Smith v. Balt. City Police Dep't

• Decision Date: 27 October 2016
• Docket Number: No. 15-1604,15-1604
• Citation: 840 F.3d 193
• Parties: Makia Smith, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. Baltimore City Police Department; Anthony W. Batts, in his official capacity as Commissioner of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Nathan Church, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Kenneth Campbell, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department, Defendants–Appellees, and Officer William Pilkerton, Jr., in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Nathan Ulmer, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

840 F.3d 193

Makia Smith, Plaintiff–Appellant,

v. Baltimore City Police Department; Anthony W. Batts, in his official capacity as Commissioner of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Nathan Church, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Kenneth Campbell, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department, Defendants–Appellees,andOfficer William Pilkerton, Jr., in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department; Officer Nathan Ulmer, in both his official and individual capacity as an officer of the Baltimore City Police Department, Defendants.

No. 15-1604

United States Court of Appeals, Fourth Circuit.

Argued: September 20, 2016

Decided: October 27, 2016

Amended: November 1, 2016

ARGUED: Lawrence S. Greenberg, GREENBERG LAW OFFICE, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellant. Suzanne Sangree, BALTIMORE CITY LAW DEPARTMENT, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Zebulan P. Snyder, GREENBERG LAW OFFICE, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellant. George Nilson, City Solicitor of Baltimore City, William R. Phelan, Chief Solicitor, Glenn Marrow, Chief of Police Legal Affairs Division, BALTIMORE CITY LAW DEPARTMENT, Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellees.

Before KEENAN, FLOYD, and THACKER, Circuit Judges.

Reversed and remanded by published opinion. Judge Thacker

wrote the opinion, in which Judge Keenan and Judge Floyd joined.

THACKER

, Circuit Judge:

Makia Smith (“Smith” or “Appellant”) sued the Baltimore City Police Department (“BCPD”) and several individual officers pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983

and Maryland law. Smith claimed two officers battered and unlawfully arrested her after they saw her filming them as they arrested a juvenile. At trial, the district court allowed defense counsel to elicit testimony that Smith had been arrested three times before. The jury ultimately returned a verdict in favor of the two officers on all counts.

We fail to see how Smith's prior arrests were relevant to her claim for damages, which was the sole reason the district court admitted them, and any probative value of those arrests was far outweighed by prejudice to Smith. The admission of such evidence was prohibited by Federal Rule of Evidence 404(b)

and was not harmless. Therefore, we reverse and remand for a new trial.

I.

A.

Officer Nathan Church of the BCPD testified to the following facts at the trial. On Friday, March 8, 2012, just as high school students were being released from school, Officer Church received a call for back-up to the 2800 block of Harford Road in Baltimore. He arrived to find several juveniles running through the streets and another officer, Talmadge Jackson, attempting to arrest one of them. When Officer Church arrived, the juvenile was giving Officer Jackson a struggle. Officer Church and several other officers formed a “half-horseshoe” barrier between the public and Officer Jackson to “keep other juveniles from getting close to [Officer Jackson].” S.J.A. 7.¹

Meanwhile, Officer Church heard tires screeching and turned to see multiple vehicles stopped on Harford Road. He testified that traffic was stopped and/or moving extremely slowly, and Smith's car was “blocking all the traffic behind her.” S.J.A. 10–11. Smith was standing outside of her car with her phone up as if videotaping. Officer Church, over 50 feet away from Smith, yelled, “Ma'am, pull your car to the side or keep on going.” Id. at 11. Smith replied, “I'm not going to let you hurt that young boy. I ain't moving—I ain't moving [shit].” Id.

Officer Church “quickstep[ped]” toward Appellant and again told her to move, and she responded, “I'm not moving [shit]. [Fuck] y'all.” S.J.A. 13–14. Officer Church moved closer, told her this was a traffic stop, and asked for her license. Smith “ran back into her car” and sat with her back toward the passenger door, which Officer Church described as “not normal[ ]” and indicative of someone “trying to flee from the scene.” Id. at 17–19. At that point, Officer Church reached in the car and was trying to grab for her keys, but Appellant began “kicking [him], throwing fists at [him], [and] scratching [him].” Id. at 19. At one point he was “being hit with a[n] [unidentified] hard object.” Id. He placed his right arm on the vehicle and reached in the car with his left arm, “just trying to grab her and pull her out of the car.” Id. She was “flailing” and Office Church was “keeping [his] face ... out of harm's way.” Id. at 22. Officer Church succeeded in pulling Smith out of the car, but he did not know what he grabbed onto, whether it was her hair or something else. He handcuffed her and began to effect an arrest. Pictures of Officer Church with visible red marks and scratch marks on his arm and neck were admitted into evidence.

