DeLoach v. Bevers - No Qualified immunity in deliberate coverup

DeLoach v. Bevers, 922 F.2d 618, 621-23 (10th Cir.1990) (denying qualified immunity to police officer on § 1983 claims in light of deliberate conduct amounting to coverup)

A "backwards looking" denial of access to the court complaint must include... !!!

The Case: Jennings v. City of Stillwater, 383 F.3d 1199 (10th Cir. 2004)

Background: Allison Jennings, the plaintiff, a Oklahoma State University (OSU) student, filed a 42 U.S.C. 1983 civil rights lawsuit against four OSU football players and members of the Stillwater Oklahoma Police Department.

The basis of the lawsuit is a sexual encounter between Ms. Jennings, the four football players. The plaintiff claims she was raped, and that the investigator, detective Robert Buzzard, failed to collect material evidence, failed to challenge the football players' account of the events, discouraged Plaintiff from prosecuting the football players in violation of state and federal law, and finally, caused the physical evidence from the alleged rape to be destroyed, making it difficult to maintain a civil action against the football players.

Side Note: Detective Buzzard, he had received an athletic scholarship to play baseball as a student. Detective Buzzard's second cousin, whom he sees about twice a year, is OSU's director of media relations.

The lawsuits were severed, and proceed against each group of defendants under different legal theories. The suit against the football players and OSU had been settled out of court, with a stipulation that the settlement amount remains confidential.

Three legal theories for a constitutional cause of action against the remaining defendants (City of Stillwater, Detective Buzzard and Officer Les Little) who allegedly mishandled or sabotaged the case against her alleged assailants, and the City of Stillwater - the issues of the appeal,.

1. That Detective Buzzard's failure to comply with Oklahoma statutes relating to rape investigations violated her procedural due process rights.
2. That the destruction of the rape kit, the failure to conduct follow-up investigations of material witnesses, and the inaccuracies and omissions contained in the police reports impaired her constitutional right of access to the courts.
3. An equal protection claim stating that over the course of the rape investigation Detective Buzzard discriminated against her by favoring and seeking to protect the football players.

The suit against detective Buzzard proceeded to trial where the district court granted summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity as to the defendants on all claims. The Circuit Court affirmed.

[Read More]

This post only addresses the decision as to the denial of access to the court.

The court treated the issue as a "backwards looking" denial of access to the court, and found that the underlying complaint failed to meet the pleading requirements for backward looking claims established in Christopher v. Harbury, 536 U.S. 403.

The Explanation: According to Harbury, a backwards looking denial of access to the court complaint must "identify a remedy that may be awarded as recompense but not otherwise available in some suit that may yet be brought." Id at 415.

In Jennings, the only remedy that could conceivably be awarded to Plaintiff as a result of the alleged police misconduct would be damages for the loss of her civil tort claim against the assailants; but this is precisely the same element of damage she sought and obtained in her suit against the four football players and OSU.

Far from being barred from bringing such an action, Plaintiff pursued her claims and reached a monetary settlement with the four football players and OSU. She thus had access to the courts, and obtained a remedy. Plaintiff has not specifically alleged, or presented evidence, that the settlement amount was inadequate on account of the government's actions so as to deny her meaningful relief.

At several points in her appellate briefs, she alludes to such a claim.

See, e.g., Pl. Br. 29. ("[T]he question is not merely whether Ms. Jennings could still maintain and prosecution and [sic] action, but also whether or not her ability to receive appropriate compensation has been compromised by the destruction of evidence having a non-speculative value to the case.");

Pl. Br. 30 (none of defendant's arguments "suggests that Ms. Jennings' ability to secure adequate relief was not materially impaired by the destruction of evidence.").

BUT... her complaint contains no such allegation, and the record contains no evidence on the point. Moreover, in light of the confidentiality of Plaintiff's settlement, there is no way such a claim could be evaluated.


