FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
November 9, 2010
PUBLISH Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
TENTH CIRCUIT
ALFREDO YERO PORRO,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
No. 10-6002
STANLEY BARNES; and MICHAEL
BRYANT, in his official capacity as
Sheriff of Jefferson County,
Defendants - Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Oklahoma
(D.C. No. 08-CV-00970-C)
Submitted on the briefs: *
Mark E. Bialick and David B. Donchin, Durbin, Larimore & Bialick, Oklahoma
City, OK; and David W. Little, Law Offices of David Little, Oklahoma City, OK
for Plaintiff-Appellant.
Robert S. Lafferrandre and Randall J. Wood, Pierce Couch Hendrickson
Baysinger & Green, L.L.P., Oklahoma City, OK; and Chris J. Collins, Timothy
M. Melton, and Linda K. Soper, Collins, Zorn & Wagner, P.C., Oklahoma City,
OK for Defendants-Appellees.
*
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has
determined unanimously to grant the parties’ request for a decision on the briefs
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(f) and 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The
case is therefore ordered submitted without oral argument.
Before KELLY and GORSUCH, Circuit Judges, and MELGREN, District
Judge. **
GORSUCH, Circuit Judge.
This case presents two central questions: What provision of the
Constitution should this court use to analyze a federal immigration detainee’s
claim of excessive force? And does a county’s failure to adopt a prophylactic
policy with a standard of care higher than what the Constitution requires suffice,
by itself, to suggest deliberate indifference to the Constitution’s protections
against excessive force? On the first question, we hold that the due process
guarantee is the proper doctrinal prism through which to analyze the claims of
federal immigration detainees who don’t challenge the lawfulness of their
detention but only the force used during that detention. On the second, we hold
that the answer is simply no. To create a triable question of fact on the use of
excessive force, a plaintiff must do more than show that the defendant county
failed to adopt the most protective possible policy against the application of
force. Because our conclusions mirror those reached by the district court on
summary judgment, we affirm.
**
The Honorable Eric F. Melgren, United States District Court Judge for
the District of Kansas, sitting by designation.
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I
This case began when members of a certified emergency response team
(“CERT”) at the Jefferson County Jail in Oklahoma responded to a call that
Alfredo Yero Porro, a federal immigration detainee, was acting in a disruptive
manner in his cell, destroying parts of it. To address the situation, CERT
members removed Mr. Porro from his cell, walked him to the jail’s booking area,
and placed him in a restraint chair. No one challenges the propriety of any of
this. But then, after Mr. Porro was restrained, a member of the CERT proceeded
to taser Mr. Porro at least three times. And it is this force that eventually gave
rise to this lawsuit. Mr. Porro filed his claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, against
three defendants: Kenny Lovett, the CERT member who tasered him; Stanley
Barnes, the sheriff of Jefferson County at the time of the incident; and Michael
Bryant, Mr. Barnes’s successor. Against all three, Mr. Porro alleged that they
violated the Constitution’s prohibitions against the use of excessive force. Mr.
Porro appeared to sue Messrs. Lovett and Barnes in their individual capacities,
and Messrs. Barnes and Bryant in their official capacities.
At summary judgment, the district court entered a pair of rulings. First, it
entered judgment for Mr. Porro against Mr. Lovett and awarded damages of
$100,000. The court found, among other things, that Mr. Lovett violated county
rules prohibiting the use of a taser against a restrained detainee who presented no
threat of harm, and that the force Mr. Lovett applied was constitutionally
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excessive. Second, the district court granted summary judgment to Messrs.
Barnes and Bryant. The court held that Mr. Porro had come forward with no
more than “supposition, conjecture and innuendo” to suggest Mr. Barnes’s
personal involvement or the county’s culpability. Aplt. App. at 467. The court
added that all the evidence adduced before it suggested that Mr. Lovett’s tasering
was no “more than a random act or isolated event which occurred outside of the
policies and procedures implemented by Defendant Barnes.” Aplt. App. at 471.
Only the district court’s latter judgment — in favor of Messrs. Barnes and
Bryant — is contested on appeal. While not entirely clear from the briefing
before us, Mr. Porro appears to suggest that the court erred in two distinct ways.
