Schaffer v. Salt Lake City Corp.
| Decision Date | 02 March 2016 |
| Docket Number | No. 14–4112.,14–4112. |
| Citation | 814 F.3d 1151 |
| Parties | Diana Sue SCHAFFER, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. SALT LAKE CITY CORPORATION; B. Gail Cameron, in her individual capacity; Ashley Hollingshead, in her individual capacity; TIMOTHY STUMM, in his individual capacity, Defendants–Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit |
Gregory W. Stevens, Salt Lake City, UT, for Plaintiff–Appellant.
J. Elizabeth Haws, Salt Lake City Attorney's Office, Salt Lake City, UT, for Defendants–Appellees Salt Lake City Corporation and Timothy Stumm.
Catherine L. Brabson, Salt Lake City Attorney's Office, Salt Lake City, UT, (with her on the brief) for Defendant–Appellee Ashley Hollingshead.
Heather S. White, Snow, Christensen & Martineau, Salt Lake City, UT, (with her on the brief) for B. Defendant–Appellee B. Gail Cameron.
Before MATHESON, EBEL, and McHUGH, Circuit Judges.
EBEL
, Circuit Judge.
Plaintiff–Appellant Diana Schaffer appeals the district court's order granting summary judgment on her 42 U.S.C. § 1983
malicious prosecution claims in favor of Defendants–Appellants Ashley Hollingshead, B. Gail Cameron, and Salt Lake City Corp. ("the City"). Schaffer maintains that Hollingshead and Cameron, two City parking enforcement officers, falsely reported to the police that Schaffer hit them with her truck after they issued her a parking ticket. We agree with the district court that the parking enforcement officers did not act under color of state law in reporting the parking incident to the police. Accordingly, we AFFIRM.
Unless otherwise indicated, the following facts are undisputed. Cameron and Hollingshead were parking enforcement officers employed by the City. As parking enforcement officers, their duties included issuing citations for local parking ordinances and impounding vehicles. They did not, however, have the authority to detain or arrest citizens.
On November 7, 2008, Schaffer parallel parked a red Dodge pickup truck in a no-parking zone. Hollingshead and Cameron were on duty together at the time, and duly issued her a parking ticket. When Schaffer returned to her truck, she found the parking enforcement officers engaged in an altercation with another citizen, Lisa Garmendia, whose car was also parked in the no-parking zone. Garmendia requested that a police officer respond to her complaints. Schaffer intervened, and requested Cameron's badge number. After briefly contesting her ticket, Schaffer got in her truck to leave.
At that time, the parking enforcement officers' car was double-parked alongside the vehicle parked directly in front of Schaffer's truck. Hollingshead was standing in the street near the front driver's side door of the City car; Cameron was standing in the street near the rear driver's side door. Cameron was talking on the phone with police dispatch, relaying Garmendia's request for a police officer to respond to the scene.
Although the exact details of what transpired next are disputed, it is undisputed that Schaffer backed up her truck, pulled away from the curb, and then began to drive forward past the parking enforcement officers and their car. Cameron's on-going phone call to dispatch recorded the incident. The recording captured the parking enforcement officers yelling and pounding on the side of the truck as Schaffer pulled by. Cameron then swore, and said to the dispatcher,
Upon hearing the pounding, Ms. Schaffer stopped briefly. On the recording, Cameron continued, As Schaffer drove away, Cameron narrated, "Yeah, she actually hit the City car and she's driving off right now." Hollingshead then got on the line. When the dispatcher asked her, "So did she hit your vehicle then?" Ms. Hollingshead responded, Schaffer, however, denies that her truck struck the parking enforcement officers or their car.
Police officer Timothy Stumm was dispatched in response to the parking enforcement officers' report, but arrived after Schaffer and Garmendia had left. Stumm and the parking enforcement officers left the scene in their respective cars and reconvened at a nearby police station, where Cameron and Hollingshead each provided a written witness statement. The statements asserted that Schaffer's truck had struck both parking enforcement officers as well as the City car's outside mirror as Schaffer drove by. Both statements also claimed that Schaffer had intentionally tried to hit the parking enforcement officers, causing them to fear for their safety. In addition, a crime lab technician at the station took pictures of the City car. The pictures showed the car's driver's side mirror bent forward out of position.
