Wallace v. Taylor ( 2023 )

Case: 22-20342 Document: 00516713338 Page: 1 Date Filed: 04/14/2023
United States Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
____________ FILED
April 14, 2023
No. 22-20342 Lyle W. Cayce
____________ Clerk
Floyd Wallace,
Plaintiff—Appellee,
versus
Heather Taylor, in her individual and official capacities; James
Hartley, in his individual and official capacities; Tyson Hamilton, in
his individual and official capacities,
Defendants—Appellants.
______________________________
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Southern District of Texas
USDC No. 4:22-CV-292
______________________________
Before Richman, Chief Judge, and Haynes and Graves, Circuit
Judges.
James E. Graves, Jr., Circuit Judge:*
Defendants Heather Taylor, James Hartley, and Tyson Hamilton
appeal the district court’s denial of their motion to dismiss seeking qualified
immunity from Plaintiff’s claims. They are each entitled to qualified
immunity, so we REVERSE and RENDER.
_____________________
*
This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
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I. Background
a. Factual Background
Plaintiff Floyd Wallace alleges the following facts in his first amended
complaint. On February 21, 2021, Wallace was walking around the parking
lot of the Tomball Police Department (“TPD”) while recording on his body
camera1 and cell phone. As he was walking away, TPD officer Taylor pulled
up in her police SUV with the emergency lights activated. She told Wallace,
“Hey man, get over here. Come here” and asked, “What are you doing over
here? What are you doing behind the police tower?” Taylor continues to ask
Wallace what he was doing behind the police tower in the parking lot when
TPD officer Hamilton approaches. A moment later, Wallace heard a police
siren and saw another police SUV approaching him. He said “I don’t have
time for this sh--. I’m out,” and he walked away from Taylor and Hamilton.
The vehicle pulled over in front of him, and TPD officer Lopez got out and
approached Wallace. Wallace asked why he was being detained, and Lopez
responded that he heard he had run from one of the other officers. Taylor
told Lopez that Wallace was “creeping around behind the police tower
crouching down right by it and as soon as he saw me, he f---ing bolted.” Lopez
asked Wallace what he was doing in the parking lot and if he was damaging
their property. He then handcuffed Wallace and told him he was being
detained for an investigation of potential criminal mischief.
Lopez, Taylor, and Hamilton repeatedly demanded that Wallace
provide them with his ID card. Wallace refused, claiming he did not have to
provide any identifying information unless he was under arrest. The officers
patted Wallace down and placed him on the ground where they directed him
_____________________
1
Wallace recorded most of the encounter on his own body camera and included
the footage as Exhibit 1 to his first amended complaint.
2
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to sit. Two other TPD officers then arrived at the scene, including Hartley.
After speaking with someone on the phone, Taylor directed Hartley and
Hamilton to stand Wallace up and search him for his wallet so they could
identify him. Wallace repeatedly protested that he did not consent to
searches. Hartley and Hamilton searched Wallace, but they did not find a
wallet on him. Lopez returned and told Wallace that Taylor checked out the
police tower and observed that one of its tires looked as if it was not properly
inflated. Lopez also told Wallace that Taylor was speaking with the District
Attorney so they could bring criminal charges against him. In hopes of
avoiding arrest, Wallace verbally provided his name, birthday, and address.
The officers picked Wallace up from the ground, and Taylor told him he was
under arrest for evading a police officer and failing to identify himself.
Wallace was held temporarily at the police station and later transferred to the
Harris County jail.
The District Attorney brought only one charge against Wallace:
evading arrest from Lopez. At a probable cause hearing, the magistrate
determined there was not sufficient probable cause to support the charge, and
Wallace was immediately released.
b. Procedural Background
On January 28, 2022, Wallace filed his original pro se complaint against
the City of Tomball and officers Taylor, Hartley, Hamilton, and Lopez. After
the City, Taylor, Hartley, and Hamilton moved to dismiss the claims against
them, Wallace filed his first amended complaint. Wallace attached four
exhibits: his body camera footage, an affidavit from another citizen who
filmed the incident, the criminal complaint against him, and a recording of
his probable cause hearing. He alleged five counts: 1) A Fourth Amendment
unreasonable seizure claim against Taylor and Lopez; 2) A Fourth
Amendment unreasonable search claim against Hamilton and Hartley; 3) A
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First Amendment claim against Lopez; 4) A Fourteenth Amendment
malicious prosecution claim against Taylor and Lopez; and 5) A Monell claim
against the City of Tomball for failure to train.
