Todd v. Hicks

• Decision Date: 23 April 2021
• Docket Number: Case No. 2:20-cv-1006-RAH-KFP [WO]
• Parties: JASON TODD, Plaintiff, v. DAVID P. HICKS, JR., et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Alabama

JASON TODD, Plaintiff, v. DAVID P. HICKS, JR., et al., Defendants.

Case No. 2:20-cv-1006-RAH-KFP [WO]

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF ALABAMA NORTHERN DIVISION

April 23, 2021

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Plaintiff Jason Todd ("Plaintiff" or "Todd"), an adult resident of Chilton County, Alabama, alleges that City of Clanton police officers David P. Hicks, Jr. ("Hicks") and Cameron Bates ("Bates") violated his constitutional rights and committed outrage and negligence in connection with his arrest and prosecution for manslaughter after his wife was struck and killed by a vehicle while walking on a dark road in Chilton County, Alabama on August 4, 2018.

The case now comes before the Court pursuant to the Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 6) and supporting brief (Doc. 7) filed by Hicks, Bates, and the City of Clanton (collectively, the "Defendants"). Todd has filed a response, (Doc. 16), and the Defendants a reply, (Doc. 17). For the following reasons, the motion will be granted in part and denied in part.

I. MOTION-TO-DISMISS STANDARD

A Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss tests the sufficiency of the complaint against the legal standard set forth in Rule 8: "a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief." Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). When evaluating a motion to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), the court must take "the factual allegations in the complaint as true and construe them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff." Pielage v. McConnell, 516 F.3d 1282, 1284 (11th Cir. 2008). However, "the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal conclusions." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 663 (2009).

"To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" Id. at 678 (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). "Determining whether a complaint states a plausible claim for relief [is] . . . a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common sense." Id. at 663 (alteration in original) (citation omitted). But if the facts in the complaint "do not permit the court to infer more than the mere possibility of misconduct, the complaint has alleged—but it has not 'shown'—'that the pleader is entitled to relief,'" and the complaint must be dismissed. Id. at 679 (citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2)).

II. JURISDICTION

The Court exercises subject matter jurisdiction over the Plaintiff's claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, 28 U.S.C. § 1331, and 28 U.S.C. § 1367. The parties do not contest personal jurisdiction or venue.

III. BACKGROUND

The relevant facts, as alleged by and viewed in the light most favorable to Todd, are as follows:

On August 4, 2018, after a night of apparently heavy drinking at Friends Steakhouse in Clanton, Alabama, Todd's wife, Tonya Anderson ("Anderson"), attempted to walk across State Highway 31 in Chilton County, Alabama. Tragically, motorist Carey Roger Glenn struck her with his vehicle and then drove away; Anderson died instantly.

Hicks and Bates were officers employed with the Clanton Police Department and were assigned to investigate the traffic homicide. Following a lengthy interrogation of Todd, and despite his repeated insistence otherwise, Hicks and Bates opined that Todd had thrown Anderson's car keys across the road and thereby caused his intoxicated wife to walk into traffic. Furthermore, Todd avers that the officers reached this conclusion despite contravening video evidence and eyewitness reportsfrom restaurant patrons that Todd did not throw the keys and had turned his back when Anderson stepped into the highway.

Following the investigation, Hicks authored a written investigative report in which he wrote that Todd was the "last person to physically possess the car key" and it was therefore "only logical" to conclude that Todd would have been the one to throw the keys. (Doc. 1, p. 34.) He continued, stating Todd "deliberately and fully intentionally threw the key chain" and "[saw] his wife walking towards the roadway." (Id., pp. 35, 31-32.) This report was delivered to a Chilton County prosecutor with Hicks's recommendation that "Jason Michael Todd should be held solely responsible and fully accountable for the wrongful death of Tonya Sherre Anderson." (Id., p. 35.) He also recommended that Glenn, the driver who struck Anderson and left the scene without stopping, be "cleared of responsibility," stating that Glenn had not seen Anderson on the roadway, was blind in one eye, the road was dimly lit, and that the contact of Anderson's body with Glenn's vehicle was "more consistent with hitting a small stick or maybe even a small animal, and not with a full grown human being." (Id., p. 33.) This report was presented to a grand jury, along with testimony from Hicks and Bates.

