Callahan v. Unified Govt of Wyandotte , 806 F.3d 1022 ( 2015 )

FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
November 16, 2015
PUBLISH Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
TENTH CIRCUIT
PATRICK E. CALLAHAN; SCOTT
A. HAMMONS; JASON PITTMAN,
Plaintiffs - Appellees,
v. Nos. 14-3171, 14-3228 and 14-3230
UNIFIED GOVERNMENT OF
WYANDOTTE COUNTY/KANSAS
CITY, KANSAS; RICK
ARMSTRONG, Chief of Police, in his
official and individual capacities;
KEVIN STEELE, Assistant Chief of
Police, in his official and individual
capacities, c/o Kansas City, Kansas
Police Department, MICHAEL YORK;
VINCE DAVENPORT; JAMES
BROWN; GREG LAWSON, CURTIS
NICHOLSON, in their official and
individual capacities,
Defendants - Appellants.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF KANSAS
(D.C. Nos. 2:11-CV-02621-KHV;2:12-CV-02028-KHV;2:12-CV-02010-KHV)
Ryan B. Denk, (Teresa A. Mata and Robert M. Smith of McAnany, Van Cleave &
Phillips, P.A.; and Henry E. Couchman, Jr. of Unified Government of Wyandotte
County, on the briefs), Kansas City, Kansas, for Defendants - Appellants.
Brian F. McCallister, of McCallister Law Firm, P.C. and Arthur A. Benson III
(and Jamie Kathryn Lansford of Arthur Benson & Associates, with him on the
briefs), Kansas City, Missouri, for Plaintiffs - Appellees.
Before KELLY, HARTZ, and GORSUCH, Circuit Judges.
KELLY, Circuit Judge.
The individual Defendants-Appellants appeal from the district court’s
denial of their motions for summary judgment based upon qualified immunity.
The entity Defendant-Appellant (Unified Government of Wyandotte
County/Kansas City) also appeals, arguing that should we determine a
constitutional violation did not occur, we should reverse and render judgment in
its favor. As we discuss, we have jurisdiction to consider the denial of qualified
immunity to the individual Defendants. We reverse the district court’s denial of
qualified immunity on the basis that the law was not clearly established at the
time of the arrests in question. We dismiss the Unified Government’s appeal for
lack of jurisdiction.
Background
These consolidated cases arise from a sting operation designed to determine
if police officers in the Kansas City, Kansas Police Department’s (KCKPD)
SCORE Unit were stealing from residences while executing search warrants. As
a result of the sting operation, three officers were indicted and pled guilty to
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federal crimes. 1 The remaining officers brought claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983,
asserting violations of their Fourth Amendment rights for arrests without probable
cause. 2
A. Events Leading to the Arrests
The SCORE Unit is a specialized, tactical component of the KCKPD,
equivalent to a SWAT team. V Aplt. App. 715; X Aplt. App. 1295. Throughout
the spring and summer of 2010, KCKPD received three allegations of theft from
residences where SCORE had participated in executing search warrants. V Aplt.
App. 717; X Aplt. App. 1297. Based on these allegations, the KCKPD planned a
sting operation in collaboration with the FBI to determine the integrity of the
SCORE Unit—“Operation Sticky Fingers.” V Aplt. App. 720–21; X Aplt. App.
1298.
Operation Sticky Fingers involved the execution of a fictitious search
1
Officers Darrell Forrest, Jeffrey Bell, and Dustin Sillings.
2
This appeal involves three cases consolidated for appeal. Callahan v.
Unified Gov’t, No. 14-3171 (individual defendants: former Police Chief Rick
Armstrong, Assistant Chief Lieutenant Colonel James Brown, former Captain
Greg Lawson, and former Captain Curtis Nicholson); Hammons v. Unified Gov’t,
No. 14-3228 (individual defendants: Armstrong, Lawson, Nicholson, and former
Major Vince Davenport); and Pittman v. Unified Gov’t, No. 14-3230 (individual
defendants: Armstrong, Lawson, Nicholson, former Assistant Chief Lieutenant
Colonel Kevin Steel, and former Captain Michael York). For simplicity’s sake,
we refer to all individual defendants collectively as “Defendants” and all
plaintiffs collectively as “Plaintiffs.” Four related but separate actions are also on
appeal. Gambrill v. Unified Gov’t, No.14-3229; Gardner v. Unified Gov’t,
No.14-3234; Hoang v. Unified Gov’t, No. 14-3233; and Mills v. Unified Gov’t,
No. 14-3235.
