Miller v. Ctr. Cnty., Case No. 4:15-CV-1754

• Decision Date: 11 May 2016
• Docket Number: Case No. 4:15-CV-1754
• Parties: STACY PARKS MILLER, Plaintiff, v. CENTRE COUNTY, TIMOTHY BOYDE, LOUIS T. GLANTZ, C. CHRIS EXARCHOS, STEVEN DERSHEM, MICHAEL PIPE, et. al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Pennsylvania

STACY PARKS MILLER, Plaintiff, v. CENTRE COUNTY, TIMOTHY BOYDE, LOUIS T. GLANTZ, C. CHRIS EXARCHOS,STEVEN DERSHEM, MICHAEL PIPE, et. al., Defendants.

Case No. 4:15-CV-1754

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA

May 11, 2016

(Judge Brann)

MEMORANDUM OPINION

I. BACKGROUND

On August 25, 2015, the current District Attorney of Centre County, Stacy Parks Miller, hereinafter "Parks Miller," filed a thirteen count complaint against twelve defendants in the Court of Common Pleas of that county. It was removed to this Court two weeks later, and, in response to the motions to dismiss filed by all Defendants, Parks Miller filed an amended complaint. All of the various Defendants next filed motions to dismiss the amended complaint. This Memorandum Opinion deals concerns a group of six defendants, Centre County, Timothy Boyde, Louis T. Glantz, C. Chris Exarchos, Steven Dershem, and Michael Pipe. When referred to in the collective, this group will be described as the "County Defendants."

The motion has been fully briefed, and I held oral argument on March 3, 2016. The matter is now ripe for disposition. For the reasons that follow I will grant the motion in part and deny it in part.

II. DISCUSSION

a. Motion to Dismiss Standard of Review

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), a defendant may file a motion to dismiss for "failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted." Such a motion "tests the legal sufficiency of a pleading" and "streamlines litigation by dispensing with needless discovery and factfinding."¹ "Rule 12(b)(6) authorizes a court to dismiss a claim on the basis of a dispositive issue of law."² This is true of any claim, "without regard to whether it is based on an outlandish legal theory or on a close but ultimately unavailing one."³

Beginning in 2007, the Supreme Court of the United States initiated what some scholars have termed the Roberts Court's "civil procedure revival" by significantly tightening the standard that district courts must apply to 12(b)(6)motions.⁴ In two landmark decisions, Bell Atlantic Corporation v. Twombly and Ashcroft v. Iqbal, the Roberts Court "changed . . . the pleading landscape" by "signal[ing] to lower-court judges that the stricter approach some had been taking was appropriate under the Federal Rules."⁵ More specifically, the Court in these two decisions "retired" the lenient "no-set-of-facts test" set forth in Conley v. Gibson and replaced it with a more exacting "plausibility" standard.⁶

Accordingly, after Twombly and Iqbal, "[t]o survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'"⁷ "A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged."⁸ "Although the plausibility standard does not impose a probability requirement, it does require a pleading to show more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully."⁹ Moreover, "[a]sking for plausible grounds . . . calls for enough facts to raise a reasonable expectation that discovery will reveal evidence of[wrongdoing]."¹⁰

The plausibility determination is "a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common sense."¹¹ No matter the context, however, "[w]here a complaint pleads facts that are 'merely consistent with' a defendant's liability, it 'stops short of the line between possibility and plausibility of entitlement to relief.'"¹²

When disposing of a motion to dismiss, a court must "accept as true all factual allegations in the complaint and draw all inferences from the facts alleged in the light most favorable to [the plaintiff]."¹³ However, "the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the allegations contained in the complaint is inapplicable to legal conclusions."¹⁴ "After Iqbal, it is clear that conclusory or 'bare-bones' allegations will no longer survive a motion to dismiss."¹⁵ "Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice."¹⁶

As a matter of procedure, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has instructed that:

Under the pleading regime established by Twombly and Iqbal, a courtreviewing the sufficiency of a complaint must take three steps. First, it must tak[e] note of the elements [the] plaintiff must plead to state a claim. Second, it should identify allegations that, because they are no more than conclusions, are not entitled to the assumption of truth. Finally, [w]hen there are well-pleaded factual allegations, [the] court should assume their veracity and then determine whether they plausibly give rise to an entitlement to relief.¹⁷

b. Facts Alleged in the Amended Complaint

The 'County Defendants' are Centre County, Pennsylvania; three current or former Commissioners of Centre County - C. Chris Exarchos, Steven Dershem and Michael Pipe; the county administrator, Timothy Boyde; and Louis T. Glantz, the former Centre County Solicitor. The relevant allegations as to this group of Defendants are as follows:¹⁸

¶ 1. Elected in November of 2009, and re-elected upon nomination by both major political parties in 2013, Plaintiff Stacy Parks Miller became the first female to serve as District Attorney of Centre County, Pennsylvania.

