Dennis v. City of Phila.

• Decision Date: 23 November 2021
• Docket Number: No. 19-2390,19-2390
• Citation: 19 F.4th 279
• Parties: James DENNIS v. CITY OF PHILADELPHIA ; Detective Frank Jastrzembski; Detective Manuel Santiago; Officers John Doe(s), Individually and As Police Officers for the City of Philadelphia Frank Jastrzembski; Manuel Santiago, Appellants
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

19 F.4th 279

James DENNIS

v. CITY OF PHILADELPHIA ; Detective Frank Jastrzembski; Detective Manuel Santiago; Officers John Doe(s), Individually and As Police Officers for the City of PhiladelphiaFrank Jastrzembski; Manuel Santiago, Appellants

No. 19-2390

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued on January 20, 2021

Opinion filed: November 23, 2021

Shane Haselbarth (ARGUED), Marshall Dennehey Warner Coleman & Goggin, 2000 Market Street, Suite 2300, Philadelphia, PA 19103, Counsel for Appellants

Craig R. Gottlieb, City of Philadelphia, Law Department, 17th Floor, 1515 Arch Street, Philadelphia, PA 19102, Counsel for Appellee City of Philadelphia

Paul M. Messing (ARGUED), David Rudovsky, Kairys Rudovsky Messing Feinberg & Lin, 718 Arch Street, Suite 501 South, Philadelphia, PA 19106, Counsel for Appellee James Dennis

Before: SMITH, Chief Judge, HARDIMAN and ROTH, Circuit Judges

OPINION

ROTH, Circuit Judge:

This is an interlocutory appeal from the Order of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, denying defendant-appellants' Motion to Dismiss James Dennis's Section 1983 claims. Defendant-appellants are police detectives with the Philadelphia Police Department, who investigated Dennis for charges relating to the murder of a young high-school student in 1991, a crime for which Dennis was convicted. In 2013, the District Court granted Dennis's habeas petition and vacated his murder conviction; that decision was affirmed by our Court en banc in 2016.¹ Shortly thereafter, Dennis brought the present action, asserting Section 1983 claims against the defendants and alleging, inter alia , the violation of his constitutional rights under the Fourteenth Amendment. Defendants moved to dismiss the complaint, arguing, among other things, that they are entitled to qualified immunity and that the suit is barred by Heck v. Humphrey .² After the District Court denied their motion, the detectives filed this interlocutory appeal.

I.

Dennis was charged with the 1991 robbery and first-degree murder of a young woman, Chedell Williams; he was convicted and sentenced to death. In 2013, the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania granted Dennis's habeas petition, vacated his conviction, and ordered a new trial on all charges, finding that Dennis's prosecutors withheld material impeachment evidence.³ In August 2016, our Court, sitting en banc, affirmed the District Court's decision and remanded the case to state court.⁴

On remand, Dennis was offered a deal, in exchange for a time-served sentence, to plead nolo contendere to reduced charges of third-degree murder, robbery, carrying a firearm without a license, possession of an instrument of crime with the intent to employ it criminally, and conspiracy to commit robbery. Rather than risk a new trial and the possibility of further imprisonment, Dennis accepted the deal and was sentenced to 12½ to 25 years imprisonment; he was given credit of 9,162 days for the time he had already served in prison for those crimes, and he was then released.

Shortly thereafter, Dennis brought this action against Detective Frank Jastrzembski, Detective Manuel Santiago (collectively, the detectives), Officer John Doe(s), and the City of Philadelphia for fabrication of evidence and for deliberate deception under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Count I), civil rights conspiracy (Count II), failure to intervene (Count III), supervisory liability against Detective Jastrzembski (Count IV), and municipal liability against the City of Philadelphia (Count V).

Dennis's complaint alleges that the detectives' investigation of Williams' 1991 murder involved conduct that violated his due process rights. First, Dennis alleges that the detectives concealed information about other individuals, who had confessed their involvement with the murder or who knew who was involved, and that the detectives coerced/concealed certain other witnesses. Specifically, Dennis alleges that the detectives never followed up on inconsistencies in statements made by Zahra Howard, who was with Williams on the day of her murder. Ms. Howard originally told the detectives that she never saw the assailants but later told her aunt and uncle that she recognized the assailants from Olney High School, a school that Dennis had never attended. Howard's aunt and uncle informed the detectives about her statement; it was also corroborated by the victim's aunt. This information, which was recorded in the detectives' activity logs, was concealed from Dennis for ten years.

