In Richards v. County of San Bernardino, published June 24, 2022, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed summary judgment granted to the defendant county and a county investigator in a 42 U.S.C. section 1983 action. The plaintiff was accused of murdering his wife. The defendant investigator found, under the fingernails of fingers of the remains that had been severed after the autopsy (and that had been scraped for trace evidence) a visible blue fiber that matched a shirt the plaintiff had been wearing. Two trials of the charges against the plaintiff ended with hung juries. A third ended in mistrial. Before the fourth attempt, the county retained a forensic odontologist who opined a bruise on the decedent’s hand (which the medical examiner had determined was not a bitemark) was a bitemark that was consistent with the plaintiff’s teeth. Plaintiff spent 20 years in prison before a habeas corpus petition with new evidence (including the odontologist recanting his testimony) resulted in vacation of his conviction. The plaintiff then sued various sheriff’s officers and the county for constitutional violations allegedly committed during the murder investigation and prosecution. In particular, he alleged that the investigator had fabricated the blue fiber evidence, and that the county’s customs and policies resulted in the alleged constitutional violations. The district court granted summary judgment for all defendants. It found that the plaintiff did not carry his burden of showing any constitutional errors, and therefore could not prove the county’s Monell liability.
The court of appeals disagreed on those points. It held that the district court erred in rejecting the deliberate fabrication claim on the grounds that the plaintiff was unable to point to evidence of a motive to deliberately manipulate the evidence; there were more plausible explanations for the late discovery of the fibers; and that the plaintiff had failed to prove causation. There is a clearly established constitutional due process right not to be subjected to criminal charges based on false evidence deliberately fabricated by the government. The district court erred in requiring the plaintiff to show evidence of motive. While motive is potentially strong circumstantial evidence in support of a fabrication claim, it is never required. The plaintiff had direct evidence of fabrication. He therefore had no need to show motive. The finding of a more plausible explanation of the fiber was error, because it resulted from the district court weighing the evidence. The district court had to accept the plaintiff’s evidence as true without making credibility determinations or weighing the evidence. Further, the plaintiff presented evidence from which a jury could reasonably infer that the fibers were not under the decedent’s fingernails at the time of the autopsy. The district court also erred in concluding that the fiber evidence was not the “but for” cause of the conviction, in light of the bitemark. Because of the fundamental due process right at issue, the correct standard was not but-for causation, but rather whether the evidence was “material”—i.e, there is a reasonable likelihood that the allegedly fabricated evidence could have affected the judgment of the jury. Finally, the court erred in holding the Monell claims failed because there was no predicate constitutional violation by a government official. Because there was an issue of fact as to whether the investigator fabricated the evidence, there was an issue of fact on constitutional violation. Further, even if no individual violated the Constitution, if the plaintiff can establish he suffered constitutional injury by a county policy, the fact that individual officers are exonerated is immaterial to Monell liability. Here, the plaintiff put forth theories of Monell liability not premised on findings of liability by any individual officer.