First, he seems to say, a triable question of fact exists on whether Mr. Barnes
should be held liable in his individual capacity for his alleged personal role in the
tasering incident. Second, Mr. Porro appears to suggest, a triable question exists
on whether both Messrs. Barnes and Bryant should be held liable in their official
capacities because the policy of the County’s Sheriff’s Office was the moving
force behind his injury.
We address these two arguments in turn. Because this case comes to us on
summary judgment, we of course review it de novo and may affirm only if the
facts, viewed in the light most favorable to Mr. Porro, warrant that result as a
matter of law.
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II
To assess Mr. Porro’s first argument — that Mr. Barnes is liable in his
individual capacity for unconstitutional use of excessive force — we must begin
by asking which constitutional standard controls before asking whether the
evidence presented creates a triable question of fact under that standard.
A
Our first task in any § 1983 suit alleging a constitutional violation is “to
isolate the precise constitutional violation with which [the defendant] is charged.”
Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 140 (1979). On this score, Mr. Porro doesn’t
offer much help: he alleges simply a violation of the “Fourth, Eighth, and
Fourteenth” Amendments, without suggesting which one he thinks best applies to
his case or offering any further explanation. See Amd. Compl. ¶ 3.
The choice of amendment matters. Excessive force claims can be
maintained under the Fourth, Fifth, Eighth, or Fourteenth Amendment — all
depending on where the defendant finds himself in the criminal justice system —
and each carries with it a very different legal test. So, because the Fourth
Amendment protects against “unreasonable searches and seizures” and pertains to
the events leading up to and including an arrest of a citizen previously at liberty,
excessive force claims arising during this period are generally reviewed under a
relatively exacting “objective reasonableness” standard. See Graham v. Connor,
490 U.S. 386, 394-95 (1989); Austin v. Hamilton, 945 F.2d 1155, 1160 (10th Cir.
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1991) (holding that the Fourth Amendment applies until formal charges are
brought or an arraignment is held because force used is part of the “seizure”),
abrogated on other grounds, Johnson v. Jones, 515 U.S. 304 (1995).
Meanwhile, prisoners already convicted of a crime who claim that their
punishments involve excessive force must proceed under the more restrictive
terms of the Eighth Amendment’s “cruel and unusual punishments” clause. Here,
we ask only whether the “force was applied in a good-faith effort to maintain or
restore discipline, or maliciously and sadistically to cause harm.” See Hudson v.
McMillan, 503 U.S. 1, 6-7 (1992); Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 671 n.40
(1977).
And when neither the Fourth nor Eighth Amendment applies — when the
plaintiff finds himself in the criminal justice system somewhere between the two
stools of an initial seizure and post-conviction punishment — we turn to the due
process clauses of the Fifth or Fourteenth Amendment and their protection against
arbitrary governmental action by federal or state authorities. See County of
Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 843 (1998). Take the example of an
arraigned pretrial detainee who brings an excessive force claim. He doesn’t
dispute that he’s been lawfully seized and committed to pretrial detention, and he
isn’t complaining about any punishment meted out as part of a post-conviction
sentence. Instead, his complaint is about arbitrary governmental action, taken
without due process, while he is detained awaiting trial. In these circumstances,
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our precedent instructs us to focus on three factors: “(1) the relationship between
the amount of force used and the need presented; (2) the extent of the injury
inflicted; and (3) the motives of the state actor.” Roska v. Peterson, 328 F.3d
1230, 1243 (10th Cir. 2003). We’ve also said that “[f]orce inspired by malice or
by unwise, excessive zeal amounting to an abuse of official power that shocks the
conscience may be redressed under the Fourteenth Amendment.” Id (internal
quotation and alterations omitted).
