Coriz By and Through Coriz v. Martinez, 89-2313

• Decision Date: 16 October 1990
• Docket Number: No. 89-2313,89-2313
• Citation: 915 F.2d 1469
• Parties: 63 Ed. Law Rep. 87 Orlando CORIZ, Jr., By and Through next friends Orlando CORIZ and Bernice D. Coriz, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Arthur MARTINEZ and Carlos Guillen, in their individual capacities only, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit

Page 1469

915 F.2d 1469

63 Ed. Law Rep. 87

Orlando CORIZ, Jr., By and Through next friends Orlando CORIZ and Bernice D. Coriz, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Arthur MARTINEZ and Carlos Guillen, in their individual capacities only, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 89-2313.

United States Court of Appeals Tenth Circuit.

Oct. 16, 1990.

John B. Roesler, Smith & Roesler, P.C., Santa Fe, N.M., for plaintiffs-appellants.

Daniel H. Friedman, Simons, Cuddy & Friedman, Santa Fe, N.M., for defendants-appellees.

Before ANDERSON, BARRETT, Circuit Judges, and CHRISTENSEN, ^* District Judge.

STEPHEN H. ANDERSON, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff-appellant Orlando Coriz Jr. appeals a summary judgment entered against him on his procedural due process claim on the grounds that the defendants were qualifiedly immune. We affirm.

In the fall of 1987, defendant Guillen, an aide to defendant Martinez, a gym teacher at Espanola Valley High School, threw Coriz to the floor in an effort to maintain discipline. Coriz suffered a broken arm and filed suit under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, alleging, inter alia, that his right to procedural due process had been violated because he had no adequate post-deprivation remedy. ¹ The district court granted defendants' motion for summary judgment on this claim, finding that they were qualifiedly immune because the inadequacy of Coriz's post-deprivation remedy was not clearly established.

In a situation such as this, "where the State is truly unable to anticipate and prevent a random deprivation of a liberty interest," Zinermon v. Burch, --- U.S. ----, 110 S.Ct. 975, 987, 108 L.Ed.2d 100 (1990), "postdeprivation tort remedies are all the process that is due, simply because they are the only remedies the State could be expected to provide," id. at 985. "[A]n unauthorized intentional deprivation ... by a state employee does not constitute a violation of the procedural requirements of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment if a meaningful postdeprivation remedy for the loss is available." Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. 517, 533, 104 S.Ct. 3194, 3204, 82 L.Ed.2d 393 (1984).

"[G]overnment officials performing discretionary functions[ ] generally are shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their 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). "[O]nce a defendant raises a qualified immunity defense the plaintiff assumes the burden of showing that the defendant has violated clearly established law." Hannula v. City of Lakewood, 907 F.2d 129, 131 (10th Cir.1990).

Coriz has failed to show that it was clearly established that New Mexico did not provide an adequate post-deprivation remedy. As this court noted in Garcia by Garcia v. Miera, 817 F.2d 650, 656 (10th Cir.1987), cert. denied, 485 U.S. 959, 108 S.Ct. 1220, 99 L.Ed.2d 421 (1988), federal judges in New Mexico had split on the question of whether the state provided adequate post-deprivation remedies for students whose procedural due process rights were allegedly violated by excessive punishment. ²

Coriz argues that the Harlow inquiry into whether the law was clearly established should apply only to the defendants' acts, not to the adequacy of the remedies available to redress those acts. We concede that this is an unusual application of qualified immunity, but we conclude that the district court applied the law correctly. ³ The right Coriz claims the defendants violated is not simply to be free from random, unauthorized deprivations of liberty, but to be free from such deprivations in the absence of adequate post-deprivation remedies. See Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U.S. 527, 537, 101 S.Ct. 1908, 1914, 68 L.Ed.2d 420 (1981) ("Nothing in [the Fourteenth] Amendment protects against all deprivations of life, liberty or property by the State. The Fourteenth Amendment protects only against deprivations 'without due process of law.' "); see also Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. at 533, 104 S.Ct. at 3203 ("the state's action is not complete until and unless it provides or refuses to provide a suitable postdeprivation remedy"). Because of the uncertain state of the law, the defendants' "actions could reasonably have been thought consistent with the right[ ] they are alleged to have violated." Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 638, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 3038, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987).

The judgment of the district court...