The City, Taylor, Hartley, and Hamilton again moved to dismiss
Wallace’s claims against them. The individual Defendants asserted qualified
immunity. Lopez did not join the motion to dismiss filed by the other
individual Defendants, so he is not a party to this appeal. The district court
granted the City’s motion to dismiss. But it denied qualified immunity to the
individual Defendants in a terse order, stating in relevant part:
The Court is of the opinion that the defendants’ defense of
qualified immunity is premature. Moreover, the facts
presented, in their totality, do not support dismissal of this suit.
...
In the case at bar, the plaintiff’s pleadings proffer the claim that
he was wrongfully arrested and detained based on suspicions
that the officers determined were unfounded and, yet, they
engaged in a malicious prosecution when the basis for the
plaintiff’s arrest/detention did not ‘pan-out’. Moreover, the
plaintiff asserts, the judge dismissed the charges that the
officers’ asserted.
In the Court’s opinion, it may be argued that the officers had a
proper basis to question and/or temporarily detain the plaintiff
until their suspicions were determined to be unfounded.
However, qualified immunity does not shield officers from
insisting on being ‘right’ and placing charges against a citizen
when their suspicions are proved unfounded.
Taylor, Hartley, and Hamilton (hereinafter “Defendants”) timely filed a
notice of appeal.
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II. Jurisdiction & Standard of Review
We have jurisdiction to review a denial of a motion to dismiss seeking
qualified immunity “only to the extent that the appeal concerns the purely
legal question [of] whether the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity
on the facts[.]” Armstrong v. Ashley, 918 F.3d 419, 422 (5th Cir. 2019)
(citation omitted).
We review the district court’s denial of the qualified immunity
defense de novo, accepting all well-pleaded facts as true and viewing them in
the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Morgan v. Swanson, 659 F.3d 359, 370
(5th Cir. 2011) (en banc). Where video recordings are included in the
pleadings, the video depictions of events, viewed in the light most favorable
to the plaintiff, should be adopted over the factual allegations in the
complaint only if the video “blatantly contradict[s]” those allegations.2
Harmon v. City of Arlington, Texas, 16 F.4th 1159, 1163 (5th Cir. 2021) (citing
Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 380 (2007)).
III. Discussion
Defendants have asserted the defense of qualified immunity. Qualified
immunity provides government officials with immunity from suit “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). We apply a two-part test: (1) whether the plaintiff
has alleged a violation of a constitutional right; and (2) if so, whether the right
was clearly established at the time of the violation. Cooper v. Brown, 844 F.3d
_____________________2
We confine our analysis to Defendants’ conduct as alleged in Wallace’s first
amended complaint since his allegations are not blatantly contradicted by the video
recordings.
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517, 522 (5th Cir. 2016) (citation omitted). Both questions are matters of law.
Id.A preliminary point before we begin our discussion. Ordinarily, each
individual defendant’s entitlement to qualified immunity should be analyzed
separately. Carroll v. Ellington, 800 F.3d 154, 174 (5th Cir. 2015). When the
district court has not engaged in the proper individualized analysis, we can
either remand or conduct the analysis ourselves. Compare Kitchen v. Dallas
Cnty., Tex., 759 F.3d 468, 478–79 (5th Cir. 2014) (“the district court must
also ‘examine[ ] the actions of defendants individually in the qualified
immunity context’ . . . The district court has not yet addressed this issue[]
and must do so on remand”) (citation omitted), with Ramirez v. Guadarrama,
3 F.4th 129, 137 n.4 (5th Cir. 2021), cert. denied, 142 S. Ct. 2571 (2022) (“We
agree with Jefferson that the district court failed to engage in an
individualized analysis, and that its collective treatment of the defendant
officers’ actions was error. This point is, however, inconsequential, as we
find that both officers are entitled to qualified immunity.”). Here, we
exercise our discretion to conduct the QI analysis ourselves.
a. Unreasonable Seizure
Wallace alleges that Taylor violated his Fourth Amendment rights by
seizing him without probable cause. Wallace makes this claim with respect to
his investigative detention and ultimate arrest.