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warrant by the SCORE team at a residence monitored via live video and audio
feed by Detective Jon Kelley of the KCKPD and FBI Special Agent Bob Schaefer.
V Aplt. App. 729, 731; X Aplt. App. 1303, 1305. Bait items had been placed in
the northwest bedroom and the basement. V Aplt. App. 729; X Aplt. App. 1303.
While observing the live video, Detective Kelley was able to observe several
instances of actual theft. 3 Because of the protective gear the SCORE officers
were wearing, Detective Kelley could not identify which officers he observed
committing theft. See V Aplt. App. 733; X Aplt. App. 1306. Therefore, he
relayed his observations to Captain Lawson at another location, who would then
contact Captain Nicholson, present at the residence. V Aplt. App. 732; X Aplt.
App. 1305. Captain Nicholson, based on the secondhand information, would
attempt to identify the officers Detective Kelley observed by going to the rooms
where the thefts occurred. V Aplt. App. 732; X Aplt. App. 1305. Because the
house was small and the information was delayed in getting to Captain Nicholson,
it was possible for the officers to have moved around the house before Captain
Nicholson could accurately identify them. X Aplt. App. 1305.
After the sting, the SCORE officers returned to the parking garage at
KCKPD headquarters, where KCKPD commanders arrested all the members of
3
Plaintiffs are inconsistent in the number of thefts they admit occurred.
See Aplee. Br. at 1–2, 9, 11; Oral Arg., 26:22–26. We find the exact number of
thefts immaterial.
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the SCORE unit as they exited their van. V Aplt. App. 739; X Aplt. App. 1309;
see Aplee. Br. at 3. It was later determined that only Officers Forrest, Bell, and
Sillings were involved in the thefts. At the time, however, the extent of the thefts
and the identities of the thieves remained unknown.
B. The Lawsuits that Followed
In their civil rights suits, Plaintiffs Callahan, Pitman, and Hammons, who
did not participate in the thefts, claim that no probable cause existed to arrest
them. 4 Before the district court, Plaintiffs moved for partial summary judgment
on this issue. Viewing the facts in favor of the Defendants, the district court
denied Plaintiffs’ motions, concluding that the record could support a finding that
probable cause existed to arrest the entire SCORE unit. XVII Aplt. App.
2615–44. The individual Defendants then moved for summary judgment on the
issue of qualified immunity. The district court, in Callahan, overruled this
motion, merely citing genuine issues of material fact—without identifying those
facts. Id. at 2608-09.
Defendants filed a motion for reconsideration of the Callahan order,
requesting a more thorough explanation of the issues of fact on which the court
relied. At the same time, Defendants also filed a notice of appeal. The court
overruled Defendants’ motion for reconsideration, reiterating that it based its
4
Plaintiffs also brought claims under state law.
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decision on genuine issues of material fact. Callahan v. Unified Gov’t, No. 11-
CV-2621-KHV, 2014 WL 4437559, at *3 (D. Kan. Sept. 9, 2014). The court then
briefly explained the facts on which it based its ruling, characterizing them as
either undisputed or construed in favor of the Plaintiff.
First, the court found that Defendants arrested Plaintiffs, as opposed to
merely detaining them. 5 Second, nobody saw Plaintiffs commit or witness the
thefts. Id. at *4. Also notable to the court was that Police Chief Armstrong told
the commanders making the arrest that “a few” of the SCORE members had stolen
during the sting. Id. Finally, “[w]hile defendants maintain that the SCORE unit
was close knit (suggesting that SCORE officers knew that some were stealing),
plaintiff [Callahan] maintains that they were not; rather, they trusted each other to
know what they were doing and to do the right thing at work.” Id. at *4 n.5.
