Gentile v. County of Suffolk
| Decision Date | 11 February 1991 |
| Docket Number | No. 203,D,203 |
| Citation | 926 F.2d 142 |
| Parties | 32 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 315 Steven GENTILE and William Rydstrom, Plaintiffs-Appellees- Cross-Appellants, v. The COUNTY OF SUFFOLK, a Municipal Entity, Detective Robert Sisino, Detective Clifford Christ, Police Officer Michael Rogers, Police Officer Allen Prim, Police Officers Johns Does, individually and in their official capacities, Defendants - Appellants - Cross - Appellees. ockets 90-7307, 90-7327. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
E. Thomas Boyle, Suffolk County Atty., Hauppauge, N.Y. (Caroline Levy, Asst. County Atty., of counsel), for defendants-appellants-cross-appellees.
James I. Meyerson, New York City (Jonathan C. Moore, of counsel), for plaintiffs-appellees-cross-appellants.
Julius L. Chambers, Cornelia T.L. Pillard, Charles Stephen Ralston, Clyde E. Murphy, Attys., NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc., New York City, as amicus curiae.
Before FEINBERG, VAN GRAAFEILAND and KEARSE, Circuit Judges.
Defendant County of Suffolk and individual defendants Robert Sisino, Clifford Christ, Michael Rogers and Allen Prim appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York, dated February 21, 1990, after a jury trial before Judge Jack B. Weinstein, granting plaintiffs Steven Gentile and William Rydstrom the sum of $150,000 each from defendant County of Suffolk (hereafter the County) for defendants' violation of their constitutional and state law rights. The jury found both the County and the individual defendants liable for malicious prosecution under state and federal law. Plaintiffs cross-appeal, challenging an aspect of the district court's ruling on damages and its denial of leave to amend their complaint in order to assert an abuse of process claim against the County.
This case grows out of a brawl between plaintiffs and four County police officers, and centers on a pattern of police and prosecutorial misconduct thereafter, including the cover-up of the police officers' role in the incident and the subsequent malicious prosecution of plaintiffs on robbery and assault charges. The parties disagree principally on whether the district judge properly admitted into evidence selected portions of a report by a state investigatory commission relating to past misconduct of the County Police Department and the District Attorney's Office, and whether the court's decision to defer the hearing on the trustworthiness of the report until after completion of trial was error. For the reasons given below, we affirm the judgment of the district court in all respects.
The violent confrontation that led to this suit occurred in a diner in the early morning of July 28, 1981. All of the parties to the dispute had been frequenting bars prior to their arrival at the diner. Plaintiffs Gentile and Rydstrom entered the diner first, accompanied by two female companions who were behaving in a loud and obnoxious manner. Plaintiffs' female companions subjected the individual defendants and their sole female companion to obscene remarks upon their initial entry into the diner, and then further harassed them after they were seated by throwing food at their table. Defendants Sisino, Christ, Rogers and Prim--all County policemen who were not in uniform--responded to this provocation by warning plaintiffs and then by using force. Plaintiffs claimed at trial that none of the defendants identified themselves as policemen in approaching them, while defendants testified that before the onset of the fight one of the officers had displayed his badge and asked plaintiffs to stop behaving in a disorderly manner.
In the course of the fight between plaintiffs and defendants, officer Rogers' gun fell to the ground. Plaintiffs testified that after recovering his gun Rogers pointed it at Rydstrom's head and threatened to shoot, an allegation denied by defendants. The fight eventually extended out into the parking lot in front of the diner, where plaintiff Gentile picked up and retained possession of Officer Sisino's wallet from the ground, allegedly believing that it belonged to Rydstrom. Sisino subsequently claimed that the wallet and accompanying identification were stolen from him as he was lying on his back outside the diner.
Shortly after plaintiffs drove away from the diner, uniformed County police arrived, responding to a call made by a diner employee. Although the police stopped plaintiffs' car near the diner, the commanding officer at the scene, Sergeant Dillworth allowed plaintiffs to leave, believing that they were not criminally liable for their conduct at the diner. None of the four defendant officers, at least two of whom had suffered serious injuries, asked that plaintiffs be arrested for assault or robbery or even held for questioning.
