P.B. v. Koch

Decision Date27 September 1996
Docket NumberNo. 95-35056,95-35056
Citation96 F.3d 1298
Parties112 Ed. Law Rep. 687, 96 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 7235, 96 Daily Journal D.A.R. 11,891 P.B., * on her own behalf and on behalf of N.B., a minor; S.G., on her own behalf and on behalf of L.G., a minor; C.D., on her own behalf and on behalf of D.D., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. Alfred KOCH, Principal of Preston High School, Defendant-Appellant, and Scott Beckstead; Mary Jo Roberts; George Wilcox; Orson Bowler, Defendants.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Phillip S. Collaer, Quane, Smith, Howard & Hull, Boise, ID, for defendant-appellant.

Stephen L. Pevar, American Civil Liberties Union, Denver, CO, for plaintiffs-appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Idaho, Edward J. Lodge, District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. CV-91-00330-EJL.

Before: FLETCHER, JOHN T. NOONAN, Jr. and RYMER, Circuit Judges.

FLETCHER, Circuit Judge:

Defendant Alfred Koch, the principal of Preston High School, a public high school in Preston, Idaho, appeals from the district court's denial of his motion for summary judgment on the grounds of qualified immunity. Three students, N.B., L.G., and D.D., sued Koch for use of excessive force. N.B. claims that Koch slapped him in the face and grabbed his neck. L.G. claims that Koch grabbed him by the neck and punched him in the chest. D.D. claims that Koch grabbed him by the neck and threw him head first into the lockers. Koch does not dispute that he used force against the students, although he disputes portions of the plaintiffs' accounts of the incidents.

Koch moved for qualified immunity, contending that his conduct did not violate clearly established constitutional rights. The district court denied the motion, concluding that students have a clearly established liberty interest in freedom from arbitrary corporal punishment. Koch appeals.

We affirm. The students had by 1990 a clearly established constitutional right to be free from the force allegedly used by Koch. No reasonable principal in 1990 could have thought it lawful to engage in the conduct plaintiffs allege.

I 1

N.B.

On September 14, 1990, N.B., a 15-year-old sophomore, was with several friends in the Preston High school parking lot after a school football game. He was talking with a friend about Preston's quarterback, whom they agreed always wanted to have his own way. N.B. then said something like "Yeah, Heil Hitler," referring to the quarterback.

Koch walked by and heard the words "Heil Hitler." He assumed they were directed at him. Without giving N.B. a chance to explain, Koch admits that he "hit [N.B.] with the back hand and then the front hand" across the mouth. Koch grabbed N.B.'s neck and squeezed, causing bruises which turned purple and lasted for a couple of days. N.B. went to the emergency room and was given Advil and an ice pack. He was hoarse for several days.

N.B. reported the incident to the police, who investigated and charged Koch with assault and battery. Koch pled guilty and was placed on three months probation.

L.G.

At the time of the incident, January 1991, L.G. was a freshman at Soda Springs High School and played on the freshman basketball team. His team had just played the Preston team at Preston. He was sitting in the bleachers watching the varsity game. During halftime, the drill team began a special service for their recently deceased drill teacher. L.G. testifies that he was unaware of the special program being performed. Koch approached L.G. and his seatmates and asked them to be quiet. L.G. did not hear him. L.G. testifies that Koch "grabbed me by the arm and pulled me outside and punched me around, and he punched me in the chest." Koch again "grabbed [him] by the neck and pulled [him] out again." The incident has affected L.G. emotionally because he has trouble trusting people. Although Koch disputes the details of the incident, he does admit that he used physical force which he guesses he did not have to use.

D.D.

On March 27, 1991, Koch saw D.D. wearing his hat in the school corridor and asked him to remove it. D.D. did so, but put his hat back on after passing Koch. Koch snatched the hat off D.D.'s head. According to D.D.:

Mr. Koch had his hands around my neck. And when he grabbed me ... he was jerking me around and I was trying to get him to let go of my neck, and he told me to come with him and so he was turning me around. [As] we got by the lockers, he was just yelling, he was blowing his stack. And he threw me headfirst into the lockers, and my head had hit into the lockers and I fell to my knees when my head hit into the lockers. And he grabbed me by the back of my neck again and lifted me up.... [H]e yanked me into his office and ... he hit me in the chest with the back of his hand.

