Callahan v. Sanders

• Decision Date: 07 September 1971
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 3374-N.
• Citation: 339 F. Supp. 814
• Parties: Eddie L. CALLAHAN et al., Plaintiffs, v. Roy SANDERS, as State Comptroller, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Alabama

339 F. Supp. 814

Eddie L. CALLAHAN et al., Plaintiffs, v. Roy SANDERS, as State Comptroller, et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 3374-N.

United States District Court, M. D. Alabama, N. D.

September 7, 1971.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Morris S. Dees, Jr., and Joseph J. Levin, Jr., Montgomery, Ala., for plaintiffs.

William J. Baxley, Atty. Gen., and Leslie H. Hall, Asst. Atty. Gen., State of Ala., Montgomery, Ala., for defendants Roy Sanders, Walter L. Allen, John C. McBride, L. J. Smith, Ray C. Stephens, and for certain other Justices of the Peace not named.

L. H. Walden and Jasper Roberts, Montgomery, Ala., for defendants J. W. Baggett, Donald Scott and other Justices of the Peace not named.

Harry Raymon, Russell, Raymon & Russell, Tuskegee, Ala., also for Donald Scott.

Ralph R. Banks, Jr., Eutaw, Ala., J. Earl Smith, Dothan, Ala., Paul J. Hooton, Roanoke, Ala., C. Neal Pope and Charles Floyd, Pope & Floyd, Phenix City, Ala., Walter J. Merrill, Knox, Jones, Woolf & Merrill, Anniston, Ala., Kenneth R. Cain, Ozark, Ala., John B. Crawley, John W. Gibson, Troy, Ala., Taylor Wilkins, Jr., C. Lenoir Thompson, Kenneth Cooper, Bay Minette, Ala., T. R. Ward, Abbeville, Ala., and Richard H. Poellnitz, Greensboro, Ala., for other Justices of the Peace.

FINDINGS OF FACT, CONCLUSIONS OF LAW AND JUDGMENT

JOHNSON, Chief Judge.

Plaintiffs in this case comprise a class of individuals who were fined on or after January 13, 1969, by Alabama Justices of the Peace for violations of Alabama's highway laws. Pursuant to Rule 23, Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, plaintiffs have brought this class action against all Justices of the Peace of Alabama, all sheriffs of Alabama in whose jurisdictions Justice of the Peace Courts are situated, George C. Wallace as Governor of Alabama, Agnes Baggett as Treasurer of Alabama,¹ Roy Sanders as State Comptroller,² and Walter L. Allen as the Director of the Department of Public Safety for the State of Alabama. Plaintiffs seek to have their convictions in Justice of the Peace Courts set aside and injunctions entered against defendant Justices from hearing any pending or future traffic cases, and against defendant sheriffs and defendant Allen and his state troopers from assigning any such future cases to Justice of the Peace Courts. Plaintiffs further seek restitution of all fines paid by them to Justices of the Peace for traffic violations, punitive damages from those Justices, and compensatory damages from all defendants. Finally, plaintiffs request an award against defendants for attorneys' fees.

This suit has been filed under Title 42, Section 1983, United States Code, to prevent the deprivation under color of state law of due process and other rights secured by the Constitution of the United States. Jurisdiction is grounded in Title 28, Section 1343. Upon a hearing of this cause, the parties presented evidence, both oral and documentary, and the case is now submitted upon the pleadings, the evidence and the briefs of the parties.

In 1966, Alabama's statutory scheme by which Justices of the Peace hear and determine alleged violations of highway laws was adjudged to be violative of federal constitutional rights. Hulett v. Julian, 250 F.Supp. 208 (M.D.Ala.1966) (three judges). In a similar holding on July 2, 1968, the court in Bennett v. Cottingham, 290 F.Supp. 759 (N.D.Ala. 1968) (three judges), ruled that defendant Justices of the Peace, in trying such cases, violated plaintiffs' rights under Title 42, Section 1983, United States Code. That court decided also that the Alabama statutory scheme could not be applied constitutionally to traffic cases because it gave the Justices a direct pecuniary interest in convicting the defendant.³ On January 13, 1969, the United States Supreme Court affirmed the Cottingham decision. Bennett v. Cottingham, 393 U.S. 317, 89 S.Ct. 554, 21 L.Ed.2d 513 (1969).

Both Hulett and Cottingham were well publicized throughout the state. Nevertheless, Alabama sheriffs and state troopers continued to assign traffic cases to Justice of the Peace Courts, and the Justices continued to hear and determine the cases. The named plaintiffs and several hundred members of plaintiffs' class were tried, convicted and fined for traffic violations by the defendant Justices subsequent to Hulett and Cottingham. On July 2, 1971, these plaintiffs filed suit on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated.

