McFarlin v. Bd. of Cnty. Comm'rs of Cnty. of Roosevelt
| Decision Date | 15 November 2021 |
| Docket Number | Civ. 2:19-cv-01106 MIS/GJF |
| Parties | James McFarlin, Plaintiff, v. Board of County Commissioners of the County of Roosevelt, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of New Mexico |
THIS MATTER is before the Court on Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment Under Heck v. Humphrey. ECF No. 51. In response to Defendant's Motion, Plaintiff filed a Motion for Discovery Under Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(d). ECF No. 58. Defendant responded to Plaintiff's Motion, and Plaintiff filed a reply. ECF Nos. 61, 68. Having considered the parties' submissions, the record, and the relevant law the Court will deny both Motions. Defendant has not shown that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law [1] so its Motion for Summary Judgment will be denied. Moreover, the discovery Plaintiff seeks would not help the Court decide Defendant's Motion; thus, Plaintiff's Motion will be denied as moot.
This lawsuit arises from events that occurred on January 15, 2018. ECF No. 51-2 at 2. On that day, law enforcement pursued Plaintiff while he attempted to evade them by driving away on his tractor, first on a road and then in a field. ECF No 51-3 at 2, 4. While he was in the field, the sheriff fired a shotgun at the tractor to end the chase, hitting Plaintiff in the head as a result. Id. at 2, 5. On November 26, 2019, Plaintiff filed the present lawsuit, alleging a § 1983 excessive-force claim and a claim for battery under the New Mexico Tort Claims Act. ECF No. 1. On November 4, 2020, Plaintiff pleaded no contest to “aggravated fleeing a law enforcement officer, ” N.M. Stat. Ann. § 30-22-1.1 (1978). ECF No. 51-1 at 1.
Defendant now moves for summary judgment claiming that it is entitled to judgment as a matter of law because if Plaintiff prevailed in this civil case, his conviction would necessarily be called into question, which violates Supreme Court precedent established in Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). In support of its Motion, Defendant provided the Court with the Judgment and Sentence filed in state court, ECF No. 51-1, an excerpt from the transcript of the sentencing proceedings, ECF No. 51-2, and an excerpt from Plaintiff's deposition in this civil case, ECF No. 51-3.
Summary judgment is appropriate “if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a). The Supreme Court has held that when a § 1983 plaintiff brings a claim that collaterally challenges an underlying conviction, the “court must consider whether a judgment in favor of the plaintiff would necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction or sentence.” Heck, 512 U.S. at 487. If it would, the plaintiff's claims are not cognizable unless the underlying conviction has been undone in some way.[2] Id. at 486-87. “To determine the effect of Heck on an excessive-force claim, the court must compare the plaintiff's allegations to the offense he committed.” Havens v. Johnson, 783 F.3d 776, 782 (10th Cir. 2015). In other words, the court must compare the conviction, and the underlying factual basis for the conviction, to the plaintiff's allegations. See Id. at 782-84. If the plaintiff could prevail under any theory of the case that would not necessarily invalidate his conviction, the case should be allowed to proceed. Heck, 512 U.S. at 487. Moreover, it is entirely possible that some factual allegations may be barred by Heck while others are not. See Hooks v. Atoki, 983 F.3d 1193, 1201 (10th Cir. 2020) (); Martinez v. City of Albuquerque, 184 F.3d 1123, 1127 (10th Cir. 1999) ( that the district court should provide jury instructions to ensure the jury does not make any assumptions or findings that would be barred by Heck).
To conduct its analysis under Heck, the Court will compare Plaintiff's conviction with his allegations in the Complaint. In so doing, the Court will find that (1) the elements of the underlying crime are not inherently inconsistent with Plaintiff's claims in this case, and (2) Defendant has not presented any evidence regarding the factual basis of the conviction to support a contrary finding. Thus, because Plaintiff can prevail on his claims without necessarily calling his conviction into question, the case will be allowed to proceed.
