Guzman v. City of Chicago

• Decision Date: 13 May 2009
• Docket Number: No. 08-2172.,08-2172.
• Citation: 565 F.3d 393
• Parties: Maira GUZMAN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF CHICAGO, a municipal corporation, Marvin Bonnstetter, Chicago Police Officers, Star 1645 and Danilo Rojas, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

565 F.3d 393

Maira GUZMAN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF CHICAGO, a municipal corporation, Marvin Bonnstetter, Chicago Police Officers, Star 1645 and Danilo Rojas, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 08-2172.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued February 13, 2009.

Decided May 13, 2009.

Lawrence V. Jackowiak (argued), Chicago, IL, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Nadine J. Wichern (argued), Office of the Corporation Counsel, Chicago, IL, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before KANNE, ROVNER, and EVANS, Circuit Judges.

EVANS, Circuit Judge.

In this case brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Maira Guzman alleges that her constitutional rights were violated when Chicago police officers performed an unreasonable search of her home, placed her under arrest, and used excessive force against her. She also sets out various state law violations. The district court granted summary judgment dismissing her claims; Guzman appeals only the dismissal of those relating to the alleged unlawful search and her claim of false arrest.

In 2005, Sergeant Marvin Bonnstetter of the Chicago Police Department was investigating gang activity. In the course of the investigation he went to the Cook County jail where he met with an inmate. Another inmate, referred to as John Doe, approached Bonnstetter and said he had information about gang activity that he wished to share with the police. Bonnstetter did not know the aspiring informant but told him to call after he was released from jail. And call he did, six months later. Then the two met at a police station, along with a special agent from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, James McDonald. Doe, who himself was a gang member and a convicted felon, discussed his knowledge of gangs. It was information which coincided with other knowledge and convinced Bonnstetter and McDonald that Doe was reliable. In addition, Doe positively identified pictures of 10 to 20 gang members from photos he was shown.

One of the specific bits of information Doe provided was that he saw a gang member and convicted felon named Ruben Estrada, whom he had known for years, at a single-family residence at 1536 West Walton in Chicago. Doe said Estrada lived in the house with his family. Doe also said that he saw Estrada enter the two-story dwelling through one door on the first floor and exit with a handgun from another door on the first floor. Doe said Estrada had a handgun for protection because his gang was at war.

Agent McDonald and Doe drove by the house on West Walton and Doe confirmed that it was where he saw Estrada. As they were driving by the house, McDonald saw "a small real estate sign" in the front window. To him, the building looked like a single-family residence and he assumed that someone was running a real estate business out of the home. McDonald conveyed this information to Bonnstetter, who then searched a police database which showed that Estrada gave 1536 West Walton as his address to the police five times from 1997 to 2001. The database also showed that after 2001 he used as his address 1538 and 1636 West Walton, 1515 West Cortez, and 2943 North Ridgeway. Apparently having regular run-ins with the police, Estrada used the latter address eight times from 2002 to 2005. In other words, it had been almost four years since Estrada used the 1536 West Walton address in his many contacts with the police.

Nevertheless, armed with the information that Estrada was connected with 1536 West Walton, Bonnstetter signed an affidavit requesting a warrant to search Estrada — a felon who was then on bond for unauthorized use of a weapon — and to search 1536 West Walton, which was described as a single-family residence. A Cook County circuit court judge found that the affidavit provided probable cause and issued a warrant authorizing the search of Estrada's person and of 1536 West Walton, a "single family residence," and the seizure of any handgun as well as proof that Estrada lived in the house.

Armed with the warrant, Bonnstetter, McDonald, and some seven other Chicago police officers as well as seven FBI agents descended on 1536 West Walton. When he arrived, Bonnstetter saw the real estate sign; like McDonald, he thought it looked like a home business. What he also saw, though, was that the front of the building had two doors, one leading to the business and the other to a stairway up to the second floor. The back of the building also had two doors.

What became clear at some point is that the building was not a single-family residence, but rather it housed a real estate office, an apartment (though unoccupied as it turned out) on the first floor, and a separate apartment on the second floor. It is unclear whether there were real estate flyers in the front window of the office and whether a mailbox on the door to the upstairs was labeled Guzman family.

