Rodriguez v. Farrell
| Decision Date | 30 January 2002 |
| Docket Number | No. 00-13147.,00-13147. |
| Parties | Joe John RODRIGUEZ, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Wayne W. FARRELL, Lois Szczepanski, Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit |
Jeffrey Arthur Rynor, Loren H. Cohen, Mitrani, Rynor & Gallegos, P.A., Miami, FL, for Defendants-Appellants.
Jon H. Gutmacher, Orlando, FL, for Plaintiff-Appellee.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.
Before EDMONDSON and RONEY, Circuit Judges, and JORDAN*, District Judge.
This appeal is about an arrest, the Fourth Amendment, and mistaken identity. Joe John Rodriguez sued Sergeant Wayne Farrell ("Sgt.Farrell") and Officer Lorri Szczepanski ("Officer Szczepanski"), under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that the police officers violated the Constitution when they mistakenly arrested him pursuant to a valid arrest warrant for another person. Sgt. Farrell and Officer Szczepanski, in their personal capacities, appeal the district court's denial of qualified immunity. We reverse.
On 8 September 1995 at 12:10 a.m., Officer Szczepanski pulled over a vehicle driven by Patricia Foulkes ("Ms.Foulkes"): the vehicle had a broken tag light. Rodriguez was the only passenger in Ms. Foulkes's car. Shortly after the initial traffic stop, Sgt. Farrell arrived to provide backup.
Officer Szczepanski told Ms. Foulkes to get out of the car and then asked for her driver's license. After Ms. Foulkes said that her driver's license was in her purse which was in her car, Officer Szczepanski returned to the car and asked Rodriguez, who was seated in the car with his arm in a sling and resting on a pillow,2 to hand her Ms. Foulkes's purse. After Rodriguez handed her Ms. Foulkes's purse, Officer Szczepanski directed Rodriguez to get out of the vehicle. Rodriguez complied and walked around freely beside the vehicle. But, before Rodriguez got out of the vehicle, he removed his sling. Because Rodriguez was wearing a long-sleeve shirt (after he had removed his sling), nothing outwardly indicated that Rodriguez's arm was injured.
Officer Szczepanski returned to Ms. Foulkes, found unlawful drugs (methamphetamine, as well as others) in her purse, and arrested her. Officer Szczepanski thereafter began to search Ms. Foulkes's car. Then, Sgt. Farrell — who, to this point, had only been observing the situation from a position behind Ms. Foulkes's car3 — approached Rodriguez.
Sgt. Farrell asked Rodriguez for identification. Rodriguez directed Sgt. Farrell's attention to a duffle bag, which contained more than ten pieces of identification, including Rodriguez's Florida driver's license, birth certificate, military discharge papers, social security card, credit card, and V.A. patient data card.4 Sgt. Farrell after obtaining consent from Rodriguez, searched the duffle bag and removed the driver's license from the organizer that contained Rodriguez's identifications. During the search, Sgt. Farrell noticed several prescription-drug bottles and questioned Rodriguez about their purpose. Rodriguez told the Sergeant that he had just gotten out of the hospital after a motorcycle wreck. Sgt. Farrell also briefly looked at a collection of hospital records5 that were in the duffle bag.
Sgt. Farrell called dispatch over his radio and ran a check on Rodriguez's driver's license information. The dispatcher responded, "no wants or warrants." Sgt. Farrell continued to talk with the dispatcher when a "name hit" was obtained on Rodriguez's name. Teletype communications to the dispatcher indicated that three warrants existed for a Victor Heredia who used the alias "Joe Rodriguez."6 Heredia was wanted by the St. Johns County, Florida Sheriff's Department for several charges, including possession of cocaine.7 The dispatcher relayed descriptive information from the warrant to Sgt. Farrell.
