Volunteer Medical Clinic, Inc. v. Operation Rescue

Citation948 F.2d 218
Decision Date29 October 1991
Docket NumberNos. 90-5159,s. 90-5159
PartiesVOLUNTEER MEDICAL CLINIC, INC., Plaintiff-Appellee, v. OPERATION RESCUE, et al., Defendants, Duane A. Peters (90-5159); Carol A. Zimmerman (90-5160); Mark S. Bodine (90-5161); Charles Franklin Bowman (90-5162), Defendants-Appellants. to 90-5162.
CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

John K. Harber (argued and briefed), Pryor, Flynn, Priest & Harber, Knoxville, Tenn., for plaintiff-appellee.

Duane A. Peters, pro se.

W. Morris Kizer (briefed), Gentry, Tipton, Kizer & Little, Knoxville, Tenn., Stephen H. Galebach (argued and briefed), West & Galebach, Gaithersburg, Md., Jame G. Bruen, Jr. (of counsel), Washington, D.C., for defendants-appellants.

Before: KENNEDY and JONES, Circuit Judges; and FORESTER, * District Judge.

NATHANIEL R. JONES, Circuit Judge.

The district court below permanently enjoined the defendant abortion protestors from entering onto the business property of plaintiff Volunteer Medical Clinic based on its finding that the clinic had stated a valid cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3) (1988). We disagree that a valid § 1985(3) claim has been alleged in this case. However, we find that Volunteer Medical Clinic has pled other causes of action which may support the injunction, and accordingly remand for further consideration of these claims.

I.

The Volunteer Medical Clinic ("VMC") is a health care facility providing family planning services and abortions. On Saturday, February 4, 1989, the defendant-protestors and others conducted an anti-abortion demonstration on the business premises of the VMC. The protesters failed to heed requests by VMC employees to leave the premises, whereupon approximately eighty protesters were arrested and charged with criminal trespass by the Knoxville Police Department.

As a result of the demonstration, VMC filed suit in federal district court on March 1, 1989, seeking injunctive relief and damages. Plaintiff's complaint alleged that the purpose of the February 4 demonstration had been "to obstruct and close down the facilities of the plaintiff ... by trespassing on, sitting in, blockading, impeding, obstructing ingress into or egress from the plaintiff's facility, intimidating and harassing the plaintiff's patients, staging a disruptive protest, assaulting and battering the plaintiff's employees, and otherwise disrupting and interfering with the lawful operation of the plaintiff's business." J.App. at 22-23. The complaint alleged a conspiracy on the part of the defendants to violate the legal rights of women seeking abortion in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3). The complaint further alleged numerous tortious claims, including creation of a public nuisance, interference with VMC's lawful business, trespass, and intentional infliction of emotional harm. Finally, the complaint requested injunctive relief to insure that the defendants "do not infringe the plaintiff's constitutional, statutory, and common law rights to provide abortions and other family planning and medical services and to enjoy protection from tortious interference with its exercise of these rights." J.App. at 23.

On the same day the complaint was filed, the district court entered a temporary restraining order prohibiting the defendants from trespassing on VMC property or otherwise interfering with the operations of VMC. 1

On March 14, 1989, the district court conducted a hearing to determine whether the temporary restraining order should be converted into a preliminary injunction pending trial. At the hearing, counsel for the defendants conceded that his clients were criminally trespassing on the day of the demonstration. The owner of the building and property occupied by VMC also testified that the defendants had no right to be on the property on February 4, 1989. Debra Walsh, the director of VMC, testified that the protestors "began to sit down, lay down, pile on top of one another, stand, push, and effectively blocked the entrance around me." J.App. at 176. Walsh also testified that, of the 48 patients scheduled for appointments on the day of the demonstration, only 18 actually received treatment. Walsh was also questioned about the protestors' response to police efforts to remove them:

Q. Did you witness the removal of these individuals?

A. Yes, I did.

Q. Were they cooperative with the police in the police's efforts to remove them from the property?

A. No, they were not.

Q. In what way were they not cooperative that you observed?

A. They went limp, they would not stand up and move when the police asked them to, they would not walk....

[A]fter the front door was cleared some of the people who had been blocking the back door ran around to make sure that they tried to block the front door and they were arrested in front of the building....