Smith's version of the facts is quite different. According to her, while she was driving with her two-year-old daughter on Harford Road, she saw Officer Jackson arresting the juvenile and became concerned when she saw the officer's “knee pressed against his temple.” J.A. 94.² She got out of her vehicle, took the keys out, and pulled her cell phone up as if videoing what the officers were doing. Officer Church yelled, “What are you doing?” and Smith replied, “I'm just trying to make sure that you guys are not hurting that little boy and trying to make sure that he's okay.” Id. at 97.

At that point, Officer Church “started coming towards the vehicle ... [l]ike The Incredible Hulk, like Manny Pacquiao ... in an aggressive ... manner,” and once he got closer to the vehicle, he started running. J.A. 97. Smith tried to get back in the car, but at that point, she could not have driven anywhere because traffic was still stopped. Officer Church came over to the car, “snatched the phone out of [her] hand and he kicked it and he stomped it.” Id. at 99. He then said, “You want to film things, B[itch], film this. I should knock your teeth out.” Id. Smith had one foot in the car and tried to get her other foot in the car when Officer Church “took both of his hands and dragged [her] out of the car” by her hair. Id. She did not punch, scratch, or kick Officer Church before he grabbed her hair because “that kind of thinking gets you killed,” although she admitted to “flailing” to try and get Officer Church off of her. Id. at 101–02. Then she felt three or four other people join in but could not really see them. She felt someone hit her in the back of the head and then she “just blacked out.” Id. at 102. The next thing she remembered is being slammed onto the car and then seeing her daughter crying. Another officer, Officer Campbell, pulled her left arm back and all the way up and said, “Did you have enough yet? Do you want me to break it?” Id. at 103.

As they began to arrest her, Smith asked Officer Church if she could call her mother to come get her baby. Officer Church taunted, “No. Child Protective Services will be here to get your daughter.” J.A. 105. Smith asked a bystander if she could come get her daughter out of the car, and the bystander did so. The officers put Smith in the patrol car, and she began yelling out her mother's phone number; another officer finally gave the bystander her mother's phone number.

Smith was taken away in the transport vehicle to a central booking station. Because she was complaining of head and neck pain, she was taken to a nearby hospital before booking. She was eventually charged with second-degree assault of Officer Church, resisting or interfering with arrest, failing to display a license on demand, willfully disobeying a lawful order of the police, and causing a vehicle to obstruct a free vehicle passage of a roadway. On January 3, 2013, after nearly a year of pre-trial release obligations, the charges against Smith were dropped via a nolle prosequi disposition.

B.

On May 8, 2013, Smith filed the instant action in the District of Maryland against the BCPD; Anthony Batts, Commissioner of the BCPD; Office Church; Officer Campbell; and two other officers at the scene, William Pilkerton and Nathan Ulmer (collectively, “Appellees”). The operative complaint, amended on October 9, 2014, alleged 13 counts: excessive force, deprivation of property without due process, and violations of the First and Fourth Amendments under 42 U.S.C. § 1983

; violation of attendant rights under the state constitution; Monell³ claims against the city; and state law claims of conversion, battery, false arrest, false imprisonment, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. Smith claimed a minimum of $1.5 million in damages for, inter alia, “emotional trauma, humiliation, distress, bodily injury and damage to personal property.” J.A. 37–38.

The original district court judge to whom the case was assigned granted summary judgment to Officers Pilkerton and Ulmer on some of the counts and determined the case should be tried in two phases. First the jury would consider claims against Officers Church and Campbell, and then, the Monell

claims against the city would proceed in a second phase if the jury determined any constitutional harm had occurred. As a result, at the trial underlying this appeal, only five claims proceeded against Officer Church—the First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, excessive force, battery, and false arrest claims—and two claims against Officer Campbell—the excessive force and battery claims.

Notably, on March 9, 2015, Smith filed a motion in limine to exclude “all evidence or discussion of [Appellant's] prior arrests.” J.A. 81. Smith had been arrested three times: for second degree assault in 2005, fleeing and eluding in 2006, and second degree assault in 2010.⁴ No convictions followed any of Smith's prior arrests. The district court granted the motion on March 11, explaining, “There shall be no reference [at trial] to [Appellant]'s prior arrests.” Id. at 86. On March 26, the case was reassigned to a new district court judge and...