Caldwell v. LeFaver, 89-35327
| Decision Date | 20 March 1991 |
| Docket Number | No. 89-35327,89-35327 |
| Citation | 928 F.2d 331 |
| Parties | Clinton Roy CALDWELL, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. John LeFAVER, Director of the Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services; Department of Social and Rehabilitation Services of the State of Montana; Gwen Farnsworth, Social Worker; Russell Francetich, Social Worker; and Mineral County, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
Julio K. Morales, Missoula, Mont., for plaintiff-appellant.
Dan G. Cederberg, Cederberg Law Firm, Missoula, Mont. and John H. Maynard, Chief Defense Counsel, Montana Tort Claims Div., Helena, Mont., for defendants-appellees John L. LeFaver, Director of the Dept. of Social and Rehabilitative Services, Dept. of Social and Rehabilitation Services of the State of Mont., Gwen Farnsworth, Soc. Worker, and Russell Francetich, Social Worker.
M. Shaun Donovan, Mineral County Atty., Superior, Mont., for defendant-appellee Mineral County.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Montana.
Before WRIGHT, SCHROEDER and NORRIS, Circuit Judges.
In this 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 action, appellant Clinton Caldwell challenges the actions of Mineral County, Montana social workers who, on an emergency basis, removed Caldwell's minor children from his physical custody without notice or hearing and arranged for the children to be transported to Caldwell's former wife in the State of Washington. Caldwell and his former wife had joint legal custody of the two daughters pursuant to a divorce decree entered in the State of Washington. Caldwell contends that his constitutional rights were violated when the social workers arranged to transport the children outside the State of Montana without affording him notice and a hearing on the issue of whether there was an emergency justifying the removal. Caldwell does not claim that such removal itself could never have been validly accomplished, contrast Baker v. Racansky, 887 F.2d 183 (9th Cir.1989), but maintains that Montana should not have permitted the children to leave the jurisdiction until his rights were determined at a hearing. We hold that the social workers' conduct is shielded by qualified immunity.
Caldwell's action was filed against the Montana Department of Social Rehabilitation Services ("DSRS"); John LeFaver, Director of the DSRS; Gwen Farnsworth and Russell Francetich, social workers; and Mineral County, Montana. The district court dismissed the action against the DSRS and LeFaver, who had been sued only in his official capacity, finding them protected by eleventh amendment immunity. Caldwell has no serious dispute that the DSRS, a state agency, is an arm of the State of Montana; hence the DSRS and LeFaver enjoy such immunity. Pennhurst State School v. Halderman, 465 U.S. 89, 100, 104 S.Ct. 900, 907, 79 L.Ed.2d 67 (1984); Southern Pacific Transp. Co. v. City of Los Angeles, 922 F.2d 498, 508 (9th Cir.1990). The district court also dismissed the action against Mineral County based on an agreement between Mineral County and the State of Montana. Pursuant to this agreement, the State of Montana assumed all of the county's responsibility under the Montana Dependent and Neglected Child Statutes. Because the record shows that Mineral County did not retain any responsibility to enforce the protective policies of the State of Montana, this dismissal is appropriate as well. See Monell v. Department of Social Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 694, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 2037, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978).
The more difficult issue in the case concerns whether an individual social worker Gwen Farnsworth, and her supervisor, Russell Francetich, also enjoy absolute immunity for their conduct in this case, as they contend, or whether they enjoy only qualified immunity. If the latter, then we must determine whether qualified immunity extends to the conduct at issue here.
The facts in this case are undisputed. On April 21, 1987, Caldwell's two daughters were removed from his home on an emergency basis and taken into temporary custody by Farnsworth and Francetich. Within a very short period of time, and without notice to Caldwell, Farnsworth and Francetich had the children transported by bus to their mother in the State of Washington. The social workers filed no petition with the court and did not seek a hearing before a judicial officer. Farnsworth and Francetich claim that their conduct falls within the scope of their duties in determining when to bring dependency proceedings, and thus they are protected by absolute immunity under our decision in Meyers v. Contra Costa County Department of Social Services, 812 F.2d 1154 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 829, 108 S.Ct. 98, 98 L.Ed.2d 59 (1987). We disagree.
In Meyers, we held that social workers are entitled to absolute immunity when performing "quasi-prosecutorial functions connected with the initiation and pursuit of child dependency proceedings." 812 F.2d at 1157. We then defined "quasi-prosecutorial functions" as those instances where a social worker contributes as an advocate to an informed judgment by an impartial decisionmaker. Id. In a later case, Coverdell v. Department of Social & Health Services, 834 F.2d 758 (9th Cir.1987), we extended absolute immunity to include "quasi-judicial" actions in the context of child welfare proceedings, such as the execution of a court order. Id. at 764-65.
The actions taken by Farnsworth and Francetich were neither quasi-prosecutorial nor quasi-judicial in nature. The defendants' actions did not aid in the preparation or presentation of a case to the juvenile court, see Meyers, 812 F.2d at 1157, nor were these actions taken in connection with or incident to ongoing child dependency proceedings, see Babcock v. Tyler, 884 F.2d 497, 503 (9th Cir.1989), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 1118, 107 L.Ed.2d 1025 (1990). Indeed, the procedure of transporting the children out of Montana to their mother in Washington seemed designed to avoid adjudication in the Montana courts altogether. See Weller v. Department of Social Servs., 901 F.2d 387, 396 (4th Cir.1990). Because the defendants were not acting under the supervision of a court, it is the qualified immunity standard, rather than the absolute immunity standard, which must govern their conduct. See Meyers, 812 F.2d at 1158.
Under the doctrine of qualified immunity, social workers are shielded from liability where their official conduct "does not violate clearly established statutory or 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). Thus the issue becomes whether the defendants' conduct violated any clearly established constitutional or statutory right of Caldwell.
Caldwell claims that the defendants' conduct violated his constitutional interest, as a parent, in his children. It is clear that a parent has a constitutionally protected interest in the custody and care of his or her children. Santosky v. Kramer, 455 U.S. 745, 753, 102 S.Ct. 1388, 1394, 71 L.Ed.2d 599 (1982); Woodrum v. Woodward County, Okla., 866 F.2d 1121, 1124-25 (9th Cir.1989). However, it is also clear that this interest is not absolute. In an emergency situation, a state agency may remove children from their parents' custody when the children are subject to immediate or apparent danger or harm. See Baker, 887 F.2d at 187-88; Myers v. Morris, 810 F.2d 1437, 1463 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 484 U.S. 828, 108 S.Ct. 97, 98 L.Ed.2d 58 (1987). This case does not present a situation in which social workers interfered with the parent-child relationship in the absence of any perceived emergency. Compare In re Juvenile Appeal, 189 Conn. 276, 455 A.2d 1313 (1983).
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