Sloley v. VanBramer
| Decision Date | 12 December 2019 |
| Docket Number | Docket No. 16-4213,August Term, 2018 |
| Parties | Maxmillian SLOLEY, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Eric VANBRAMER, in his individual and official capacity, Bryan VanBramer, in his individual and official capacity, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
JONATHAN K. YOUNGWOOD, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP (Janet A. Gochman, on the brief), New York, NY, for Plaintiff-Appellant Maxmillian Sloley.
JONATHAN D. HITSOUS, Assistant Solicitor General (Barbara D. Underwood, Solicitor General, Victor Paladino, Assistant Solicitor General, on the brief), for Letitia James, Attorney General of the State of New York, Albany, NY, for Defendants-Appellees Eric VanBramer and Bryan VanBramer.
Before: NEWMAN, JACOBS, and POOLER, Circuit Judges.
Judge Newman concurs in the judgment and in the opinion of the Court and files a separate concurring opinion.
Judge Jacobs dissents in a separate opinion.
Plaintiff-Appellant Maxmillian Sloley brought this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 to vindicate the violation of his constitutional rights occasioned by, inter alia, a visual body cavity search to which he was subjected incident to arrest. The district court (Gary L. Sharpe, J. ) granted summary judgment in favor of Defendants-Appellees Eric and Bryan VanBramer, reasoning that Bryan was not personally involved in the search, the search was supported by a reasonable suspicion, and Eric was entitled to qualified immunity in any event because reasonable officers in his position could conclude that he had the requisite reasonable suspicion. See Sloley v. VanBramer , No. 1:14-cv-339 (GLS/CFH), 2016 WL 6603211, at *2-4 (N.D.N.Y. Nov. 8, 2016). On appeal, the VanBramers additionally argue that they are also entitled to qualified immunity because it was not clearly established at the time of the search that visual body cavity searches incident to felony arrests must be supported by reasonable suspicion.
We vacate in part and hold that visual body cavity searches must be justified by specific, articulable facts supporting reasonable suspicion that an arrestee is secreting contraband inside the body cavity to be searched. Moreover, because this requirement was established by sufficiently persuasive authority, it was "clearly established" for purposes of a qualified immunity defense by New York state police officers at the time Eric searched Sloley. We further hold that disputed facts preclude a finding of reasonable suspicion on a motion for summary judgment and remand for trial on the merits of Sloley’s claim and the issue of Eric’s entitlement to qualified immunity. Finally, we affirm in part because Sloley has not presented any evidence indicating that Bryan was aware that Eric was conducting, or was going to conduct, the visual body cavity search.
In the pre-dawn hours of Monday, April 1, 2013, Sloley and Daphne Rollins got into an argument at Rollins’s house in Athens, New York. According to Sloley, Rollins was somewhere between being his "girlfriend or ex-girlfriend" at the time. Sloley Dep. Tr. at 37:4-6, ECF No. 41-2.3 The argument stemmed from rumors Rollins had heard that Sloley was romantically involved with another woman.
The argument escalated. At some point during the confrontation, Sloley grabbed the intoxicated Rollins’s cellphone and ran out of the house with it. Rollins gave chase, falling down the house’s front steps in the process. Rollins then went back inside, reemerging with a baseball bat in hand. At that point, Sloley retreated into his car, tossing Rollins’s phone to the ground as he ran. Rollins then struck the windshield of Sloley’s car with the baseball bat.
After Rollins struck Sloley’s car with the bat, they both returned inside. At some point while they were inside, Sloley grabbed the bat from Rollins, went back outside, and hit Rollins’s car with it. Sloley then tossed the bat to the ground before driving off. Rollins called 9-1-1, though Sloley was not aware at that time that Rollins had called the police.
New York State Trooper Bryan VanBramer responded to Rollins’s 9-1-1 call. According to Bryan, Rollins told him that Sloley may be involved with illegal drug activity and possibly was in possession of illegal drugs. Rollins denies having made any mention of Sloley being involved in, or possibly involved in, drug activity and denies having suggested that Sloley might have been possession of any illegal drugs.
A deputy from the Greene County Sheriff’s Office pulled Sloley over about five minutes after he left Rollins’s house. Sloley told the deputy about his dispute with Rollins. Upon consultation with the New York State Police, the deputy then placed Sloley in handcuffs and brought him back to Rollins’s house.
