Johnson v. City of West Memphis

• Decision Date: 14 May 1997
• Docket Number: No. 96-3081EA,96-3081EA
• Citation: 113 F.3d 842
• Parties: William H. JOHNSON, Appellant, v. CITY OF WEST MEMPHIS; Al Boals, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Joe Brasfield, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Thomas Burroughs, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Al Felton; Roberta Jackson, in Her Official and Individual Capacity; Bill Pollard, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Dan Scott, in His Official and Individual Capacity, Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 842

113 F.3d 842

William H. JOHNSON, Appellant, v. CITY OF WEST MEMPHIS; Al Boals, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Joe Brasfield, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Thomas Burroughs, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Al Felton; Roberta Jackson, in Her Official and Individual Capacity; Bill Pollard, in His Official and Individual Capacity; Dan Scott, in His Official and Individual Capacity, Appellees.

No. 96-3081EA.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted March 10, 1997.

Decided May 14, 1997.

Timothy Oliver Dudley, Little Rock, AR, for appellant.

Mark Robert Hayes, North Little Rock, AR (David Schoen, on brief), argued, for appellees.

Before FAGG, HEANEY, and MORRIS SHEPPARD ARNOLD, Circuit Judges.

FAGG, Circuit Judge.

In January 1995, newly elected mayor Al Boals fired William H. Johnson from his job as the general manager of the utility commission in West Memphis, Arkansas. Despite Johnson's repeated requests, Mayor Boals refused to hold a termination hearing or to offer any reasons for his decision. Johnson asked the city council to intervene, but his request was denied. See Ark.Code Ann. § 14-42-110 (Michie 1987) (unless vetoed by two-thirds of city council, city mayor can appoint and remove all department heads). Believing he was entitled to a hearing, and that he was fired because he declined to support Mayor Boals's election campaign, Johnson filed this 42 U.S.C. § 1983 lawsuit against Mayor Boals, the members of the city council, and the City of West Memphis (collectively the City). The district court granted the City's motion for summary judgment, and Johnson appeals. We affirm.

The Due Process Clause requires the government to provide an employee with procedural due process if the employee stands to lose a constitutionally protected property or liberty interest. See Board of Regents v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 569-70, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 2705, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972). For a property interest to exist, the public employee must have a legitimate claim of entitlement to continued employment. See Skeets v. Johnson, 816 F.2d 1213, 1215 (8th Cir.1987) (en banc). An employee's liberty interests are implicated when, in connection with the employee's discharge, a government official makes accusations that seriously damage the employee's standing in the community or foreclose other employment opportunities. See Shands v. City of Kennett, 993 F.2d 1337, 1347 (8th Cir.1993).

Johnson lacked a property interest because he was not entitled to continued employment as the utility commission's general manager. Under Arkansas law, Johnson was an at-will employee who could be terminated at any time without cause. See Skeets, 816 F.2d at 1215. The Arkansas Supreme Court recognizes certain exceptions to its employment-at-will doctrine, see Mertyris v. P.A.M. Transport, Inc., 310 Ark. 132, 832 S.W.2d 823, 825 (1992), but Johnson does not fall within any of them. Johnson had no written employment contract covering a definite term, and although the city's personnel manual states employees will not be terminated "without being offered a pre[ ]termination hearing," the manual does not expressly provide that employees will only be dismissed for cause. See id. Contrary to Johnson's view, the longstanding custom of providing all city employees with a due process hearing before they were terminated does not affect our analysis. See Packett v. Stenberg, 969 F.2d 721, 724-25 (8th Cir.1992) (newly elected officials may change an earlier administration's employment practices). Besides, like the terms of the personnel manual itself, the past mayor's willingness to grant a hearing merely creates an expectancy of review, and not a legitimate claim to continued employment with the City of West Memphis. See Stow v. Cochran, 819 F.2d 864, 866-67 (8th Cir.1987).

Likewise, Johnson lost no liberty interest during the city council's public debate on whether the council should override Mayor Boals's termination decision. Rather than making accusations that would stigmatize Johnson's protected liberty interest, see Shands, 993 F.2d at 1347-48, councilwoman Roberta Jackson simply expressed her view that it was inappropriate for the utility commission to do construction work on private property, and stated some anonymous commission employees had complained to her about being ...