Applying the original Callahan ruling, the court denied summary judgment in
Pittman and Hammons as well. XVII Aplt. App. 2715–18. Defendants then filed
an amended notice of appeal of the Callahan order and also appealed both the
Pittman and Hammons orders. We consolidated these appeals for procedural
purposes.
5
For purposes of this appeal, Defendants concede that an arrest occurred.
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Discussion
A. Our Limited Jurisdiction
Qualified immunity “protects government officials ‘from liability for civil
damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or
constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.’” Pearson
v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231 (2009) (quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S.
800, 818 (1982)). This protection applies to “all but the plainly incompetent or
those who knowingly violate the law.” Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341
(1986). We review de novo a district court’s denial of a summary judgment
motion raising qualified immunity. Gross v. Pirtle, 245 F.3d 1151, 1155 (10th
Cir. 2001). Because qualified immunity establishes “immunity from suit rather
than a mere defense to liability,” Lewis v. Tripp, 604 F.3d 1221, 1225 (10th Cir.
2010) (internal quotations and citation omitted), a district court’s denial of a
claim of qualified immunity is immediately appealable under 28 U.S.C. § 1291.
Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 530 (1985). Our jurisdiction, however, is
limited to whether the facts of the case constituted a violation of clearly
established law. Clark v. Wilson, 625 F.3d 686, 689 (10th Cir. 2010). We lack
jurisdiction if the district court denied qualified immunity based only on evidence
sufficiency. Gross, 245 F.3d at 1156.
Plaintiffs argue that we lack jurisdiction to hear this appeal because the
district court’s order relied on disputes of material facts and not questions of law.
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But if the district court inadequately explains the factual basis for its decision, we
have the authority to “review the entire record de novo to determine for ourselves
as a matter of law which factual inferences a reasonable jury could and could not
make.” Lewis, 604 F.3d at 1225. Invoking this, Defendants argue that the
district court did not sufficiently identify the facts supporting its conclusion.
Therefore, they argue, we should perform an independent review of the record.
We find that unnecessary. The district court made clear that it based its
decision on disputed facts and, despite its brief explanation, 6 sufficiently
established for us what the operative facts were. Regardless, we have jurisdiction
to hear the individual Defendants’ appeals. In reaching our decision, we are not
“second-guessing the district court’s determinations of evidence sufficiency.”
6
The court explained why it “did not ‘address all arguments, evidence and
matters presented by parties. . .’”: “Given the fact that for nearly four years, the
Court has had one and sometimes two vacancies out of six authorized district
judge positions, the Court encourages the parties to contact their United States
Senators Pat Roberts and Jerry Moran to address this Court’s inability to
accommodate their request for more plenary work product.” The court also noted
that:
It is an overstatement to say it is only fair that the more people use a
resource, the more they should pay for it. This axiom makes sense
regarding electricity; not so much regarding the federal court system.
But judicial resources are finite. At some point, increasing caseloads
[and decreasing judicial resources] detrimentally affect the level of
service . . . that . . . federal judges provide.
Id. (alterations in original) (quoting David R. Cohen, Special Masters Versus
Magistrate Judges: No Contest, Fed. Law., Sept. 2014, at 76).
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Gross, 245 F.3d at 1157 (citing Behrens v. Pelletier, 516 U.S. 299, 312–13
(1996)). Rather, “under any view of the facts,” we cannot say that Defendants
violated Plaintiffs’ clearly established rights. See Armijo ex rel. Armijo Sanchez
v. Peterson, 601 F.3d 1065, 1067–68 (10th Cir. 2010).
B. Qualified Immunity
Summary judgment is proper only if no dispute of material fact exists and
“the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Tolan v. Cotton, 134 S.