For his investigative detention, “police officers may stop and briefly
detain an individual for investigative purposes if they have reasonable
suspicion that criminal activity is afoot.” Carroll, 800 F.3d at 171 (internal
quotation marks and citation omitted). Reasonable suspicion requires “the
police officer . . . to point to specific and articulable facts which, taken
together with rational inferences from those facts, reasonably warrant that
intrusion.” United States v. Rodriguez, 564 F.3d 735, 741 (5th Cir. 2009)
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(quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 21 (1968)). According to Wallace’s
complaint, Taylor saw Wallace crouched down by the police tower in the
parking lot. In his response to Defendants’ motion to dismiss, Wallace
explained that “after looking at the police tower, a portable surveillance
tower, in the parking lot[, he] ran a short distance across the parking lot and
then began to walk to other areas of the Police Station.” Taylor and Lopez
repeatedly asked Wallace what he was doing behind the police tower in the
parking lot and if he had damaged TPD property. They placed Wallace
under investigative detention for criminal mischief, and Taylor checked to
see if the tower had been tampered with.
Wallace admits that he was standing near the police tower in the TPD
parking lot and then ran a short distance away. This activity alone was
sufficient for Taylor to have a reasonable suspicion that Wallace was
tampering with the police tower, so she had authority to detain Wallace, ask
him what he was doing, and investigate whether the police tower had been
tampered with. Since this is what Wallace alleges she did, at a minimum, it
was not clearly established that Taylor was committing a constitutional
violation during Wallace’s initial detention.
For Wallace’s arrest, Taylor is entitled to qualified immunity unless
there was no actual probable cause for the arrest and Taylor’s decision to
arrest was objectively unreasonable in light of clearly established law. Crostley
v. Lamar Cty., 717 F.3d 410, 422–23 (5th Cir. 2013). “The Supreme Court
has defined probable cause as the ‘facts and circumstances within the
officer’s knowledge that are sufficient to warrant a prudent person, or one of
reasonable caution, in believing, in the circumstances shown, that the suspect
has committed, is committing, or is about to commit an offense.’” Piazza v.
Mayne, 217 F.3d 239, 245–46 (5th Cir. 2000) (quoting Michigan v. DeFillippo,
443 U.S. 31, 37 (1979)). “If an officer reasonably but mistakenly believes that
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probable cause exists, [she] is entitled to qualified immunity.” Carroll, 800
F.3d at 172 (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).
Wallace argued before the district court that there was no probable
cause to arrest him for evading arrest because the officers did not attempt to
lawfully arrest or detain him. Tex. Penal Code § 38.04 (“A person
commits an offense if he intentionally flees from a person he knows is a peace
officer or federal special investigator attempting lawfully to arrest or detain
him.”). Wallace was only charged with evading arrest from Lopez. However,
when considering wrongful arrest claims, we “apply an objective standard,
which means that we will find that probable cause existed if the officer was
aware of facts justifying a reasonable belief that an offense was being
committed, whether or not the officer charged the arrestee with that specific
offense.” Club Retro, L.L.C. v. Hilton, 568 F.3d 181, 204 (5th Cir. 2009).
Even if there was no probable cause to arrest Wallace for evading arrest from
Lopez, Wallace must also show there was no probable cause to arrest him for
evading arrest from Taylor.
As discussed above, Taylor had reasonable suspicion to lawfully
detain Wallace for an investigation. Cf. Goodson v. City of Corpus Christi, 202
F.3d 730, 740 (5th Cir. 2000) (“if the detention was not lawful, then even if
[plaintiff] fled, [the officers] would not have had probable cause to believe
that [plaintiff] was violating § 38.04(a).”). The next question is whether
Taylor was attempting to arrest or detain Wallace. Wallace argues that Taylor
was not attempting to arrest or detain him because she did not tell him he was
being arrested or to stop when he started walking away. Defendants argue
that Taylor had probable cause to arrest Wallace for evading arrest because a
reasonable officer in Taylor’s situation would have understood that Wallace
committed the “offense by ignoring her command to ‘come here’ and
walking away.” In support, Defendants cite to Texas courts affirming
convictions for evading arrest where defendants fled after being directed to
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“come here.” Cash v. State, No. 07-17-00173-CR, 2017 WL 6614270, at *1
(Tex. App.—Amarillo Dec. 19, 2017, no pet.) (“Such was enough for a
rational fact-finder to conclude, beyond reasonable doubt, that it was
appellant who departed after the trooper directed him to ‘come here.’”);
Graves v. State, No. 01-19-00868-CR, 2020 WL 7349101, at *6 (Tex. App.—
Houston [1st Dist.] Dec. 15, 2020, pet. ref’d) (“Officer Luna ordered
appellant to ‘come here’ or ‘stop.’ However, rather than comply, appellant
ignored the officers’ repeated commands to stop and began sprinting across
the street away from the officers.”); see also Hervey v. State, No. 10-17-00140-
CR, 2017 WL 6614656, at *2 (Tex. App.—Waco Dec. 27, 2017, no pet.)