Once there, the deputy who had apprehended Sloley transferred Sloley into Bryan’s police car. After some discussion with Sloley, Bryan and another state trooper present at the scene brought Sloley to a nearby state police station. The troopers did not ask him if he was involved in any illegal drug activity.
At the police station, the troopers brought Sloley to an office, where they handcuffed him to the wall. At that point, the troopers informed Sloley that he was going to be charged with harassment and criminal mischief.
Unbeknownst to Sloley at the time, Bryan had at some point told his brother, New York State Trooper Eric VanBramer, to go to Sloley’s car with Eric’s drug-sniffing dog, Ryder. According to Eric, he recognized Sloley’s name "as referring to an individual who was well known in the area for being wrapped up in illegal drugs." Eric VanBramer Aff. ¶ 4, ECF No. 41-5. Moreover, before April 1, 2013, "several people" had told Eric that "Sloley was a drug dealer." Id.
Eric brought Ryder near Sloley’s car. Ryder alerted—i.e., indicated the presence of drugs—on each side of the car, in the area around the car’s hood, and in the center console area inside the car. According to Eric, he saw "a small amount of a loose, chunky substance that appeared to be crack cocaine in the crease in the driver’s seat." Id. ¶ 5. Eric claims he field tested the substance, which tested positive for cocaine. Sloley does not contest the fact that Eric brought Ryder to the car. However, he does dispute that Eric found any drugs in the car. He asserts that neither he nor his mother, who owned the car, use crack cocaine.
In any event, at some point after searching Sloley’s car, Eric and Ryder arrived at the state police station where Sloley was being held. Ryder walked right by Sloley but paid no attention to him. Eric then asked Sloley if he "had any drugs stashed in [his] anal area." Sloley Dep. Tr. at 64:9-10, ECF No. 41-2. Sloley said that he did not. Eric told Sloley that he had found a small quantity of drugs in his car, which provided grounds to strip search Sloley. Sloley denied that Eric found drugs in the car, possibly saying something along the lines of, Id. at 64:18-20. As Sloley elaborated at his deposition, Id. at 67:19-21.
When the incredulous Sloley asked to see the drugs, Eric told him he could not, because the "crumbs" of crack cocaine were "too small" to see. Id. at 85:3-6. Nevertheless, according to Eric, he "documented on a General 2 Evidence Record" that he had obtained from Sloley’s car a substance that "tested positive for cocaine" and gave the evidence to Bryan. Eric VanBramer Aff. ¶ 9, ECF No. 41-5. According to Bryan, he "executed [the] General 2 Evidence Record" and placed the evidence in an evidence locker. Bryan VanBramer Aff. ¶ 9, ECF No. 41-4.
Sloley’s denial notwithstanding, Eric unhooked Sloley from the wall to which he was handcuffed and brought him to a private back room of the police station. Eric instructed Sloley to remove his clothing, and Sloley did so, piece by piece. Eric searched each article of clothing as Sloley handed them to him. Once Sloley was completely naked, Eric instructed him to lift his genitals, bend over, spread his buttocks, and allow Eric to examine the now-exposed areas of Sloley’s body. The search revealed no drugs secreted on or in Sloley’s body.
After the search, Sloley got dressed and was brought to Athens Town Court to be arraigned. Sloley was arraigned on the harassment and criminal mischief charges, as well as a drug possession charge for the cocaine Eric had purportedly found in his car. Sloley was held without bail in Greene County Jail. Three days after his arraignment, Sloley was brought back to Athens Town Court where he pled guilty to the harassment charge—a violation—and was sentenced to time served. The other charges were dropped.
On March 27, 2014, Sloley filed a pro se complaint, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, against New York State and the VanBramers alleging, inter alia, that the search Eric conducted violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable searches. The district court dismissed his claims against New York State and the VanBramers in their official capacity sua sponte pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e).
The VanBramers moved for summary judgment on September 18, 2015. The district court granted the motion on November 8, 2016. See Sloley , 2016 WL 6603211, at *1. The district court first concluded that Sloley had failed to establish that Bryan was either present for, or personally involved in, the search and thus could not be held liable. Id. at *2. The court then concluded that Eric had the reasonable suspicion required before officers can conduct strip and visual body cavity searches incident to arrest and that Eric conducted the search in a reasonable manner. Id. at *3-4. The district court further concluded that Eric was entitled to qualified immunity in any event because no clearly established law stated that the...
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