Michael Beckinger v. Township of Elizabeth , 434 F. App'x 164 ( 2011 )

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
____________
No. 10-2002
____________
MICHAEL BECKINGER;
ADAM BLAKE;
DAVID KERESTES;
PAUL SAXON;
JUSTIN WARDMAN,
Appellants
v.
TOWNSHIP OF ELIZABETH;
DONALD R. SIMILO, Commissioner;
JOANNE BECKOWITZ, Commissioner;
ROBERT THOMAS, Commissioner;
HELEN KOCHAN, Commissioner;
EDWARD GRONLUND, Commissioner;
ROBERT H. KEEFER, Commissioner;
LARRY VOTA, Commissioner;
CHIEF OF POLICE ROBERT W. MCNEILLY;
ADMIN. SERGEANT WILLIAM K. BLACK,
individually and in their capacity
___________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Pennsylvania
(D.C. Civil No. 2-08-cv-00432)
District Judge: Honorable Joy Flowers Conti
___________
Submitted Under Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
May 13, 2011
Before: SMITH, CHAGARES, and VANASKIE, Circuit Judges
(Filed: June 29, 2011)
___________
OPINION OF THE COURT
___________
VANASKIE, Circuit Judge.
At issue on this appeal is whether the District Court erred in sustaining the defense
of qualified immunity to Appellants‟ First Amendment claims and in declining to
exercise supplemental jurisdiction over Appellants‟ state law claims. Discerning no
error, we will affirm the District Court‟s judgment.
I.
As we write only for the parties, who are familiar with the facts and procedural
history of the case, we relate the background of this case only to the extent that it is
essential to our own analysis. Appellants Michael Beckinger, Adam Blake, David
Kerestes, Paul Saxon, and Justin Wardman are police officers employed by Appellee
Elizabeth Township. In addition to Elizabeth Township, Appellants named as defendants
Appellees Chief of Police McNeilly and Administrative Sergeant Black, township
employees who had positions of authority within the police department.
Elizabeth Township has an ordinance prohibiting on-street parking in certain areas
of residential districts when off-street parking is available. To enforce this ordinance, the
township police would issue parking citation tags to offenders. First, however, township
policy directed officers, upon receipt of a complaint, to investigate by knocking on the
door of the residence believed to be associated with an illegally parked vehicle. The
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officer would then attempt to ascertain the owner‟s identity and the reason that the
vehicle was parked on the street. At that point, the officer would direct the owner to
move the vehicle, rather than immediately issuing a citation. Apparently, if the owner
did not cooperate or could not be located, a citation would be issued. In 2005, the
township issued nineteen parking citations, and issued only seven in 2006.
In early 2007, McNeilly and Black recognized that the township citation forms
were out-of-date, containing incorrect addresses and payment directions. Accordingly,
on January 16, 2007, Black issued Administrative Sergeant Memorandum No. 07-06,
directing all township officers not to use the township citation forms for parking offenses,
and instead to use state traffic citation forms. This memorandum also outlined detailed
procedures for implementing the parking ordinance:
In order to be fair to all concerned, state tags will be issued and any person
who wishes to contest the situation will be directed to do so by requesting a
hearing in front of the magistrate. Officers are reminded that it may be
necessary, in some circumstances, to knock on a residents [sic] door to
clarify that a vehicle or vehicles in violation are actually connected with
that resident, prior to issuing a citation.
(A. 51.) Within a week of this memorandum, six township police officers, claiming a
need to clear the roads following a heavy snowfall, issued approximately 75 parking
citations to township residents. The issue quickly outraged the public. Township
residents began to complain about the incident at public supervisors‟ meetings, and it
ultimately came to the attention of two major area newspapers.
In an effort to quell the public outrage, McNeilly issued a memorandum to the six
officers. McNeilly indicated his concern about the spike in ticket-writing, and directed
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offers to write a memorandum answering a list of specific questions intended to help him
understand whether a drastic change in local conditions prompted the surge in parking
tickets. In response, several officers wrote memoranda indicating that they did not
attempt to contact the vehicle owners prior to writing citations.
On January 30, 2007, Black, at McNeilly‟s direction, issued yet another
memorandum, No. 07-17, to the officers:
Any officer that receives a notice from the magistrates [sic] office,
regarding hearings set for “Township Ordinance – Parking Violations” or
“Any State Parking Violations”, [sic] shall not attend those hearings. No
overtime will be authorized for officers to attend these type [of] hearings.
(A. 56.)
On or about January 31, 2007, a magisterial district judge issued “Notice of Trial /
Summary Case” to the individuals who received parking tickets, with copies to the
officers who issued the citations. Appellant Saxon attended a parking citation hearing
and submitted a request for overtime pay in connection with his attendance. He was
subsequently disciplined for his action with a three-day suspension, which was upheld by
the board of commissioners and a neutral arbitrator after a grievance hearing. Although
receiving similar notices, Appellants Beckinger and Wardman did not attend any parking
citation hearings connected with the citations that they issued. Appellants Kerestes and
Blake did not issue any parking citations during the relevant time period, and
consequently were not called to, nor did they attend, any hearings.
