Jones v. Doria

• Decision Date: 10 June 1991
• Docket Number: No. 90 C 6926.,90 C 6926.
• Citation: 767 F. Supp. 1432
• Parties: Edward M. JONES, Plaintiff, v. Richard P. DORIA, Sheriff of DuPage County and John C. Smith, Deputy Chief of the DuPage County Sheriff's Department, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

767 F. Supp. 1432

Edward M. JONES, Plaintiff, v. Richard P. DORIA, Sheriff of DuPage County and John C. Smith, Deputy Chief of the DuPage County Sheriff's Department, Defendants.

No. 90 C 6926.

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, E.D.

June 10, 1991.

Richard J. Reimer, Puchalski, Keenan & Reimer, Chicago, Ill., for plaintiff.

James E. Ryan, DuPage County State's Atty., Thomas F. Downing, Asst. State's Atty., for defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

SHADUR, District Judge.

Edward Jones ("Jones") has sued DuPage County Sheriff Richard Doria ("Doria") and Deputy Chief of DuPage County Sheriff's Department John Smith ("Smith") in both their individual and official capacities under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 ("Section 1983"). Jones' Complaint seeks damages, injunctive relief and reinstatement based on defendants' alleged violations of his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process in connection with the suspension and then the later termination of Jones' employment without a predeprivation hearing at either time.

Both Doria and Smith have moved for dismissal under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6),¹ asserting that the Complaint:

1. fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted and

2. is barred under the doctrine of res judicata.²

For the reasons stated in this memorandum opinion and order, defendants' motion is granted and this action is dismissed.

Facts

Jones was hired by the DuPage County Sheriff's Department as a Deputy Sheriff Corrections Officer in September 1983 (¶ 7). After successfully completing his one-year probationary period Jones became a permanent employee, and he remained on active duty until July 22, 1989, when Doria and Smith suspended him without pay for misconduct that had allegedly occurred a day earlier (¶¶ 8-9).

Jones had an opportunity to appeal his suspension under General Order DEP 4-26, entitled "Departmental Discipline" (the "Department Policy," P.Mem.Ex. 5), and he does not contend that he was denied that right. Instead of pursuing his right to appeal, on December 1, 1989 Jones spoke with Smith to inquire about his returning to work, and Smith advised him that the Sheriff would fire Jones should he not resign from the Sheriff's Department (¶ 11).

Jones alleges (¶ 12) that:

as a result of coercion and under influence employed by the Defendants, plaintiff involuntarily, conditionally resigned from the Sheriff's Department on December 22, 1989....

That resignation was made effective January 1, 1990. Doria had not yet accepted Jones' resignation when on June 5, 1990, through his attorney, Jones formally withdrew his resignation and declared himself available for work (¶ 14 and P.Mem.Ex. 2). Two days later Doria once again suspended Jones without pay pending the outcome of charges filed with the DuPage County Merit Commission ("Commission") on that same date (¶¶ 15-16).

Jones appeared before Commission and denied the allegations contained in Doria's complaint against him (¶ 17). On October 22, 1990, without conducting any evidentiary hearing, Commission dismissed Doria's complaint against Jones for lack of jurisdiction because Commission held that Jones had resigned (¶ 18 and Ex. A to D.Mem.Ex. 1) and was thus not currently a member of the Sheriff's Department. Jones has since filed a state court action seeking administrative review of Commission's decision (D.Mem.Ex. 1). This action followed.

Issue Preclusion

Jones claims a twofold deprivation of his property rights:

1. his suspension, which lasted from July 22, 1989 until his resignation (which, as already stated, he made effective on January 1, 1990); and

2. the effective termination of his employment, which Jones claims was both conditional and involuntary — and hence a constructive discharge (¶ 12).

Although no state agency or court has addressed Jones' temporary loss of his job during the period of suspension, Commission did determine the effectiveness of Jones' termination when it dismissed Doria's complaint against Jones for lack of jurisdiction because it held that due to his resignation (Ex. A to D.Mem.Ex. 1, and see ¶ 18³): Jones is not a member of the DuPage County Sheriff's Police Department.