Q. Were you capable of opening the rear doors to your clinic?

A. No, we were not. The clinic staff tried to get all together at one door and push as hard as they could to get out and they could not open the door.

Q. Were you able to open the front door of your clinic?

A. No. The whole staff pushed on the front door trying to open it and we could not do it, too many people in front. We could not open it....

Q. What happened to you, physically, as you stood at the front door of your clinic?

A. I was pinched, hit, grabbed, kicked, and jammed against the door repeatedly.

J.App. at 178-79, 183, 187. Ms. Walsh testified that the attrition rate on February 4 "greatly" exceeded the normal no-show rate. The district court later declared Walsh to be "a credible witness and, as such, attache[d] great weight to her testimony." J.App. at 64.

On March 15, 1989, the district court entered a preliminary injunction pending resolution of defendants' motions to dismiss. The preliminary injunction mirrored the temporary restraining order in most respects, but deleted that language which prohibited demonstrations "within fifteen (15) feet of any person seeking access to or leaving the plaintiff's clinic at any time[.]" J.App. at 103; see text of temporary restraining order, supra note 1.

On March 18, 1989, the defendants staged another demonstration utilizing the same tactics employed at the February 4 protest. On March 20, VMC filed a petition for contempt citing as contemnors those defendants who had participated in both demonstrations. The district court subsequently permitted the VMC to amend its complaint to add additional party defendants, and to allege violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO), 18 U.S.C. §§ 1961-68 (1988).

On April 6, 1989, the district court held a hearing on issues raised by the second demonstration. Walsh testified that 200 pickets appeared on the morning of March 18 and that copies of the injunction were handed to the protesters. She stated that "[t]hey laughed at me and tore [the injunctions] up." J.App. at 231. Most of the hearing was devoted to the testimony of attorney D. Vance Martin, who represented several defendants in the earlier hearing and who had been present at the March 18 protest. The district court found that Martin had violated the preliminary injunction by not discouraging the protest. Accordingly, Martin was fined $500.00, barred from practicing before the district court for one year, and assessed costs and attorney fees.

On May 19, 1989, the district court issued a Memorandum Opinion and Order resolving defendants' motions to dismiss. The court found that VMC had standing to assert the rights of its patients based on this court's holding in Planned Parenthood Ass'n v. City of Cincinnati, 822 F.2d 1390, 1394 (6th Cir.1987).

The district court then addressed VMC's claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3). The court concluded that defendants' actions against women constituted a class-based animus, and that VMC had offered sufficient evidence that "the defendants have greatly interfered and hindered the local police authority's ability to secure equal access to medical treatment for women who choose abortion[,]" J.App. at 64, to establish the requisite state action under § 1985(3). The district court then dismissed VMC's claim based on the right to travel as VMC had failed to allege that any patient from outside Tennessee traveled to the clinic to receive an abortion. Finally, the district court found VMC's RICO claim to be exceedingly vague, and afforded VMC ten days to file an amended RICO claim. On June 1, 1989, VMC filed its amended civil RICO claim. J.App. at 68.

On May 30, 1989, the district court again heard testimony concerning the alleged contemptuous demonstration on March 18. Several of the demonstrators testified concerning their understanding of the district court's preliminary injunction. Based on the evidence presented, the district court issued a Memorandum Opinion on June 5, 1989, finding that the participants in the March 18 demonstration, although fully aware of the injunction's terms, had disrupted the functioning of VMC. The district court also found that VMC's business was "damaged by the acts of defendants and that an inordinate number of patients missed their appointments with plaintiff on that day." J.App. at 119. Two attorneys who participated in the March 18 demonstration were fined $500.00 each. The district court also assessed fines of $250.00 and $125.00 against thirty-four contemnors who were found to have had actual knowledge of the preliminary injunction.

On December 1, 1989, the district court issued a permanent injunction essentially reiterating the terms of the earlier injunction. The permanent injunction added a prohibition against entering either of VMC's parking lots, and contained a more detailed description of the physical property affected by the injunction. This timely appeal followed.

II.

42 U.S.C. § 1985(3) provides in relevant part that:

If two or more persons in any State or Territory conspire or go in disguise on the highway or...

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