Armstrong v. City of Melvindale, 04-2192.

CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)
Citation432 F.3d 695
Docket NumberNo. 04-2192.,04-2192.
PartiesCarl Robert ARMSTRONG; Donna M. Bradley; Renae Armstrong; Lori Armstrong; Brandy Armstrong; Carl R. Armstrong, Jr.; Jean K. Armstrong, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. CITY OF MELVINDALE, et al., Defendants, David Fobar; Brad Gratz, Defendants-Appellants.
Decision Date06 January 2006

ARGUED: Marcia L. Howe, Johnson, Rosati, LaBarge, Aseltyne & Field, Farmington Hills, Michigan, for Appellants. Cynthia Heenan, Constitutional Litigation Associates, Detroit, Michigan, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Marcia L. Howe, Johnson, Rosati, LaBarge, Aseltyne & Field, Farmington Hills, Michigan, for Appellants. Cynthia Heenan, Constitutional Litigation Associates, Detroit, Michigan, for Appellees.

Before: GILMAN and COOK, Circuit Judges; MILLS, District Judge.*

OPINION

COOK, Circuit Judge.

Defendants-Appellants, Southgate Police Officers David Fobar and Brad Gratz, appeal the district court's order denying their motion for summary judgment with respect to: (1) Plaintiffs-Appellees' claim of a Fourth Amendment violation, brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, arising out of Defendants' execution of a search warrant on the premises of Plaintiffs' business, and (2) their defense of qualified immunity. Because we find that a reasonable person in the officers' position would not have known that his conduct violated a clearly established right, we reverse the district court's denial of Defendants' motion for summary judgment on qualified immunity grounds.

I.
A. Factual Background

In 1999 Defendants executed a warrant on the premises of Cad Visions,1 a Southgate, Michigan business (allegedly known as a center of narcotics activity) to inventory and seize assets in connection with a forfeiture action pending against John Ziriada, the owner and longtime friend of Carl Armstrong, one of the plaintiffs.2 During the search, Armstrong entered the store and asserted ownership of the computers in the building. He claimed to have ownership documents, but presented Defendants with only his business card. Defendants seized the computers.

Defendants then sought a warrant to search Armstrong's business, Computer Time, located in Melvindale, Michigan, for the documents that would substantiate Armstrong's ownership claim. Before applying for the warrant, Defendants consulted a county prosecutor, Karen Plants, about the legality of obtaining such a warrant. Plants advised the Defendants that she "did think it was legally feasible" and she ultimately reviewed the affidavit and warrant Fobar drafted, finding it unobjectionable. Defendants then presented those documents to a judge, who issued the warrant.

The resulting search failed to turn up any documentation, because, as it turns out, Armstrong lied about owning the computers. But the officers' search of the premises did turn up marijuana. Defendants did not seize the drugs themselves; instead they informed the local Melvindale police about the discovery. The Melvindale police then obtained a separate warrant, seized a large quantity of contraband, and soon began forfeiture proceedings against the Armstrongs. The forfeiture action was later dismissed after a judge suppressed the evidence on the ground that both searches (the one conducted by Defendants and the one conducted by the Melvindale police) were unconstitutional.

B. Procedural Background

The Armstrongs then filed suit, asserting various causes of action under both federal and state law. Defendants responded by moving for summary judgment on all claims, which the district court granted in part and denied in part. The court granted Defendants' motion for summary judgment with respect to Plaintiffs' federal conspiracy claim as well as their state-law claims for malicious prosecution, conversion, and trespass. Summary judgment was also granted with respect to Plaintiffs' claims for constitutional violations, brought via 42 U.S.C. § 1983, of their First Amendment, Due Process, and Equal Protection rights. Plaintiffs do not appeal these rulings. Defendants appeal only the denial of summary judgment with respect to Plaintiffs' claimed Fourth Amendment violation and their claim to qualified immunity for any such violation.

II.
A. Jurisdiction/Standard of Review

Circuit "courts generally only have jurisdiction over the final decisions of district courts," Crockett v. Cumberland Coll., 316 F.3d 571, 577 (6th Cir.2003); 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and the "denial of summary judgment is ordinarily not a final judgment." Barrett v. Steubenville City Schs., 388 F.3d 967, 970 (6th Cir.2004) (citing Hoover v. Radabaugh, 307 F.3d 460, 465 (6th Cir.2002)). But where, as here, Defendants do not dispute the facts—they claim instead that the alleged facts do not reflect a violation of clearly established law—"a district court's denial of a claim of qualified immunity ... is an appealable `final decision' ... notwithstanding the absence of a final judgment." Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 530, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985); see Hoover, 307 F.3d at 465 (citing Cohen v. Beneficial Indus. Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541, 69 S.Ct. 1221, 93 L.Ed. 1528 (1949)).