On that morning, Guzman, who lived in the second-floor apartment with her husband, was at home, undressed, lying on her bed talking on her phone, when she heard knocking at her door. She put on a long, loose-fitting T-shirt and walked toward the door. Suddenly, the door was forced open with a crowbar and officers entered the apartment with guns drawn. Guzman did not speak English but she understood a gesture made by one of the officers to mean that she should lie down on the floor. Realizing that Guzman did not speak English, Officer Danilo Rojas began to serve as an interpreter. Guzman, who was seven months pregnant at the time, remained on the floor, in what she said was an uncomfortable position, for about 10 minutes. After the officers completed a security check of the apartment, she was permitted to get up, put on pants, and sit on a chair. The officers proceeded to search her apartment. Guzman told the officers that she did not know Estrada, that he did not live in her apartment, and that there was no handgun. After 30 minutes of searching, finding nothing of interest in the apartment, the officers left. As a result of the entire episode, all that was found was an inoperable, rusty handgun in the search of the backyard. The officers also admitted observing that the first-floor apartment was under renovation and unoccupied.

As the officers were leaving, Guzman's husband arrived home. Guzman, who was by then feeling pain in her abdomen, wanted to see her doctor. Because her doctor was unavailable, Guzman went to a nearby hospital where she was kept overnight for observation.

As a result of the incorrect information in the warrant application, Bonnstetter decided not to execute a second search warrant he had obtained, also based on information provided by Doe. Bonnstetter testified in his deposition that about a week after the search he had a conversation with Doe in which he told him "the information he gave me wasn't right and I was upset." He also said he "was upset to the point that if he told me that it was a residence on the first floor and I go in there and it's an office building, I was upset about that."

Guzman brought this lawsuit, seeking damages for the alleged illegal search as well as other claims. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants. Our review is de novo. Bell v. Duperrault, 367 F.3d 703 (7th Cir.2004).

In evaluating an alleged violation of the Warrant Clause of the Fourth Amendment, we look at two distinct aspects of the warrant — its issuance and its execution. Maryland v. Garrison, 480 U.S. 79, 107 S.Ct. 1013, 94 L.Ed.2d 72 (1987). We will turn first to the issuance of the warrant.

The Fourth Amendment requires that a warrant be supported by probable cause and that it describe, with particularity, the place to be searched and the items or persons to be seized. Absent exigent circumstances, a neutral magistrate must make the probable-cause determination and issue the warrant. Chambers v. Maroney, 399 U.S. 42, 90 S.Ct. 1975, 26 L.Ed.2d 419 (1970); Jones v. Wilhelm, 425 F.3d 455 (7th Cir.2005).

Obviously, in this case the information provided to the judge — i.e., that 1536 West Walton was a single-family house and that Estrada lived there — was not accurate. However, we do not view probable cause determinations with hindsight. Rather, the validity of the warrant is assessed on the basis of the "information that the officers disclosed, or had a duty to discover and to disclose, to the issuing Magistrate." Garrison, 480 U.S. at 85, 107 S.Ct. 1013. Information that emerges after the warrant is issued has no bearing on this analysis.

In this case, Bonnstetter and McDonald talked with Doe to assess his reliability. The information about gang activity coincided with their own. They also showed him pictures of gang members and he was able to identify them. McDonald took Doe to West Walton to look at the house. McDonald observed what he thought was a single-family house with a home business. Despite these precautions, Guzman argues that they should have done more — that they should have told the judge that this was the first time Doe had provided information so they were limited in their assessment of his reliability. We doubt that would have made a difference. At the beginning of his work with the police, every informant necessarily provides information for the first time. We are convinced that the steps taken to verify the information Doe provided were sufficient. There was probable cause to issue the warrant.

Our conclusion is in line with prior cases. In Jones we found a warrant to be valid when it was issued despite a finding that the police were not diligent in ensuring that the name of the tenant and the apartment number were on the warrant. Also, in a situation similar to the one before us now, we upheld a search warrant on the basis that the police investigation did not suggest that the house involved was not a single-family residence but rather a multiunit, multipurpose building, which also housed a barber shop. United States v. White, 416 F.3d 634 (7th Cir. 2005).

That the warrant be properly issued,...