Byers v. City of Eunice , 157 F. App'x 680 ( 2005 )

United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
F I L E D
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FIFTH CIRCUIT December 1, 2005
Charles R. Fulbruge III
Clerk
No. 04-31053
N’YICHI BYERS,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
versus
CITY OF EUNICE; RONALD PAPILLION, individually and in his
official capacity as an employee of Eunice Police Department,
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Louisiana
(6:03-CV-1523-TLM-MEM)
Before BARKSDALE and CLEMENT, Circuit Judges, and ENGELHARDT,
District Judge.*
PER CURIAM:**
N’Yichi Byers challenges the summary judgment awarded
Detective Papillion and the City of Eunice, Louisiana. Among other
claims, Byers sued pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for violations of
her civil rights, stemming from her arrest for alleged
participation in a felony theft. The district court held, inter
alia, the Detective entitled to qualified immunity. AFFIRMED.
*
District Judge of the Eastern District of Louisiana, sitting
by designation.
**
Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that
this opinion should not be published and is not precedent except
under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR. R. 47.5.4.
I.
On 12 November 2001, a theft occurred at Leger’s Grocery Store
in Eunice; Byers was the cashier. Following an initial
investigation by other Officers of the Eunice Police Department,
Detectives Papillion and Kennedy took over the investigation, the
results of which caused them to believe Byers committed the crime.
John Clay, an inmate in the Eunice County Jail, asked to speak with
Detective Papillion in December 2001. He told Detectives Papillion
and Kennedy: while in the store on the day of the theft, he
witnessed Byers take a box from behind the counter and give it, as
well as money from the cash register, to Phillip Hebert in a set-up
burglary. Clay also implicated Lindsey Freeman in the theft.
Detective Papillion spoke with Freeman, who admitted his
involvement and corroborated Clay’s statement that Byers and Hebert
were also involved.
Relying upon Clay’s and Freeman’s statements, Detective
Papillion sought an arrest warrant for Byers from a city judge, who
determined probable cause existed and issued the warrant. After
Byers was arrested, another judge found probable cause and set
bail.
At Byers’ trial for felony theft in 2002, Clay recanted his
earlier statement and testified: he had not been in the store on
the day of the theft; he had lied when he implicated Byers; and
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Detective Papillion told him what to say during the December 2001
interview. Byers was found not guilty.
Byers then filed this action in state court against Detective
Papillion, in both his individual and official capacities, and the
City of Eunice, claiming, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983, 1985, and
1988, violations of numerous constitutional rights. Byers also
raised state-tort claims for slander, false arrest, false
imprisonment, and malicious prosecution.
Following removal to district court, summary judgment was
awarded against Byers; her claims were dismissed with prejudice.
The court held: in his individual capacity, Detective Papillion
was protected by qualified immunity because probable cause
supported Byers’ arrest; Byers failed to establish the requisite
constitutional violation for proceeding against the Detective in
his official capacity, or the City; and Byers’ state-law claims
were precluded because she could show neither malice nor a lack of
probable cause.
II.
Byers has briefed neither (1) her claims against the City and
Detective Papillion, in his official capacity, nor (2) her state-
law claims. They are waived. See FED. R. APP P. 28(a); Yohey v.
Collins, 985 F.2d 222, 225 (5th Cir. 1993) (“[O]nly the issues
presented and argued in the brief are addressed”.). Thus, the only
issue is the summary judgment awarded the Detective in his
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individual capacity; Byers contends it should not be granted based
on qualified immunity.
A summary judgment is reviewed de novo, viewing the facts in
the light most favorable to the non-movant. E.g., Freeman v.
County of Bexar, 210 F.3d 550, 553 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 531
U.S. 933 (2000). Such judgment is proper if there exists no
genuine issue of material fact and the movant is entitled to a
judgment as a matter of law. FED. R. CIV. P. 56(c); Celotex Corp.
v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322-23 (1986); Freeman, 210 F.3d at 553.
Qualified immunity “shield[s public officials] from undue
interference with their duties and from potentially disabling
threats of liability”. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 806
(1982); see Sanchez v. Swyden, 139 F.3d 464, 467 (5th Cir.) (noting
“the deterrent effect that civil liability may have on the
willingness of public officials to fully discharge their
professional duties”), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 872 (1998).