Appellants commenced this action in the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny
County, Pennsylvania, on February 12, 2008, and it was removed to the United States
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District Court for the Western District of Pennsylvania on March 31, 2008. Appellants
brought seven claims against the township, its commissioners, McNeilly, and Black. By
the time of the motion for summary judgment at issue here, the Appellants‟ claims had
been reduced to only three against the township, McNeilly and Black: retaliation and
prior restraint in violation of the First Amendment; slander per se; and intentional
infliction of emotional distress. On March 17, 2010, the District Court found that the
township, McNeilly and Black were entitled to qualified immunity with respect to the
retaliation and prior restraint claims brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, and remanded the
state law claims to the Court of Common Pleas of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.
This appeal followed.
II.
The District Court had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1331 and 28 U.S.C. §
1367. We have jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291.
A.
We exercise plenary review over an appeal from a grant of summary judgment.
Jacobs Constructors, Inc. v. NPS Energy Servs., Inc., 264 F.3d 365, 369 (3d Cir. 2001).
Summary judgment is appropriate only if “there is no genuine dispute as to any material
fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
Appellants argue that, by issuing Memorandum No. 07-17, the township, Chief
McNeilly and Administrative Sergeant Black violated their First Amendment right, as
public employees, to attend court hearings and offer testimony. In Reilly v. Atlantic City,
532 F.3d 216 (3d Cir. 2008), we recognized the right of a public employee to testify in a
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criminal matter without fear of retaliation when compelled to do so by subpoena.
Previously, in Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410 (2006), the Court had held that, while
“the First Amendment protects a public employee's right, in certain circumstances, to
speak as a citizen addressing matters of public concern,” id. at 417, “the First
Amendment does not prohibit managerial discipline based on an employee's expressions
made pursuant to official responsibilities,” id. at 424. It was unclear from Garcetti
whether a public employee‟s right to testify was speech protected by the First
Amendment, or whether it was permissibly subject to “managerial discipline.” In Reilly,
a police officer filed suit against his superiors, claiming that they retaliated against him
because of his participation, including trial testimony, in investigations launched against
a superior and his associates. His superiors asserted qualified immunity based on
Garcetti.
Noting that “Garcetti offers no express instruction on the application of the First
Amendment to the trial testimony of a public employee,” Reilly, 532 F.3d at 231, we
reached the question of “whether truthful trial testimony arising out of the employee's
official responsibilities constitutes protected speech.” Id. at 230. Finding that “[i]t is
axiomatic that every citizen owes to his society the duty of giving testimony to aid in the
enforcement of the law,” id. at 228 (internal quotation marks omitted), we concluded:
When a government employee testifies truthfully, s/he is not simply
performing his or her job duties; rather, the employee is acting as a citizen
and is bound by the dictates of the court and the rules of evidence.
Ensuring that truthful testimony is protected by the First Amendment
promotes the individual and societal interests served when citizens play
their vital role in the judicial process. Thus, the principles discussed in
Garcetti support the need to protect truthful testimony in court.
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Id. at 231 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).
Appellees argued in the District Court, and renew their argument here, that they
are entitled to qualified immunity even if their conduct infringed First Amendment rights.
The doctrine of qualified immunity exists because “permitting damages suits against
government officials can entail substantial social costs, including the risk that fear of
personal monetary liability and harassing litigation will unduly inhibit officials in the
discharge of their duties.” Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 638 (1987). Qualified
immunity applies to “government officials performing discretionary functions . . .
shielding them from civil damages liability as long as their actions could reasonably have
been thought consistent with the rights they are alleged to have violated.” Id. It affords
“protection to all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.”
Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986). Once an official has asserted qualified
immunity, we must determine whether there is an actionable violation of a federally
protected right that is “clearly established” at the time of its violation. See Saucier v.
Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201 (2001) (setting forth general framework).1
Appellants argue that their right to present testimony was clearly established at the
time of the violations. “A plaintiff need not show that the very action in question has
previously been held unlawful, but needs to show that in light of preexisting law the
unlawfulness was apparent.” McLaughlin v. Watson, 271 F.3d 566, 571 (3d Cir. 2001).
1
Saucier was overruled in part by Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223 (2009),
which granted more flexibility to courts in determining the order in which the Saucier test
should be applied.
7
Reilly, which acknowledged First Amendment protection for a government employee‟s
compelled attendance at a court proceeding to give truthful testimony, was decided on
July 1, 2008. The events at issue here took place, as noted above, in January, 2007.
