Bell v. Hood

• Citation: 150 F.2d 96
• Decision Date: 22 October 1945
• Docket Number: No. 10790.,10790.
• Parties: BELL et al. v. HOOD et al.
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (9th Circuit)

150 F.2d 96 (1945)

BELL et al. v. HOOD et al.

No. 10790.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

June 7, 1945.

Writ of Certiorari Granted October 22, 1945.

Lorrin Andrews and A. L. Wirin, both of Los Angeles, Cal. (Betty Aronow, of Los Angeles, Cal., of counsel), for appellants.

Charles H. Carr, U. S. Atty., and Ronald Walker, Asst. U. S. Atty., both of Los Angeles, Cal., for appellees.

Before MATHEWS, STEPHENS, and BONE, Circuit Judges.

Writ of Certiorari Granted October 22, 1945. See 66 S.Ct. 98.

STEPHENS, Circuit Judge.

The district court ruled that it was without original jurisdiction of the subject matter and dismissed the complaint. Plaintiffs below appeal. For convenience we shall refer to appellees as defendants.

The complaint filed in the district court sounds in tort; the damages prayed for far exceed the jurisdictional requirement as to value in controversy; there is no diversity of citizenship. It follows that the district court was right unless original jurisdiction of the case is conferred by § 41, Title 28 U.S.C.A., § 24 of the Judicial Code, as amended, the applicable part of which reads: "The district courts shall have original jurisdiction as follows: (1) * * * when the case (a) arises under the Constitution or laws of the United States, * * *."

Appellants contend that their right of action arises under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the federal Constitution, which we quote in the margin.¹

It is set out in the complaint that defendants, through the medium of unlawful and unreasonable searches and seizures, have violated the Fourth Amendment to the personal injury of the several plaintiffs and that such defendants have invaded plaintiffs' immunities as provided by the Fifth Amendment to the effect that no person "* * * shall be compelled in any Criminal Case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; * * *." It is therefore alleged and argued by the plaintiffs that they have a right to recover personal judgments in the federal district court against the defendants involved for injuries sustained.

It is alleged in the complaint that Arthur L. Bell, one of the plaintiffs and appellants, is an "Associate of and Division Superintendent of Mankind United, a Voluntary Association," and brings the action in behalf of the organization and of the Associates thereof. Whether or not Bell can legally, or whether or not he has the right or power to, maintain the action on behalf of such persons or on behalf of such association, we do not consider.

The defendants are not sued in the capacity of officers but it is alleged in the complaint that they were, with one exception, Federal Bureau of Investigation officers.

It appears that one Merle Armstrong, one of the defendants below, is a Los Angeles policeman and that he was not an acting federal officer at any of the time or during any of the events with which this action is concerned. Counsel stated in the oral argument in this court that they do not press any of their points as to Armstrong, and we shall therefore proceed in our reasoning without regard to him.

At the time of the alleged invasion of plaintiffs' rights each plaintiff stood indicted as of December 18, 1942, by a federal grand jury of violating § 34, Title 50 U.S.C.A. (use of United States mails to defraud). No trial had been held.

It is alleged that the defendants, on the day the indictment was returned, "unlawfully conspired with each other to act beyond their authority as said Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and police officer respectively, and agreed that they would abridge the Constitutional rights of the plaintiffs as guaranteed by the Fourth and Fifth Amendments to the Constitution of the United States to be free from the deprivation of liberty and property without due process of law, and to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures, and agreed unlawfully to simultaneously, in the early morning of December 18th, 1942, search the homes of the individual plaintiffs herein without any warrants of search or seizures, and unlawfully to seize the papers, documents and effects of said plaintiffs and of `Mankind United', and falsely to imprison the individual plaintiffs by unlawfully arresting some of the individual plaintiffs without a warrant of arrest and unreasonably to delay the taking of all of the individual plaintiffs before a committing officer, in order to effectuate the unlawful searches and seizures aforesaid.

