Martin v. City of Albany

• Citation: 396 N.Y.S.2d 612,42 N.Y.2d 13,364 N.E.2d 1304
• Parties: , 364 N.E.2d 1304 Roswell MARTIN, Plaintiff, and Elizabeth A. Martin, Appellant, v. CITY OF ALBANY et al., Respondents.
• Decision Date: 09 June 1977
• Court: New York Court of Appeals

Page 612

396 N.Y.S.2d 612

42 N.Y.2d 13, 364 N.E.2d 1304

Roswell MARTIN, Plaintiff, and Elizabeth A. Martin, Appellant, v. CITY OF ALBANY et al., Respondents.

Court of Appeals of New York.

June 9, 1977.

Jonathan P. Harvey, Albany, for appellant.

John E. Roe, Corp. Counsel, Albany, (Joseph V. Zumbo, Albany, of counsel), for respondents.

JASEN, Judge.

This action, insofar as pertinent on appeal, is for malicious prosecution. The jury awarded plaintiff Elizabeth Martin $1,000 in compensatory and $4,000 in punitive damages against the City of Albany and its police officer, Patsy Deso. The Appellate Division reversed the judgment, on both the law and the facts, and dismissed the complaint. There are two issues presented for our consideration. We must decide whether the evidence was legally sufficient to sustain the jury verdict, and, if it was, whether the Appellate Division properly dismissed the complaint on the facts.

According to the evidence adduced by the plaintiff at trial, at approximately 5:40 p. m. on January 10, 1973, she and her husband Roswell were returning home in their car from a visit with a sick friend at the Albany Medical Center. Their homeward route took them along Central Avenue in the City of Albany. While stopped at a traffic signal at the corner of Central Avenue and Quail Street, Mrs. Martin noticed that the vehicle of an acquaintance, who had a history of drinking problems, had been flagged over to the side of the road by a police officer. This acquaintance recognized the Martins, rolled down her car window, and asked Mrs. Martin to drive her car home. After the light had changed, the Martins drove a short distance, parked their car, and walked back to the corner. Mrs. Martin told the police officer that she did not wish to "get involved in this", but asked whether there was anything she could do to help the woman. The officer replied, "(w)ell not for her. She is going down for the test." Thereupon, Mrs. Martin offered to drive the woman's car home for her. The policeman at first granted permission, but then suggested that they await the arrival of another officer. When this second officer, subsequently identified as Patsy J. Deso, appeared on the scene, he assertedly approached Mrs. Martin, put his finger under her nose, and demanded to know whether she was involved in the incident. Mrs. Martin said no, but before she could explain her presence at the scene, Officer Deso allegedly pushed her backwards. The officer declined a request to identify himself and, instead, remarked "I told you to get on the sidewalk." He twisted Mrs. Martin's hand behind her back, forced her onto the sidewalk, pushed her, and then placed her under arrest. Mr. Martin then intervened to protect his wife; he told the officer not to "manhandle" his wife and put his hands out against the officer. Officer Deso released Mrs. Martin momentarily, grabbed the husband and placed him under arrest also. Mrs. Martin and her acquaintance were put in a paddywagon and driven to the police station. Mr. Martin was first frisked and then placed in a second police car for the trip to the station house.

The Martins were charged, by an information filed by Officer Deso, with violating section 195.05 of the Penal Law, in that they obstructed the administration of law by interfering with an arrest. Officer Deso, in his version of the incident, contended that Mrs. Martin had several times refused his request to stand on the sidewalk and that Mr. Martin had endeavored to block the arrest of his wife. The Martins were released on cash bail and arraigned the following morning. After a two-day jury trial in the Police Court of the City of Albany, the Martins were acquitted of the criminal charges.

Mrs. Martin commenced an action against the City of Albany and Officer Deso for unlawful arrest, assault and malicious prosecution. Her husband sued for false arrest and malicious prosecution. After a trial, the jury found no cause of action on the husband's two claims and on the wife's assault claim. However, Mrs. Martin was awarded $15,000 in compensatory damages for unlawful arrest, $1,000 compensatory damages for malicious prosecution, and $4,000 punitive damages for malicious prosecution.

