Jackson v. City of San Diego

• Court: California Court of Appeals
• Writing for the Court: WIENER; WORK
• Citation: Jackson v. City of San Diego, 121 Cal.App.3d 579, 175 Cal.Rptr. 395 (Cal. App. 1981)
• Decision Date: 14 July 1981
• Parties: Sergeant JACKSON, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. CITY OF SAN DIEGO, Defendant and Appellant. Civ. 22257.

Page 395

175 Cal.Rptr. 395

121 Cal.App.3d 579

Sergeant JACKSON, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. CITY OF SAN DIEGO, Defendant and Appellant.

Civ. 22257.

Court of Appeal, Fourth District, Division 1, California.

July 14, 1981.

Hearing Denied Oct. 7, 1981.

John W. Witt, City Atty., San Diego, Ronald L. Johnson, Chief Deputy, City Atty., and Vincent P. Di Figlia, Deputy City Atty., San Diego for defendant and appellant.

Sheela, Lightner & Castro and Barton C. Sheela, Jr., and Kim W. Cheatum, San Diego, for plaintiff and respondent.

WIENER, Justice.

The emotionally charged question in this appeal is whether an innocent man, convicted and imprisoned for crimes he did not commit, can obtain damages for the entire period of his incarceration.

We are unable to treat this question as an original proposition. The Legislature in enacting the California Tort Claims Act (Gov. Code, § 810 et seq.) ¹ has explored and attempted to balance the competing policy considerations for and against governmental immunity. By expressly providing in section 820.4 that a public employee is liable for false arrest or false imprisonment, the Legislature acknowledged the importance of the individual's right of freedom and to move about in society in an unrestrained manner free from oppressive action. However, in granting immunity to the public employee for malicious prosecution (section 821.6) it recognized the chilling effect and impediments to law enforcement if public officers and public prosecutors were to be held liable for their official conduct. (See White v. Towers (1951) 37 Cal.2d 727, 235 P.2d 209; also generally, A Study Relating To Sovereign Immunity, 5 Cal. Law Revision Com.Rep. (1963) 406-415.) As we will explain, we interpret the Legislature's action as reflecting its intent that a ceiling be placed on damages which may be awarded for false imprisonment, limiting those damages to the period of incarceration beginning with the false arrest, but ending when lawful process begins. We hold here that Jackson is entitled to all the damages he suffered during the period from his warrantless arrest to the date he was rearrested pursuant to the grand jury indictment. Accordingly, we must reverse the judgment for limited retrial on the issue of damages only.

Background

Appeal

Sergeant Jackson was convicted of robbery and murder. When he was released from prison after spending about 10 months in custody, he sued the City of San Diego for false imprisonment. A jury awarded him $280,000. The City appeals.

Trial Factual and Procedural History

Because the City does not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence supporting liability, the facts are stated briefly only to set the stage underlying these proceedings.

Robert Hoke, a gas station attendant, was murdered and robbed on November 26, 1973. The police investigation and the subsequent arrest of Jackson turned on information received from a Victor Thomas, a police informant. Thomas told San Diego detectives that on the day after the murder, Jackson had come to Thomas' home and said he and Gilbert Andrews had gone on the previous day to a bar next to the gas station and after leaving the bar got into a fight with the gas station attendant, hit him and robbed the station. Thomas' categorical identification of Jackson was at odds with the description of either assailant given by several witnesses at the scene after the incident and contrary to the statement of another witness who positively excluded Jackson as the robber from a photographic lineup.

On December 4, 1973, Jackson was arrested without a warrant for Hoke's murder and robbery. The wallet in Jackson's possession was later incorrectly identified by the victim's wife as belonging to her husband.

On December 6, 1973, a felony complaint was issued charging Jackson with murder and robbery. Thirteen days later, December 19, the grand jury returned an indictment against Jackson for these crimes. A bench warrant for his arrest was issued on the indictment the following day. On December 21, the criminal complaint was dismissed and Jackson was then held pursuant to the indictment and warrant. On February 24, 1974, a jury convicted him of both first degree murder and first degree robbery. He was sentenced to state prison on April 8, 1974 for the term prescribed by law. During his incarceration, Clarence Blunt came forward and implicated himself in the murder of which Jackson had been convicted. Blunt was tried and convicted. Jackson was set free. Pursuant to Jackson's writ of habeas corpus, the charges against him were dismissed in the furtherance of justice and the judgment of conviction was vacated on October 29, 1974.