(“The attempted detention occurred immediately upon the command of
Detective Dunagan for Hervey to ‘Come here, man!’ upon exiting the
unmarked vehicle.”).
Again, Wallace alleged that Taylor pulled up in a police SUV with the
emergency lights activated. Taylor directed Wallace repeatedly to “come
here.” Even without telling Wallace to stop or that he was under arrest, a
reasonable officer could believe that activating emergency lights and
commanding Wallace to “come here” are a sufficient show of authority to
put him on notice that he or she intends to detain him. Cf. United States v.
Wright, 57 F.4th 524, 532 (5th Cir. 2023) (When an officer quickly pulled up
behind the defendant’s parked vehicle “with emergency lights engaged, she
was showing a sign of authority clearly communicating to [defendant] he was
not free to leave.”); see also Redwine v. State, 305 S.W.3d 360, 362 (Tex.
App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 2010, pet. ref’d) (“A person commits a crime
under Section 38.04 only if he knows a police officer is attempting to arrest
him but nevertheless refuses to yield to a police show of authority.”). While
Wallace was stopped by Lopez soon after he walked away from Taylor,
“[e]ven a dispirited, brief attempt to walk away from an officer’s command
to stop has been held to be sufficient flight to constitute evading arrest or
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detention.” Henderson v. State, No. 12–09–00399–CR, 2011 WL 2162820, at
*5 (Tex. App.—Tyler May 31, 2011, no pet.) (collecting cases). Based on the
facts alleged in Wallace’s first amended complaint, Taylor’s decision to
arrest Wallace was not objectively unreasonable in light of clearly established
law. Accordingly, Taylor is entitled to qualified immunity from Wallace’s
unlawful detention and unlawful arrest claims against her.
b. Unreasonable Search
Wallace also alleges that Hartley and Hamilton violated his Fourth
Amendment rights by searching his person without his consent. The officers
searched Wallace for his wallet after he refused to identify himself. When
Hartley and Hamilton stood him up to search him, he repeatedly asked the
officers to stop searching and proclaimed that he did not consent to searches.
Defendants argue that Hartley and Hamilton’s search was a valid search
incident for a weapon, but Wallace alleges that the stated purpose of the
search was to find his wallet so the officers could identify him. This court
recently confronted a similar claim in McCullough v. Wright, 824 Fed. App’x.
281 (5th Cir. 2020).3 There, the officers arrested the plaintiff for interference
of public duties, and they searched her wallet for identification after she
refused to identify herself. Id. at 287. In an unpublished opinion, we
concluded that plaintiff had “failed to show that it is clearly established that
a limited search for the sole purpose of procuring identification, after an
uncooperative arrestee refuses numerous requests to identify herself, violates
the Fourth Amendment.” Id. However, the plaintiff in that case was already
under arrest, so the officers performed a search incident to a lawful arrest.
Here, Wallace alleges the officers searched him while he was under
_____________________
3
Although an unpublished opinion issued on or after January 1, 1996 is generally
not precedential, it may be considered as persuasive authority. Ballard v. Burton, 444 F.3d
391, 401 & n.7 (5th Cir. 2006).
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investigative detention and before he was arrested. The Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals has explained the materiality of this distinction:
Though an officer may ask a defendant to identify himself
during a valid investigative detention, that does not
automatically mean that the officer can search a defendant’s
person to obtain or confirm his identity. Consequently, the
officer’s conduct of reaching into appellant’s pocket—even
under a valid investigative detention—was an illegal search
unless there existed some exception to the usual probable cause
requirement.
Baldwin v. State, 278 S.W.3d 367, 372 (Tex. Crim. App. 2009) (citation
omitted). Nevertheless, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals has also held
that “[i]t is irrelevant that the arrest occurs immediately before or after the
search [incident], as long as sufficient probable cause exists for the officer to
arrest before the search.” State v. Ballard, 987 S.W.2d 889, 892 (Tex. Crim.
