Adams v. Town of Clarkstown Police Dep't
| Decision Date | 30 January 2023 |
| Docket Number | 21-CV-11062 (CS) |
| Parties | THOMAS ADAMS, Plaintiff, v. TOWN OF CLARKSTOWN POLICE DEPARTMENT, JOHN DOE Police Officers 1-99, JANE DOE Police Officers 1-99, and LORI ADAMS, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York |
Matthew H. Herlihy, Scale LLP, Croton-on-Hudson, Counsel for Plaintiff
Michael H. Sussman, Sussman & Associates Counsel for Defendant Lori Adams
Lalit K. Loomba, Wilson, Elser, Moskowitz, Edelman & Dicker LLP Counsel for Defendant Town of Clarkstown
Before the Court are the motions to dismiss of Defendant Lori Adams (ECF No. 31), and Defendant Town of Clarkstown, (ECF No. 37). For the following reasons, both motions are GRANTED.
The following factual allegations are taken from the Amended Complaint, (ECF No. 30 (“AC”)), and documents attached to the AC or incorporated in it by reference. For the purposes of Defendants' motions, I assume that the factual allegations, but not the conclusions, in the AC are true.
On or about May 26, 2020, Plaintiff Thomas Adams called Defendant Lori Adams (“Lori”) to discuss her allegedly unexpected decision to seek full custody of their child as part of their divorce. (AC ¶ 13.) During the call, the parties became upset with one another, and Plaintiff used “colorful language” toward Lori. (Id.)
After the call, Lori called her divorce attorney, who directed her to file a police report. (Id. ¶ 15.) Lori then packed up her belongings and drove to her mother's house. (Id.) From there she went to the Town of Clarkstown Police Department (“Clarkstown P.D.”) and filed a complaint against Plaintiff. (Id.) In her statement, Lori wrote:
At 5:12pm my husband Thomas R. Adams called me regarding a custody agreement pending our divorce screaming he called me a “cunt,” he told me he was going to destroy me, coming after me guns blazing if he should lo[]se the right to see his son. No such documentation was placed. He said he would hunt me down should the things my attorney said were true. I called my attorney and explained the call. She advised me to come in being he's a police officer.
(ECF No. 30-2.) Plaintiff denies making any type of threat against Lori during the conversation. (AC ¶ 14.)
Plaintiff was then contacted by a Clarkstown P.D. police officer (“PO # 1”), who advised him that they were preparing a domestic incident report. (Id. ¶ 16.) PO #1 directed Plaintiff to contact his employer, the New York Police Department (“NYPD”), and surrender his weapon, and asked him whether he made the statements recounted by Lori, which he “flatly denied.” (Id.) PO #1 called Plaintiff once more later that day, informing him that he would receive a criminal summons as a result of the phone call with Lori. (Id. ¶ 17.)
On May 26, 2020, Lori stated the following, under penalty of perjury, on a misdemeanor information form:
The deponent states the deponent did receive a phone call from a number she recognizes to be that of her soon to be ex-husband defendant, Thomas Adams, at 17:15 on this date. The deponent states she recognized the voice of the caller to be that of defendant, Thomas Adams, and that the defendant did communicate, by telephone, a threat to cause physical harm to the deponent. The deponent states the call lasted approximately 4 minutes during which the defendant verbalized, “I[']m coming at you guns blazing. . . I will hunt you down.” The deponent states the defendant[']s statements did make her fear for her physical safety.
(ECF No. 30-1.)
On July 14, 2020, Plaintiff surrendered himself at the Clarkstown P.D., where he was arrested and charged with aggravated harassment in the second degree, (AC ¶ 18; see ECF No. 30-3), which is committed when, “[w]ith intent to harass another person,” a person:
communicates, anonymously or otherwise, by telephone, by computer or any other electronic means, or by mail, or by transmitting or delivering any other form of communication, a threat to cause physical harm to, or unlawful harm to the property of, such person, or a member of such person's same family or household . . ., and the actor knows or reasonably should know that such communication will cause such person to reasonably fear harm to such person's physical safety or property, or to the physical safety or property of a member of such person's same family or household.
