Grandstaff v. City of Borger, Tex.
| Citation | 767 F.2d 161 |
| Decision Date | 05 August 1985 |
| Docket Number | 84-1337,Nos. 84-1241,s. 84-1241 |
| Parties | Sharon GRANDSTAFF, Individually and As Representative of the Estate of James C. Grandstaff; and Kay Lajune Grandstaff, As Next Friend of Jo Cheryl Grandstaff, A Minor, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, Cross-Appellants, v. The CITY OF BORGER, TEXAS, et al., Defendants-Appellants, Cross-Appellees. Sharon GRANDSTAFF, Individually and As Representative of the Estate of James C. Grandstaff, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. The CITY OF BORGER, TEXAS, et al., Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (5th Circuit) |
Gibson, Ochsner & Adkins, Wayne P. Sturdivant, Amarillo, Tex., Gassaway, Gurley, Sheets & Mitchell, Jody Sheets, Borger, Tex., for City of Borger, Tex., et al.
Haynes & Fullenweider, Clinard J. Hanby, Robert B. Wallis, Houston, Tex., for Grandstaff, et al.
Appeals from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Texas.
Before GOLDBERG, REAVLEY and GARWOOD, Circuit Judges.
The City of Borger police mistook James C. Grandstaff for a fugitive and killed him. The estate and family of Grandstaff sued and recovered $1,430,000, together with attorneys fees and expenses, from four of the officers as well as the City. We uphold the liability of the officers on both the federal and state claims and the damages award because of Texas law; we sustain the 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 liability of the City but modify the damages recovered against it.
Shortly after 4:00 a.m. two Borger policemen signaled the driver of a pickup truck to stop because, according to them, they saw the vehicle veer across the street's center stripe and they identified it as one thought to be driven by Lonnie Cox. Cox was not known to the officers, but they had received reports that day of his involvement in some difficulty and they expected notification of a warrant that would justify his arrest. Cox was actually the one driving the pickup and had no passenger with him, although the officers could not have then known this to be so. When Cox refused to stop, three police patrol cars gave chase at high speeds, and gunfire erupted. No bullet struck the police cars, but many did strike the Cox vehicle and Cox was wounded. About seven miles east of Borger, Cox suddenly turned from the highway and went through a fence onto the 6666 Ranch. He drove south into the ranch and then turned to the east. The police officers came to an entrance into the ranch and drove across the cattle guard and on a caliche road for a distance of about 100 yards. The first three police units were quickly joined by two more.
The Cox vehicle had crossed the caliche road and stopped some 75 yards to the east near a cross fence. Down the caliche road about 200 yards further stood a house, although the officers said that they could not see it at the time of their arrival in the rainy darkness. When Cox left his pickup, there was more gunfire. Again, no bullets struck the police cars, but one police bullet did strike the ranch house.
In the house James C. Grandstaff and his family were awakened by the noise. James Grandstaff was the 31 year old foreman in charge of the north portion of this large ranch. His family included his wife, Lois Sharon Grandstaff, his minor daughter, Jo Cheryl Grandstaff, and two stepsons, Randy Glen and Charles Robert Gatlin. Grandstaff went to the window, saw the flashing lights of the police cars, and heard commands being shouted over a loud speaker. He quickly dressed and drove his own pickup down the caliche road to investigate the problem, no doubt thinking himself safe in the presence of so many law enforcement people. After he reached the police cars, saw the Cox pickup to the east and heard the call on the police loudspeaker for the one addressed being ordered to come out with his hands up, James Grandstaff drove back to his house to warn his family that the police were after someone who could possibly reach the area of the home. He left a gun with his oldest stepson, told him to lock the doors and let no one in the house, and then returned in his pickup to assist the police officers. As his pickup reached the patrol cars the second time, officers opened fire upon him from two sides. He managed to get out of his pickup but was shot in the back with a high powered rifle. Grandstaff was dead before he could be taken to a hospital. An hour later the wounded Lonnie Cox surrendered at the highway, after having hidden in an outbuilding near the Grandstaff home.
The dispatcher at Borger police headquarters made the following entries on her police radio log:
Time Nature of Transaction
---- --------------------------------
4:23 (3 units in pursuit)
Chief advised subject firing
4:29 Left pickup in pasture . .
firing on them
4:33 Car coming out from house
Don't know if it will be people
4:35 Vehicle backing up going back to
house
4:40 Light just came on inside house
Light now gone off
4:43 At present everything quiet
Vehicle leave house again
4:47 Firing, man down, send ambulance
At the time of the firing there were five police cars in a line on the caliche road manned by six Borger policemen, composing the entire night shift of the force. All of the officers were heavily armed.
The plaintiffs sued four of the officers and the City seeking damages for a civil rights violation under Sec. 1983 as well as for state tort claims. After a two week trial, the jury found that the four officers were reckless in their gunfire, consciously disregarding a substantial and unjustifiable risk and that the use of that deadly force was maliciously, wantonly, or oppressively done. The jury further found that the City of Borger was grossly negligent in failing to properly train its police officers and that there was serious incompetence or misbehavior general or widespread throughout the City police force. The following damages were awarded:
1. To the estate $100,000 for the pain and suffering of James Grandstaff prior to his death.
2. To the widow, Lois Sharon Grandstaff, $250,000 for her pecuniary loss and $250,000 for her loss of society and mental anguish.
