Mohsen Moaddab v. County of Orange ( 2020 )

FILED
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
AUG 10 2020
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
MOHSEN MOADDAB, No. 19-55581
Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No.
8:18-cv-00006-JVS-DFM
v.
COUNTY OF ORANGE; et al., MEMORANDUM*
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
James V. Selna, District Judge, Presiding
Submitted August 7, 2020**
San Francisco, California
Before: THOMAS, Chief Judge, and HAWKINS and McKEOWN, Circuit Judges.
Mohsen Moaddab appeals pro se from the district court’s judgment
following a jury verdict for the defense in Moaddab’s 42 U.S.C. § 1983 lawsuit
against the County of Orange and a correctional officer in connection with an
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
**
The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).
assault that he experienced while in protective custody. We have jurisdiction
under § 1291, and we affirm.
1. The district court did not abuse its discretion by conducting the jury
trial without Moaddab. See Price v. Kramer, 200 F.3d 1237, 1252 (9th Cir. 2000)
(“Federal judges are granted broad discretion in supervising trials.”); Hernandez v.
Whiting, 881 F.2d 768, 770 (9th Cir. 1989) (“[I]mprisonment suspends the
plaintiff’s usual right to be personally present at judicial proceedings brought by
himself or on his behalf.”). Moaddab sought a writ of habeas corpus ad
testificandum a mere eight days before trial. And although the district court
granted the writ, Moaddab’s counsel subsequently agreed to proceed without
Moaddab upon learning that federal authorities were unable to timely transport his
client from Pennsylvania to California. The court did not err in proceeding to trial
without Moaddab’s physical presence, especially given the presentation of his
deposition testimony during those proceedings. See Holt v. Pitts, 619 F.2d 558,
561 (6th Cir. 1980) (listing alternatives “to decide fairly the merits of an inmate’s
. . . civil rights action,” including “the presentation of evidence by means of
depositions”).
2. To the extent that Moaddab assigns error to the proceedings below
without offering any supporting argument or citations to any portion of the record,
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we deem those arguments abandoned. See Acosta-Huerta v. Estelle, 7 F.3d 139,
144 (9th Cir. 1992) (holding, in pro se appeal, that claims not supported by
argument are deemed abandoned unless failure to consider them would result in
manifest injustice); see also Fed. R. App. P. 28(a)(8)(A) (requiring appellant’s
brief to contain “appellant’s contentions and the reasons for them, with citations to
the authorities and parts of the record on which the appellant relies”).
3. We further decline to consider Moaddab’s claims regarding his trial
counsel’s ineffective assistance, raised for the first time in his reply brief.
“Generally, a plaintiff in a civil case has no right to effective assistance of
counsel,” see Nicholson v. Rushen, 767 F.2d 1426, 1427 (9th Cir. 1985), and
Moaddab points to no considerations that rebut this presumption.
AFFIRMED.
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