Garcia v. City of Honolulu

• Decision Date: 18 September 2020
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 18-00100 ACK-WRP
• Parties: DONNA GARCIA, Individually and As Guardian Ad Litem for Her Minor Children, J.L. and G.L. Plaintiff, v. CITY AND COUNTY OF HONOLULU; RONALD J. LOMBARDI; LANELL ARAKAWA; NATHAN HEE; PAUL LEE; and JOHN and/or JANE DOES 1-10, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Hawaii

DONNA GARCIA, Individually and As Guardian Ad Litem for Her Minor Children, J.L. and G.L. Plaintiff, v. CITY AND COUNTY OF HONOLULU; RONALD J. LOMBARDI;

LANELL ARAKAWA; NATHAN HEE; PAUL LEE; and JOHN and/or JANE DOES 1-10, Defendants.

Civ. No. 18-00100 ACK-WRP

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF HAWAI'I

September 18, 2020

ORDER GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTIONS FOR JUDGMENT ON THE PLEADINGS AND SUMMARY JUDGMENT

Defendant Ronald J. Lombardi is a Honolulu Police Officer who was previously married to Plaintiff Donna Garcia. Plaintiff Garcia alleges that Defendant Lombardi committed acts of domestic violence and domestic abuse against her and their two children since 2008. Plaintiff Garcia further alleges that Defendant Lombardi was enabled by his fellow police officers, who either took insufficient action or actively assisted Defendant Lombardi in harassing behavior, despite that Plaintiff Garcia informed the Honolulu Police Department ("HPD") about Defendant Lombardi's conduct. Plaintiff Garcia asserts that the HPD has a custom in which police officers provide favorable treatment to fellow officers who are accused of domestic abuse—favor that is not provided when the accused abuser is not an HPD officer.

Based on these allegations, Plaintiff Garcia filed a lawsuit on March 15, 2018, against Defendant Lombardi, several of his fellow officers, and the City and County of Honolulu ("Defendant Honolulu") for violating her Fourteenth Amendment rights to equal protection and substantive due process. The claims against most individual officers were subsequently dismissed as time-barred by the two-year statute of limitations, but the claims against individual Defendant Officers Lanell Arakawa ("Defendant Arakawa"), Nathan Hee ("Defendant Hee"), and Paul Lee ("Defendant Lee") involved at least one allegation of a timely act. The claims against those individual officers largely survived a motion to dismiss on that basis. The claims against Defendant Honolulu, which the Court found plausibly subject to the continuing violations doctrine, also largely survived.

Each of the remaining Defendants, except Defendant Lombardi, now moves for dismissal of the remaining claims. As against Defendant Lee, the Court now considers the timely allegation that he conducted an intentionally deficient investigation of Plaintiff Garcia's complaint regarding certain incident reports. As against Defendant Officers Arakawa andHee, the Court now considers the timely allegation that the officers assisted Defendant Lombardi in filing an HPD incident report accusing Plaintiff Garcia of custodial interference. As against Defendant Honolulu, the Court now considers the sufficiency of the municipal liability claim. For the reasons that follow, the Court GRANTS the Motion for Summary Judgment filed by Defendant Officer Paul Lee, ECF No. 131; GRANTS the Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings filed by Defendant Officers Lanell Arakawa and Nathan Hee, ECF No. 130; and GRANTS the Motion for Summary Judgment filed by Defendant Honolulu, ECF No. 134.

PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

On March 15, 2018, Plaintiff Donna Garcia, individually and as guardian ad litem for her minor children, J.L. and G.L. ("Plaintiff Garcia"), filed a Complaint, ECF No. 1, against Defendant Honolulu, twenty-one HPD officers, and John and/or Jane Does 1-10 ("Doe Defendants"). Compl. ¶¶ 11-14.

Defendant Honolulu and each HPD officer except Defendant Lombardi filed motions to dismiss. ECF Nos. 20, 25, 40, 45. The Court granted the Defendants' motions to dismiss, finding that (1) the claims against most of the officers were time-barred, except for those claims against Officers Arakawa, Hee, and Lee, which were insufficiently pled; (2) that theofficial-capacity claims were duplicative of the claims against Defendant Honolulu; and (3) that the municipal liability claim was insufficiently pled. ECF No. 64 (the "11/16/2018 Order").

On December 14, 2018, Plaintiff Garcia filed her First Amended Complaint ("FAC"). ECF No. 70. The FAC alleges claims against Defendant Honolulu and Defendant HPD Officers Lombardi, Lee, Arakawa, and Hee, as well as Doe Defendants. The FAC alleges nearly the same claims as the Complaint, except that the FAC alleges an additional constitutional deprivation—violation of the substantive due process right to bodily integrity, which is protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.¹ FAC ¶¶ 213-233.

Defendant Honolulu and, separately, Defendant Officers Arakawa, Hee, and Lee, filed motions to dismiss the FAC. ECF Nos. 76, 77. The Court granted in part and denied in part those motions, leaving intact the 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claims against the officers in their individual capacities and against Defendant Honolulu, and dismissing the remaining claims. ECF No. 93 (the "05/03/2019 Order").

