Pete's Towing Co. v. City of Tampa, Florida , 378 F. App'x 917 ( 2010 )

[DO NOT PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
________________________ FILED
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
No. 09-14718 ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
MAY 06, 2010
Non-Argument Calendar
JOHN LEY
________________________
CLERK
D.C. Docket No. 08-00209-CV-T-23-EAJ
PETE'S TOWING CO., a Florida corporation,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
CITY OF TAMPA, FLORIDA, a municipal corporation,
STEPHEN HOGUE, City of Tampa Police Chief,
MICHAEL KITT, Sergeant,
JOSE PENICHET, Sergeant,
Defendants-Appellees.
________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
________________________
(May 6, 2010)
Before EDMONDSON, BIRCH and COX, Circuit Judges.
PER CURIAM:
Pete’s Towing Company contracted with business establishments operating
apartment complexes and other business establishments to tow and impound
trespassing vehicles. Pete’s also participated in a rotating tow list administered by
the Tampa Police Department; it towed vehicles upon request of the police
department, usually from accident scenes. The police department received a number
of complaints from vehicle owners alleging that Pete’s illegally towed and impounded
their vehicles. According to Pete’s, police officers often responded to these
complaints by advocating for the vehicle owners and demanding that the vehicles be
released without charge. Pete’s also asserts that its employees were harassed,
threatened with arrest if they refused to release vehicles, and informed that the towing
company was under investigation, would be removed from the police towing rotation,
“put out of business,” or “shut down.”
Pete’s filed complaints with the police department’s internal affairs office
regarding the harassment of its employees. A few months later, it was removed from
the tow rotation upon the recommendation of the police department’s
communications manager, who cited the high number of complaints by customers as
the basis for his recommendation. Pete’s asserts that after it was removed from the
towing rotation, “the level of harassment escalated,” and the company’s owners
secretly formed other towing companies operating out of separate facilities to avoid
2
harassment from police officers. Once officers discovered that these companies were
owned and operated by the owners of Pete’s, it claims “the familiar pattern of
harassment” began against these companies as well.
Pete’s brought this 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action against: the City of Tampa; Chief
of Police Steven Hogue; Sergeants Jose Penichet and Michael Kitts; Officers Orlando
Gudes, Patricia Lastra, Darryl Johnson, John Ricardo, and Johny Adkins; and
Assistant City Attorney Laurie Woodham. The Complaint alleged violations of the
towing company’s rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendment. All defendants
moved to dismiss, and Pete’s voluntarily dismissed, with prejudice, its claims against
Johnson and Ricardo. The court then dismissed claims against Gudes, Lastra,
Adkins, and Woodham; held Pete’s stated a claim for which relief could be granted
against Hogue, Penichet, and Kitts; and granted leave to amend the Complaint. Pete’s
filed an Amended Complaint, and later a Second Amended Complaint against the
City of Tampa, Hogue, Penichet, and Kitts. The Second Amended Complaint alleged
four counts: (I) violation of the towing company’s liberty interest; (II) a violation of
procedural due process; (III) a violation of equal protection; and (IV) First
Amendment retaliation.
The district court entered a case management and scheduling order setting a
discovery deadline of November 1, 2008, and a deadline for dispositive motions of
3
January 13, 2009. The motion deadline was ultimately extended to March 16, and on
that date Defendants filed a motion for summary judgment. On April 23, Pete’s filed
a response in opposition to summary judgment and filed affidavits of Ian McGeehan,
the company’s part-owner, and Alexis Torres, an employee of one of the other towing
companies owned and operated by the owners of Pete’s. Torres’s affidavit asserted
that on March 15, 2009, he was arrested as part of the ongoing campaign of
harassment by the police department. Prior to submitting the affidavit, Pete’s did not
identify Torres as a potential witness. In addition, McGeehan’s affidavit included
allegations that had not been previously disclosed to Defendants in response to
discovery requests. On the same day it filed its response to summary judgment,
Pete’s filed a motion to supplement or amend the complaint with the information
contained in the affidavits of Torres and McGeehan. The court denied this motion,
which did not seek to add additional causes of action or parties but merely additional
bases in support of the original claims, for undue delay and resulting prejudice to the
defendants.
Defendants then filed a motion to strike Torres’s affidavit in its entirety,
portions of McGeehan’s affidavit that contradicted deposition testimony, and portions
of McGeehan’s affidavit that had not been previously disclosed. The district court
referred this motion and the motion for summary judgment to a magistrate judge for
4
consideration. The magistrate judge recommended that the motion to strike be denied
as to the portion of McGeehan’s affidavit alleged to contradict deposition testimony,
but granted as to the portions of McGeehan’s affidavit not previously disclosed and
as to Torres’s affidavit. The magistrate judge also recommended that Defendants’
motion for summary judgment be granted. Over an objection by Pete’s, the district
court adopted the magistrate judge’s report and recommendation.