In addition, Dennis alleges that several days after the murder, Montgomery County law enforcement advised the Philadelphia Police Department that an inmate in their County Prison spoke with a man who confessed his involvement in Williams's murder. A signed statement from the inmate included details about all three men involved in the murder and identified the source of the information. However, defense trial counsel never received any materials relating to the investigation of these three individuals; the information was only revealed 10 years later during Post Conviction Relief Act (PCRA)⁵ discovery.

Second, Dennis alleges that the detectives fabricated evidence to secure his conviction. Specifically, Dennis alleges that the detectives falsely claimed to have found certain clothing items that matched those of the shooter, as described by eyewitnesses to the murder. He further alleges that Detective Jastrzembski falsely testified that the clothing was found at Dennis's residence but later "disappeared" from police headquarters prior to trial. He also alleges that the detectives coerced and threatened Charles Thompson to testify falsely at trial that he saw Dennis with a gun the night of the murder.

Third, Dennis alleges that the detectives concealed evidence that would have supported his alibi. Specifically, Dennis's alibi that he was elsewhere at the time of the murder would have been corroborated by a witness's time-stamped welfare receipt. When questioned by the detectives, the witness based her time estimates on the receipt's military-style timestamp of 13:03 (1:03 PM), which she mistook to mean 3:03 PM. The detectives did not correct the witness when she misread the receipt's military-style timestamp while they were interviewing her; instead, they took the only copy of the receipt and never shared it with Dennis or the prosecutors. Dennis's trial counsel never obtained a copy; the witness testified based on her earlier misreading of the receipt; and it was not until direct appeal that a copy of the receipt revealed the witness's mistake.

Dennis also alleges that only four of the nine eyewitnesses identified by Philadelphia Police had selected him from the lineup; three of those four testified for the Commonwealth at Dennis's trial. After learning this information, Dennis's counsel requested a new lineup with all nine eyewitnesses. The new lineup never occurred.

Defendants moved to dismiss Dennis's claims under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. They argued, among other things, that the action is barred by Heck v. Humphrey⁶ and that they are entitled to qualified immunity because Dennis has failed to allege a constitutional violation of clearly established law. On May 15, 2019, the District Court partially granted the motion as to the City and denied the motion as to the detectives. The detectives appealed.

II. SCOPE OF REVIEW

"We exercise de novo review of a district court's denial of a motion to dismiss on qualified immunity grounds as it involves a pure question of law."⁷ In reviewing a denial of qualified immunity at the Rule 12(b)(6) stage of litigation, we must accept Dennis's allegations as true and draw all inferences in his favor.⁸

III. APPELLATE JURISDICTION

The District Court has subject matter jurisdiction over Dennis's federal claims under 28 U.S.C. § 1331.⁹ "Ordinarily we do not have jurisdiction to review district court orders denying motions to dismiss ... because there is no final order within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 1291."¹⁰ However, in Ashcroft v. Iqbal ,¹¹ "the Supreme Court held that a district court order denying a motion to dismiss based on qualified immunity [can be] appealable under the collateral order doctrine."¹² To review a collateral order, the order must conclusively determine the disputed question.¹³ A refusal to dismiss is a ruling "conclusive as to this right," for which immediate appeal is available.¹⁴

Before the District Court, the defendants argued that qualified immunity attaches to any Brady v. Maryland¹⁵ claim because (1) in 1992, when the alleged violations occurred, no reasonable detective could have known that she could be sued for a Brady violation by a plaintiff that pled guilty or nolo contendere , and (2) the police's Brady obligations were not clearly established in 1992. The District Court denied the motion.

In analyzing qualified immunity, the District Court found that the defendants' arguments improperly characterized Dennis's claims. It found that Dennis had not asserted any claims involving Brady violations against the detectives, only claims for fabrication of evidence and deliberate deception. That said, the District Court left open the opportunity for the defendants to reassert their qualified immunity defense at a later date.

Despite leaving open the opportunity for the defendants to re-raise their qualified immunity defense at a later date, the District Court's express denial of qualified immunity is a conclusive determination of an important issue that is completely separable from the merits and is unreviewable on appeal from final judgment.¹⁶ This is sufficient to give rise to appellate jurisdiction over the qualified immunity ruling to the extent it turns on an issue of law.

Our jurisdiction over this interlocutory appeal does not, however, extend to the question of whether Dennis's claims are barred by Heck . We have discretion...