We hold that it is this last, due process, standard that controls excessive
force claims brought by federal immigration detainees like Mr. Porro. Why he
was being detained at the Jefferson County Jail — whether, for example, he had
violated his parole or was awaiting deportation — Mr. Porro does not tell us. But
neither does he dispute that he had been lawfully seized and detained. In this
way, he is unlike the citizen who complains about the force used to effect his
seizure in his initial encounter with the police, which would trigger the Fourth
Amendment’s protections. Mr. Porro also appears to be unlike the convicted
prisoner who may be lawfully subjected to punishment as part of his sentence, but
who complains that his punishment involves excessive force and so must resort to
the Eighth Amendment. No one alleges that Mr. Porro’s detention came after any
conviction. In these circumstances — circumstances in which many federal
immigration detainees’ claims of excessive force must surely arise — Mr. Porro
appears to walk in much the same shoes as an arraigned pre-trial detainee. He is
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therefore protected by the due process clause (in this case, the Fourteenth
Amendment’s due process clause, given that Mr. Porro’s complaint is against
state officials). We note that other courts confronting the status of immigration
detainees before us have reached this same conclusion, assessing their excessive
force claims under the due process rubric. See, e.g., Edwards v. Johnson, 209
F.3d 772, 778 (5th Cir. 2000); Sidorov v. Sabol, 2010 WL 500415, *2 n.2 (M.D.
Pa. Feb. 4, 2010).
B
That much straightened out, we agree with the district court that Mr. Porro
cannot make out an excessive force claim against Mr. Barnes. And this is
because there’s no evidence of his direct personal responsibility for the force
used against Mr. Porro. In our due process precedent we have said that we
examine the force used, the injury inflicted, and relevant motives. But in each
instance, the focus must always be on the defendant — on the force he used or
caused to be used, on the injury he inflicted or caused to be inflicted, and on his
motives. This is because § 1983 isn’t a strict liability offense. It renders liable
only those persons “who, under color of any [state law] . . . subject[], or cause[]
to be subjected, any citizen” to a deprivation of his or her lawful rights. 42
U.S.C. § 1983. From this statutory language, it is evident that “[i]n order for
liability to arise under § 1983, a defendant’s direct personal responsibility for the
claimed deprivation of a constitutional right must be established.” Trujillo v.
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Williams, 465 F.3d 1210, 1227 (10th Cir. 2006) (emphasis added); see also
Novitsky v. City of Aurora, 491 F.3d 1244, 1254 (10th Cir. 2007) (requiring that
the defendant have “personally participated” in the constitutional deprivation and
holding that mere presence at the scene was insufficient).
Viewed through this prism, Mr. Porro can satisfy none of the due process
factors against Mr. Barnes individually. 1 True enough, Mr. Porro was subjected
to force, injured by it, and an improper motive was involved. But all this came at
Mr. Lovett’s hands and as a result of his motives. When it comes to Mr. Barnes,
the undisputed facts show that Mr. Barnes did not employ any force on Mr. Porro
and was not present when the force was applied. Neither does the record suggest
Mr. Barnes gave any advance approval to the use of a taser on Mr. Porro. Though
Mr. Porro says that Mr. Barnes knew CERT members “planned” to taser him and
assented to it, this claim is, as the district court observed, based on innuendo and
speculation rather than fact. The facts to which Mr. Porro himself stipulated
indicate that Mr. Barnes did not hear any prior discussions among members of the
1
How much one due process “factor” may “balance” against another is the
subject of little discussion in our case law. For example, while we’ve said that
due process violations “required that the force be inspired by malice or by
excessive zeal that shocks the conscience,” Cortez v. McCauley, 478 F.3d 1108,
1129 n.24 (10th Cir. 2007) (en banc) (citing Hannula v. City of Lakewood, 907
F.2d 129, 131-32 (10th Cir. 1990)), we have usually examined an officer’s motive
in combination with the preceding factors, conducting such an inquiry in Hannula
itself, see 907 F.2d at 131-32. Happily, we need not delve further into any of this
today because Mr. Porro fails on each of the due process factors our precedent
discusses.
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CERT that a taser was going to be used, or might be used, on Mr. Porro. Aplt.
Appx. at 15, 272. The record likewise lacks any evidence suggesting that Mr.
Barnes caused any of Mr. Porro’s injuries, or bore malice or exhibited excessive
zeal toward him.
To all this, Mr. Porro seems to reply that Mr. Barnes should be held liable
by virtue of the fact that he was Mr. Lovett’s supervisor. But even assuming Mr.
Barnes enjoyed supervisory authority over Mr. Lovett and the rest of the CERT —
a question suggested by the parties’ briefs but which we need not explore — that
isn’t enough to generate a triable question of liability.
