Seyfried v. City of Lewisville Police Dep't

• Decision Date: 28 August 2014
• Docket Number: Civil Action No. 4:13cv560
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Texas
• Parties: DAVID SEYFRIED AS NEXT FRIEND OF DELORES SEYFRIED AND DAVID SEYFRIED, INDIVIDUALLY, Plaintiffs, v. CITY OF LEWISVILLE POLICE DEPARTMENT, SGT. COURTNEY LETALIEN, GEORGE REED, MICHAEL MOORE, C. CASSELS, CYNTHIA COYLE, AND CPT. EDWARD JARRETT, Defendants.

DAVID SEYFRIED AS NEXT FRIEND OF DELORES SEYFRIED
AND DAVID SEYFRIED, INDIVIDUALLY, Plaintiffs,
v.
CITY OF LEWISVILLE POLICE DEPARTMENT,
SGT. COURTNEY LETALIEN, GEORGE REED,
MICHAEL MOORE, C. CASSELS, CYNTHIA COYLE,
AND CPT. EDWARD JARRETT, Defendants.

Civil Action No. 4:13cv560

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS SHERMAN DIVISION

August 28, 2014

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION OF THE UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE ON DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO DISMISS OR, IN THE ALTERNATIVE, MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

I. BACKGROUND

The following statement of background is compiled and condensed from Plaintiff's¹ First Amended Complaint ("FAC") (docket entry #20) and the pleadings and responses filed in this case related to the instant Motion to Dismiss or, in the Alternative, Motion for Summary Judgment (docket entry #26) (the "MTD/MSJ").

Plaintiff alleges that his wife, Delores², was at the time of the incident that is the subject of

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the complaint a 68³ year-old woman suffering from Alzheimer's disease. The couple lives in Lewisville, Texas, and their home is the site of the incident involving the Lewisville Police Department.

On May 29, 2013, Mrs. Seyfried had become agitated with Plaintiff, her husband, and apparently threatened him with a "four-five inch letter opener" she held in her hand, resulting in a struggle over the letter opener. At some point, Plaintiff received a scratch on his right arm; whether the scratch was imparted by the letter opener or by some other means is not resolved in the pleadings. The evening before, he had called the National Alzheimer's Association regarding his wife, who apparently relayed the substance of the call to the Dallas Alzheimer's Association ("DAA"). The afternoon of May 29, 2013, Plaintiff called the DAA seeking assistance in resolving his wife's agitation. The DAA, apparently unbeknownst to Plaintiff, called the Lewisville Police Department via a 911 call and advised them of the situation. In the course of this relayed call, the Lewisville Police were advised that Mrs. Seyfried was an Alzheimer's victim who was agitated and was holding a letter opener; that she had dementia; that Plaintiff was intoxicated⁴; that Plaintiff kept a gun in the house; and that a stabbing had occurred. The

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Lewisville Police dispatched officers to perform a "welfare concern" check at the DAA's request, but without Plaintiff's knowledge or consent.⁵

Lewisville Police Officer George Reed and Sergeant Courtney Letalien, among others, were dispatched to perform the welfare check. The substance of the DAA's 911 call was transmitted for display on the officers' in-vehicle computers. Prior to arrival, Sergeant Letalien and Officer Reed coordinated their strategy in response to the report of potential violence. Sergeant Letalien was armed with a less lethal shotgun⁶ and Officer Reed with a Taser. Upon arriving at the Seyfried home the afternoon of May 29, 2013, the two attempted contact with persons inside the home via the front door, but there was no answer. Sergeant Letalien then took a position in the home's front yard while Officer Reed found Plaintiff at the back yard gate.⁷

Plaintiff was displeased with the arrival of the police and voiced his displeasure. Officer Reed asked if he was injured and Plaintiff showed him a cut on his right forearm or wrist.⁸ Officer Reed directed him to go to the front yard, which he did. When Plaintiff saw Sergeant

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Letalien armed with the orange-colored less lethal shotgun, he became more agitated and loudly, persistently and profanely demanded that she remove it. Sergeant Letalien contacted Lieutenant Michael Moore, who was also responding to the welfare concern call, and asked him to "step it up," meaning to get there fast. Lieutenant Moore responded that he was around the corner.

