Moreta-Ramirez v. Lemert

• Decision Date: 26 November 2002
• Docket Number: No. CIV.00-1103(SEC).,CIV.00-1103(SEC).
• Parties: Ramon MORETA-RAMIREZ, et. al. Plaintiffs v. Bonnie LEMERT, et. al. Defendants
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Puerto Rico

233 F.Supp.2d 286

Ramon MORETA-RAMIREZ, et. al. Plaintiffs v. Bonnie LEMERT, et. al. Defendants

No. CIV.00-1103(SEC).

United States District Court, D. Puerto Rico.

November 26, 2002.

Luis R. Rivera-Rodriguez, Hato Rey, PR, for plaintiffs.

Lisa E. Bhatia-Gautier, Fidel A. Sevillano-Del-Rio, U.S. Attorney's Office, Hato Rey, PR, Arlene De-La-Matta-Melendez, Santurce, PR, Jaime Marcial-Falcon, San Juan, PR, for defendants.

OPINION AND ORDER

CASELLAS, District Judge.

Pending before the Court are Defendants Bonnie Lemert, Richard Roark, Rodolfo Salcedo, Luis Ortiz, and Ismael Rodríguez's motions for summary judgment (Docket##46, 50, 51 and 52). The Court granted Plaintiffs until October 26, 2002 to file their opposition to the motions, and conduct any necessary discovery regarding the issue of qualified immunity. Almost a month has come and gone since said deadline, and Plaintiffs have failed to file their opposition or request an extension of time to do so. Therefore, the Court has considered the motions as unopposed. For the reasons stated below, both motions are GRANTED. Plaintiffs' claims shall be dismissed consistent with this opinion.

Factual Background

Plaintiffs, Ramón Moreta-Ramírez and Leopoldo Moreta-Ramírez, (hereinafter "Plaintiffs"), filed a civil rights complaint on January 25, 2000, against Ismael Rodríguez, Richard Roark, and Rodolfo Salcedo, all acting investigators of the U.S. Customs Service; Luis Ortiz, an acting Task Force Agent of the U.S. Customs Service; and Bonnie Lemert, the Area Port Director of the U.S. Customs Service and commanding officer of the other defendants (Docket # 1 ¶¶ 4-10). In their complaint Plaintiffs allege that they were wrongfully and unlawfully arrested and prosecuted by the above-mentioned defendants, who negligently or intentionally:

1. Concealed the fact that the address in a cardboard box sent from Cali, Colombia to San Juan, Puerto Rico, via Airborne Express, was not addressed to an existing and verified address (Docket # 1 ¶¶ 15-8). The box in question contained seven religious candles made of a wax which reacted positive to the presence of cocaine (Id. ¶ 12).

2. The fact that the address in the cardboard box did not exist was allegedly omitted from Defendants' statements and testimony, including their official reports of the investigation (Id. ¶¶ 18-9).

3. Plaintiffs further alleged that Defendants Ismael Rodríguez, Richard Roark, Rodolfo Salcedo, and Luis Ortiz advised, assisted, and ratified to a Federal Magistrate-Judge that the box was connected to Plaintiff's Ramon Moreta's residence, for purposes of a search warrant (Id. at ¶¶ 20-2).

4. In addition, Plaintiffs alleged that Defendant Ismael Rodríguez "testified falsely before a grand jury," (Id. at ¶ 23), and that he "concealed and lied about a number of details of the controlled delivery of the box, including, but not limited to: (a) that the airway bill depicted an incorrect address; and (b) that the plaintiffs' waived their Miranda rights and gave exculpatory statements." (Id. at ¶ 24).

5. As a result of those acts, Plaintiffs allege that they were arrested without probable cause to believe they had committed a crime, and were held in custody continuously until July 17, 1999. (Id. at ¶¶ 27-8). The charges against Plaintiffs were eventually dismissed, on June 17, 1999 (Id. at ¶ 29).

Defendants have moved for summary judgment mainly on the grounds that: (1) the doctrine of qualified immunity applies to these defendants; and (2) under a totality of the circumstances standard, the Magistrate-Judge's finding of probable cause prevails. This Court had already addressed these arguments in the context of a motion to dismiss. At that time, however, we were bound by a standard of review which required us to give full credence to the Plaintiffs' allegations. The situation is now different, particularly when Plaintiffs' have failed to oppose Defendants' motions for summary judgment.

Standard of Review

Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(b) provides that: "A party against whom a claim ... is asserted ... may, at any time, move with or without supporting affidavits for a summary judgment in the party's favor as to all or any part [of the claims asserted against him/her]." The Court may grant the movant's motion for summary judgment when "the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); See also Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202(1986); NASCO, Inc. v. Public Storage, Inc., 29 F.3d 28 (1st Cir.1994). "The principal judicial inquiry required by Rule 56 is whether a genuine issue of material fact exists." 10A Charles A. Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure: Civil 3d § 2725, p. 401.