Ct. 1861, 1866 (2014) (internal quotations omitted). In deciding this, we view the
evidence in favor of the nonmovant. Id. When a defendant raises the defense of
qualified immunity, the plaintiff bears the burden to demonstrate that the
defendant violated his constitutional rights and that the right was clearly
established. See Gross, 245 F.3d at 1155–56. If the plaintiff meets this burden,
then the defendant must show that no genuine issues of material fact exist. Id. at
1156 (citing Albright v. Rodriguez, 51 F.3d 1531, 1535 (10th Cir. 1995)). This
high burden requires Plaintiffs here to not only establish that no probable cause
existed, but also that this was clearly established law such that reasonable officers
in this case would know that their actions were improper. We have discretion to
decide which prong of the qualified immunity analysis to address first. Pearson,
555 U.S. at 236. Because we conclude that Plaintiffs have not carried their
burden in showing that the law was clearly established, it is unnecessary to
address whether Defendants had probable cause.
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In this circuit, to show that a right is clearly established, the plaintiff must
point to “a Supreme Court or Tenth Circuit decision on point, or the clearly
established weight of authority from other courts must have found the law to be as
the plaintiff maintains.” Estate of Booker v. Gomez, 745 F.3d 405, 427 (10th Cir.
2014) (quoting Fogarty v. Gallegos, 523 F.3d 1147, 1161 (10th Cir. 2008)). The
law is also clearly established if the conduct is so obviously improper that any
reasonable officer would know it was illegal. See Hope v. Pelzer, 536 U.S. 730,
739–42 (2002). Without such conduct, case, or consensus, we may not second-
guess judgments of law enforcement with the benefit of hindsight.
Plaintiffs and the district court confounded this inquiry by engaging in
generic, overbroad, and conclusory analyses on the question of clearly established
law. Both assert that the law was clearly established that an officer must have
probable cause to make a warrantless arrest. Of course it was. But such a
sweeping pronouncement of the law could not put Defendants on fair notice that
their conduct was illegal. Presenting the issue so broadly is at odds with the
Supreme Court’s consistent admonishment “not to define clearly established law
at a high level of generality.” Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. 2074, 2084 (2011).
Though “a case directly on point” is not required, “existing precedent must have
placed the statutory or constitutional question beyond debate.” Stanton v. Sims,
134 S. Ct. 3, 5 (2013) (quoting al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. at 2083).
The proper and properly-focused inquiry is whether the law was clearly
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established that an officer could not arrest an entire small group when he knows
some unidentifiable members, if not all members, of that group have committed a
crime. This question of probable cause in multi-suspect situations is far from
beyond debate. Plaintiffs and the district court relied upon Ybarra v. Illinois to
remind us that probable cause must be particularized to the individual who is
searched or seized. Ybarra v. Illinois, 444 U.S. 85, 91 (1979). Indeed, Ybarra
may have served as a case on point if Maryland v. Pringle—which the district
court appears to have overlooked in its clearly established law analysis—had
never been decided. But Pringle makes the question debatable at the very least,
and therefore precludes a finding that the law was clearly established. See, e.g.,
Tracey Maclin, The Pringle Case’s New Notion of Probable Cause: An Assault on
Di Re and the Fourth Amendment, 2004 Cato Sup. Ct. Rev. 395, 427 (2004)
(positing that Pringle likely “translates into a new per se rule that permits the
arrest of multiple suspects whenever police discover contraband in compact
spaces”); 2 Wayne R. LaFave, Search & Seizure: A Treatise on the Fourth
Amendment § 3.6(c) (5th ed.) (recognizing an “undercurrent” in Pringle that
views probable cause “as something less than more-probable-than-not and views
arrest as sometimes serving an investigative function” and admitting that it is
uncertain if this will impact “how lower courts construe the case in the years
ahead”); 2 Wayne R. LaFave, et al., Crim. Proc. § 3.3(b) (3d ed.) (citing
precedent that probable cause requires “a basis for singling out but one person,”
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but admitting Pringle “can be interpreted otherwise”).
In Ybarra, police officers in possession of a valid search warrant covering a
tavern and its bartender also searched the patrons in the tavern. Ybarra, 444 U.S.
at 88–89. The Court, holding the searches of the patrons unconstitutional,
explained that “a person’s mere propinquity to others independently suspected of
criminal activity does not, without more, give rise to probable cause to search that
person.” Id. at 91 (citing Sibron v. New York, 392 U.S. 40, 62–63 (1968)).