Commission's decision that Jones' termination—the result of his resignation — was legally effective cannot be reexamined by this Court. University of Tennessee v. Elliott, 478 U.S. 788, 799, 106 S.Ct. 3220, 3226, 92 L.Ed.2d 635 (1986) (footnote omitted) explains that a decision by a state agency acting in a judicial capacity must be given the "same preclusive effect to which it would be entitled in the State's courts." And Buckhalter v. Pepsi-Cola General Bottlers, Inc., 820 F.2d 892, 895 (7th Cir. 1987) teaches:

From our reading of the Supreme Court's decision in Elliott and our own research we have not discovered any legislative history establishing that Congress intended that the civil rights statutes were to foreclose application of the common-law doctrine of preclusion in discharge cases ..., and therefore a plaintiff is precluded from relitigating his section 1983 claim in federal courts if: (1) the State agency has acted in a judicial capacity; (2) has resolved disputed issues of fact properly before it; and (3) the parties have had an adequate opportunity to litigate the issues.

First of all, Commission clearly acted in a judicial capacity when it dismissed the Sheriff's complaint against Jones. It is the agency authorized by law to review a sheriff's decision to suspend or fire a deputy sheriff. Wagner v. Kramer, 108 Ill.2d 413, 420, 92 Ill.Dec. 218, 221, 484 N.E.2d 1073, 1076 (1985) confirms that principle:

From an examination of the statutes set out above and based on Kropel v. Conlisk, 60 Ill.2d 17, 322 N.E.2d 793 (1975) and its reasoning, the Sheriff's Merit System Act must be construed, under the public policy of this State, to provide some method of review of disciplinary suspensions imposed by the sheriff. We consider that the sheriff's merit commission is the proper body to review disciplinary suspensions under its established procedures set out in section 14 (Ill.Rev. Stat.1983, ch. 125, par. 164), which section also provides an avenue of judicial review of orders of the commission to the circuit court under the Administrative Review Law (Ill.Rev.Stat.1983, ch. 110, par. 3-101 et seq.).

Second, Commission necessarily decided the issue of the legal effectiveness of Jones' resignation when it ruled on Board's motion to dismiss the case. Commission states immediately before the finding quoted in n. 3 (Ex. A to D.Mem.Ex. 1):

The parties have been fully advised in the premises and have fully briefed the issue of the questioned resignation of Edward M. Jones from the DuPage County Sheriff's Department....

Commission's determination of the effectiveness of Jones' resignation necessarily subsumes a negative answer to such subsidiary questions as whether it was, as he now asserts, involuntary (and hence ineffective) or conditional (and hence inoperative).

Finally, there can be no quarrel with the parties' adequate opportunity to litigate those issues. They both had and exercised that opportunity before Commission. And Jones lost.

Thus Jones has no right to bring those issues before this Court anew. Accordingly the entire portion of the Complaint relating to Jones' termination must be and is dismissed.

Due Process Claims

As to the period of his suspension, Jones contends that both substantive and due process rights are implicated in the deprivation of his property interest in his employment (¶ 26). Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U.S. 527, 535, 101 S.Ct. 1908, 1912, 68 L.Ed.2d 420 (1981) explains that to establish such a Section 1983 violation, a plaintiff must prove that:

the conduct complained of was committed by a person acting under the color of state law; and ... this conduct deprived a person of rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States.

Jones has pleaded that defendants—both of them being state actors by occupation and both acting in their official capacities— acted "under color of State law" (¶ 4), and that characterization is of course not contested by defendants. To satisfy the other component of a Section 1983 claim, Jones must also show that he had a property interest in his employment. As New Burnham Prairie Homes, Inc. v. Village of Burnham, 910 F.2d 1474, 1479 (7th Cir. 1990) (citations omitted) states:

Before a party may assert a due process argument—procedural or substantive—it must be established that it has a "legitimate claim of entitlement" to the right being asserted.

On that score, Jones has properly shown that his interest in his job is a property right protected by the Due Process Clause—one created by Ill.Rev.Stat. ch. 125, ¶ 113:⁴

Except as is otherwise provided in this Act, no deputy sheriff in the county police department shall be removed, demoted or suspended except for cause, upon written charges filed with the Board by the Sheriff and a hearing before the Board thereon, upon not less than 10 days' notice at a place to be designated by the chairman thereof. At such hearing, the accused deputy sheriff shall be afforded full opportunity to be heard in his own defense and to produce proof in his defense.

Once the State thus granted Jones the right to employment unless there was "cause" to suspend or fire him, that right became a property interest protected by the Due Process Clause. If the State were then to deprive a person of such a protected property interest, two types of due process claims—substantive and procedural— might perhaps arise. As already stated, here Jones claims both types, and they will be dealt with in turn.⁵

Substantive Due Process

There is no question that Jones may plead a substantive due process claim for a deprivation of a state-created property interest (Polenz v. Parrott, 883 F.2d 551, 558 (7th Cir.1989)). But New Burnham Prairie Homes, 910 F.2d at 1481 (citations omitted) teaches that for a...