Trujillo v. DeBaca

• Decision Date: 23 December 1970
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 8382.
• Citation: 320 F. Supp. 1038
• Parties: Gilbert TRUJILLO and Tino Montoya, on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs, v. Fernando E. C. DeBACA, Commissioner, New Mexico Department of Motor Vehicles and Eloy Tapia, Director of the Financial Responsibility Section of the New Mexico Department of Motor Vehicles, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of New Mexico

320 F. Supp. 1038

Gilbert TRUJILLO and Tino Montoya, on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated, Plaintiffs, v. Fernando E. C. DeBACA, Commissioner, New Mexico Department of Motor Vehicles and Eloy Tapia, Director of the Financial Responsibility Section of the New Mexico Department of Motor Vehicles, Defendants.

Civ. No. 8382.

United States District Court, D. New Mexico.

December 23, 1970.

John T. Dunn, Joseph T. Sprague and Richard C. Bosson, of counsel, Albuquerque, N. M., for plaintiffs.

Sidney S. Jaffe, Sp. Asst. Atty. Gen., Santa Fe, N. M., for defendants.

Before SETH, Circuit Judge, and PAYNE and BRATTON, District Judges.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND JUDGMENT

BRATTON, District Judge.

A three-judge court has been convened to consider the complaint filed herein by Gilbert Trujillo and Tino Martinez on behalf of themselves and all others similarly situated. The class action seeks to have declared unconstitutional N.M. Stat. Ann. §§ 64-24-45, 64-24-50 (1953) (Suppl.1969), which are provisions of the financial responsibility act applicable to the owners or operators of motor vehicles on the highways of the state of New Mexico, and to have enjoined further enforcement of these provisions.

Defendant state officials subsequently filed a motion to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted, upon the ground that the law of the case had been established by Quetawki v. Prentice, 303 F. Supp. 737 (D.N.M.1968), and upon the ground that the complaint presented no substantial federal question warranting the convening of a three-judge court.

In lieu of oral argument, counsel for the parties have submitted to the panel exhaustive memoranda on the motion, which will be treated as one for summary judgment. These memoranda, together with subsequent letter memoranda, have been considered by the panel in arriving at its conclusion.

The thrust of plaintiffs' attack on the statutes revolves first around the automatic suspension of the license and vehicle registration of any person involved in an accident unless the person furnishes proof of financial responsibility and deposits security with the state's division of motor vehicles. The plaintiffs' specific complaint is that suspension is effected without a prior determination of fault, which summary procedure, they claim, denies them and the class they represent due process of law in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

The plaintiffs also assault the statutes in question on the ground they are over-broad, in that their purpose of insuring that judgments shall be paid is not rationally related to the requirement that all uninsured drivers, whether or not they are at fault, are included within the statutes' terms and required to post security.

The plaintiffs final argument is that the challenged statutes deny them their licenses in violation of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The plaintiffs concede that the state may regulate driver's licenses under its police power and may revoke them by administrative action as well as by judicial action. What the state may not do, they claim, is to revoke such licenses by summary administrative action. Their economic interest in a driver's license, they assert, outweighs any burden that may be imposed on the state by having to establish and finance administrative machinery capable of hearing and determining fault prior to the suspension of licenses.

The plaintiffs rely on Goldberg v. Kelly, 397 U.S. 254, 90 S.Ct. 1011, 25 L.Ed. 2d 287 (1970); and Sniadach v. Family Finance Corp., 395 U.S. 337, 89 S.Ct. 1820, 23 L.Ed.2d 349 (1969); to support their claim. In Goldberg, the Court held that welfare benefits could not be terminated without a prior evidentiary hearing, while its decision in Sniadach held violative of the Fourteenth Amendment a state statute allowing the immediate freezing of wages pending an adjudication of the merits of a creditors' garnishment of such wages.

The principle evolved from these cases is asserted to be applicable to what plaintiffs assert in a present case to be their fundamental right to a determination of fault prior to suspension of a driver's license.

We do not agree that Goldberg v. Kelly, supra, and Sniadach v. Family Finance Corp., supra, compel a different result. In the present case there is no right so basic to the necessities of life that it, without more, compels the state to establish the administrative machinery necessary to effect what plaintiffs would...