Particularized probable cause “cannot be undercut or avoided by simply pointing
to the fact that coincidentally there exists probable cause to search or seize
another or to search the premises where the person may happen to be.” Id.In Pringle, an officer pulled a car over for speeding. Maryland v. Pringle,
540 U.S. 366, 368 (2003). When the driver retrieved his registration, the officer
observed a large amount of money in the glove compartment. Id. The driver
consented to a search of his vehicle, which revealed the money as well as five
small bags of cocaine located behind the backseat armrest. Id. When none of the
three occupants of the car claimed the drugs, the officer arrested all three. Id. at
368–69. Pringle attempted to suppress his later confession as the fruit of an
illegal arrest, arguing the officer lacked probable cause particularized to him. Id.
at 369.
The Supreme Court rejected this argument and distinguished this case from
Ybarra. Id. at 373. First, all three men had access to the drugs. Id. at 371–72.
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This was a “relatively small automobile, not a public tavern,” and car passengers
are often engaged in a “common enterprise” and “have the same interest in
concealing the fruits or the evidence of their wrongdoing.” Id. at 373 (internal
quotation marks and citation omitted). Drug dealing, the Court noted, is “an
enterprise to which a dealer would be unlikely to admit an innocent person with
the potential to furnish evidence against him.” Id. It was reasonable for the
officer to conclude he had probable cause that Pringle committed the drug crime
“either solely or jointly.” Id. at 372. While “any inference that everyone on the
scene of a crime is a party to it must disappear” if the guilty person is singled out,
id. at 374 (alterations omitted) (quoting United States v. Di Re, 332 U.S. 581,
592–94 (1948)), without such a singling out, the officer could reasonably infer
“that any or all three of the occupants had knowledge of, and exercised dominion
and control over, the cocaine.” See id. at 372 (emphasis added).
Before we hold officers liable, we must ensure that they were fairly put on
notice that their actions were unlawful. The contours of the law must be
sufficiently drawn so that a reasonable officer knows when he is acting outside of
those lines—the law must be clearly established. That was simply not the case
here. Though Ybarra requires particularized probable cause, Pringle raises
questions regarding how that requirement is satisfied in multi-suspect situations.
The officer in Pringle knew a crime had been committed but could not identify
the perpetrator. He was presented with three suspects, none of whom were
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independently suspected prior to the stop. Evidence of a “common enterprise”
existed, and so the officer could reasonably infer that all present were involved in
the crime. In such a scenario, the Supreme Court seemed satisfied that Ybarra’s
particularized probable cause requirement was met. But see Maclin, supra, at 415
(arguing that Pringle effectively eliminated Ybarra’s particularized probable
cause requirement).
But what if there were ten passengers, not three? What if the suspects were
in a house, not a car? What if they were engaged in theft, not drug dealing? The
Court did not establish a clear standard for applying Pringle beyond its specific
facts. But neither are the facts of this case so distinct from Pringle that an officer
could not reasonably assume it applied. Simply put, Pringle’s application to this
case is debatable. See 2 LaFave, Search & Seizure, supra, § 3.2(e) (concluding
that the Supreme Court side-stepped the question of whether probable cause
requires “more probable than not as to a particular member of the group”). We
cannot ask officers to make a legal determination—that law professors probably
could not agree upon—without any guidance from the courts and then hold them
liable for guessing incorrectly. Qualified immunity exists to prevent exactly that.
Plaintiffs offer us no other case on point to establish that Defendants violated
their clearly established rights by arresting the entire unit.
C. The Unified Government’s Appeal
Of course, an entity defendant is not entitled to qualified immunity and the
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denial of summary judgment is not immediately appealable. Moore v. City of
Wynnewood, 57 F.3d 924, 928–29 (10th Cir. 1995). We refuse to exercise
pendent jurisdiction to avoid that result.
REVERSED. We DISMISS the appeal of the Unified Government. We
GRANT Defendants’ motion to file a supplemental appendix. All other pending
motions seeking any other relief are DENIED.
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