Plaintiff pleaded no contest to, and was convicted of, “aggravated fleeing a law enforcement officer, ” N.M. Stat. Ann. § 30-22-1.1 (1978). See ECF No. 51-1 at 1. The state statute defines the crime as follows:
Aggravated fleeing a law enforcement officer consists of a person willfully and carelessly driving his vehicle in a manner that endangers the life of another person after being given a visual or audible signal to stop . . . by a uniformed law enforcement officer ....
§ 30-22-1.1. In making its arguments, Defendant focuses the Court's attention on the element “willfully and carelessly driving his vehicle in a manner that endangers the life of another person.” ECF No. 51 at 4-6, 8. Thus, the Court will compare said element of the underlying conviction to Plaintiff's claims in this civil case.
In relevant part, Plaintiff alleges that (1) police received a call that he was driving a tractor on a residential street and ramming it into his own vehicle; (2) deputies arrived and tried to speak with Plaintiff but he drove away; (3) eventually four officers arrived on the scene, including the County Sheriff; (4) Plaintiff drove the tractor approximately 25 miles per hour on the street as he drove away from the officers; (5) Plaintiff drove the tractor into a vacant field and drove it in circles in the field at approximately 5-10 miles per hour; (6) the officers engaged in some debate about the best way to get Plaintiff to stop the tractor; (7) after failing to stop the tractor by shooting at its tires, the sheriff fired “several shotgun rounds of buckshot” at Plaintiff; (8) the tractor stopped when Plaintiff was too injured to drive it further; (9) Plaintiff is permanently disabled; (10) “[a]t the time of the shooting [Plaintiff] was not an immediate threat to officers or the public”; (11) Plaintiff was unarmed; (12) Plaintiff had both hands on the steering wheel at the time of the shooting. ECF No. 1 at 2-5.
In his § 1983 claim, Plaintiff alleges that (1) the sheriff was acting under color of law; (2) Plaintiff has a constitutional right to be free from excessive force; (3) the sheriff's decision to use deadly force was “objectively unreasonable” because Plaintiff “was not an immediate threat to officers or the public”; (4) at the time the sheriff used deadly force, the sheriff had no reason to believe that Plaintiff was an immediate threat to others; (5) the sheriff's actions were not constitutionally justified; (6) the sheriff's intentional actions deprived Plaintiff of his constitutional right to be free from excessive force; (7) the County is liable because the sheriff was functioning as a policymaker for the County; (8) Plaintiff suffered damages as a result of the sheriff's actions; and (9) the sheriff acted with reckless indifference when he used deadly force on Plaintiff, such that punitive damages are warranted. ECF No. 1 at 7-8 (emphasis added).
In his battery claim, Plaintiff alleges that (1) the sheriff intentionally shot Plaintiff “without sufficient provocation or justification”; (2) the shot “caused an offensive contact” with Plaintiff; (3) the sheriff's actions amount to a battery under New Mexico law; (4) the County is responsible for the sheriff's actions under the doctrine of respondeat superior; and (5) Plaintiff suffered damages. ECF No. 1 at 6-7.
Assuming that Plaintiff prevails on his § 1983 claim based on the factual allegations and legal assertions outlined above, no part of his conviction is necessarily invalidated. In a Fourth Amendment excessive-force claim, “the question is whether the [sheriff's] actions [were] ‘objectively reasonable' in light of the facts and circumstances confronting [him].” Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 397 (1989). This determination “requires careful attention to the facts and circumstances of each particular case, including the severity of the crime at issue, whether the suspect pose[d] an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others, and whether he [was] actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by flight.” Id. at 396 (emphasis added). In Havens, the Tenth Circuit compared an excessive-force claim to the plaintiff's conviction for assaulting an officer. Havens, 783 F.3d at 782. The court stated that Id.
Defendant argues that because Plaintiff was convicted of “willfully and carelessly driving his vehicle in a manner that endangers the life of another person, ” he cannot prevail in this civil case without violating the principles of Heck. See ECF No. 51 at 5-6 (citing § 30-22-1.1). Yet, Plaintiff's § 1983 claim, and his factual allegations that support it, focus on the immediacy of the threat he posed to others at the time of the shooting. Thus, just as Mr Havens' excessive-force claim was not necessarily inconsistent with his conviction for assaulting an officer, so Plaint...
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