Schoonfield v. Mayor and City Council of Baltimore

• Decision Date: 20 August 1975
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. N-73-896.
• Citation: 399 F. Supp. 1068
• Parties: Hiram L. SCHOONFIELD v. MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE, a Municipal Corporation, et al.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Maryland

399 F. Supp. 1068

Hiram L. SCHOONFIELD v. MAYOR AND CITY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE, a Municipal Corporation, et al.

Civ. A. No. N-73-896.

United States District Court, D. Maryland.

August 20, 1975.

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Patrick A. O'Doherty, Baltimore, Md., for plaintiff.

Norman P. Ramsey, H. Thomas Howell, Alan N. Gamse and Semmes, Bowen & Semmes, Baltimore, Md., for all defendants except Herbert J. Belgrad.

Stephen H. Sachs, Elizabeth Logan Nilson, Frederick J. Green, Jr., and Lord, Whip, Coughlan & Green, Baltimore, Md., for defendant Herbert J. Belgrad.

NORTHROP, Chief Judge.

The plaintiff, Hiram L. Schoonfield, the former Warden of the Baltimore City Jail, has brought this action seeking compensatory and punitive damages for injuries arising out of his allegedly wrongful dismissal from that position on September 22, 1972. The plaintiff having filed his amended complaint,¹ the case is now before this Court on motions by the various remaining defendants to dismiss the amended complaint, or in the alternative, for summary judgment.

The remaining defendants in the case are: 1) the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, a municipal corporation; 2) William Donald Schaefer, individually and as Mayor of the City of Baltimore; 3) George L. Russell, Jr., individually and as City Solicitor of the City of Baltimore; 4) five of the seven members of the Jail Board of the City of Baltimore—H. Mebane Turner, President, Dr. Elaine C. Davis, Linwood Jennings, Walter E. Black, Jr., and Maurice A. Harmon — in both their individual and official capacities;² and 5) Herbert J. Belgrad, Esquire, in his individual capacity.

While plaintiff's amended complaint still leaves much to be desired from the point of view of precision and specificity, it appears that his operative claims are essentially as follows: 1) that he was discharged from his position as Warden of the Baltimore City Jail without having been granted a prior hearing in violation of his right to procedural due process of law under the fourteenth amendment (Count One); 2) that the defendants conspired to deprive him of equal protection of the laws, and of equal privileges and immunities under the laws, solely because of his race (white) and because of their desire to replace him with a black Warden, in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1985 (Counts One and Five); 3) that the defendants Schaefer, Russell, Belgrad and Turner knew of the aforesaid conspiracy and of the actions contemplated in pursuance thereof and were in a position to have prevented the commission of the same, but did nothing to prevent the commission of those acts, in violation of 42 U. S.C. § 1986 (Count Five); 4) that the action of the members of the Jail Board in discharging him without first filing charges against him and holding a hearing thereon constituted a breach of his contract of employment with the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore (Count Three); 5) that in causing his discharge, the defendants willfully and maliciously caused a breach by the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore of its contract of employment with him (Count Four); and 6) that defendant H. Mebane Turner maliciously published and caused to be published a letter dated September 22, 1972, which contained a certain libel, and which was widely disseminated (Count Two).

The theoretical bases for this action are the Civil Rights. Act of 1871, 42 U. S.C. §§ 1983, 1985 and 1986, the fourteenth amendment to the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution, statutory law and common law of the State of Maryland. Jurisdiction over the federal causes of action rests on 28 U.S.C. § 1343, while the state law claims are grounded on either the diverse citizenship of the parties,³ 28 U.S.C. § 1332, or the doctrine of pendent jurisdiction. See United Mine Workers of America v. Gibbs, 383 U.S. 715, 86 S.Ct. 1130, 16 L.Ed.2d 218 (1966). The amount in controversy, exclusive of interest and costs, exceeds the statutory prerequisite of $10,000.

The undisputed material facts underlying this controversy are as follows. In 1961, plaintiff was appointed Warden of the Baltimore City Jail by the then incumbent City Jail Board, acting pursuant to the powers vested in it by the Baltimore City Charter.⁴ Thereafter, he continued to serve in that position until September 22, 1972, when, as the culmination of the events to be set forth herein, he was removed from office by the Jail Board.