CASES CITED RE: DENIAL OF ACCESS TO THE COURT

• Wilson v. Meeks, (10th Cir.1995)
• Foster v. City of Lake Jackson, 28 F.3d 425, 430 (5th Cir.1994)
• Bell v. Milwaukee, 746 F.2d 1205, 1261 (7th Cir.1984)
• Ryland v. Shapiro, 708 F.2d 967, 971-73 (5th Cir.1983)
• Christopher v. Harbury, 536 U.S. 403 (2002)

NOTE: The Court cites Wilson v. Meeks, suggesting that denial of access to the court claims in the 10th Cir. does not include interference with discovery, but is limited to actions that interfere with the filing of the complaint. This is the case in the 5th Circuit (Foster v. City of Lake Jackson, citing Ryland v. Shapiro)

Parallel Case: Broudy, Alice P. vs. Mather, Susan H. - U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Cir. - August 23, 2006, Federal Circuits, Docket 05-5085:

Post Imbler - Obstruction of justice is actionable under 42 USC 1983

The Case: Ryland v. Shaipiro 708 F.2d 967 (5th Cir. 1983)

On appeal from a dismissal for failure to state a cause of action.

FACTS:

• Alfred shapiro, a local prosecutor, murdered Lavonna Rylan
  
• After the murder, Shapiro telephoned Roberts, then an assistant District Attorney, and asked him to come to his residence.
  
• Roberts and Edwin Ware, the District Attorney at the time, canceled a pending autopsy, and went shopping for a coroner who would sign an autopsy report and death certificate claiming the death to be a suicide.

THE CASE:

Hardy and Alma Ryland sued Roberts under 42 USC 1983 claiming that by concealing the murder for a period of approximately eleven months, the defendants prevented them from discovering that their daughter had been murdered. Since the Rylands were entitled to bring a wrongful death action against Shapiro under Article 2315 of the Louisiana Civil Code, they claim that the defendants deprived them of their civil rights by wrongfully interfering with their access to the state courts to pursue their tort claim against Shapiro.

The district court granted the defendants' motion to dismiss, holding that the Rylands lacked standing to bring this suit, and that the defendants were protected by prosecutorial immunity.

The 5th Cir. reverse and remanded.

Questions:

• Did the district court improperly find the defendants did not invade substantive or procedural rights protected by federal statute or the United States Constitution ?
  
• Did the court err in finding the defendants are otherwise entitled to absolute prosecutorial immunity ?

Show/Hide

STANDING:

The district court below viewed the Rylands' claim as a suit by citizens to compel state prosecutors to initiate a criminal action against an alleged murderer.

On appeal, the Fifth Circuit found the district court had failed to entertain the legal theory upon which the Rylands based their case, that agents of the state intentionally engaged in conduct that interfered with their exercise of their constitutionally protected right to institute a wrongful death suit in the Louisiana courts. In other words, a denial of access to the courts.

The Circuit Court found the Ryland's had standing, because a summary judgment rendered as a result of a failure to entertain a valid legal theory is reversible error..., citing Trevino v. Celanese Corp., 701 F.2d 397(5th Cir.1983)

The court then provided a thorough analysis of historic case law establishing denial of access to the courts as a deprivation of one of the most fundamental of Constitutional rights.

ABSOLUTE IMMUNITY:

The district court applied Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U.S. 409, and held that the defendants were shielded by absolute immunity because their actions were taken in their role as prosecutors. On this appeal, the Circuit Court disagreed.

The court noted that Imbler left open the question whether this immunity extends to actions in which the prosecutor acts as an investigator or administrator, rather than as an advocate.

And cited the logic applied in Bell v. City of Milwaukee, 514 F.Supp. 1363, 1372 (E.D.Wis.1981), [Affirmed by Bell v. City of Milwaukee, 746 F.2d 1205 (7th Cir. 1984)]to support the finding that "the alleged actions of the defendants in falsifying the death certificate and in covering up the murder for a period of eleven months, if proven, were actions performed outside their role as prosecutors. Because... characterizing these actions as akin to those traditionally undertaken by officers of the court (which would entitle them to assert absolute immunity) would make a mockery of the judicial system.

Subsequent cases citing Ryland...