Three days later, on July 31, 1981, plaintiffs were arrested after Sisino told his superiors that his badge had been stolen. Shortly after the incident, the Internal Affairs Division of the County Police Department began a departmental investigation. While Sergeant Dillworth was later charged with neglecting his duty for failing to detain plaintiffs, none of the four defendants actually involved in the fighting was charged with any wrong-doing. On November 27, 1981, plaintiffs were indicted on two counts of robbery against Sisino and three counts of assault against Sisino, Christ and Rogers.
The first trial of Gentile and Rydstrom on the criminal charges against them ended in a mistrial. In 1982, the state trial court dismissed the indictments because retrial was barred by the Double Jeopardy Clause. People v. Gentile, 114 Misc.2d 610, 452 N.Y.S.2d 507 (Suffolk Co.Ct.1982). More than a year later, the Appellate Division, Second Department, reversed this ruling and reinstated the indictments. People v. Gentile, 96 A.D.2d 950, 466 N.Y.S.2d 405 (2d Dept.1983). In April 1985, a jury found plaintiff Rydstrom guilty of assault and plaintiff Gentile guilty of robbery. It should be noted that the Assistant District Attorney who handled both the first and second trials, Timothy Mazzei, was a close friend of Officer Sisino and after the second trial met and eventually married Sisino's daughter.
In February 1987, the convictions were reversed and the indictment dismissed by the Appellate Division, Second Department, on the grounds that the evidence was "insufficient in quality and quantity to justify the verdict." People v. Gentile, 127 A.D.2d 686, 687, 511 N.Y.S.2d 901 (2d Dept.1987). The court noted that the testimony of Officer Sisino regarding the alleged theft of his badge was sufficiently "inconsistent" with the evidence to "raise a reasonable doubt as a matter of law as to the defendants' guilt of the crime of robbery." Id. at 688, 511 N.Y.S.2d 901. Since the count on which Rydstrom had been convicted was assault in the course of the commission of the robbery, the appellate court also reversed his conviction. Id. The court went on to say that it would have reversed the convictions even if the evidence had been sufficient because, among other reasons:
[W]e believe that, in view of the Assistant District Attorney's admittedly close personal relationship with the complainants (he became engaged to Sisino's daughter) and his confessed deep emotional involvement in the case, he should neither have tried this case nor been involved in its course.
Following dismissal of the indictments, plaintiffs requested the County Police Commissioner and the County District Attorney to investigate defendant police officers for perjury and other related offenses. The Chief Law Assistant to the District Attorney refused this request, and Captain Hough of the Police Department responded that a thorough investigation of the incident had been conducted and revealed no foundation for plaintiffs' allegations.
In July 1987, plaintiffs initiated this civil action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 and the district court's pendent jurisdiction over related state law claims. Plaintiffs argued that a cover-up of the diner incident began almost immediately after the fight, when police officers discovered that a badge had been misplaced and found it necessary to concoct a story in order to shield their own misconduct at the diner from official scrutiny. As confirmation of this claim, plaintiffs pointed to defendants' delay in reporting any criminal wrongdoing until the day after the episode in question, when they began to appreciate the need to protect themselves from possible charges of misconduct that might jeopardize their prospects for continued employment or retirement benefits.
In addition to claiming against the individual defendants, plaintiffs also sued the County, alleging that it was responsible for the actions of the individual defendants and relying on Monell v. New York City Dep't of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978). Plaintiffs claimed that the actions of the County Police Department and the District Attorney's Office in refusing seriously to investigate the incident or to discipline the involved officers constituted a pattern of conduct that ratified and even encouraged the officers' violations by recklessly ignoring evidence that County employees had violated plaintiffs' constitutional rights in attempting to secure their malicious prosecution.
Trial commenced in May 1989, and lasted for seven days; 24 witnesses, including plaintiffs and all of the individual defendants, testified. Shortly before trial, the Temporary Commission of Investigation of the State of New York (the Commission) issued a report entitled "An Investigation of the Suffolk County District Attorney's Office and Police Department" (the SIC Report). This followed a formal investigation...
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