Wallace v. Mulholland, s. 91-1037
| Decision Date | 30 March 1992 |
| Docket Number | Nos. 91-1037,91-2401,s. 91-1037 |
| Parties | 35 Fed. R. Evid. Serv. 99 James M. WALLACE and James E. Wallace, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. John MULHOLLAND, in his official and individual capacities, and other unnamed City of Evanston, Illinois employees and Michael Leon, Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit |
Arvin Boddie, Chicago, Ill. (argued), for plaintiffs-appellees.
Richard T. Ryan (argued), Mark F. Smolens, Flynn, Murphy & Ryan, Chicago, Ill., for defendants-appellants.
Before CUMMINGS and CUDAHY, Circuit Judges, and WISDOM, Senior Circuit Judge. 1
The appellants, two police officers found liable for violating the civil rights of a young man and his father, challenge the district judge's behavior at trial, his legal decisions, and his award to the plaintiffs of attorney fees significantly greater than the damages awarded them by the jury. Because all of the district judge's decisions and actions were either legally correct or well within his discretion we AFFIRM the judgment below as to all questions on appeal.
On March 4, 1988 Jacquelyn and James E. ("James") Wallace, the parents of James Michael ("Michael") Wallace, obtained from the Evanston (Illinois) Hospital a petition for the involuntary commitment of their son, a young man with a history of mental problems. Mr. and Mrs. Wallace immediately brought the petition to the Evanston police station. After requesting enforcement of the petition, they returned home, where they lived with their son.
Evanston police officers John Mulholland and Michael Leon were assigned the duty of enforcing the petition and committing the son to a mental hospital. They were given little, if any, specific information about the son's mental condition before reaching the Wallaces' house.
Precisely what happened at the Wallaces' house that day remains unclear. When the two men approached the Wallaces' kitchen, Michael--who weighed about 250 pounds--stood up and said he was not going to the hospital. The police officers ended up in a physical struggle with both father and son. Both Wallace men were treated for injuries sustained in that struggle. James Wallace was arrested for battery and obstructing a peace officer; criminal charges against him were later stricken on leave to reinstate.
The Wallaces sued Officers Mulholland and Leon and the City of Evanston under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and Illinois state law. They alleged violations of their civil and constitutional rights and sought over $4 million in damages. Before trial the district court granted summary judgment in favor of the City of Evanston.
After four days of trial the jury decided in favor of James and Michael Wallace. Based on the use of excessive force against Michael Wallace it awarded him $1 in compensatory damages against both officers and $5,000 in punitive damages against each officer. Based on the unconstitutional seizure of James Wallace it awarded him $1,000 in compensatory damages and $10,000 in punitive damages against Mulholland alone. The court entered judgment on this verdict. 2 The court later awarded the plaintiffs reasonable attorney fees of $43,200 and costs of $2,912.65. The two officers together filed two separate appeals (now consolidated), raising the following issues:
A. The trial court's refusal to admit certain expert testimony;
B. The trial judge's biased behavior C. The trial court's denial of their motion for a directed verdict; and
D. The trial court's award of attorney fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988.
The pretrial order listed the defendant's intention to call a medical expert witness to discuss the son's mental condition. After several pretrial hearings, the judge granted the plaintiffs' motion in limine to prevent the defendants' use of that expert or of any other evidence regarding Michael's schizophrenia. The court found that evidence about the general nature of Michael's condition, and of the likelihood that someone with that condition will act aggressively, was probably irrelevant, and certainly prejudicial, to Michael's case. The subject of that case was Michael's actual behavior, and the way the police officers responded to it. The subject was not a psychiatric prediction about how someone like Michael might have behaved. Such evidence, together with evidence about Michael's specific actions in the past, would have overemphasized the likelihood that Michael acted in a manner that justified the officers' reaction.