In this regard, the First Circuit Court of Appeals has noted that for a dispute to be "genuine," there must be sufficient evidence to permit a reasonable trier of fact to resolve the issue in favor of the nonmoving party. U.S. v. One Parcel of Real Property, 960 F.2d 200, 204 (1st Cir.1992); see also Boston Athletic Assn. v. Sullivan, 867 F.2d 22, 24 (1st Cir.1989); Medina Muñoz v. R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, 896 F.2d 5, 8 (1st Cir.1990) ("[a] `genuine' issue is one that must be decided at trial because the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmovant, would permit a rational factfinder to resolve the issue in favor of either party.") (citations omitted).

By like token, "material" means that the fact is one that might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing law. Morris v. Government Development Bank of Puerto Rico, 27 F.3d 746, 748 (1st Cir. 1994). "A fact is material if it tends to resolve any of the issues that have been properly raised by the parties." Wright, Miller & Kane, supra, § 2725 at p. 419. "Not every genuine factual conflict necessitates a trial. It is only when a disputed fact has the potential to change the outcome of the suit under the governing law if found favorably to the nonmovant that the materiality hurdle is cleared." Martínez v. Colón, 54 F.3d 980, 983-984 (1st Cir. 1995).

In addition, when determining whether to grant summary judgment, the Court may not weigh the evidence. Casas Office Machines, Inc. v. Mita Copystar America, Inc., 42 F.3d 668 (1st Cir.1994). Summary judgment "admits of no room for credibility determinations, not room for the measured weighing of conflicting evidence such as the trial process entails." Id. (citing Greenburg v. Puerto Rico Maritime Shipping Authority, 835 F.2d 932, 936 (1st Cir.1987)). Accordingly, if the facts permit more than one reasonable inference, the court on summary judgment may not adopt the inference least favorable to the non-moving party. Casas Office Machines, 42 F.3d at 684.

While the moving party has the burden of initially establishing that there is "an absence of evidence to support the nonmoving party's case", Maldonado-Denis v. Castillo-Rodríguez, 23 F.3d 576, 581 (1st Cir.1994); the nonmovant has a "corresponding obligation to offer the court more than steamy rhetoric and bare conclusions." Lawton v. State Mutual Life Assurance Company of America, 101 F.3d 218, 223 (1st Cir.1996). Furthermore, "the nonmovant must produce specific facts, in suitable evidentiary form' sufficient to limn a trialworthy issue .... Failure to do so allows the summary judgment engine to operate at full throttle." Id.; see also Kelly v. United States, 924 F.2d 355, 358 (1st Cir.1991) (warning that "the decision to sit idly by and allow the summary judgment proponent to configure the record is likely to prove fraught with consequence."); Medina-Muñoz, 896 F.2d at 8, (quoting Mack v. Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Co., 871 F.2d 179, 181 (1st Cir. 1989)) (holding that "[t]he evidence illustrating the factual controversy cannot be conjectural or problematic; it must have substance in the sense that it limns differing versions of the truth which a factfinder must resolve.")

Local Rule 311(12), moreover, requires the moving party to "file annexed to the motion a separate, short, and concise statement of the material facts as to which the moving party contends there is no genuine issue to be tried ...." Unless the nonmoving party controverts this statement, all the material facts set forth therein "shall be deemed to be admitted." Id. This is the so-called "anti-ferret rule." See, e.g., Orbi, S.A. v. Calvesbert & Brown, 20 F.Supp.2d 289, 291 (D.P.R.1998). While failure to comply with this rule does not automatically warrant the granting of summary judgment, "it launches the nonmovant's case down the road toward an early dismissal." Tavárez v. Champion Products, Inc., 903 F.Supp. 268, 270 (D.P.R.1995). In the present case, Plaintiffs failed to comply with Local Rule 311(12). Therefore, the facts, as set forth in Defendants' statement of material facts and memoranda in support of their motions, are deemed admitted for the purposes of this motion.

Applicable Law and Analysis

Civil claims based on unreasonable searches and seizures are controlled by the Fourth Amendment. Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 109 S.Ct. 1865, 104 L.Ed.2d 443 (1989). In Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388, 91 S.Ct. 1999, 29 L.Ed.2d 619 (1971), the Supreme Court recognized that the violation of the Fourth Amendment by federal agents is redressible through an action for money damages against the federal agents. Plaintiffs' complaint claims compensatory and punitive damages against federal agents "in their personal and individual capacities" for the violation of their "rights to be free from a prosecution without probable cause," under the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the Bivens case (Docket # 1 ¶ 1).

Defendants, on the other hand,...