Defendants filed the now-pending motions on December 23, 2019. First, Defendant Officers Arakawa and Hee filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings, ECF No. 130;second, Defendant Officer Lee filed a motion for judgment on the pleadings or, in the alternative, for summary judgment, ECF No. 131; and third, Defendant Honolulu filed a motion for summary judgment, ECF No. 134. The Court initially set a hearing for March 24, 2020, then granted Plaintiff's unopposed request for a continuance and reset the hearing for April 14. ECF Nos. 152, 153. After Plaintiff filed her oppositions on March 24 and 25, ECF Nos. 159, 160, 161, the Court granted Defendants' unopposed motion for a 90-day stay of the case, and reset the April 14 hearing date for July 23, ECF Nos. 162, 165. Defendants filed their respective replies on June 29, ECF Nos. 175, 176, 178. A telephonic hearing was held on July 23.

FACTUAL BACKGROUND

The Court provides a consolidated review of the facts alleged in the First Amended Complaint and outlined in the Court's prior 05/03/2019 Order, as well as a brief reference to some of the evidence now before it, noting at the outset that the two-year statute of limitation window commenced on March 15, 2016.

According to the FAC, Plaintiff Garcia is employed as an officer with the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and she currently resides in Georgia, having permanently left Honolulu in 2009. FAC ¶¶ 9-10. DefendantsLombardi, Arakawa, Hee, and Lee are all currently employed as HPD officers and reside in Honolulu. Id. ¶¶ 12-13.

Plaintiff Garcia and Defendant Lombardi were married in November 1999, separated in November 2007, and divorced in February 2011. Id. ¶¶ 15, 17. They have two children together, J.L. and G.L. Id. ¶ 16. Plaintiff Garcia was awarded temporary sole legal and physical custody of the children in the year following the separation, and that custody arrangement was made permanent in the divorce decree. Id. ¶ 19. Defendant Lombardi was awarded certain visitation rights. FAC ¶¶ 113-14.

The 73-page FAC features allegations spanning a ten-year period from 2008 to 2018 that describe how Defendant Lombardi engaged in abusive and harassing conduct over that period. The FAC also alleges how Defendant Honolulu and numerous HPD officers failed to do anything to stop Defendant Lombardi and other HPD officers that Plaintiff Garcia alleges aided him in his harassment campaign. The thrust of Plaintiff Garcia's claims is that the HPD has a longstanding practice or custom of mishandling complaints of domestic abuse filed by victims against HPD officers.²

I. Assaults and Protective Orders

Plaintiff Garcia alleges that on February 28, 2008, Defendant Lombardi sexually assaulted G.L. Id. ¶¶ 20-21. At some point prior to or in March 2008, Defendant Lombardi physically or sexually assaulted J.L, the other daughter. Id. ¶¶ 22, 25. In August 2009, J.L. and G.L. both reported to their therapist that Defendant Lombardi had committed sexual assaults. Id. ¶ 79.

Between March and September of 2008, Plaintiff Garcia obtained three separate protective orders and one order for pre-decree relief due to Defendant Lombardi's conduct. In her petitions, Plaintiff Garcia reviewed instances in which Defendant Lombardi made threats of physical harm and assaulted the minor children. Id. ¶¶ 24-50.

Plaintiff Garcia alleges that Defendant Lombardi then violated the protective orders and pre-decree relief in ways including stalking Plaintiff Garcia and the children, attempting to have unsupervised visitation with the children, initiating unauthorized communications with Plaintiff Garcia, possessing a firearm in the presence of the children, and attempting to manipulate G.L. when she was undergoing treatment at the Sex Abuse Treatment Center. Id. ¶ 40, 49.

Plaintiff Garcia filed notice of these violations with the HPD throughout 2008. Id. ¶ 60. Despite such notices ofDefendant Lombardi's violations of the three protective orders and pre-decree relief order, Plaintiff Garcia alleges that Defendant Honolulu failed to adequately investigate the incidents. She contends that Defendant Honolulu's failure to do so was pursuant to a longstanding custom or policy of mishandling allegations of abuse and harassment involving an HPD officer. Id. ¶ 73.

II. Incident Reports

Plaintiff Garcia alleges that Defendant Lombardi further harassed her by obtaining the assistance of two other HPD officers to file six false incident reports with the HPD between 2008 and 2011. Id. ¶ 85. The false incident reports involved accusations that Plaintiff Garcia committed criminal contempt, violated custodial arrangements, and made false allegations against Defendant Lombardi. Id. ¶ 86.

Plaintiff Garcia alleges that Defendant Lombardi resumed his campaign of harassment in November 2015 by again obtaining the assistance of other HPD officers to file four more false incident reports with HPD (the "Incident Reports"). Id. ¶ 113. Each of these reports falsely accused Plaintiff Garcia of custodial interference even though she was granted sole custody of the children, with Defendant Lombardi having only visitation rights. I...