before the school board at a public meeting and voiced complaints about Medley, Chapa and Crow. Medley was subsequently issued a letter of reprimand but when his employment contract expired the school board renewed it.

Following his appearance at the school board meeting Mr. Nieto continued to remove students from class and listen in on teacher conversations. The majority of the teachers at San Perlita High School told principal Chapa and superintendent Crow that they would not return the following year if Mr. Nieto was retained as an employee of the school district.

In early April 1987, almost all of the teachers at San Perlita High School signed a letter to the school board in support of Mr. Chapa and Mr. Crow and asked the board to promptly "resolve the present problems" concerning Mr. Nieto.

Members of the board stated by affidavit that at its April meeting the board in executive session discussed Nieto's activities but determined it was the superintendent's responsibility to handle the situation. Nieto contends that the board in executive session instructed the superintendent to fire him.

The day following the April board meeting, Crow and Chapa met with Mr. Nieto and the superintendent informed Mr. Nieto that he was terminated.

Mr. Nieto filed suit in November 1987 against San Perlita Independent School District, and against superintendent Jimmy Crow, principal Raul Chapa, school board members Brenda Fort, Vickie Shewmaker, Jeannine Tankersley, and Billy Bob Todd, and Coach Carl Medley in their individual and official capacities. Mr. Nieto alleged in his Sec. 1983 action that his termination as maintenance supervisor violated his First Amendment rights as well as his right to procedural Due Process guaranteed him by the Fourteenth Amendment. More specifically, Mr. Nieto alleged that he was dismissed as "retaliation for having made complaints about the Coach, Superintendent and Principal" and "for reporting violations of school board policy and state law concerning the conduct of a coach and the failure of the Superintendent and Principal to take any action against him." The complaint also alleged:

10. On several occasions [Mr. Nieto] heard coach Medley use profanity in front of the students in violation of school board policy. He also saw him physically abuse students....

11. On or about the 10th day of March, 1987, the plaintiff appeared before the San Perlita Independent School District Board of Trustees to present the complaints about Coach Medley and Ron Squires. On that date the school district heard the complaints.

The individual defendants answered the suit and asserted the defense of qualified immunity. They also moved for a more definite statement and an order staying discovery.

The district court granted both of the defendants' motions and entered an order staying discovery and requiring the plaintiff to plead with more particularity. Although Nieto amended his complaint, he included no significant additional details of his claim. After Nieto amended his complaint, appellants moved for summary judgment seeking a dismissal of the suit. In response to defendants' detailed summary judgment evidence, Nieto offered only that Principal Chapa told him "the reason for his dismissal had to do with the letter of complaint he had distributed to the Board Members," and "that he had attacked allot [sic] of teachers."

The district court partially granted defendants' motion for summary judgment and struck plaintiff's procedural due process claim. The district court denied defendants' summary judgment motion on the ground of qualified immunity, and also denied defendants' summary judgment motion leveled at plaintiff's First Amendment claim. The individual defendants appeal the district court's denial of qualified immunity.

II.

A.

The parties agree that this court has jurisdiction to review the district court's denial of summary judgment predicated on qualified immunity. See Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985).

In reviewing the district court's ruling on a motion for summary judgment, we apply the same standard that governs the district court. Bache v. American Tel. & Tel., 840 F.2d 283 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 109 S.Ct. 219, 102 L.Ed.2d 219 (1988). To defeat a motion for summary judgment, the plaintiff "may not rest upon the mere allegations or denials of the adverse party's pleading, but ... must set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(e); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986).

The Supreme Court has consistently held that "Government officials are entitled to some form of immunity from suits for damages. As recognized at common law, public officers require this protection to shield them from undue interference with their duties and from potentially disabling threats of liability." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 806, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2732, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). See also Geter v. Fortenberry, 849 F.2d 1550, 1553 (5th Cir.1988) (Geter I). Public officials who are required to exercise their discretion enjoy a qualified immunity defense to Sec. 1983 actions, insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Harlow, 457 U.S. at 818, 102 S.Ct. at 2738; Whatley v. Philo, 817 F.2d 19 (5th Cir.1987). The reason for granting the qualified immunity to public officials is clear: "where an official's duties legitimately require action in which clearly established rights are not implicated, the public interest may be better served by action taken 'with independence and without fear of consequences.' " Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 525, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 2815, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985), quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 819, 102 S.Ct. at 2739.

In granting qualified immunity to officials, the Supreme Court is concerned not only with protecting officials from money judgments, but also with "the general costs of subjecting officials to the risks of trial--distraction of officials from their governmental duties, inhibition of discretionary action, and deterrence of able people from public service." Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 526, 105 S.Ct. at 2815, quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 816, 102 S.Ct. at 2737.

The Court in Harlow thereby

refashioned the qualified immunity doctrine in such a way as to "permit the resolution of many insubstantial claims on summary judgment" and to avoid "subject[ing] government officials either to the costs of trial or to the burdens of broad-reaching discovery" in cases where the legal norms the officials are alleged to have violated were not clearly established at the time.

Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 526, 105 S.Ct. at 2815, quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 817-18, 102 S.Ct. at 2737-38.

This circuit has similarly recognized "the substantial costs which result from merely subjecting public officials to the defense of damage claims." Elliott v. Perez, 751 F.2d 1472, 1477 (5th Cir.1985) (emphasis in...