Garcetti, with its distinction between a public employee‟s right to speak in “certain
circumstances,” Garcetti, 547 U.S. at 417, and permitted discipline with respect to “an
employee‟s expressions made pursuant to official responsibilities,” id. at 424, left the
state of the law unsettled in this area. Indeed, we recognized this in Reilly when we
stated that “Garcetti offers no express instruction on the application of the First
Amendment to the trial testimony of a public employee.” Reilly, 532 F.3d at 231. As the
District Court reasoned, after Garcetti and prior to our decision in Reilly on July 1, 2008,
the status of First Amendment protection for government employee attendance at
hearings as part of employment duties was uncertain. To the extent that Reilly clarified
the issue, it did so in the context of testimony presented under compulsion of a subpoena
in a criminal trial. Reilly, therefore, does not stand for the proposition that a law
enforcement officer has a First Amendment right to attend voluntarily a parking ticket
adjudication hearing in derogation of direct orders to the contrary. Thus, it cannot be said
that the right asserted in this case was clearly established when Memorandum No. 07-17
was issued.
Moreover, Reilly is also distinguishable on the ground that it involved discipline
for the content of the employee‟s testimony. In this case, by way of contrast, the
employer made a decision not to pursue parking violation charges against any alleged
violators as part of an effort to correct what it felt was an overzealous enforcement of a
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township parking ordinance. Recently, the Court reiterated that courts must be reluctant
to interfere in what is essentially “„a personnel decision taken by a public agency
allegedly in reaction to the employee‟s behavior.‟” Borough of Duryea v. Guarnieri, No.
90-345, __ U.S. __, slip op. at 5 (Jun. 20, 2011) (quoting Connick v. Myers, 461 U.S.
138, 147 (1983)). The Court explained that “substantial government interests . . . justify
a cautious and restrained approach to the protection of speech by public employees . . . .”
Id. at 8. Indeed, emphasizing the distinction made in Garcetti, the Court in Guarnieri
emphasized that “„[w]hen someone who is paid a salary so that she will contribute to an
agency‟s effective operation begins to do or say things that detract from the agency‟s
effective operation, the government employer must have some power to restrain her.‟”
Id. at 5-6 (quoting Waters v. Churchill, 511 U.S. 661, 675 (1994) (plurality opinion)).
The instant case, rather than focusing on an employer‟s retaliation based on the substance
of testimony, is far more akin to an employer‟s attempt to restrain the actions of
employees which were considered to “detract from the agency‟s effective operation.” In
this case, a decision was made to not devote public resources to pursuing parking
citations issued under unique circumstances. Our holding in Reilly certainly did not
address this particular context. Nor have the Appellants cited any authority that would
preclude a municipality from instructing its law enforcement officers from appearing at
hearings to enforce parking violations. Under this set of facts, it simply cannot be said
that the Appellants‟ “right” to appear at hearings was “clearly established.”
In summary, we find that a government employee‟s right to attend a court
proceeding to enforce parking violations was not clearly established at the time
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Memorandum No. 07-17 was issued.2 Thus, we will affirm the District Court‟s finding
of qualified immunity for Appellants McNeilly and Black and its concomitant grant of
summary judgment on this basis.3
B.
Appellants apparently also seek to appeal the District Court‟s remand of the claims
over which it exercised supplemental jurisdiction.4 The issue of remand of state law
claims is governed by 28 U.S.C. § 1367(c)(3), which provides that “[t]he district courts
may decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over a [state law] claim if . . . the
district court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction.” We review
a District Court‟s decision to remand under § 1367 for abuse of discretion. Anderson v.
Wachovia Mortgage Corp., 621 F.3d 261, 283 (3d Cir. 2010).
2
It bears emphasizing the point that the one instance of discipline imposed as a
result of Memorandum No. 07-17 was the subject of a formal grievance that was denied
by a neutral arbitrator. Thus, Appellants had the ability to contest the discipline within
the framework of established dispute resolution processes.
3
The District Court also granted summary judgment to the township, apparently
also on the basis of qualified immunity. It is well-established that no qualified immunity
defense exists for municipalities under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. See Owen v. City of
Independence, Mo., 445 U.S. 622, 638 n.18 (1980) (“[T]here is no tradition of immunity
for municipal corporations, and neither history nor policy supports a construction of §
1983 that would justify the qualified immunity accorded [to the municipality].”) Because
Appellants did not raise this issue in their appeal, however, it is waived. See Graden v.
Conexant Systems, Inc., 496 F.3d 291, 296 n.7 (3d Cir. 2007) (“Absent compelling
circumstances not present here, failing to raise an argument in one‟s opening brief waives
it.”)
4
It is unclear whether Appellants actually seek to appeal this remand to the state
court, as their argument on this issue is essentially limited to the issue of whether “high
public official immunity” applies to the remanded state law claims. The District Court
did not address this question and it is not properly before us.
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“[W]here the claim over which the district court has original jurisdiction is
dismissed before trial, the district court must decline to decide the pendent state claims
unless considerations of judicial economy, convenience, and fairness to the parties
provide an affirmative justification for doing so.” Borough of West Mifflin v. Lancaster,
45 F.3d 780, 788 (3d Cir. 1995). Here, because the two remaining claims are state-law
claims, judicial economy, convenience and fairness to the parties counsel against
retaining supplemental jurisdiction over them. Accordingly, we find that the District
Court did not abuse its discretion in remanding these claims to the state court.
III.
For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the judgment of the District Court.
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