N.Y. Penal Law § 240.30(1)(a). Plaintiff alleges that two additional Clarkstown P.D. officers (“PO #2” and “PO #3”) told him while they were processing him that they did not believe Lori's allegations. (AC ¶ 21.) Plaintiff alleges that the two officers stated “in sum and substance:
‘Nobody believes Lori . . . This case is complete nonsense . . . Nobody believes this actually ever happened . . . Everyone knows that Lori is liar . . . Lori is full of shit.'” (Id.) On the same day, Plaintiff alleges, a supervisory officer (“SPO #1”) contacted Plaintiff's squad commander at the NYPD and told him “in sum and substance: ‘I don't believe what Lori is saying . . . Other officers agree with me in that they don't believe anything Lori has said or that this even ever happened.” (Id. ¶ 22.)
On June 2, 2020, after an evidentiary hearing at which Plaintiff and Lori both testified, Rockland County Supreme Court Justice Robert M. Berliner granted Lori a temporary order of protection. (ECF No. 33-1.) The Court stated: (ECF No. 33-1 at 82:7-11.)
On June 3, 2021, after numerous appearances in the Town of Clarkstown Justice Court, Plaintiff was acquitted at his criminal trial before Justice Howard Gerber. (AC ¶ 24.) Plaintiff alleges that during the trial, a police officer (“PO #4”) approached him and his counsel, stating, ” (Id. ¶ 25.)
On December 14, 2021, Plaintiff brought this action in the Supreme Court of the State of New York, Rockland County, against the County of Rockland, the Rockland County District Attorney's Office, the Clarkstown P.D., John Doe Police Officers 1 through 99, Jane Doe Police Officers 1 through 99, Lori, and Lori's lawyer, Marcia Kusnetz.[1] (ECF No. 1-1.) On December 26, 2021, the County of Rockland and the Rockland County District Attorney's Office removed the action to this Court. (ECF No. 1.)
On January 20, 2022, Plaintiff voluntarily dismissed the County of Rockland and the Rockland County District Attorney's Office, (ECF No. 18), and on January 26, 2022, Plaintiff voluntarily dismissed Kusnetz, (ECF No. 29).
At a pre-motion conference the next day, I gave Plaintiff permission to amend his complaint, (Minute Entry dated Jan. 27, 2022), and he filed the AC on February 7, 2022. Plaintiff brings three claims for malicious prosecution under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the Clarkstown P.D. and John/Jane Doe officers, (id. at 6-10), and one claim of abuse of process under § 1983 against Lori, (id. at 10-11). Plaintiff seeks compensatory and punitive damages arising from the alleged constitutional violations. (Id. at 11.) Because the Clarkstown P.D. may not be sued as it is a subdivision of the Town of Clarkstown (the “Town”), see Schisler v. Utica Police Dep't, No. 16-CV-1051, 2016 WL 11265987, at *2 (N.D.N.Y. Sept. 9, 2016) (), Defendants have correctly interpreted the AC as bringing the malicious prosecution claims against the Town.
“A federal court has subject matter jurisdiction over a cause of action only when it ‘has authority to adjudicate the cause' pressed in the complaint.” Arar v. Ashcroft, 532 F.3d 157, 168 (2d Cir. 2008) ), rev'd en banc on other grounds, 585 F.3d 559 (2d Cir. 2009). “Determining the existence of subject matter jurisdiction is a threshold inquiry, and a claim is properly dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under Rule 12(b)(1) when the district court lacks the statutory or constitutional power to adjudicate it.” Id.[2] “When jurisdiction is challenged, the plaintiff bears the burden of showing by a preponderance of the evidence that subject matter jurisdiction exists, and the district court may examine evidence outside of the pleadings to make this determination.” Id. “The court must take all facts alleged in the complaint as true and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of plaintiff, but jurisdiction must be shown affirmatively, and that showing is not made by drawing from the pleadings inferences favorable to the party asserting it.” Morrison v. Nat'l Austl. Bank Ltd., 547 F.3d 167, 170 (2d Cir. 2008), aff'd on other grounds, 561 U.S. 247 (2010). When a defendant moves to dismiss both for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and on other grounds such as failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, the Court must address the issue of subject matter jurisdiction first. See Rhulen Agency, Inc. v. Ala. Ins. Guar. Ass'n, 896 F.2d 674, 678 (2d Cir. 1990).
“To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, ...
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