Stumm traced the truck's license plate number and visited Schaffer's house, where he found the truck parked in the driveway. He observed handprints and marks on the passenger side of the truck that were consistent with the parking enforcement officers' statements. When Schaffer answered the door, Stumm detained and booked her for aggravated assault.
Schaffer was ultimately charged with aggravated assault and criminal mischief. The charges proceeded to a probable cause hearing and then trial, during which proceedings the parking enforcement officers testified that Schaffer's truck had struck both them and their car. Schaffer was acquitted on all counts.
Schaffer then filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983
, bringing claims against the City and the parking enforcement officers for malicious prosecution and against Stumm for malicious prosecution and false arrest. In this suit, Schaffer denies that her truck struck the parking officers or their car, and contends that the parking officers' allegedly false testimony to the contrary led to her arrest and prosecution without probable cause. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the defendants. Schaffer appeals that ruling only with respect to the City and the parking enforcement officers.1
We review a district court's grant of a summary judgment de novo, applying the same legal standard as the district court. Twigg v. Hawker Beechcraft Corp., 659 F.3d 987, 997 (10th Cir.2011)
. 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). "In applying this standard, we view the evidence and the reasonable inferences to be drawn from the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party." Twigg, 659 F.3d at 997.
The two elements of a Section 1983
claim are (1) deprivation of a federally protected right by (2) an actor acting under color of state law. D.T. ex rel. M.T. v. Indep. Sch. Dist. No. 16, 894 F.2d 1176, 1186 (10th Cir.1990). Schaffer contends that the parking enforcement officers violated her Fourth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment rights by providing false statements and testimony that resulted in her arrest and prosecution. We need not reach that issue, however, because we conclude that the parking enforcement officers were not acting under color of state law when they reported the parking incident. Consequently, Schaffer's Section 1983 claims against the parking officers fail, and with them, her claims against the City.
Whether a defendant acted under color of state law is a mixed question of fact and law. How v. City of Baxter Springs, 217 Fed.Appx. 787, 791 (10th Cir.2007)
(unpublished) (citing Duke v. Smith, 13 F.3d 388, 392 (11th Cir.1994) ). Where, as here, the underlying facts are undisputed, the standard of review is de novo. Van Scoten v. C.I.R., 439 F.3d 1243, 1252 (10th Cir.2006). Schaffer's two theories as to why the parking enforcement officers acted under color of state law are discussed in turn below.
Schaffer first contends that the parking officers acted under color of state law because the incident occurred while they were performing their duties as City employees. "Section 1983
was enacted ‘to deter state actors from using the badge of their authority to deprive individuals of their federally guaranteed rights and to provide relief to victims if such deterrence fails.’ "2
Haines v. Fisher, 82 F.3d 1503, 1508 (10th Cir.1996) (quoting Wyatt v. Cole, 504 U.S. 158, 161, 112 S.Ct. 1827, 118 L.Ed.2d 504 (1992) ). "The traditional definition of acting under color of state law requires that the defendant in a § 1983 action exercised power possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because the wrongdoer is clothed with the authority of state law." Id. (quoting West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 49, 108 S.Ct. 2250, 101 L.Ed.2d 40 (1988) (internal punctuation omitted).) However, "the fact that a tort was committed by an individual employed by the state does not, ipso facto, warrant attributing all of the employee's actions to the state." Jojola v. Chavez, 55 F.3d 488, 493 (10th Cir.1995) (internal quotation marks omitted). Rather, "before conduct may be fairly attributed to the state because it constitutes action ‘under color of state law,’ there must be ‘a real nexus' between the employee's use or misuse of their authority as a public employee, and the violation allegedly committed by the defendant." Id. (quoting D.T. ex rel. M.T., 894 F.2d at 1188 ).
Schaffer is unable to establish the requisite nexus between the parking enforcement officers' alleged unconstitutional conduct—namely, lying in witness statements and at the probable cause hearing—and their authority to write parking tickets and impound vehicles. After all, any citizen can report suspicious activity to the police and repeat that testimony in court; in doing so, the parking enforcement officers exercised no "power possessed by virtue of state law and made possible only because [the parking officers were] clothed with the authority of state...
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