Discussion

There are two distinct paths we can take in our analytical journey to determine whether events occurring after Jackson's warrantless arrest restrict the amount of damages which he may receive. One path, with a couple of byways, is to proceed with a traditional tort analysis, examining whether Jackson's indictment or later jury conviction are independent intervening acts severing the chain of causation for damages arising from his false imprisonment. The first byway we encounter is best exemplified by the New York rule "that damages for false arrest should be limited to the period before arraignment since after arraignment the accused is no longer held as a result of the arrest but as a result of the intervening act of the arraigning Magistrate (citations)." ² (Broughton v. State (1975) 37 N.Y.2d 451, 459, 373 N.Y.S.2d 87, 95-96, 335 N.E.2d 310.) Our Supreme Court in a somewhat similar fashion has held where a plaintiff prevails at the preliminary hearing and is not imprisoned beyond an independent evaluation of probable cause, he is entitled to all damages proximately related to his entire period of confinement. The court explained:

"The trial court instructed the jury that damages for physical and mental suffering during the period of imprisonment following the order of the Magistrate committing him were not legally compensable. The instruction was necessarily based upon the theory that the confinement after arraignment was not proximately caused by the wrongful arrest. (P)The arraignment would not have taken place had the arrest had not been made. Thus, the arrest was a cause in fact of plaintiff's imprisonment. Although a chain of causation may be broken by an independent intervening act which is not reasonably foreseeable (citation), plaintiff's arraignment was not such an act. It was clearly a foreseeable result of the arrest and was actually contemplated by defendants. (P)Under the circumstances, the arrest was a proximate cause of plaintiff's imprisonment both before and after the arraignment, and he is entitled to recover damages for physical and mental suffering during the entire period he was confined. (Citations.)" (Original italics.) (Gill v. Epstein (1965) 62 Cal.2d 611, 617-618, 44 Cal.Rptr. 45, 401 P.2d 397.)

Another less mechanical byway along this path is to permit the trier of fact to hear evidence in order to factually resolve whether later events, individually or cumulatively, give rise to an independent intervening cause of the damages. For example, a jury could decide whether the grand jury indictment severed the chain of causation or whether it was so dependent upon the prosecutor and law enforcement that its action in returning an indictment was preordained and orchestrated by the formers' submission of selective evidence. The practical and legal problems associated with this approach include not only the substantial amount of time used in relitigating questions regarding the propriety of the district attorney's performance of his prosecutorial role, but also the retrospective guesswork by petit jurors in a civil case of whether grand jurors acted correctly in issuing an indictment. To say, as a matter of law, however, that the indictment terminates damages for false imprisonment because of its independent nature is inconsistent with our Supreme Court's description of the grand jury process.

"Indeed, current indictment procedures create what can only be characterized as a prosecutor's Eden: he decides what evidence will be heard, how it is to be presented, and then advises the grand jury on its admissibility and legal significance." (Hawkins v. Superior Court (1978) 22 Cal.3d 584, 592, 150 Cal.Rptr. 435, 586 P.2d 916.)

Faced with the foregoing obstacles, we take the other path, analyzing the Legislature's purpose in immunizing the public employee from damages for malicious prosecution, while retaining liability for the tort of false imprisonment.

" ' "False imprisonment is the unlawful violation of the personal liberty of another (Pen.Code, § 236), the interference (being) absolutely unlawful and without authority " ' " (Singleton v. Perry (1955) 45 Cal.2d 489, 494, 289 P.2d 794, quoting Neves v. Costa (1907) 5 Cal.App. 111, 117-118, 89 P. 860; Barrier v. Alexander (1950) 100 Cal.App.2d 497, 499, 224 P.2d 436.) " 'Malicious prosecution is procuring the arrest or prosecution of another under lawful process, but from malicious motives and without probable cause.' " (Singleton v. Perry, supra, 45 Cal.2d at p. 494, 289 P.2d 794; Barrier v. Alexander, supra, 100 Cal.App.2d at p. 499, 224 P.2d 436; Sullivan v. County of Los Angeles (1974) 12 Cal.3d 710, 720, 117 Cal.Rptr. 241, 527 P.2d 867; 4 Witkin, Summary of Cal. Law (8th ed. 1974) Torts, § 242, pp. 2522-2523.) Even though each tort may cause a person to be restrained or confined, each remains distinct, protecting different personal interests. False imprisonment protects the personal interest in freedom from restraint of movement; malicious prosecution protects the personal interest in freedom from unjustifiable litigation. (See Prosser on Torts (4th ed.1971) p. 42, p. 834.) When a person " ' "is arrested or confined without a warrant, or legal authority apart from a warrant, malicious prosecution will not lie, since the...