Accordingly, a qualified immunity defense should be resolved as
early as possible in the litigation. See Brown v. Lyford, 243 F.3d
185, 191 (5th Cir.) (“Since qualified immunity is immunity not only
from damages but also from suit itself, it is to be determined as
early as possible.”), cert. denied, 534 U.S. 817 (2001). To
overcome qualified immunity at the summary-judgment stage, Byers
must satisfy a two-prong test.
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A.
First, she must state a claim for the violation of “a ‘clearly
established’ constitutional or statutory right” under current law.
Sanchez, 139 F.3d at 466 (citing Harlow, 457 U.S. at 818); see
Siegert v. Gilley, 500 U.S. 226, 227 (1991) (requiring plaintiffs
to “state a claim for violation of any rights secured to [them]
under the United States Constitution”); see also Saucier v. Katz,
533 U.S. 194, 201 (2001) (“This must be the initial inquiry.”);
Siegert, 500 U.S. at 231 (stating that, at the summary-judgment
stage, plaintiffs need only “allege the violation of a clearly
established constitutional right”).
Byers appears to claim wrongful or illegal arrest. She
maintains: because the Detective lacked probable cause to procure
a warrant for her arrest, her Fourth Amendment right (through the
Fourteenth Amendment) to be free from unreasonable seizure was
violated. See Thomas v. Kippermann, 846 F.2d 1009, 1011 (5th Cir.
1988) (“Claims of false arrest ... involve the guarantees of the
fourth and fourteenth amendments when the individual complains of
an arrest, detention, and prosecution without probable cause.”).
Byers satisfies the first prong.
B.
For the second prong, Byers must show: (1) the right was
clearly established when the violation occurred; and (2) the
official’s conduct was “objectively unreasonable in the light of
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that then clearly established law”. Hare v. City of Corinth, 135
F.3d 320, 326 (5th Cir. 1998); see Tarver v. City of Edna, 410 F.3d
745, 750 (5th Cir. 2005) (“If officers of reasonable competence
could disagree as to whether the plaintiff's rights were violated,
the officer's qualified immunity remains intact.”); Felton v.
Polles, 315 F.3d 470, 478 (5th Cir. 2002) (“For the second prong
... ‘the right ... alleged to have [been] violated must have been
‘clearly established’ in a more particularized, and hence more
relevant, sense: The contours of the right must be sufficiently
clear that a reasonable official would understand that what he is
doing violates that right.’”) (quoting Anderson v. Creighton, 483
U.S. 635, 640 (1987)) (alterations to Anderson in original).
1.
For a law to be “clearly established”, for purposes of the
second prong, it “is not enough” that a “broad general proposition”
is well established. Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201-02. Again, the
“contours of the right must be sufficiently clear that a reasonable
official would understand that what he is doing violates that
right”. Goodson v. City of Corpus Christi, 202 F.3d 730, 736 (5th
Cir. 2000) (quoting Anderson, 483 U.S. at 640). “The relevant,
dispositive inquiry in determining whether a right is clearly
established is whether it would be clear to a reasonable officer
that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted.”
Saucier, 533 U.S. at 202.
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Here, “[t]he relevant question ... is the objective (albeit
fact-specific) question whether a reasonable officer could have
believed” probable cause existed to seek an arrest warrant for
Byers, “in [the] light of clearly established law and the
information [the Detective] possessed”. Anderson, 483 U.S. at 641.
That Byers was not to be arrested without probable cause was
clearly established, needless to say, long before the arrest in
2001. Blackwell v. Barton, 34 F.3d 298, 302-03 (5th Cir. 1994).
Further, it was also clearly established that a police officer
could not manufacture probable cause by using knowingly or
recklessly false statements or omissions. United States v. Cavazos,
288 F.3d 706, 709-10 (5th Cir.) (requiring the excision of false
information from a probable cause determination) (citing United
States v. Alvarez, 127 F.3d 372, 374 (5th Cir. 1997)), cert.
denied, 537 U.S. 910 (2002).
2.
This “clearly established” law provides the framework from
which to examine, for summary-judgment purposes, the objective
reasonableness of the Detective’s conduct. Restated, the Detective
is protected by qualified immunity unless a genuine issue of
material fact exists for whether his actions were “objectively
reasonable”. Goodson, 202 F.3d at 736. “Only where the warrant
application is so lacking in indicia of probable cause as to render
official belief in its existence unreasonable will the shield of
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immunity be lost.” Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 344-45 (1986)
(internal citation omitted).