The following chart lists relevant descriptive information from the warrant that was available and the corresponding information for Rodriguez:
Name: Victor Manuel Heredia Joe John Rodriguez
a/k/a Joe Rodriguez
Sex: Male Male
Race: White White
Date/Birth: 6/24/53; 3/23/53
7/2/53
6/23/53(multiple)
Place/Birth: New York New York
SSN: 112-42-9808; 115-42-5388
112-42-5808
112-43-9809
(multiple)
Tattoos 4 tattoos: right forearm, 6 tattoos: both biceps, both
left arm, right arm, back shoulder blades; both
ankles (none on right
forearm)
Height: 5'6" 5'11"
Weight: 139 lbs. 180 lbs
Hair Color: Brown Brown
Eye Color: Green Brown
Scar Scar: forehead No scar
Residence: St. Augustine, Florida Apopka, Florida
After Sgt. Farrell received identifying information from the dispatcher, Sgt. Farrell approached Rodriguez and questioned him about two of his physical characteristics: height and tattoos. Sgt. Farrell first asked Rodriguez his height. Rodriguez responded by claiming he was 5'11". Sgt. Farrell disagreed, stating: "No way, I'm 5'11", you're shorter than me." Rodriguez claims that Sgt. Farrell was standing on a curb when Farrell made this statement. Sgt. Farrell then focused on Rodriguez's tattoos. Convinced by the fact that Rodriguez had at least four tattoos (he had six) and that the locations of the first two identified by Rodriguez were in the locations listed in the warrant, Sgt. Farrell arrested Rodriguez on the Heredia warrant.
When Sgt. Farrell arrested Rodriguez, Sgt. Farrell grabbed Rodriguez's left arm, twisted it behind Rodriguez's back, and forced it up to just below the shoulder-blade. Rodriguez fell to the ground screaming in pain, telling Sgt. Farrell that he was hurting his arm.8 Sgt. Farrell ignored Rodriguez's screams, completed the cuffing, and took Rodriguez to the station. After arriving at the station roughly 10 minutes later, Rodriguez was placed in a holding cell and his cuffs were removed.
"Qualified immunity protects government officials performing discretionary functions ... from liability if their conduct violates no `clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.'" Lassiter v. Alabama A&M Univ., Bd. of Trustees, 28 F.3d 1146, 1149 (11th Cir.1994) (en banc).
"Unless a government agent's act is so obviously wrong, in the light of pre-existing law, that only a plainly incompetent officer or one who was knowingly violating the law would have done such a thing, the government actor has immunity from suit." Id. Whether a defendant official has violated a constitutional right at all is, of course, "a `necessary concomitant' to the question of qualified immunity: if a defendant has not violated the law at all, he certainly has not violated clearly established law." Hudson v. Hall, 231 F.3d 1289, 1294 (11th Cir.2000) (quoting GJR Investments, Inc. v. County of Escambia, 132 F.3d 1359, 1366-67 (11th Cir.1998)).
"A warrantless arrest without probable cause violates the Fourth Amendment and forms a basis for a section 1983 claim." Ortega v. Christian, 85 F.3d 1521, 1525 (11th Cir.1996). We conclude that no violation occurred in this case. In reaching this conclusion, the Supreme Court's opinion in Hill v. California, 401 U.S. 797, 91 S.Ct. 1106, 28 L.Ed.2d 484 (1971), and various cases from the Seventh Circuit (as well as other circuits) guide our determination.
In Hill v. California, 401 U.S. 797, 91 S.Ct. 1106, 28 L.Ed.2d 484 (1971), the Supreme Court determined, in a criminal case, whether the mistaken arrest of one person (for whom no probable cause to arrest existed) based upon the misidentification of that person as a second person (for whom probable cause to arrest existed) violated the Constitution. The Court concluded "no," writing that "[w]hen the police have probable cause to arrest one party, and when they reasonably mistake a second party for the first party, then the arrest of the second party is a valid arrest." Id. at 802, 91 S.Ct. 1106 (alteration in original).
The same "reasonable mistake" standard applies (1) in the context of a section 1983 action and (2) when the police have a valid warrant — as opposed to just probable cause — to arrest someone, but mistakenly arrest someone else due to a misidentification. E.g., White v. Olig, 56 F.3d 817, 820 (7th Cir.1995) (); cf. Rodriguez v. Jones, 473 F.2d 599, 605-06 (5th Cir.1973) (). See generally U.S. Const. amend. IV () (emphasis added). We must, therefore, determine as a legal matter whether Sgt. Farrell and Officer Szczepanski's mistaken arrest of Rodriguez — pursuant to the execution, in the field, of a valid arrest warrant for Heredia — was outside the scope of "reasonable mistakes."
The Eleventh Circuit has no precedents for what constitutes an unreasonable seizure due to a mistaken identification and arrest under a valid warrant in the field. The Seventh Circuit, however, has addressed this problem in several opinions: their discussions guide us today.9 In Johnson v. Miller, 680 F.2d 39, 42 ...
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