Warren v. Dwyer
| Decision Date | 25 June 1990 |
| Docket Number | D,No. 1327,1327 |
| Parties | Lamont WARREN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Joseph L. DWYER, Individually and in his Official Capacity as an Officer in the Police Dept. of Hartford, CT, Defendant-Appellee. ocket 90-7013. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
John R. Williams (Williams and Wise, New Haven, Conn., Karen Lee Torre, of counsel), for plaintiff-appellant.
James J. Szerejko (Halloran & Sage, Hartford, Conn., Michael J. Gustafson, of counsel), for defendant-appellee.
Before KAUFMAN, FEINBERG and WINTER, Circuit Judges.
In an appeal from a jury verdict exonerating the defendant in a civil rights action for damages flowing from false arrest, we are called upon to determine whether the district court's charge to the jury was of a kind requiring reversal. In particular, we are asked to assess whether the affirmative defense of qualified immunity is an issue appropriate for determination by a jury--or one solely for judicial disposition as a matter of law.
After less than twenty four hours of deliberation, the jury returned a verdict for the defendant by answering "no" to the question "Did Joseph L. Dwyer falsely arrest Lamont Warren?" In an earlier trial also conducted before Judge Clarie, a jury exonerated Officer Dwyer of claims of excessive force, racial discrimination, and intentional filing of a false police report, but was deadlocked on the false arrest claim Warren claims the trial court committed reversible error by instructing the jury to consider, in determining the lawfulness of plaintiff's arrest, whether there was probable cause for an additional criminal charge imposed after plaintiff was seized and in custody. Appellant further contends that the district court erred by reversing its position in the initial trial and submitting the affirmative defense of qualified immunity to the jury for determination.
voting five to one in favor of the defendant.
For the reasons below we affirm the judgment. Although we cannot determine conclusively whether the jury even considered the defense of qualified immunity in arriving at its verdict of no liability, the charge was at most redundant, but not so confusing as to constitute prejudicial error.
The following facts are not in dispute. Lamont Warren, originally of Hartford, Connecticut, presently resides in Massachusetts, where he is employed as a computer analyst by an insurance company. On August 24, 1984, Warren drove with friends to Hartford to visit his relatives at his brother's residence on Huntington Street. At approximately midnight, Warren and his friends were en route to his automobile parked across the street, when they were approached and asked for identification by defendant-appellee Joseph Dwyer, an officer with the Hartford Police Department for almost two years at the time. Dwyer was responding to a radio dispatch reporting an unrelated burglary in progress at a neighboring Huntington Street residence. It is further undisputed that Warren's three companions produced drivers' licenses and remained silent while Dwyer verified their backgrounds over the radio, which revealed no information or prior arrests.
The parties sharply dispute, however, the circumstances which attended Warren's identification check. Warren testified at trial that he was frightened by Dwyer, who approached with his hand on his gun, demanded identification without explanation, and refused to answer Dwyer's inquiries of "What's going on?" and "What is wrong?" Warren claimed that he proffered his driver's license, but before accepting, Dwyer ordered him to lean against the police cruiser. After allegedly encircling and gazing at Warren for several moments, Dwyer arrested Warren for breach of peace and ordered him to sit in the back of the police car.
Officer Dwyer, on the other hand, testified that he promptly informed the group he was investigating a burglary and merely requested identification; his gun, he said, was concealed. He claimed Warren refused to give his name and instead stated that he knew many powerful black people, that he lived on Huntington Street, and was the brother of a Hartford police officer. Dwyer noted that Warren smelled of alcohol and characterized his behavior as loud, abusive and obscene. Dwyer stated that he warned Warren to calm down or risk arrest, yet Warren continued to "rant and rave," and used profane language. Dwyer maintained that he arrested Warren for breach of peace because his conduct was attracting a hostile crowd that might engender a hazardous condition in such a high crime neighborhood. Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 53a-181.
After returning identifications to Warren's three companions and filling out a form for Warren's arrest, Dwyer drove to the end of Huntington Street where a police van was stationed. As Warren was transferred into the vehicle, he allegedly stated that he would "get" Dwyer. Dwyer, accordingly, recorded an additional charge for threatening in the police report. Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 53a-62.