The appealable issue on review before us "is a purely legal one: whether the facts alleged ... support a claim of violation of clearly established law," Mitchell, 472 U.S. at 529 n. 9, 105 S.Ct. 2806, and accordingly, we review the district court's denial of qualified immunity de novo under the usual summary judgment standard. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c).

B. Qualified Immunity Framework

Qualified immunity shields public officials who perform discretionary functions from the necessity of defending against tort liability so long as their conduct does not violate clearly established rights of which a reasonable official would have known. See Fisher v. Harden, 398 F.3d 837, 842 (6th Cir.2005). Whether qualified immunity applies turns on the "objective legal reasonableness" of the official's action, viewed on a fact-specific, case-by-case basis. O'Brien v. City of Grand Rapids, 23 F.3d 990, 999 (6th Cir.1994) (citation omitted). Qualified immunity is an affirmative defense; once asserted, the "burden of proof is on the plaintiff to show that the defendant[s] [are] not entitled to qualified immunity." Sheets v. Mullins, 287 F.3d 581, 586 (6th Cir.2002) (citing Wegener v. Covington, 933 F.2d 390, 392 (6th Cir.1991)).

The doctrine is designed to "avoid excessive disruption of government and permit the resolution of many insubstantial claims on summary judgment," Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982); it protects "all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law." Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341, 106 S.Ct. 1092, 89 L.Ed.2d 271 (1986). To analyze claims of qualified immunity the court uses a two-part test: "(1) whether, considering the allegations in a light most favorable to the party injured, a constitutional right has been violated, and (2) whether that right was clearly established." Estate of Carter v. City of Detroit, 408 F.3d 305, 310-11 (6th Cir.2005) (citing Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151, 150 L.Ed.2d 272 (2001)).3

1. Constitutional Violation

Whether a constitutional violation occurred is a threshold issue: if the officers' conduct violated no constitutionally protected right, there is no need for further analysis. Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151. Here, Plaintiffs argue that Defendants' warrant was constitutionally deficient because the Fourth Amendment prohibits the issuance of a search warrant except upon a showing that probable cause exists to believe that fruits, instrumentalities, or evidence of a crime will be found at the place sought to be searched. See Warden v. Hayden, 387 U.S. 294, 301-02, 87 S.Ct. 1642, 18 L.Ed.2d 782 (1967). Plaintiffs allege that when the officers executed the search of their Melvindale business they were not searching for evidence of a crime, and thus, the search violated their constitutional rights. We agree.

Defendants respond with two arguments to support the constitutional validity of the warrant, both of which fall short. First, they argue that the warrant was valid under several provisions of Michigan's drug forfeiture laws. At oral argument, however, Defendants conceded that they neglected to argue this point of law below. Although both parties briefed this court on the issue, the failure to present an issue to the district court forfeits the right to have the argument addressed on appeal. See Legg v. Chopra, 286 F.3d 286, 294 (6th Cir.2002) (citing Foster v. Barilow, 6 F.3d 405, 407 (6th Cir.1993)) ("In general, `issues not presented to the district court but raised for the first time on appeal are not properly before the court.'") (citation omitted). It is well-settled that this court's "function is `to review the case presented to the district court, rather than a better case fashioned after a[n] ... unfavorable order.'" Barner v. Pilkington N. Am., Inc., 399 F.3d 745, 749 (6th Cir.2005) (citation omitted).

Second, Defendants posit that Zurcher v. Stanford Daily, 436 U.S. 547, 98 S.Ct. 1970, 56 L.Ed.2d 525 (1978), requires a finding of no Fourth Amendment violation. Defendants point to the fact that the Zurcher Court upheld the constitutionality of a warrant issued to search the premises of a third party not suspected of criminal wrongdoing. Similarly, no suspected wrongdoing supported the issuance of the warrant here, say Defendants.

The Zurcher feature missing here, however, is evidence of a crime. In Zurcher the police had probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime would be located on the third-party's premises. Though Defendants may have had probable cause to believe the ownership documents would be found on the Melvindale premises, no probable cause existed to believe the documents themselves evidenced a crime. Although Armstrong...

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