¶ 7. The Commissioners of Centre County became adverse to Plaintiff prior to her election as Centre County's District Attorney. Parks Miller ran as a political outsider who advocated for a tougher stance on crime and an adherence to law and order, which she saw as lacking in Centre County's District Attorney's Office. Plaintiff ousted the incumbent District Attorney, who was the same political party as an enjoyed an amicablerelationship with Commissioners Dershem and Exharchos.

¶ 8. After taking office, Plaintiff followed through with her tough on crime philosophy, which proved unpopular with the County Defendants...

¶ 15. At all times relevant to this Complaint, Defendant Glantz was the appointed Centre County Solicitor, though Plaintiff believes and therefore avers he no longer enjoys the support of Commissioner Pipe based on published accounts that Commissioner Pipe sought Defendant Glantz's removal as solicitor once the facts contained in this Complaint became public.

¶ 22-47 (Paraphrased by the Court) Parks Miler began investigating an alleged murder plot by a prisoner attempting to hire a contract killer to murder an Assistant District Attorney in Parks Miller's office.

¶ 48. To facilitate the plan...Parks Miller agreed to create a pretend bail order purporting to release [an informant]

¶ 61. As part of the intricate plan to net a person intent on killing a colleague, Plaintiff Parks Miller asked [her, at the time, paralegal] Defendant [Michelle] Shutt to prepare the pretend bail order.

¶ 72. Ten months into the sting operation, Defendant Shutt, the paralegal in the Centre County DA's office who drafted the pretend order, left the DA's office to eventually work for the Masorti Law Group.

¶ 78. Defendant Shutt fabricated [a] forgery story [alleging that Parks Miller forged a judge's signature on the pretend bail order].

¶ 87. []Defendant Masorti...filed a complaint with the Bellefonte Borough Police alleging that Plaintiff had"forged" Judge Ruest's name on the pretend court order...

¶ 93. As was her duty, knowing the allegations to be utterly false, but as required by the Commonwealth Attorneys Act, District Attorney Parks Miller promptly referred the false allegations to the Office of Attorney General ("OAG") in order to initiate a full and fair investigation of the allegations against her.

¶ 98. The Defendants exerted political, financial and/or other pressure on the Bellefonte Police Department local law enforcement to investigate and seek an illegal prosecution of District Attorney Parks Miller.

¶ 99. Defendant Administrator Boyde offered Bellefonte Borough financial assistance from Defendant County by suggesting Defendant County would defray the Borough's expenses to offset the cost of investigating and prosecuting the District Attorney. No evidence exists of which Plaintiff is aware that anyone representing Bellefonte Borough even considered such an outlandish notion.

¶ 103. When the Bellefone Police expressed a desire to refer the case to the Pennsylvania State Police for investigation (due to the close working relationship between District Attorney Parks Miller and the Bellefonte Police), the Centre County Commissioners called the Bellefonte Chief of Police into a private meeting behind closed doors that resulted in the Bellefonte Police resurrecting their investigation and not referring the case to the State Police.

¶ 104. A grand jury thoroughly investigated this matter and exonerated Plaintiff finding as a fact that Judge Ruest did sign the order.

¶ 111 [At a January 20, 2015 Commissioners meeting, approximately 10 months prior to the grand jurydecision] The alleged forgery matter was not an item on the Commissioner's agenda for that day, but the Commissioners and Solicitor were nonetheless prepared to address obscure statutes from 1955, never before used anywhere in Pennsylvania as the Commissioners intended to use them, to claim they had the power to initiate criminal investigations and prosecutions of the county's elected chief law enforcement official.

¶ 114. For example, the following quotes were taken from a January 21, 2015 article printed in The Progress News, entitled "Centre Co. DA accused of forgery":

A. Defendant Pipe publically called for the immediate resignation of District Attorney Parks Miller: "If this is true, then I'd ask for Stacy Parks Miller to resign right now and not hold the county hostage."

B. Defendant Glantz publically substantiated the false allegations against Plaintiff by suggesting: "The evidence has been mounting, it didn't just come

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