Just as § 1983’s plain language doesn’t authorize strict liability, it doesn’t
authorize respondeat superior liability. The plain language of the statute, again,
asks simply whether the defendant at issue “subject[ed], or cause[d] to be
subjected” a plaintiff to a deprivation of his legal rights. 42 U.S.C. § 1983
(emphasis added). To establish a violation of § 1983 by a supervisor, as with
everyone else, then, “the plaintiff must establish a deliberate, intentional act” on
the part of the defendant “to violate [the plaintiff’s legal] rights.” Serna v. Colo.
Dep’t. of Corr., 455 F.3d 1146, 1151 (10th Cir. 2006) (internal quotation marks
omitted); see also Jenkins v. Wood, 81 F.3d 988, 994 (10th Cir. 1996) (“[T]here is
no concept of strict supervisor liability.”) (internal quotation omitted); Coleman
v. Turpen, 697 F.2d 1341, 1346 n.7 (10th Cir. 1982).
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In the due process context, this means the focus is on the force the
supervisor used or caused to be used, the resulting injury attributable to his
conduct, and the mens rea required of him to be held liable, which can be no less
than the mens rea required of anyone else. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. 1937,
1949 (2009); Dodds v. Richardson, 614 F.3d 1185, 1204 (10th Cir. 2010) (a
plaintiff can “no longer succeed on a § 1983 claim . . . by showing that as a
supervisor [the defendant] behaved knowingly or with deliberate indifference that
a constitutional violation would occur at the hands of his subordinates, unless that
is the same state of mind required for the constitutional deprivation he alleges”)
(internal quotation omitted). Simply put, there’s no special rule of liability for
supervisors. The test for them is the same as the test for everyone else. And as
we’ve already explained, Mr. Porro’s claim against Mr. Barnes fails that test.
III
Even if Mr. Barnes isn’t liable in his individual capacity, Mr. Porro argues
that Mr. Barnes — and Mr. Bryant — are liable in their official capacities for
violating his constitutional due process rights by failing to train CERT members
adequately. Suing individual defendants in their official capacities under § 1983,
we’ve recognized, is essentially another way of pleading an action against the
county or municipality they represent. See Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Serv. of New
York, 436 U.S. 658, 690 n.55 (1978); Barney v. Pulsipher, 143 F.3d 1299, 1307
(10th Cir. 1998). Because of this, we apply the standard of liability to
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municipalities and counties in assessing whether Mr. Porro’s official capacity
claim for failure to train survives summary judgment. See Kentucky v. Graham,
473 U.S. 159, 165-66 (1985); see also Dodds, 614 F.3d at 1202 (noting that
although Iqbal clarified the standards for assessing supervisory liability,
“[n]othing in Iqbal contradicts” the standards for municipal liability under
§ 1983).
To prevail under this standard, Mr. Porro must demonstrate, among other
things, that “the need for more or different training [was] so obvious, and the
inadequacy so likely to result in the violation of [his due process] rights, that the
policymakers of the [county] can reasonably be said to have been deliberately
indifferent to the need for additional training.” Jenkins, 81 F.3d at 994 (internal
quotation omitted). It isn’t enough to “show that there were general deficiencies
in the county’s training program for jailers.” Lopez v. LeMaster, 172 F.3d 756,
760 (10th Cir. 1999). Rather, a plaintiff must “identify a specific deficiency” that
was obvious and “closely related” to his injury, id., so that it might fairly be said
that the official policy or custom was both deliberately indifferent to his
constitutional rights and the moving force behind his injury, see City of Canton v.
Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 385 (1989).
Mr. Porro cannot shoulder that burden in this case. The undisputed facts
show that the county trained jailers to use tasers only if and when an inmate
should become violent, combative, and pose a direct threat to the security of staff.