Both sides took appeals to the Appellate Division. The court affirmed the judgment in favor of the defendants on the husband's claim and directed a new trial on the issue of damages for the wife's unlawful arrest unless she stipulated to reduce the verdict to $5,000. She has since so stipulated. The court dismissed the wife's cause of action for malicious prosecution, with two Justices dissenting. The majority stated that "(o)n the instant record, even assuming arguendo a lack of probable cause and thus an inference of malice, the finding of malicious prosecution is against the weight of the evidence. There is absolutely no showing of malice on the part of Officer Deso. Accordingly, the claim of malicious prosecution of Elizabeth Martin must be dismissed". (51 A.D.2d 596, 597, 377 N.Y.S.2d 774, 776.)

Mrs. Martin has appealed only from so much of the Appellate Division order as dismissed her claim for malicious prosecution. There should be a reversal and a new trial. The evidence presented by the plaintiff was legally sufficient to sustain the jury verdict in her favor. While it remained in the province of the Appellate Division to conclude that the verdict was against the weight of the evidence, the action to be taken upon such a determination is to order a new trial. When reversin on the facts, a judgment for plaintiff entered upon a jury verdict, the Appellate Division is constitutionally precluded from dismissing the complaint.

The elements of a malicious prosecution cause of action were succinctly stated in Broughton v. State of New York, 37 N.Y.2d 451, 373 N.Y.S.2d 87, 335 N.E.2d 310, cert. den. sub nom. Schanbarger v. Kellogg, 423 U.S. 929, 96 S.Ct. 277, 46 L.Ed.2d 257. The plaintiff must establish that (1) the defendant either commenced or continued a criminal proceeding against him; (2) that the proceeding terminated in his favor; (3) that there was no probable cause for the criminal proceeding; and (4) that the criminal proceeding was instituted in actual malice. (37 N.Y.2d at p. 457, 373 N.Y.S.2d at p. 93-94, 335 N.E.2d at p. 314.) In this case, the first two elements are conclusively established. The plaintiff also submitted proo which if credited by a jury, as it was, would establish the lack of probable cause to commence the criminal proceeding. (See, generally, Munoz v. City of New York, 18 N.Y.2d 6, 271 N.Y.S.2d 645, 218 N.E.2d 527; Burt v. Smith, 181 N.Y. 1, 73 N.E. 495, app. dismd. 203 U.S. 129, 27 S.Ct. 37, 51 L.Ed. 121.) The only serious law issue, then, is whether there was sufficient proof of actual malice.

While lack of probable cause to institute a criminal proceeding and proof of actual malice are independent and indispensable elements of a malicious prosecution action, the absence of probable cause does bear on the malice issue. Actual malice is seldom established by direct evidence of an ulterior motive on the part of the prosecutor. (Dean v. Kochendorfer, 237 N.Y. 384, 389, 143 N.E. 229, 231.) This is particularly true where the prosecutor and the accused are strangers to each other at the time the criminal proceeding is initiated. In such cases, a finding of actual malice depends largely upon inferences to be reasonably drawn from the surrounding facts and circumstances. As put by the Restatement of Torts ( § 669), "(l)ack of probable cause for the initiation of criminal proceedings, in so far as it tends to show that the accuser did not believe in the guilt of the accused, is evidence that he did not initiate the proceedings for a proper purpose." The circumstances "may show so slight a basis for the defendant's belief in the guilt of the accused as to justify the jury in finding that he did not have that belief in the guilt of the accused which is necessary to justify the initiation of criminal proceedings, and, therefore, did not initiate them for their only proper purpose. On the other hand, the absence of reasonable grounds for belief in the guilt of the accused has little tendency to prove that the proceedings were initiated through ill will or personal hostility to the accused, and no tendency to prove that the purpose of their institution was to obtain a personal advantage." (Restatement, Torts, Comment a, § 669.) In other words, probable cause to initiate a criminal proceeding may be so totally lacking as to reasonably permit an inference that the proceeding was maliciously instituted.

Hence, a jury may, but is not required to, infer the existence of actual malice from...