According to Koch, he did not push or shove D.D.; D.D. "stumbled and fell to the ground." The police investigated the incident but did not file charges against Koch.

On April 17, 1991, the School Board heard evidence regarding these incidents. The Board voted to place Koch on probation for one year.

In 1991, N.B., L.G. and D.D., through their mothers, filed suit against Koch in the district of Idaho seeking declaratory and injunctive relief and damages pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They also sued as defendants Superintendent Bowler and members of the School Board, claiming that Koch had assaulted and battered many students before and that had these defendants adequately disciplined Koch in the past, the incidents would not have occurred.

Defendants moved for summary judgment. On March 31, 1994, the district court granted the school board members' motion for summary judgment and granted summary judgment on plaintiffs' First Amendment claims against all defendants. The court denied Koch's motion for summary judgment as to the three plaintiffs' Fourteenth Amendment excessive force claims, and partially denied Bowler's motion for summary judgment. Koch and Bowler then filed a second motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity. This motion was granted as to Bowler and denied as to Koch. Koch now appeals from the denial of qualified immunity on plaintiffs' excessive force claims. 2

II

Although a denial of summary judgment is not usually an appealable order, the district court's denial of qualified immunity on summary judgment is immediately appealable. See Behrens v. Pelletier, --- U.S. ----, ----, 116 S.Ct. 834, 842, 133 L.Ed.2d 773 (1996) ("[S]ummary-judgment determinations are appealable when they resolve a dispute concerning an abstract issu[e] of law relating to qualified immunity, typically, the issue whether the federal right allegedly infringed was clearly established.") (emphasis in original) (internal quotations omitted); Johnson v. Jones, --- U.S. ----, ----, 115 S.Ct. 2151, 2156, 132 L.Ed.2d 238 (1995) (holding that a portion of a district court's summary judgment order that, though entered in a "qualified immunity" case, determines only a question of "evidence sufficiency" is not appealable); Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985); Osolinski v. Kane, 92 F.3d 934, 936 (9th Cir.1996) ("Because the issue appealed from here concerns not which facts the parties may be able to prove but whether certain given facts show a violation of clearly established law, we conclude that we have jurisdiction."). That the parties dispute some of the facts does not render the denial of qualified immunity nonappealable. See Behrens, --- U.S. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 842. Koch is entitled to contend on appeal that all of the evidence that the district court deemed sufficiently supported for purposes of summary judgment meets a standard of "objective legal reasonableness." See id. We consider whether, viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to plaintiffs, Koch's conduct was objectively reasonable. See id. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 840. If it was, we must reverse the district court's denial of qualified immunity. If it was not, plaintiffs are entitled to proceed to trial.

III

Government officials enjoy qualified immunity from civil damages unless their conduct violates "clearly established constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982); see also Behrens, --- U.S. at ----, 116 S.Ct. at 838 (describing Harlow 's standard as one of "objective legal reasonableness"). Determining whether a public official is entitled to qualified immunity "requires a two-part inquiry: (1) Was the law governing the state official's conduct clearly established? (2) Under that law could a reasonable state official believe his conduct was lawful?" Browning v. Vernon, 44 F.3d 818, 822 (9th Cir.1995) (quoting Act Up!/Portland v. Bagley, 988 F.2d 868, 871-72 (9th Cir.1993)). "A public official is not entitled to qualified immunity when the contours of the allegedly violated right were sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would understand that what he [was] doing violate[d] that right." Osolinski, 92 F.3d at 936 (alterations in original) (internal quotations omitted).

A.

The Supreme Court held as early as 1977 that public school students have a right guaranteed by the Due Process Clause "to be free from, and to obtain judicial relief for, unjustified intrusions on personal security." Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 673, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 1413, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977); see also Wood v. Ostrander, 879 F.2d 583, 589 (9th Cir.1989), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 938, 111 S.Ct. 341, 112 L.Ed.2d 305 (1990) (describing Ingraham as holding that students have "[a] liberty interest in personal security and freedom from restraint and infliction of pain"). Although the Ingraham Court did not grant certiorari regarding the specific question whether unreasonable corporal punishment violates substantive due process, the Court, in its analysis declared that students...

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