App. 1999) (citation omitted); see also Thornton v. Beto, 470 F.2d 657, 659 (5th
Cir. 1972) (“The fact that the search was commenced shortly before the
arrest was made does not vitiate the search as incident to the arrest since
there was probable cause to arrest without regard to the fruits of the
search.”). Even if the officers had not formally arrested Wallace yet, Wallace
had already walked away from Taylor. Assuming that Wallace’s detention
had not already amounted to a formal arrest,4 Wallace has failed to show it is
clearly established that, in a situation where officers reasonably believe they
have probable cause to arrest someone, a search to procure identification
after the detainee refuses to identify himself violates the Fourth Amendment.
Cf. McCullough, 824 Fed. App’x. at 287. Hartley and Hamilton are entitled
_____________________
4
See Turner v. Lieutenant Driver, 848 F.3d 678, 693 (5th Cir. 2017) (explaining
when an investigative stop amounts to an arrest).
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to qualified immunity from Wallace’s Fourth Amendment claim against
them.
c. Malicious Prosecution
Lastly, Wallace alleges a malicious prosecution claim against Taylor
for initiating the evading arrest charge against him. When Wallace filed his
first amended complaint on March 16, 2022, this court did not recognize a
freestanding federal claim for malicious prosecution. Castellano v. Fragozo,
352 F.3d 939, 942 (5th Cir. 2003) (en banc) (holding that “‘malicious
prosecution’ standing alone is no violation of the United States
Constitution.”). However, the Supreme Court later held that litigants may
bring Fourth Amendment malicious prosecution claims under § 1983.
Thompson v. Clark, 142 S. Ct. 1332, 1337 (2022). Accordingly, we recently
recognized that Thompson overruled Castellano and reinstated our prior six-
element malicious prosecution claim from Gordy:
(1) the commencement or continuance of an original criminal
proceeding; (2) its legal causation by the present defendant
against plaintiff who was defendant in the original proceeding;
(3) its bona fide termination in favor of the present plaintiff; (4)
the absence of probable cause for such proceeding; (5) malice;
and (6) damages.
Armstrong v. Ashley, 60 F.4th 262, 279 (5th Cir. 2023) (citing Gordy v. Burns,
294 F.3d 722, 727 (5th Cir. 2002)). In addition to proving each of these
elements, plaintiffs must also prove “the threshold element of an unlawful
Fourth Amendment seizure.” Id. “[I]f the prosecution is supported by
probable cause on at least one charge, then a malicious prosecution claim
cannot move forward.” Id. at n.15. Therefore, Wallace must sufficiently
allege each of these elements in order to bring a claim for malicious
prosecution.
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When there is a change in law during the pendency of an appeal, this
court will generally remand to give the parties and the district court an
opportunity to address the new standard. See, e.g., Luke v. CPlace Forest Park
SNF, L.L.C., 608 F. App’x 246 (5th Cir. 2015) (remanding grant of summary
judgment after the Supreme Court issued a decision abrogating relevant Fifth
Circuit precedent). However, in order to overcome Taylor’s assertion of
qualified immunity, Wallace must ultimately show that his Fourth
Amendment right to be free from malicious prosecution “was clearly
established at the time of the alleged violation.” Cooper, 844 F.3d at 522. This
court did not recognize a federal malicious prosecution claim at the time
Wallace was charged with evading arrest, and “[a] claim that we ha[d]
expressly not recognized is the antithesis of a clearly established one.” Watts
v. Northside Indep. Sch. Dist., 37 F.4th 1094, 1096 (5th Cir. 2022); Morgan v.
Chapman, 969 F.3d 238, 251 (5th Cir. 2020) (“Under this circuit’s
precedents, there is no constitutional right to be free from abuse of process
or malicious prosecution.”). While the Fourth Amendment right to be free
from arrest absent probable cause has been clearly established for some time,
there was no clearly established Fourth Amendment right to be free from
malicious prosecution at the time of Wallace’s arrest. Therefore, Taylor is
entitled to qualified immunity from Wallace’s malicious prosecution claim.
IV. Conclusion
For the reasons stated above, we REVERSE the district court’s
denial of qualified immunity as to Taylor, Hartley, and Hamilton and
RENDER judgment in their favor.
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