The grand jury indicted Todd for manslaughter on February 1, 2019, and criminal proceedings commenced. Todd's criminal defense attorneys filed a motion to quash the indictment, and during a contested hearing held in Chilton CountyCircuit Court, Hicks testified to the lack of evidence showing that Todd had thrown Anderson's keys. (Id., p. 36.) On June 17, 2020, the circuit judge granted Todd's motion to quash and dismissed the criminal charges brought against him with prejudice for lack of probable cause. (See Doc. 1-3.)

Todd filed his four-count Complaint on December 9, 2020. (Doc. 1.) Todd alleges malicious prosecution (Count I) against Hicks and Bates under federal law and Alabama common law; municipal liability against the City under federal law (Count II); a state law claim for outrage (Count III) against Hicks and Bates; and a state law failure-to-train and/or supervise claim (Count IV) against the City.

IV. DISCUSSION

A. Count I - § 1983 and Common Law Malicious Prosecution

In Count I, Todd first raises a claim for malicious prosecution against Hicks and Bates under § 1983 and Alabama common law. More specifically, Todd alleges that Hicks and Bates violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from seizure in the absence of probable cause when Hicks recommended the criminal prosecution of Todd for the wrongful death of his late wife and when the indictment was procured by the testimony of Hicks and Bates.

Hicks and Bates offer four primary arguments in support of their motion to dismiss this claim, including (1) the inadequacy of Todd's factual allegations that a constitutional violation occurred, as well as Hicks and Bates's entitlement to(2) absolute immunity, (3) qualified immunity, and (4) state-agent immunity. The Court takes up each of these arguments in turn.

1. Malicious Prosecution

The Eleventh Circuit has long recognized malicious prosecution as a violation of the Fourth Amendment that is cognizable under § 1983. See Uboh v. Reno, 141 F.3d 1000, 1002-04 (11th Cir. 1998), abrogated on other grounds by Williams v. Aguirre, 965 F.3d 1147, 1159 (11th Cir. 2020). In order to state a claim for malicious prosecution under both federal and Alabama law, a plaintiff must "prove a violation of his Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable seizures in addition to the elements of the common law tort of malicious prosecution." Wood v. Kesler, 323 F.3d 872, 881 (11th Cir. 2003) (citing Uboh, 141 F.3d at 1002-1004). These elements include: "(1) a criminal prosecution instituted or continued by the present defendant; (2) with malice and without probable cause; (3) that terminated in the plaintiff accused's favor; and (4) caused damage to the plaintiff accused." Id. at 881-82; see also Delchamps, Inc. v. Bryant, 738 So. 2d 824, 831-32 (Ala. 1999) (stating the elements of common law malicious prosecution in Alabama as the same).

Defendants, without conceding that either Hicks or Bates acted with malice, focus their challenge on the first element. To this end, they argue that Todd has failed to provide factual contentions to support his allegations that Hicks and Bates actually instituted or continued a criminal proceeding against Todd. Instead, as theDefendants' brief argues, Hicks filed no charges himself and merely recommended prosecution of Todd; it was the district attorney's own investigation, and thereafter the grand jury's return of an indictment that provided an independently adequate basis for bringing criminal charges against Todd. As the theory goes, Hicks and Bates's liability is now precluded because of these intervening actors - the district attorney and the grand jury.

In response to the Defendants' Motion, Todd argues that the pleading standard at this stage only requires him to allege that Hicks and Bates's nontestimonial actions¹ "tainted" the indictment. Here, Todd continues his claim that Hicks and Bates's nontestimonial actions, namely the abusive interrogation tactics of Todd and the subsequent investigative report that recommended a criminal prosecution, prejudiced the grand jury proceedings. Todd further argues that by submitting a report to the district attorney, Hicks and Bates instituted the prosecution of Todd, allowing Todd to maintain the present civil action against Hicks and Bates.

While the Eleventh Circuit has yet to directly address whether an indictment per se absolves an investigating officer of liability, see Williams v. Aguirre, 965 F.3d 1147, 1168 (11th Cir. 2020), the Circuit has not foreclosed the notion that including materially false statements in an investigative report that later leads to an indictment may subject the acting officer to suit. See Barts v. Joyner, 865 F.2d 1187, 1195-96 (11th Cir. 1989) (holding that intervening acts of a grand jury cannot shield an arresting officer from liability where deception or undue pressure was exercised); but see Jones v. Cannon, 174 F.3d 1271, 1287 (11th Cir. 1999) (finding intervening acts of prosecutor and grand jury in returning an...