In Collins v. Schoonfield, 363 F.Supp. 1152, 1159 (D.Md.1973), Judge Harvey of this Court described the immediate backdrop to the events which are central to this case as follows:

Warden of the Baltimore City Jail from 1961 to 1972, his term of office has been a stormy one, particularly in recent years. Because of inmate disturbances, strikes by Jail guards and other events occurring in 1971 and 1972, the administration of the Baltimore City Jail and the competency of defendant Schoonfield to be Warden became a subject of considerable public discussion in the Baltimore press. A Special Grand Jury undertook an extensive investigation of the Jail and rendered in July of 1972 a Report (which was not admitted in evidence in this case) criticizing conditions in the Jail. . . .

The "other events occurring in 1971 and 1972" referred to by Judge Harvey included the completion in January, 1972, of a special study by the Federal Bureau of Prisons, conducted at the request of Mayor Schaefer, which was highly critical of conditions existing at the Jail. Then in May, 1972, Judge Kaufman of this Court issued his Opinion in Collins v. Schoonfield, 344 F. Supp. 257 (D.Md.1972), holding that the conditions of confinement at the Jail violated certain minimal constitutional standards and decreeing broad equitable relief in connection therewith. Finally, in July, 1972, the Mayor's Special Committee on the Baltimore City Jail, the so-called Marbury Commission, issued its Preliminary Report concluding that during the previous six months little progress had been made in implementing the recommendations of the Federal Bureau of Prisons' Study.

It was with this background that the newly constituted Jail Board took office on July 26, 1972, with H. Mebane Turner being appointed by the Mayor to serve as its President. Almost immediately it became embroiled in the rising controversy.

On July 20, 1972, following disturbances of major proportions at the Maryland Penitentiary, the Maryland House of Correction and the Prince George's County Jail, representatives of Local 44 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represented, inter alia, the correctional officers at the Baltimore City Jail, presented a list of written demands relating to working conditions at the Jail to Robert S. Hillman, Esquire, the Labor Commissioner for the City of Baltimore. One week later, on July 27, 1972, the correctional officers scheduled to report for work on the "B" shift at the Jail staged a wildcat strike and refused to report for work, primarily because of a lack of progress having been made on the previously submitted demands. Several union officials including Ernest Crofoot, Council-Director for the Maryland Public Employees Council 67, and Raymond Clarke, President of Local 44 and Assistant Council-Director, immediately proceeded to the Jail upon being informed of the situation and entered into negotiations there with the Warden and Mr. Hillman concerning the various demands. Some progress was apparently being made thereon when the Warden allegedly uttered a racial slur. The meeting almost immediately broke up. The union officials, including correctional officers, then went to Mr. Hillman's office where discussions continued.

At that time, Mr. Crofoot telephoned Herbert J. Belgrad, Esquire, a partner in the law firm representing the union,⁵ and requested him to come down to the Commissioner's office to provide advice and assistance in working things out. After considerable negotiation the correctional officers finally agreed to return to work in exchange for a promise that the new Jail Board would schedule an immediate hearing to give them an opportunity to present their grievances against the Warden.

Hearings essentially limited to the alleged racial slur incident were held by the Jail Board on July 31 and August 2, 1972. Mr. Belgrad represented the union during the course of those hearings. At the conclusion thereof, the Jail Board ordered that the Warden be suspended for a period of two weeks. It further stated that it would begin immediately to study the conditions existing at the Jail, including the ability of the Warden to continue in his then present capacity.

Pursuant to the Jail Board's indication that the union would have an opportunity to present its additional grievances against the Warden, certain union officials and correctional officers met with Belgrad during the period of the Warden's suspension to discuss their various complaints and to request Belgrad to forward them to the Jail Board with a demand for immediate action. On August 14, 1972, having received information that the Warden had been violating the terms of his suspension, Belgrad telephoned Turner to inform him of the Warden's actions. That evening Turner, accompanied by George L. Russell, Jr., the City Solicitor, made an unannounced visit to the Jail to investigate Belgrad's allegations. Although Turner learned that the allegations were essentially true in that the Warden had been utilizing an inmate to walk his dog in the evenings and that the Warden had been interfering in the operations of the Jail during the period of his suspension, he took no further action at that time.

About August 17, 1972, Belgrad met with Turner to further discuss the specific allegations which had been brought to his attention concerning the Warden. Turner indicated that any charges would have to be made in writing before they would be considered. Belgrad thereafter drafted and...