"That thereafter, and on the 18th day of December, 1942, as will appear more particularly hereinafter, the defendants and each of them, in order to carry out the terms and conditions of the illegal conspiracy aforesaid, and solely for the purpose of carrying out said terms and conditions, did arrest and imprison the individual plaintiffs herein, and did search the homes of said plaintiffs, and seize and carry away books, papers and effects of said individual plaintiffs and of said `Mankind United.'"

It is alleged that as to plaintiff Bell the following occurred. Defendants Cruise, Bowser, Langdon, Gieson, Greer, and two named fictitiously broke doors of his residence, entered, and arrested Bell. The defendants had no search warrant or warrant of arrest. They searched the entire premises leaving them in confusion and disorder. They took Bell and held him for several hours away from the premises and did not take him before a magistrate. They took thousands of documents, papers, and records belonging to "Mankind United", which were entrusted to Bell and took $8,500.00 in money. They took property belonging to Bell and his wife including safe deposit boxes. During a considerable period Bell was held incommunicado and not allowed to see his attorney who was just outside the door, and he was questioned. The allegations are to the effect that at about the same time all the other plaintiffs were subjected to essentially the same illegal treatment, though in detail varying, by one or more of the defendants.

It is apparent that each plaintiff personally seeks compensatory damages for alleged illegal arrest, false imprisonment, the forceable removal of his person from one place to another, the searching of his premises illegally and unreasonably, the seizing of property belonging to him and others, and the questioning without affording him the aid or advice of an attorney.

There can be no question but that the complaint states strong cases, and if the allegations have any foundation in truth, the plaintiffs' legal rights have been ruthlessly violated. The question of whether or not actions for the recovery of personal judgments for damages against the defendants individually can be maintained in federal court under the allegations hereinbefore briefly set out was directly before the trial court, and it very properly noticed the question sua sponte, and answered it in the negative.

It will be helpful at this juncture briefly to comment upon the genesis of the Fourth and Fifth constitutional Amendments.² The theory of our federal Constitution is that each state is sovereign with absolute sovereign powers unlimited except by those powers which have been granted to the federal government. No right or any power to curtail any right mentioned in either the Fourth or Fifth Amendments was ever surrendered or was ever granted to the United States Government by the states or by the people. However, fearing that the exercise of the power actually granted to the central government of the union might tend to whittle away the civil rights of the people, the people affirmatively asserted some of such rights in the text of the national charter itself. In stating them, the people did so by directly denying to the federal government the power to infringe upon such rights.

Nowhere in this case is there a suggestion that anyone questions the existence of or a complete understanding of these rights. (We use the word "rights" throughout this opinion as including immunities mentioned in the constitutional articles here under consideration.) The allegations of the complaint are that the defendants conspired to do what they recognized as beyond their authority. Therefore, there is no question of construction concerning any constitutional or other United States law.

Chief Justice Marshall declared in Cohens v. Virginia, 1821, 6 Wheat. 264 19 U.S. 264, 379, 5 L.Ed. 256: "A case in law or equity consists of the right of the one party, as well as of the other, and may truly be said to arise under the constitution or a law of the United States, whenever its correct decision depends on the construction of either." In Osborn v. Bank of the United States, 1824, 9 Wheat. 738, 22 U.S. 737, 821, 822, 6 L.Ed. 204, he commented: "If it be a sufficient foundation for jurisdiction, that the title or right set up by the party, may be defeated by one construction of the constitution or law of the United States, and sustained by the opposite construction, provided the facts necessary to support the action be made out, then all the other questions must be decided as incidental to this, which gives that jurisdiction."

The trial court thought Taylor v. DeHart, D.C.Mo., 1926, 22 F.2d 206, which presents essentially the same question as here, was correctly decided. Cornelius in his work on Search and Seizure (2d ed.), p. 958, § 491, states the rule as follows: "Where an illegal search has been made by federal officers in violation of the rights of the plaintiff under the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, no action will lie in the federal court unless there is a diversity of citizenship between the...