Charles v. Johnson

• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit
• Writing for the Court: Watkins, District Judge
• Citation: Charles v. Johnson, 18 F.4th 686 (11th Cir. 2021)
• Decision Date: 16 November 2021
• Docket Number: No. 20-12393,20-12393
• Parties: Ethan James CHARLES, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Jeff JOHNSON, individually and in his official capacity as Sheriff of Dawson County, William Thacker, Charles Brantley, Ryan Leckie, Defendants-Appellees.

18 F.4th 686

Ethan James CHARLES, Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.Jeff JOHNSON, individually and in his official capacity as Sheriff of Dawson County, William Thacker, Charles Brantley, Ryan Leckie, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 20-12393

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

November 16, 2021

Ralph Goldberg, Goldberg & Cuvillier, PC, Tucker, GA, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Jason C. Waymire, Williams Morris & Waymire, LLC, Buford, GA, for Defendants-Appellees Jeff Johnson, William Thacker, Charles Brantley.

Matthew D. Williams, Matthew D. Williams & Associates, LLC, Cumming, GA, for Defendant-Appellee Ryan Leckie.

Before William Pryor, Chief Judge, Lagoa, Circuit Judge, and Watkins,^* District Judge.

Watkins, District Judge:

After midnight on July 8, 2016, Appellant Ethan Charles was arrested by Appellee William Thacker, a Dawson County Sheriff's Deputy. Charles, who claims to suffer from bipolar disorder and panic attacks, resisted this arrest for over five minutes. Deputy Thacker only succeeded in subduing Charles with the aid of Appellee Ryan Leckie—a civilian bystander—and Appellee Charles Brantley—a second Sheriff's Deputy. Charles was convicted of felony obstruction of a law enforcement officer in a Georgia state court. He then brought suit against the individual Appellees under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia, alleging excessive force under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. Charles also brought related state law claims against the individual Appellees. Additionally, Charles sued the Dawson County Sheriff, alleging that a failure to accommodate Charles's disability constituted a violation of the Rehabilitation Act.

The district court granted summary judgment in favor of Defendants on all federal claims and declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the pendent state claims. For the reasons stated below, we affirm.

I

On the night of the traffic stop, Charles was one of four passengers in a red Ford Mustang stopped for speeding by Deputy Thacker, who was on patrol alone. Charles was a passenger in the front seat. The car stopped at a well-lit gas station next to an island of gas pumps. Deputy Thacker parked to the rear and slightly to the right of the stopped car. Dash cameras in Deputy Thacker's vehicle and, later, in Deputy Brantley's vehicle, recorded all of the incident on audio and most of the incident on video.

After collecting the occupants’ identification, Deputy Thacker discovered that Charles had an outstanding warrant. Charles was unaware of the warrant. When asked by Deputy Thacker to step out of the vehicle, Charles exited with a cell phone to his ear. Deputy Thacker told Charles four times to hang up the phone and told Charles that he would have an opportunity to call the person back later. Before making physical contact, Deputy Thacker also told Charles twice to put his hands behind his back. Charles ignored the requests and orders of the deputy. Eventually, after Charles continued to ignore the deputy and move away from him, Deputy Thacker reached for Charles, who pulled his arms away from the deputy's reach. Deputy Thacker told him to place his hands behind his back five more times and then told him: "I'm about to tase you. Hands behind your back! I'm about to tase you." Deputy Thacker once again told Charles to put his phone down and, as Charles continued to struggle and shout, told him: "Ethan—you're gonna get tased, Ethan! Stop! Put the phone down!"

The struggle moved off-video, where Appellee Ryan Leckie, a bystander, is heard asking, "Sir, can you get a cuff on him?" Leckie assisted Deputy Thacker by restraining Charles in what Charles has described as a "chokehold." Leckie testified that he instead used a "full nelson." Deputy Thacker told Charles to put his hands behind his back two more times while Charles continued yelling at Thacker. While off-video, Deputy Thacker tackled Charles and brought him to the pavement.¹

Charles's yelling could be clearly heard through the radio in Deputy Brantley's patrol car as he approached the scene, as well as on the audio recording from Deputy Thacker's vehicle. When Deputy Brantley arrived at the scene, Deputy Thacker, Leckie, and Charles were seen struggling on the pavement, with Charles at the bottom of the pile. Charles was lying on his side, with Deputy Thacker kneeling on or near Charles's hips and Leckie pressing his upper body into Charles's chest and neck. Leckie's left elbow was pressed into either the side or back of Charles's neck while Leckie's right arm restrained Charles's right arm. As Deputy Brantley exited his vehicle and approached the scrum, his hand reached to his belt and drew his taser. With taser in hand, Brantley knelt down near Charles's chest.