A trial judge has broad discretion in deciding questions of admissibility of expert evidence under Federal Rule of Evidence 702 and in conducting the evidentiary balancing test required by Federal Rule of Evidence 403. We will reverse his decisions only in the case of a clear abuse of discretion. 3 In this case the judge did not abuse that discretion.
Our holding, and the trial judge's decision, find confirmation in an earlier opinion by this Court. Rascon v. Hardiman 4 was a § 1983 action against prison guards who had beaten an inmate who had a history of mental problems. The magistrate refused to receive evidence of the inmate's mental health history because the prejudicial effect of such evidence would outweigh its probative value. The district court, and this Court, agreed.
The lesson of Rascon is the danger that a jury will conclude that a mentally deficient plaintiff, regardless of his actual behavior, somehow "asked for" mistreatment at the hands of two policemen is greater than the value of such evidence to explain the police officers' use of force. That general proposition seems especially correct where--as here--the police officers had no specific knowledge of Michael's condition before they tried to take him away. The trial judge found, and we agree, that the forbidden evidence would have shifted the focus from Michael's actions to his condition. Only his actions can justify the use of force. Evidence as to the general propensity of people suffering his ailments to make similar attacks would have been of more prejudicial than probative value to the defendants.
The defendants charge that the trial judge abandoned his role as an impartial arbiter of the law. A careful review of the record reveals those charges to be a mischaracterization of the trial, almost entirely without merit.
The defendants are correct in saying that the judge did strike one defendant's qualified immunity defense; allow only the plaintiffs to use evidence of Michael's mental history; interrupt the examination of witnesses; and entertain sua sponte objections. The sum of these actions, however, did not prejudice the appellants' defense.
The first alleged impropriety was a legal decision. It goes unchallenged by the defendants as such. There is no justification for describing a legal decision adverse to the defendants as part of the trial judge's advocatorial assistance to the plaintiffs.
The second arises from the judge's conscientious effort to uphold the motion in limine as to the defendants' use of psychiatric evidence while also allowing Mr. and Mrs. Wallace a chance to use related evidence to explain why they sought involuntary commitment for their son. We have already noted that a trial court has broad discretion in controlling the admission of evidence. The defendants cannot show that the trial judge abused that discretion by preventing both parties from presenting legally irrelevant evidence. The record reveals no improper assistance to the plaintiffs. It shows, instead, a concern that the plaintiffs themselves not abuse a possible evidentiary advantage. The judge actually warned them that if they did not use less of such evidence, he would be forced to deny the motion in limine or retry the case. He understood the evidentiary problem, and controlled it well.
As for the third alleged error, the judge's "interference" with witnesses apparently consisted only in refusing to let the defendants' counsel use deposition testimony when he believed it did not impeach the testifying witness. Again, the appellants do not question the legal correctness of these actions; without additional prejudicial behavior they do not contribute to a biased trial.
Finally, we find only a few instances of the fourth and final alleged error, that the judge entertained sua sponte objections. In each of these instances, the judge's object was to clarify the questions asked by counsel on both sides (such objections were not entertained solely against the appellants) or to remind stubborn lawyers that their questions had been already asked and answered. This Court has noted that lawyers who do not obey a judge's instructions as to their examination of witnesses can expect those instructions to be repeated. 5 In the one case where the appellants' counsel brought to the judge's attention the absence of any objection from the plaintiffs, he immediately admitted that he had anticipated an objection from the plaintiffs' counsel, who had already stood to make it. We refuse to find that a few instances of conscientious, if occasionally premature, efforts by a trial judge to control consistently improper questioning by counsel amount to the sort of bias that would have unfairly limited the appellants' defense.
A charge that a trial judge has assumed the role of advocate and deprived one side of a fair trial is a serious one. It should not be made lightly, or without support. In this case, we find that the allegations of partiality, when examined against the record, are either untrue or so insubstantial that the defendants' contention that they received an unfair trial must fail.
The defendants argue that the trial court erred in denying their motion for a directed verdict, and that there was insufficient evidence to support a jury...
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