Defendants in answer to the bill of complaint assert that this action is barred by plaintiffs' failure to exhaust their state remedies. It is clear, however, that Section 1983 provides a cause of action which may be pursued in federal court regardless of available state remedies. Damico v. California, 389 U.S. 416, 88 S.Ct. 526, 19 L.Ed.2d 647 (1967); McNeese v. Board of Education, 373 U.S. 668, 83 S.Ct. 1433, 10 L.Ed.2d 622 (1963); Scott v. Davis, 404 F.2d 1373 (5th Cir. 1968). It also avails defendants nothing that plaintiffs took no appeal from their convictions in the Justices' courts. In Hulett v. Julian, supra, while finding that plaintiffs' rights could not be vindicated adequately by appeal, the Court said:

"There is no provision for review of the legality of the proceedings before the Justice of the Peace upon appeal ... We do not think that the plaintiff can be required to submit to an unconstitutional trial as a prerequisite to being accorded a valid trial de novo." 250 F.Supp. at 209-210.

As to plaintiffs' claim for injunctive relief, defendants argue that this cause is moot because they have voluntarily ceased trying alleged violations of highway laws. But a voluntary cessation of allegedly illegal conduct does not render the case moot. United States v. W. T. Grant Co., 345 U.S. 629, 73 S. Ct. 894, 97 L.Ed. 1303 (1953). Furthermore, defendants terminated their involvement in traffic cases only after this suit was initiated. Such a last minute change is extremely suspect to say the least. Jenkins v. United Gas Corp., 400 F.2d 28 (5th Cir. 1968); Cypress v. Newport News Gen. & Nonsectarian Hosp. Ass'n, 375 F.2d 648 (4th Cir. 1967). Absent a judicial order, the Justices are free to return to their old ways. Thus, a finding of mootness would be improper.

It is settled law that one is denied due process when he is subjected to the scrutiny of a judge who has a direct pecuniary interest in his conviction, Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510, 47 S.Ct. 437, 71 L.Ed. 749 (1927); Bennett v. Cottingham, supra; Hulett v. Julian, supra, and Section 1983 is violated even though the judge had no specific intent to deprive plaintiff of constitutional rights. See, Whirl v. Kern, 407 F.2d 781 (5th Cir. 1969). The relevant statutes give Alabama Justices of the Peace such an interest. Bennett v. Cottingham, supra. By trying plaintiffs' traffic cases, the defendant Justices deprived them of constitutional rights, and injunctive relief, therefore, is warranted. For reasons specified in Hulett v. Julian, supra, this Court is not barred from enjoining even pending cases in Justice of the Peace Courts. The principles in Younger v. Harris, 401 U.S. 37, 91 S.Ct. 746, 27 L. Ed.2d 669 (1971), as applied to the facts in this case, do not constitute authority to the contrary.

Plaintiffs further contend that as a part of their equitable relief, they are entitled to a refund of their fines. As support for this contention, plaintiffs rely upon Harkless v. Sweeny Independent School District, 427 F.2d 319 (5th Cir. 1970), a case in which Negro school teachers, having been dismissed from their jobs, alleged a violation of their civil rights under Section 1983, and prayed for reinstatement and back pay. In holding that a jury trial was improper, the Court said that the claim for back pay was an integral part of the equitable remedy of reinstatement. Plaintiffs argue that a logical application of this doctrine requires that they be reimbursed the money paid by them in fines to the Justices of the Peace. This Court is unwilling to proceed on that theory.

In Harkless, plaintiffs had been made to suffer a loss of salary solely because they were Negroes, and they in no way contributed to their own injury. That situation is far different from the present one where both black and white plaintiffs were arrested for highway law violations and paid fines to Justices of the Peace. It has long been settled that when one pays a fine voluntarily under a mistake of law, that fine cannot be recovered unless payment was induced by the fraud or the undue advantage of the one receiving it. Deppe v. Lufkin, 116 F.2d 483 (1st Cir. 1940); Blumenthal v. United States, 4 F.2d 808 (S.D.Cal. 1925); Miami v. Keton, Fla., 115 So.2d 547 (1959). The evidence presented reflects that the named plaintiffs were guilty as charged. It must be assumed that most, if not all, of the members of plaintiffs' class also committed the offenses for which they were charged. There is no contention to the contrary. Thus we find plaintiffs and the members of their class pleading guilty and paying fines for highway offenses when they were guilty in fact and were disposing of their misdemeanor cases as expeditiously and conveniently as possible. The fines were not paid because of fraud on the part of the defendants; at the time of their arrests, plaintiffs and their class members were not interested in the constitutionality of Alabama's Justice of the Peace statutory scheme.

Plaintiffs contend, further, that defendant Justices of the Peace knew, or should have known, that they had no jurisdiction to try traffic cases; that, therefore, plaintiffs' payments were not made under a mistake of law and involuntariness should be presumed. This argument must fail. The evidence demonstrates that although the statutory scheme upon which Justices base their fees had been declared unconstitutional before the present plaintiffs were tried in Justice of the Peace Courts, confusion has prevailed as to the effect these decisions had on the Justices' traffic...