In Rieman v. Vasquez, published March 5, 2024, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed denial of absolute and qualified immunity to the defendant social workers. The plaintiff infant fell off a bed. His mother (a plaintiff) and grandmother took him to a hospital, which examined him but did not perform any diagnostic studies. A nurse at the hospital, as a mandated reporter, reported the incident to the county Child and Family Services. A defendant social worker went to the family's home and advised the mother to take the baby to another hospital for further evaluation. The family asked to speak to the social worker's supervisor. The mother, grandmother and the mother's stepfather drove to the office to meet with the supervisor. On the way, they made an appointment for the baby to be seen by a doctor. The family met with the defendant supervisor, who urged them to consider taking the baby to to the hospital to be evaluated by another doctor. The CFS representives did not not inform the family that CFS would seek a warrant if the mother did not take the baby to the hospital. After the family left, the supervisor and social worker applied for a detention warrant. Based on the application, the juvenile court issued a temporary detention warrant for the child. Law enforcement and the social worker attempted multiple times that day and the next morning to serve the warrant at the mother's home address, without success. The social worker then prepared a juvenile dependency petition and detention report, scheduling a detention hearing for the morning after the petition and report were filed. In the report, which the supervisor and social worker signed, they claimed the mother was not noticed for the detention hearing because her whereabouts were unknown. They listed a different telephone number than the one listed for the mother in the original referral CFS compiled. Meanwhile, the family tried to contact CFS on several occasions. The supervisor and social worker never called or otherwise attempted to notify the mother of the detention hearing. The mother did not appear at the hearing. At the hearing, the court ordered the child to be detained and placed in CFS's custody, issued a warrant of apprehension, and set the matter for another conference nearly a month later. The mother learned of the hearing two days after the hearing. Soon after hearing of it, the mother provided CFS with additional medical records for the child. CFS representatives told her that the issue was out of their hands, and CFS could not withdraw the warrant. The mother took the baby to the hospital, where she was forced to relinquish the child to a law enforcement officer. The baby was returned almost two months later. The mother and baby sued the social worker and supervisor under 42 U.S.C. section 1983 alleging violation of their 14th Amendment rights by failing to provide notice of the detention hearing and providing false information to the juvenile court about why the mother was not noticed for the hearing. The district court denied the defendants' motion for summary judgment based on absolute and qualified immunity, and granted the plaintiffs' motion for summary judgment, ruling the plaintiffs' 4th and 14th Amendment rights were violated.
The 9th Circuit agreed that the defendants were not entitled to absolute or qualified immunity. They were not entitled to absolute prosecutorial immunity for initiating the juvenile dependency proceeding. Social workers may enjoy absolute immunity from suit when they make discretionary, quasi-prosecutorial decisions to institute court dependency proceedings to take custody away from parents. But the defendants were not sued for instituting the dependency proceedings; they were sued for failing to provide notice and for acts of judicial deception regarding the mother's whereabouts. These actions and omissions are not similar to discretionary decisions about whether to prosecute, and so are not subject to absolute immunity. The defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity, because they violate the mother's clearly-established right to notice of the dependency hearing before she was deprived of custody of her child, and violated the plaintiffs' clearly-established right to be free from deception in the presentation of evidence during juvenile dependency hearings.
Comments