For this inquiry, we look to a totality of the circumstances
surrounding an officer’s probable-cause determination. Mendenhall
v. Riser, 213 F.3d 226, 231 (5th Cir. 2000) (citing Illinois v.
Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 238 (1983)), cert. denied, 531 U.S. 1071(2001). The qualified-immunity standard gives officers flexibility
for mistaken judgments “by protecting ‘all but the plainly
incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law’”. Id. at 230(quoting Malley, 475 U.S. at 341). Again, it is an objective
standard. Id. at 231. In other words, as discussed supra, “[e]ven
if officers of reasonable competence could disagree”, an officer
would still be entitled to qualified immunity. Freeman, 210 F.3d
at 554; see also Tarver, 410 F.3d at 750.
Along this line, rather than operating with the benefit of
hindsight, we consider the reasonableness vel non of an officer’s
conduct at the time of arrest. Mendenhall, 213 F.3d at 231.
Accordingly, Clay’s recantation at trial of his statement and
Byers’ being found not guilty have no bearing on our inquiry. Id.
at 237. Again, we examine the information existing when the
Detective sought the arrest warrant.
Nevertheless, Byers challenges the district court’s failure to
consider that recantation. As discussed, it is irrelevant to the
Detective’s probable cause determination at the time of arrest.
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Moreover, Byers challenges the district court’s excluding the
expert testimony of her law-enforcement-procedures expert. That
decision must be shown to be “manifestly erroneous”. Hayter v.
City of Mount Vernon, 154 F.3d 269, 273-74 (5th Cir. 1998). Byers
fails to do so.
As part of our review, we must consider Byers’ assertion that
a genuine issue of material fact exists for whether the Detective
attempted to set Byers up by providing false information to obtain
an arrest warrant and by providing Clay all information regarding
the theft. See Freeman, 210 F.3d at 553. This contention arises
out of Clay’s failure to identify Byers by name when interviewed by
Detective Papillion in December 2001. Although Clay was unable to
do so, he told the Detective he entered Leger’s Grocery and
witnessed the theft. Before the Detective provided Byers’ name to
Clay, the colloquy proceeded as follows:
[Clay]: And I entered the store. There’s this girl
– I forgot her name.
[Detective] Papillion: Uh.
[Clay]: Uh, this short, heavy shaped girl.
[Detective] Papillion: She works over there at Leger’s?
[Clay]: Yes sir. She’s a cashier over there.
[Detective] Papillion: Would that would uh that female would
that be Niesha Bias [sic].
[Clay]: Yes sir.
[Detective] Papillion: Ok, and she was working that night?
[Clay]: Yes sir.
Byers met this description. Based on this testimony and Freeman’s
corroborating statement, Detective Papillion’s conduct in deeming
Byers a suspect was not objectively unreasonable.
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Byers fails otherwise to address the second prong; nowhere
does she maintain the Detective acted objectively unreasonably in
procuring the arrest warrant. Arguably, her claim is waived on
this basis alone, as discussed supra.
In any event, when Byers’ arrest was effected, the Detective
and his fellow officers had learned that: Byers was working at the
store when the theft occurred; Clay, a recurrent criminal, claimed
to be an eyewitness and identified a person matching Byers’
physical description as one of the participants, although he did
not know her name; and Freeman implicated both Byers and himself in
the crime. Although no physical evidence tied Byers to the theft,
it was not objectively unreasonable for Detective Papillion to rely
on the results of his investigation. Based on Freeman’s
independent corroboration of Clay’s testimony, “officers of
reasonable competence” would not agree that the Detective’s conduct
was objectively unreasonable. See Freeman, 210 F.3d at 554.
In sum, for summary-judgment purposes, Byers fails to satisfy
the second prong of the qualified immunity analysis: the
Detective’s conduct was not objectively unreasonable in the light
of then clearly established law. (Accordingly, we need not decide
whether the state judge’s independent assessment of probable cause
for Byers’ arrest broke the chain of causation for the false-arrest
claim. See Murray v. Earle, 405 F.3d 278, 290-92 (5th Cir.), cert.
10
denied, 2005 WL 3144163 (U.S. 28 Nov. 2005) (No. 05-396); Taylor v.
Gregg, 36 F.3d 453, 456 (5th Cir. 1994).)
III.
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment is
AFFIRMED.
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