3. To the minor daughter, Jo Cheryl Grandstaff, $200,000 for her pecuniary loss and $250,000 for her loss of society and mental anguish.
4. To the father, Joe H. Grandstaff, $200,000 for his loss of society and companionship and for his mental anguish.
5. To Lois Sharon Grandstaff $100,000, to Randy Gatlin $25,000 and to Robert Gatlin $25,000, for their emotional injury sustained as the result of seeing the circumstances surrounding the shooting and death of James Grandstaff.
6. Punitive damages were awarded against the four officers--$3000 to Lois Sharon Grandstaff against each, $3000 to Jo Cheryl against each, and $1500 to Joe Henry Grandstaff against each.
Peace officers stand at the front of law and the ordering processes of society. They restrain the violator, protect the compliant, and represent constituted authority in the scenes of both peace and turbulence of community life. We depend heavily upon their skill and disposition. They deserve and require the understanding and support of judges as well as of all citizens. Where any officer fails--whether for lack of courage, judgment, integrity, or humaneness--all the community suffers. We suffer because vested authority has failed to prevent some harm or because authority has been sullied and abused. With any abuse of authority the entire ordering process is weakened. The public trusts the entire process less, and antagonism to all figures of authority rises. No one should be more alert to the cost of failure than responsible law enforcement officers and we who work in the courts. We must do what we can to avoid the failures, to prevent their reoccurrence, and--at all times--stay true to the requisites of honesty and accountability imposed upon all who are at once representative of the law and subject to it.
Our reading of this long trial record reveals how officers and a city police force failed, at great cost, and how those officers and their supervisors thereafter denied their failures and concerned themselves only with unworthy, if not despicable, means to avoid legal liability. The City and officers insist, to this day, that they are free of fault and deserve no blame. They display no sense of obligation other than to this joint disclaimer and defense. There is not a single word in this record about any effort at any time by the City of Borger to avoid police failure or abuse. The officers, called to the witness stand by the plaintiffs, were evasive and forgetful and self-contradictory. The scene at the 6666 Ranch that dark night in 1981 was distressing; succeeding events, the scene of this trial, and the posture of the defense only exacerbate the distress. 1
The officers are liable under Texas law for the wrongful death of James Grandstaff. Even if the officers would have been justified under Texas law in using appropriate deadly force against Lonnie Cox, there could be no justification where an innocent third person was recklessly killed. Tex.Pen.Code Ann. Sec. 9.05 (Vernon 1974). The officers are likewise liable for Grandstaff's death on a federal civil rights claim, authorized by 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 where a person, acting under color of law, deprives another of rights assured by the Constitution or federal law. No less than Texas law, the Fourteenth Amendment protection against deprivation of life without due process of law is violated when police officers using deadly force, in conscious disregard of substantial risk of harm to innocent parties, kill an innocent third party. See Garner v. Tennessee, --- U.S. ----, 105 S.Ct. 1694, 1700, 85 L.Ed.2d 1 (1985) ().
The jury found, and was entitled to find, that the defendant...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Hood v. Itawamba County, Miss.
...658, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978); Palmer v. City of San Antonio, 810 F.2d 514, 516 (5th Cir. 1987); Grandstaff v. City of Borger, Texas, 767 F.2d 161, 169 (5th Cir.1985); Boston v. Lafayette County, Mississippi, 743 F.Supp. 462, 467 I. Failure to Train The failure to provide pre-tr......
-
Merriweather v. Reynolds
...stress, or mental anguish, and, hence, there is no liability under Section 1983 regarding such claims. See Grandstaff v. City of Borger, 767 F.2d 161 (5th Cir.1985), rehearing denied, 779 F.2d 1129 (5th Cir. 1986), cert. denied, City of Borger v. Grandstaff, 480 U.S. 916, 107 S.Ct. 1369, 94......
-
In re N.Y.C. Policing During Summer 2020 Demonstrations
...violation." Collins v. City of New York , 923 F. Supp. 2d 462, 477 (E.D.N.Y. 2013) (brackets omitted) (quoting Grandstaff v. City of Borger , 767 F.2d 161, 170 (5th Cir. 1985) ), "deliberate indifference may be inferred if the complaints [of wrongdoing] are followed by no meaningful attempt......
-
Roma Const. Co. v. aRusso
...and have been done' " in the Town. See Kibbe v. City of Springfield, 777 F.2d 801, 806 (1st Cir.1985) (quoting Grandstaff v. City of Borger, 767 F.2d 161, 171 (5th Cir.1985), cert. denied, 480 U.S. 916, 107 S.Ct. 1369, 94 L.Ed.2d 686 (1987)), cert. granted, 475 U.S. 1064, 106 S.Ct. 1374, 89......
-
Ratification as an Exception to the Section 1983 Causation Requirement: Plaintiff's Opportunity or Illusion?
...the [subordinates], or if they otherwise failed to admit the [subordinates'] conduct was in error."); Grandstaff v. City of Borger, 767 F.2d 161, 171 (5th Cir. 1985) ("[S]ubsequent acceptance of dangerous recklessness by the policymaker tends to prove his preexisting disposition and policy.......