In Hill v. City of Fountain Valley, published June 1, 2023, a divided panel of the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed summary judgment for the defendant officers in a 42 U.S.C. section 1983 case. A man decided to take his wife for a surprise anniversary dinner. A 911 caller reported seeing the man driving erratically with a blindfolded female passenger, and provided the license plate number. The defendant officers drove to the man's home to check the well-being of the passenger. At the house, the officers asked the man's parents about him. The parents confirmed that the man drove a vehicle matching the 911 caller's description, but said he was not home. The father of the man demanded the officers tell him what was going on. The officers related the 911 call to him. The father said the son was out with his wife. The officers requested the man's phone number. While waiting outside for the phone number, the officers noticed a young man who matched the man's description through a window. (The young man was actually the man's brother.) The officers asked the father, "Who's the other person here?" The father did not hear the question, and closed the curtains on the window. The officers told all occupants to exit the house. The father stepped outside while the mother and brother stayed inside. The father closed the door and told the officers they could not come in. The officers grabbed the father, led him to the lawn, and brought to the ground. The father alleges that his eyeglasses cut him on the forehead, and that he sustained neck and back injuries when an officer knelt on him. The family sued the officers, under federal and state law, for use of excessive force and 1st Amendment retaliation on behalf of the father, and unreasonable seizure on behalf of all family members, including two grandchildren who were present. The district court remanded a state law false arrest claim to state court, and granted the officers summary judgment on all other claims.
The panel majority affirmed summary judgment. The officers did not seize the mother or brother. Seizure requires either physical force or submission to assertion of authority. The mother and brother did not exit the house on the officers' commands, and so did not submit to the officers' show of authority. They did not leave the house until the officers restrained the father and lead him outside. Those family members therefore cannot pursue 4th Amendment claims. Assuming the officers seized the father, their alleged warrantless in-home arrest is protected by qualified immunity. Officers may make a warrantless in-home arrest if they faced exigent circumstances and had probable cause to arrest. These officers likely lacked probable cause to arrest the father for obstruction. Under California law, passively blocking a door or refusing to open a door after proper police demand are examples of permissible refusals to cooperate with police that do not amount to obstruction of justice. A jury could find there was an arrest without probable cause. But qualified immunity applies because not all reasonable police officers would believe that they lacked probable cause to arrest, especially given the urgency and unique facts--a perceived ongoing kidnapping, probable cause to arrest the brother because he matched the suspect's description, and the exigent circumstance of investigating a potentially kidnapped woman who might be hidden in the home. The officers may have believed ordering the family outside would ensure the safety of a potential kidnap victim. Closing the curtains as an officer asked a question about the unidentified male behind the window could have suggested obstruction of the investigation, or that the occupants were preparing to do battle. Even though the officers were ultimately mistaken, courts are wary of second-guessing split-second judgments by law enforcement officers. The plaintiffs did not offer any factually analogous case clearly establishing the officers' actions were unlawful under these circumstances. On the father's excessive force claim, the relatively minor injuries balanced against a tense, escalating situation during an investigation into a potential kidnapping, the balance of interests favors the government. The officers therefore did not violate the father's 4th Amendment right against excessive force. The father's 1st Amendment retaliation claim failed because he could not show retaliatory animus for his statements to the officers was a substantial factor behind his arrest. There was no evidence the father's statements perturbed the officers; and even if they did, no evidence suggests that they would not have arrested him absent those statements. The district court properly dismissed the plaintiffs' state-law claims for assault, battery and Civil Code section 52.1, since all of them have similar requirements as an excessive force claim. The district court also properly dismissed the plaintiffs' claims for negligent and intentional emotional distress, since they failed to show the requisite severe emotional distress.
One judge concurred with the decision to affirm dismissal of the excessive force and 1st Amendment retaliation claims, but opined that clearly established precedent prohibited the officers from making an in-home warrantless arrest without probable cause or exigent circumstances.
Comments