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The record also shows that Mr. Lovett knew he was acting in defiance of this
policy when he tasered Mr. Porro. See Aplt. App. at 16, 110. From this
undisputed evidence, any reasonable fact finder would have to conclude that —
far from exhibiting deliberate indifference to Mr. Porro’s due process rights
against the use of excessive force or causing his injury — the county actively
sought to protect those rights and it was (only) Mr. Lovett’s improper actions,
taken in defiance of county policy, that caused Mr. Porro’s injuries. See id. at 16,
110, 273. 2
To this, Mr. Porro replies that the county exhibited deliberate indifference
by failing to enforce a putative federal policy that completely bans the use of
tasers on immigration detainees. In pursuing this line, Mr. Porro seems to assume
that the putative federal policy and the Constitution are congruent, so that a
failure to train on the former is incontrovertible evidence that the latter was
offended. The failure to abide by the federal policy apparently amounts, in his
view, to automatic or per se proof of deliberate indifference. Cf. Restatement
2
Mr. Porro’s brief isn’t clear whether he seeks to raise his failure-to-train
argument against Mr. Barnes in his individual, as well as official, capacity. And,
of course, arguments not clearly made in an opening brief are deemed waived.
See Adler v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 144 F.3d 664, 679 (10th Cir. 1998). But even
if we were to assume Mr. Porro raised this argument against Mr. Barnes in his
individual capacity, it would fail for essentially these same reasons.
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(Third) of Torts: Liability for Physical and Emotional Harm § 14 (2010)
(discussing statutory violations as negligence per se). 3
The problem is that Mr. Porro never seeks to explain how or why the
violation of the federal policy (assuming it existed and controlled in a county jail)
necessarily demonstrates deliberate indifference to his constitutional due process
rights. It is his burden to establish that the Constitution, not just a policy, is
implicated. Yet he overlooks this necessity altogether. Cf. Jolivet v. Cook, 1995
WL 94496, *2 (10th Cir. 1995) (unpublished) (“Plaintiff notes that defendants
admitted they violated prison policy on use of taser weapons. However, violation
of a prison regulation does not give rise to an Eighth Amendment violation absent
evidence the prison official’s conduct failed to conform to the constitutional
standard.”).
No doubt Mr. Porro hasn’t sought to carry this burden because he can’t.
Policies are often prophylactic, setting standards of care higher than what the
Constitution requires. And that’s surely the case here. While the putative federal
policy may totally forbid the use of tasers on immigration detainees, the
Constitution doesn’t go so far. The use of tasers in at least some circumstances
— such as in a good faith effort to stop a detainee who is attempting to inflict
harm on others — can comport with due process. Cf. Hinton v. City of Elwood,
3
Neither does Mr. Porro bring his § 1983 suit alleging violation of any
other federal legal entitlement. His suit alleges only the violation of his
constitutional rights. See Aplt’s Br. at 1; Amd. Compl. ¶ 3.
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997 F.2d 774, 777 (10th Cir. 1993) (holding, in the Fourth Amendment context,
that it is not excessive force for officers to use an “electrical stun gun” on a man
resisting arrest); Hunter v. Young, 238 F. App’x 336, 339 (10th Cir. 2007)
(unpublished) (use of taser is not per se unconstitutional when used to compel
obedience by inmates); Draper v. Reynolds, 369 F.3d 1270, 1278 (11th Cir.
2004); Jasper v. Thalacker, 999 F.2d 353, 354 (8th Cir. 1993); Caldwell v.
Moore, 968 F.2d 595, 602 (6th Cir. 1992); Michenfelder v. Sumner, 860 F.2d 328,
335-36 (9th Cir. 1988).
Simply put, the failure to enforce a prophylactic policy imposing a standard
of care well in excess of what due process requires cannot be — and we hold is
not — enough by itself to create a triable question over whether county officials
were deliberately indifferent to the Constitution. This isn’t to say, of course, a
county’s failure to train its employees in a prophylactic policy is always or
categorically irrelevant to the question of deliberate indifference. We need and
do reject only Mr. Porro’s claim that such a failure alone suffices to make out a
claim of deliberate indifference.
* * *
Mr. Porro won a significant judgment against Mr. Lovett, the individual
who tasered him. With this result, no party to this appeal has any quarrel. We
hold only, as did the district court, that Mr. Porro has failed to adduce evidence
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suggesting that Messrs. Barnes or Bryant also bear legal responsibility for the
violation of his constitutional rights. The judgment of the district court is
Affirmed.
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