It is undisputed that Warren was then taken to the Hartford police station where he was booked, photographed, strip searched, and incarcerated for 8-9 hours before he was able to post bond. At his first appearance in Connecticut Superior Court, however, the prosecutor declined to prosecute and the judge dismissed both charges.
It is basic law that a jury charge should be examined in its entirety, not scrutinized strand-by-strand. Lowe v. Commack Union Free School Dist., 886 F.2d 1364, 1378 (2d Cir.1989). Generally, we will reverse the judgment of a trial court and grant a new trial because of an error in the jury instructions only if we are persuaded, based on a review of the record as a whole, that the error was prejudicial or the charge was highly confusing. Nat'l R.R. Passenger Corp. v. One 25,900 Square Foot More or Less Parcel of Land, 766 F.2d 685, 688 (2d Cir.1985); Lowe, 886 F.2d at 1378; see Fed.R.Civ.P. 61.
The trial court properly instructed the jury that at the time of the challenged arrest, under "clearly established" law in Connecticut, a police officer could lawfully make a warrantless arrest for a misdemeanor "only if the arresting police officer had probable cause to believe that the person was committing or had committed a criminal offense in the officer's presence." See Conn.Gen.Stat. Sec. 54-1f(a); State v. Elliott, 153 Conn. 147, 152-53, 215 A.2d 108, 110-11 (1965). The court then defined probable cause and instructed the jury to consider its existence with respect to both charged offenses:
So the questions you have to answer are whether Officer Dwyer had probable cause to believe that Mr. Warren was committing the offense of: One, breach of peace; and two, the second charge referred at the transfer to the paddy wagon, threatening in his presence.
After reading both statutes to the jury, the court further explained that the jury was not to determine whether the plaintiff actually committed either of these offenses but "whether the plaintiff's conduct was sufficient to justify a reasonable person in believing that there was reasonable ground for arresting the plaintiff for either breach of the peace or threatening." Upon the jury's request, the court later provided it with a "copy of the exact wording of the 'Breach of Peace' " statute.
On the second day of deliberations, Warren took exception to the court's instruction on the ground that the offense of "threatening" was added after he had been arrested--for breach of peace--and was in custody. Thus, plaintiff protested, the charge improperly permitted the jury to find for the defendant police officer if probable cause was lacking for the arrest provided there was probable cause for the subsequent charge of threatening. After hearing objections from Dwyer's counsel, the trial court agreed to reinstruct the jury "without doing harm to either side." The Court added:
[The] statutes are in two parts. One is the breach of peace statute and the other is the threatening statute. I simply call your attention to the fact that the threatening charge was not added until plaintiff was under arrest and that threatening charge was added, according to the testimony.
We must determine on appeal whether the district court's clarification of its charge effectively removed any confusion from the jurors' minds as to which principles of law to apply to the facts they found. Norfleet v. Isthmian Lines, Inc., 355 F.2d 359, 362-63 (2d Cir.1966). For the purpose of determining the lawfulness of an arrest, probable cause encompasses only that information available to the arresting official prior to and including the point of seizure. Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 170-78, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 1308-12, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949).
Warren contends that the trial court failed to cure its error and merely restated the evidence, reminded the jury of the sequence of events and told the jurors their "memory" would control. We might be inclined to agree with plaintiff's conclusion on a superficial reading of the record. The entire record, however, reveals that the court later clearly directed the jury to consider only whether there was probable cause for the breach of peace charge. When asked, in a note from the jury, for "a copy of the section ... pertaining to a false arrest but no liability," the court stated If you find by a preponderance of the evidence that the defendant Officer Dwyer did not have probable cause to believe that the plaintiff Lamont Warren was committing the criminal offenses of "breach of the peace" that does not end your inquiry.... [The] defendant may be entitled to ... qualified immunity.
Accordingly, no reasonable juror could have been mislead into believing that the existence of probable cause for the threatening offense was sufficient to reject plaintiff's claim of unlawful arrest.
While any attempt at reading the minds...
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