Deputy Brantley told Leckie to "get behind" him. Leckie stood up and backed away. Deputy Brantley told Charles, "You move and I will tase you. You got me? Got it?" Brantley repeated, "Move, and you will get tased. You got it?" Charles replied "yes sir" four times. Sometime during the melee, Charles was initially handcuffed. However, because of Charles's erratic movements and awkward position on the ground, Charles's arms were cuffed in the front of his body.

While Deputies Thacker and Brantley discussed how to move Charles to reposition the cuffs to the back, Charles attempted to lift himself up off the pavement. One of the deputies told him: "Do it. I'm fixin’ to tase you. Do it. Do it. Move again. Move again and I will tase you." Charles continued yelling and arguing. Deputy Brantley told Charles: "We gone [sic] put these cuffs on the back of you. You move, I will tase you. You got it?"

As Deputies Thacker and Brantley attempted to readjust Charles, Charles again raised his body off the pavement. Deputy Brantley told him to get on the ground four times. Charles replied, "I can't. I can't moves [sic] up my leg." While on the pavement, the deputies were unsuccessful in gaining control over Charles's hands to recuff him, as Charles "had his hands pulled into his body and would not relax his hands." After more seconds of Charles's screaming and struggling, Brantley said: "I do not want to tase you." Charles replied: "I don't wanna get tased."

In an attempt to get the handcuffs to the back of Charles, Deputy Brantley removed the cuffs and began to instruct Charles: "Put, put your hands up here in the front. Put your hand in the front or you can des— (inaudible)." At this point Charles raised his body off the pavement for a third time, first getting onto his knees and then pushing up onto his hands and feet. Deputy Brantley pressed his taser into the right side of Charles's back, and the taser audibly engaged. As Charles fell to the ground, the sound of the taser briefly stopped, resuming shortly after Charles reached the pavement. Brantley remarked: "I told you I didn't wanna tase you." The taser was deployed for five seconds in the "drive stun" mode, a less potent application of the taser device that is only intended to stun the target.

On the pavement, Charles continued struggling and yelling. Brantley told him: "Stop. Do it again. Do it again, I will tase you again. You got it?" After Deputies Thacker and Brantley both warned Charles that he would get tased again, the officers managed to recuff him in the back and move him into Thacker's patrol car. In the patrol car, Charles continued shouting and thrashing about, and he began beating his head against the metal partition in the patrol car. Sixteen staples were needed to treat Charles's self-inflicted head injuries.

Charles was arrested and charged with felony obstruction under Georgia law. He was accused of "unlawfully knowingly and willfully resist[ing] and oppos[ing] Deputy William Thacker, a law enforcement officer in the lawful discharge of his official duties, by offering violence to such officer by resisting a lawful arrest, pulling away, slamming his head against Deputy Thacker's patrol vehicle, and screaming at and fighting with said officer ...." Charles pleaded guilty and was sentenced as a first offender.

II

We review an order granting summary judgment de novo . Yarbrough v. Decatur Hous. Auth. , 941 F.3d 1022, 1026 (11th Cir. 2019). To obtain summary judgment, the movant must show that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. FED. R. CIV. P. 56(a). The facts are construed in the light most favorable to the non-movant. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. , 477 U.S. 242, 255, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986).

We will first address the § 1983 claim against the civilian bystander, Appellee Ryan Leckie. Next, we will address the deputies’ qualified immunity. Finally, we will consider Charles's claim against the Sheriff under the Rehabilitation Act.

III

Charles's federal claim against Leckie, the bystander, alleges that Leckie used excessive force against Charles in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. The Supreme Court has held that the Fourth Amendment applies only to governmental actions. See Burdeau v. McDowell , 256 U.S. 465, 475, 41 S.Ct. 574, 65 L.Ed. 1048 (1921). The Fourteenth Amendment, by its own language, applies solely to state action. See U.S. CONST. amend. XIV, § 1 ("No State shall ...."). These constitutional rights are enforceable in federal court through § 1983, which creates a private right of action against those who violate the rights of others while acting "under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia ...." 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The requirement that the deprivation be made "under color of state law" means that the deprivation must be made by a state actor. See Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co. , 457 U.S. 922, 929, 102 S.Ct. 2744, 73 L.Ed.2d 482 (1982) ("[I]n a § 1983 action brought against a state official, the statutory requirement of action ‘under color of...