Wray v. City of New York
| Decision Date | 18 October 2004 |
| Docket Number | No. 01-CV-04837.,01-CV-04837. |
| Citation | 340 F.Supp.2d 291 |
| Parties | Raymond WRAY, Plaintiff, v. CITY OF NEW YORK, New York City Police Department, Daniel Martorano, Police Officer, William Weller, Police Officer, James McCavera, Police Officer, and Police Officers "John Does" including supervisors, in their Individual and Official Capacities, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of New York |
Dawn M. Cardi & Associates by Dawn M. Cardi, Esq., Robert Rosenthal, Esq. by Robert Rosenthal, Esq., New York City, for Plaintiff.
Corporation Counsel of the City of New York by Liora Jacobi, Esq., New York City, for Defendants.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
I. Introduction .......................................................295
II. Facts and Procedural History .......................................296
III. Law ................................................................301
A. Summary Judgment Standard .......................................301
B. Police Officers .................................................301
1. Individual Capacity ..........................................301
a. False Arrest and False Imprisonment .......................301
b. Use of Suggestive Showup ..................................302
c. Malicious Prosecution .....................................302
d. Failure to Intercede ......................................302
2. Official Capacity ............................................303
C. New York City Police Department .................................303
D. City's Failure to Train .........................................303
1. Police Officers ..............................................304
2. District Attorneys ...........................................304
E. Notice of Claim under New York City General Municipal Law........305
IV. Application of Law to Facts ........................................305
A. Police Officers .................................................305
1. Individual Capacity ..........................................305
a. False Arrest and False Imprisonment .......................305
b. Use of Suggestive Showup ..................................306
c. Malicious Prosecution .....................................306
d. Failure to Intercede ......................................306
2. Official Capacity ............................................306
B. New York City Police Department .................................307
C. City's Failure to Train .........................................307
1. Police Officers ..............................................307
2. District Attorneys ...........................................307
D. Notice of Claim under New York City General Municipal Law........307
V. Interlocutory Appeal ...............................................308
VI. Conclusion .........................................................308
Plaintiff Raymond Wray — found to have been improperly convicted in state court for an armed robbery and then "exonerated" — states an arguably viable section 1983 claim against police officer William Weller for conducting an improperly suggestive showup at a police precinct lockup and against the City of New York for failure to train the police on proper identification procedures. Remaining claims against police officers and the City are dismissed. Wray's argument that the City is responsible for failing to train district attorneys not to use illegally obtained evidence cannot be countenanced; in the criminal courts district attorneys are independent of municipal control.
In setting aside Wray's conviction, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit — as did the Appellate Division on a direct appeal and the federal district court on a habeas petition — found the showup by the police at the station house unconstitutionally suggestive. Unlike these other courts, however, the Court of Appeals found the police investigation so flawed and proof of guilt so inadequate as to require setting aside the conviction because of use of evidence of the showup at trial.
Wray sought federal habeas corpus relief after his convictions for robbery and weapons offenses were upheld on direct appeal. He alleged that he was denied due process when the state trial court improperly permitted the use of testimony regarding a witness's out of court showup identification at a precinct lockup. His petition was dismissed by this court. The Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit reversed. It concluded that the admission of the showup evidence was not harmless error. The Queens District Attorney declined to retry Wray. State court charges were then dismissed.
Wray sues the City of New York under section 1983 of title 42 of the United States Code, asserting pendent jurisdiction over related state law claims. Also named as defendants are the Police Department and police officer Daniel Martorano, police officer William Weller, police sergeant James McCavera and unnamed police officers, in their individual and official capacities. Alleged are federal constitutional and state law violations arising out of Wray's arrest and the use of the showup evidence. Damages and injunctive relief are sought requiring training by the City of police and district attorneys on proper identification procedures.
Defendants move for summary judgment on various grounds. They include the existence of probable cause, qualified immunity and failure to state a claim under section 1983 and state causes of action.
Shortly after midnight on November 25, 1990, officers Martorano, Weller and McCavera were at a stakeout observing the front of a restaurant from a rooftop across the street. Officers Martorano and Weller say they saw Wray, in the company of Dennis Bailey, point a gun at Melvin Mitchell and take Mitchell's jacket. Mitchell was accompanied by his friend Craig Williams. Officers Weller and McCavera promptly left the rooftop to apprehend the robbers while officer Martorano remained on the roof, called for backup and stayed in radio contact with his two team members. Officer Martorano observed Wray and his accomplice, Bailey, walk to the restaurant; Wray handed the gun to Bailey, who remained on the street, and then went into the restaurant. Weller and McCavera arrested Bailey, who was carrying a gun.
As Bailey was being escorted to a marked backup police car, officers Martorano and Weller say they saw Wray come out of the restaurant, observe the arrest and run back in. Officer Weller looked inside the restaurant and spotted Wray standing at the back, looking directly at him. Officer Weller then went into the restaurant with officer McCavera and a uniformed police officer, found the stolen jacket, and arrested Wray, who had no weapon.
The victim, Mitchell, and his friend Williams were not on the scene when the arrests occurred, but Mitchell returned to the scene almost immediately and an officer asked him to go to the police station. Within an hour of the arrests, the victim, Mitchell, and his friend Williams were at the station house.
The evidence as to identification at the police station is ambiguous. According to the police, Mitchell and Williams each separately identified Wray, then in a jail cell, as the gunman. Officer Martorano brought Mitchell to the holding cell, pointed to Wray and asked whether Mitchell recognized the prisoner. Officer Martorano recollected that Mitchell confirmed that Wray was the gunman who had taken his jacket. Mitchell testified both before the grand jury and at Wade hearing that he told the police that Wray was with the gunman, not that he was the gunman. The recollections of officer Martorano and Mitchell also differed on whether Wray was alone or with one other person in the cell.
It is agreed that Williams positively identified Wray, while he was in a cell, as the gunman. There is no indisputable information in the record identifying the police officer who brought Williams to the holding cell to identify Wray, aside from Williams' statement, "I think his name starts with a W. Wellie," which a jury, on the other evidence, might find referred to officer Weller.
After Wray was indicted, he moved to dismiss the indictment. The New York state trial court denied Wray's motion, finding that "the evidence adduced before the Grand Jury was legally sufficient to support the charges in the Indictment," the legal instructions given by the District Attorney to the Grand Jury were proper, and "the Indictment is sufficiently specific." Meanwhile, Bailey pled guilty to criminal possession of a weapon. Bailey stated at his allocution that Wray had handed the gun to him but he did not see or know anything about how Wray got the jacket.
At a Wade hearing the trial judge suppressed any evidence of Mitchell's station house identification of Wray, but found that Mitchell had an independent basis to make an in-court identification. The court ruled that Williams would be allowed to testify to his identification of Wray at the station house; although Williams was unable to recognize Wray at the Wade hearing, he testified that he had seen the robbers around the neighborhood before and after the robbery.
At trial officers Martorano and Weller each identified Wray as the gunman. Neither Williams nor Mitchell recognized Wray as the gunman. Williams did not even recognize Wray as a robber but testified, at different points, that the person he had seen from a side view at the showup was or "looked like" the gunman. When shown the photographs of Wray taken at the police station, Williams testified that the person in the photographs "kind of" looked...
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