Pete’s appeals. First, it contends that the court abused its discretion in granting
the motion to strike the affidavits. Second, Pete’s contends that the court erred by not
construing its motion to amend or supplement its complaint as a Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 56(f) motion and by not sua sponte continuing the summary judgment
proceedings to permit supplementation of its Rule 26 disclosures. Third, Pete’s
contends that there was sufficient evidence notwithstanding the assertions in the
excluded affidavits to preclude the grant of summary judgment. (Appellant’s Br. at
21.)
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a)(3) requires a party to disclose the
identity of a witness it expects to testify at trial. Rule 26(e) requires a party to
supplement disclosures or discovery responses in a timely manner if the party learns
that in some material respect the disclosures or responses are incomplete or incorrect
and if the corrective information has not otherwise been made known to the other
5
party during the discovery process or in writing. Rule 37(c) provides that if a party
fails to provide information or identify a witness as required by Rule 26, the party is
not allowed to use that information or witness to supply evidence on a motion, at a
hearing, or at trial unless the nondisclosing party shows that the failure is
substantially justified or is harmless. Our review of a ruling under Rule 37 “is
sharply limited to a search for an abuse of discretion and a determination that the
findings of the trial court are fully supported by the record.” Serra Chevrolet, Inc. v.
Gen. Motors Corp., 446 F.3d 1137, 1146-47 (11th Cir. 2006) (quotations and citation
omitted). In reviewing the exclusion of a non-disclosed witness, we consider “(1) the
importance of the testimony; (2) the reason for the appellant’s failure to disclose the
witness earlier; and (3) the prejudice to the opposing party if the witness had been
allowed to testify.” Bearint ex rel. Bearint v. Dorell Juvenile Group, Inc., 389 F.3d
1339, 1353 (11th Cir. 2004) (citation omitted).
We find no reversible error in the exclusion of the Torres affidavit and portions
of the McGeehan affidavit. The facts McGeehan attested to occurred between
October 2008 and March 2009, and the facts Torres attested to occurred one day prior
to the filing of Defendants’ motion for summary judgment. Pete’s filed the affidavits
with its summary judgment papers five-weeks after the filing of Defendants’ motion
and without first supplementing its disclosures to list Torres as a witness or disclose
6
the information offered by McGeehan that had not been included in prior responses
to discovery requests. Pete’s offered the court no justification for its delay in
disclosing the information. And, because Defendants filed their summary judgment
papers prior to being informed of the facts attested to in the affidavits, Defendants
would have been prejudiced had the affidavits been considered. Therefore, we
conclude the court did not abuse its discretion in striking the McGeehan affidavit in
part and the Torres affidavit in its entirety.1
We also find no reversible error in the court’s failure to construe the motion to
amend or supplement the Complaint as a Rule 56(f) motion for a continuance to
permit additional discovery. Rule 56(f) “allows a party who ‘has no specific material
contradicting his adversary’s presentation to survive a summary judgment motion if
he presents valid reasons justifying his failure of proof.’” Wallace v. Brownell
Pontiac-GMC Co., 703 F.2d 525, 527 (11th Cir. 1983) (quoting 10A C. Wright, A.
Miller, & M. Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2740 at 530 (2d ed. 1983)).
At the time Pete’s filed its motion to amend its Complaint it was in possession of all
the information it believed sufficient to oppose Defendants’ motion for summary
1
It may be that admission of the evidence that was stricken required that Pete’s receive
permission to file a supplemental complaint under Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(d). Since no such permission
was granted, however, we need not be detained by consideration of whether this was also a basis for
striking the affidavits in question.
7
judgment. Pete’s did not inform the court that additional discovery would enable it
to produce facts that would rebut Defendants’ showing of the absence of a genuine
issue of fact. Therefore, the court had no reason to construe the motion to amend the
Complaint as a Rule 56(f) motion and to order a continuance to permit additional
discovery.
Because we affirm the striking of the Torres affidavit and portions of the
McGeehan affidavit and find no error in failure to order a continuance of the
summary judgment proceedings, we consider whether Defendants are entitled to
summary judgment based on the evidence considered by the district court. After
review of the record, we agree with the analysis contained in the report and
recommendation that was adopted by the district court. (R.1-66 at 10-26.) We
conclude that Defendants are entitled to summary judgment on all claims.
AFFIRMED.
8