Officer Reed, in the meantime, from outside the fence gate, observed that the back door to the house was open and ordered anybody inside to come out. Mrs. Seyfried immediately exited the house through the door, "clinching" tightly the letter opener in her right hand and holding a padlock in her left hand.⁹ Officer Reed reported that she saw him and was enraged, slobbering and gritting her teeth and yelled, "I will f...ing kill you," and advanced directly toward him holding the letter opener toward him. Reed Decl. at ¶¶ 13-14. Plaintiff was not present at that time. Officer Reed ordered her to drop the weapon, but she ignored him. He attempted to force the fence gate closed, but she was able to open it and get through it. Mrs. Seyfried advanced on Officer Reed, who was backing away until he was blocked by a parked car. He grabbed Mrs. Seyfried's right hand, holding the letter opener pointed at him, with his left hand but could not get it away from her. He attests in his declaration that she used the padlock in her left hand to beat his left wrist, and he would imminently lose control of her right hand. He attempted to fire his Taser at her, but only one of its two prongs made contact, meaning the electrical circuit could not be established. The Taser began emitting an audible sound announcing that it had not made an

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effective cycle. He then attempted to "drive-stun" Mrs. Seyfried by making direct contact with the Taser unit, but she backed away; he reloaded the Taser with another firing cartridge.

Hearing the Taser's audible alert, Sergeant Letalien ran to Officer Reed's location. Plaintiff also returned to the backyard area. Both officers shouted for Mrs. Seyfried to drop the letter opener, but she refused and advanced again on Officer Reed, still with an angry look on her face and brandishing the letter opener at him. Sergeant Letalien then fired the first of three bean bag rounds from the less lethal shotgun, hitting Mrs. Seyfried in one thigh. However, although Mrs. Seyfried exclaimed in pain, she was "unfazed" and continued her advance with the letter opener. She then apparently saw Plaintiff, then in the driveway, and became more enraged, cursing and yelling and appeared to advance toward him. Sergeant Letalien was generally in between the couple and, with Mrs. Seyfried advancing, fired the second bean bag round, hitting her other thigh. Mrs. Seyfried went down briefly (reportedly to "one knee") and then got up again and continued brandishing the letter opener.¹⁰ Both officers were shouting at her to drop the letter opener and Plaintiff was yelling and upset.

Mrs. Seyfried then turned toward the backyard of the house. Stating that she "had no knowledge about who was in the backyard or the house" and knowing that there was a gun in the house, Sergeant Letalien fired the third and final bean bag round, hitting Mrs. Seyfried in the left buttock. Letalien Decl. at ¶ 19. She again was "unfazed" and continued toward the backyard. Sergeant Letalien then drew her Taser and fired at Mrs. Seyfried's back, hitting her in the back and

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right buttock, completing a circuit. Mrs. Seyfried fell to the ground, partly on the concrete and partly on the grass. Her right hand was then empty but her left hand was curled under her body. Officer Reed approached her and began to handcuff her, successfully placing a handcuff bracelet on her right wrist. However, Mrs. Seyfried again became combative and resisted and kicked at Officer Reed, keeping her left hand underneath her. Officer Reed believed she may have the letter opener in her left hand underneath her but could not get her left hand out. He placed his right boot on Mrs. Seyfried's right wrist to hold it down and with both hands attempted to pull her left arm out from underneath her. She continued to resist. Sergeant Letalien reached in and "gave Mrs. Seyfried a quick drive stun with my Taser to the back of her left thigh." Id. at ¶ 23. Officer Reed was then able to pull Mrs. Seyfried's left arm out from underneath, finding that she indeed had the letter opener in her left hand, and completed handcuffing her. At that point, the use of force ended and the officers sat Mrs. Seyfried up into a sitting position on the ground and called for the responding medical team to attend to her (an ambulance and a fire truck had arrived during these events, which reportedly took approximately two and one-half minutes, start to finish). However, Mrs. Seyfried continued to violently pull at her handcuffs, leading Officer Reed to wonder whether she would actually break the chain. Reed Decl. at ¶ 32. He removed the three Taser probes connected to her body (one from his original, unsuccessful attempt to Tase her, and two from Sergeant Letalien's successful attempt). Id. at ¶ 31.

Other officers had arrived by that time. Lieutenant Moore, not having obtained any answers from Plaintiff and not knowing whether any injured person was inside the house, directed Officer Reed and new arrival Officer Hayney to conduct a protective sweep through the house to make that determination. Taking Plaintiff's keys, they did so, reportedly completing the sweep of

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the two-story house in five minutes or less. After the two had started the protective sweep, Lieutenant Moore and another new arrival, Officer Coyle, entered the back door of the house to assist in the protective sweep, but encountered Officers Reed and Hayney on their way out. They informed Lieutenant Moore and Officer Coyle that they had completed the protective sweep, finding nobody inside, and all four exited the house.

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