Benedda Cotten v. Ryan Miller ( 2023 )

United States Court of Appeals
For the Eighth Circuit
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No. 22-2872
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Benedda Cotten; Terry Davis,
lllllllllllllllllllllPlaintiffs - Appellees,
v.
Ryan Miller, in their individual capacities; Brian Graupner, in their individual capacities,
lllllllllllllllllllllDefendants - Appellants.
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Appeal from United States District Court
for the District of Minnesota
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Submitted: March 14, 2023
Filed: July 24, 2023
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Before COLLOTON, MELLOY, and GRUENDER, Circuit Judges.
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COLLOTON, Circuit Judge.
Benedda Cotten and Terry Davis sued police officers Ryan Miller and Brian
Graupner under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. They claimed that the officers violated the Fourth
Amendment by making a warrantless entry to the apartment occupied by Cotten and
Davis. The district court granted summary judgment for Cotten and Davis. We
conclude that the entry did not violate their Fourth Amendment rights, and therefore
reverse the judgment.
I.
At approximately 1:30 a.m. on May 4, 2019, officers Miller and Graupner were
dispatched to a duplex in South Minneapolis in response to a 911 call reporting
possible domestic violence. The officers received a report summarizing the content
of the call through the computer system in their vehicle. The report stated that the
call came from a neighbor regarding sounds coming from an upstairs apartment where
a woman lived with her boyfriend and child. The neighbor heard yelling, screaming,
and noise indicating that someone was being thrown around in the upstairs apartment.
The officers arrived at the duplex approximately ten minutes after the 911 call.
As they approached the building, Miller believed he could hear children’s voices that
sounded playful. Graupner believed that he heard indistinguishable yelling.
Miller approached the front exterior door to the duplex, announced the officers’
presence, and repeatedly kicked and knocked on the door. The downstairs resident
who made the 911 call eventually opened the front door. She told the officers that
she had heard screaming, screeching, and thuds coming from the upstairs apartment.
She also told the officers that the voices sounded like a woman or a child, but that she
could not discern what was said. At that point, the officers did not hear noise coming
from upstairs.
Miller ascended the stairs to the second-floor apartment and said, “open the
door, it’s the police.” Cotten asked from behind a closed door why Miller was there.
Miller responded that “I’ll force entry if I need to because I’m investigating a possible
domestic.” Davis then yelled from behind the closed door, “a possible domestic, for
what?” Miller demanded that Cotten and Davis open the door. Cotten stated that
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nobody inside the apartment was hurt, and Davis asked why the officers were there.
Graupner then yelled at Cotten and Davis to open the door, or he would kick it in.
Nearly two minutes after the conversation began, Davis cracked open the front
door. Miller commanded Davis to back up, and the officers entered the apartment.
The officers then ordered Davis to face a wall in the apartment; when he did not
comply, Miller placed him in handcuffs. Cotten asked the police why they had
entered the apartment. She and Davis repeatedly denied any domestic violence.
Graupner walked through the apartment and saw that nobody in the residence was
harmed.
Miller patted down Davis for weapons and found a live .45 caliber bullet on
Davis’s person. The officers arrested Davis for unlawful possession of ammunition.
The charge against Davis was later dismissed.
Cotten and Davis sued Miller and Graupner, alleging that the officers violated
their Fourth Amendment rights by entering the apartment without a warrant. Both
sides moved for summary judgment. The officers asserted that they were entitled to
qualified immunity because they did not violate a clearly established right of the
occupants. They argued that the warrantless entry was justified to assist potential
victims of domestic violence who were injured or threatened with imminent injury.
The district court granted summary judgment for Cotten and Davis. The court ruled
that a report of domestic abuse by itself was not enough to justify the entry, and that
the officers violated a clearly established right of the residents by entering the
apartment without a warrant.
We have jurisdiction to review the district court’s order denying qualified
immunity, and we consider legal issues de novo. Loch v. City of Litchfield, 689 F.3d
961, 965 (8th Cir. 2012). Summary judgment is appropriate if “there is no genuine
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dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of
law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
II.
Warrantless searches of a home are presumptively unreasonable under the
Fourth Amendment, Michigan v. Fisher, 558 U.S. 45, 47 (2009) (per curiam), but the
warrant requirement is subject to certain exceptions. One exception permits police
officers to enter a home without a warrant if the officers act with probable cause to
believe that a crime has been committed and an objectively reasonable basis to
believe that exigent circumstances exist. Radloff v. City of Oelwein, 380 F.3d 344,
348 (8th Cir. 2004). “One exigency obviating the requirement of a warrant is the
need to assist persons who are seriously injured or threatened with such injury.”
Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U.S. 398, 403 (2006).
Miller and Graupner argue that the 911 call and conversation with the
downstairs neighbor established probable cause that domestic violence had occurred
in the upstairs apartment. They maintain that exigent circumstances existed because
the officers were unable to confirm the safety of potential victims who remained
inside the apartment with the putative suspect.
Probable cause exists when there is a fair probability that contraband or
evidence of a crime will be found in a particular place. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S.
213, 238 (1983). Here, the officers were dispatched to the scene in response to a
report of domestic violence. The report received by the officers explained that the
911 call came from a neighbor who thought “abuse” was occurring, and heard a
“verbal argument,” “someone being thrown around,” and “yelling and screaming” in
the upstairs apartment. The neighbor stated that a woman, her boyfriend, and a child
lived in the apartment.
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When the officers arrived, they spoke with the downstairs neighbor, who
confirmed the information in the report, and told the officers that she heard “really,
really aggressive” screaming, screeching, and thuds coming from the upstairs
apartment. She also told the officers that the screaming and screeching sounded like
it came from a woman or child. Although officers heard the sounds of a child acting
playfully when they arrived, this innocent noise did not require them to disregard the
report of a witness that she heard alarming sounds ten minutes earlier. Under the
totality of the circumstances, the information presented to the officers established
probable cause to believe that domestic violence recently had occurred in the
apartment of Cotten and Davis.
The circumstances also created an exigency that justified the officers’
warrantless entry. Miller and Graupner arrived at the scene approximately ten
minutes after the neighbor called 911. The officers had been informed that sounds
of distress were coming from a woman or child. And they were told that a man
occupied the apartment with a woman and child. The officers had no reliable
information that anyone had departed the upstairs apartment during the short period
between the 911 call and their arrival. Under those circumstances, it was reasonable
for the officers to believe that a woman or child in the upstairs apartment was a victim
of domestic violence, and was injured or threatened with future injury.
The officers then spoke to Cotten and Davis through a closed door. Although
Cotten told the officers that nobody inside the apartment was injured, an officer need
not take a putative victim’s statement at face value when assessing whether a suspect
presents an ongoing threat to the victim. See United States v. Bartelho, 71 F.3d 436,
441-42 (1st Cir. 1995). We have recognized that “domestic disturbances are highly
volatile and involve large risks.” United States v. Henderson, 553 F.3d 1163, 1165
(8th Cir. 2009) (per curiam). With probable cause that domestic violence recently
occurred in the apartment, a reasonable officer was not required to deem a denial
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through a closed door sufficient to dispel the concern that a potential victim was
injured or threatened with future harm.
The officers also reasonably could have believed that exigent circumstances
existed because the putative suspect remained in the residence with a potential victim.
See Tierney v. Davidson, 133 F.3d 189, 197 (2d Cir. 1998). Cotten and Davis argue
that the presence of a domestic violence suspect in a residence does not by itself
create exigent circumstances. To be sure, this court held in Smith v. Kansas City
Police Department, 586 F.3d 576 (8th Cir. 2009), that officers could not enter a
residence without a warrant to arrest a domestic violence suspect after the suspect had
relocated to a place where the alleged victim was not present. Id. at 580-81. The
arrest of a domestic violence suspect does not create exigent circumstances justifying
a warrantless entry if there is no reason to believe that the suspect presents a danger
to others at the location. Id. at 580.
The officers here, however, had reasonable grounds to believe that a domestic
violence suspect was still inside the home with a putative victim. Based on the 911
call and the report of the downstairs neighbor, it was reasonable to infer that the
suspect posed a threat to a victim. The location of the entry was the same place where
alleged abuse had occurred ten minutes earlier. Under the totality of the
circumstances, a reasonable officer in the position of Miller and Graupner could have
concluded that entry was necessary to provide assistance to a victim who was already
injured, or to prevent future harm to a potential victim. The entry thus did not violate
the Fourth Amendment rights of Cotten and Davis. As such, the officers were
entitled to summary judgment.
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For these reasons, we reverse the judgment of the district court, and remand
with directions to enter judgment for the defendants.
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