Wayne Wright v. Charles Beck ( 2020 )

NOT FOR PUBLICATION FILED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS DEC 1 2020
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
WAYNE WILLIAM WRIGHT, No. 19-55084
Plaintiff-Appellant, D.C. No.
2:15-cv-05805-R-PJW
v.
CHARLES L. BECK; et al., MEMORANDUM*
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Central District of California
Manuel L. Real, District Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted April 1, 2020
Pasadena, California
Before: PAEZ, CALLAHAN, and VANDYKE, Circuit Judges.
Wayne Wright appeals the district court’s grant of summary judgment in
favor of Defendants-Appellees on his Fourth Amendment claim brought under 42
U.S.C. § 1983.1 The district court concluded the individually named Defendants-
Appellees were entitled to qualified immunity. Reviewing de novo, Mendiola–
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
1
In a separately filed opinion, we address Wright’s Fourteenth Amendment due
process claim. Because the facts and procedural history are outlined there, we
need not recount them here.
Martinez v. Arpaio, 836 F.3d 1239, 1247 (9th Cir. 2016), we affirm.
Although our decision in Brewster v. Beck, 859 F.3d 1194, 1197 (9th Cir.
2017), may suggest that the government might violate the Fourth Amendment by
interfering with one’s property even after conducting a lawful seizure, we decided
Brewster three years after the allegedly unlawful conduct here. It thus fails to
show the law was clearly established at the time the Los Angeles Police
Department officers destroyed Wright’s firearms. Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563 U.S.
731, 741 (2011) (stating law must be clearly established “at the time of the
challenged conduct”).
Our earlier cases also fail to show the law was “clearly established” because
they involve different facts. See, e.g., Jessop v. City of Fresno, 936 F.3d 937 (9th
Cir. 2019), pet. for cert. denied, 140 S. Ct. 2793 (May 18, 2020). For example,
both United States v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109 (1984), and Lavan v. City of Los
Angeles, 693 F.3d 1022 (9th Cir. 2012), involved warrantless seizures, unlike here.
Jacobsen, 466 U.S. at 113, 120–21 & n.3 (1984); Lavan, 693 F.3d at 1032-33.
We thus cannot conclude that the law was “clearly established” that the
Fourth Amendment protected Wright’s interest against an unreasonable
interference with his property.2
2
Because the law was not clearly established, we do not address whether Wright’s
Fourth Amendment interest was violated. See Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223,
236 (2009).
2
AFFIRMED.
3