Enoch v. Hamilton Cnty. Sheriff's Office

VANESSA ENOCH, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. HAMILTON COUNTY SHERIFF'S OFFICE, et al., Defendants-Appellants.

Case No. 19-3428

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

June 11, 2020

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION

File Name: 20a0343n.06

ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF OHIO

OPINION

Before: SUHRHEINRICH, BUSH, and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.

JOHN K. BUSH, Circuit Judge. This case arises from arrests of Vanessa Enoch and Avery Corbin for taking videos and photos in a hallway of a courthouse in Hamilton County, Ohio, ostensibly in violation of a judge's order prohibiting courtroom pictures and videos. Enoch and Corbin claim that the arrests violated their rights under the First and Fourth Amendments as incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment, and also raise state-law claims. At the pleadings stage the district court denied qualified immunity for the arresting officers, Sheriff's Deputies Gene Nobles and Brian Hogan (together, "the Deputies"), and a panel of this court affirmed. Enoch v. Hogan, 728 F. App'x 448 (6th Cir. 2018) (Enoch I). At summary judgment the district court again denied qualified immunity to the Deputies on the First and Fourth Amendment claims, granted summary judgment to Enoch and Corbin on three of those claims (Counts I, II and II), and denied summary judgment on the remaining claims. For the reasons stated below, we REVERSE the district court's denial of qualified immunity, AFFIRM the district court's denial of state-law immunity to all Defendants-Appellants, DISMISS the interlocutory appeal of the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office, and REMAND for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I.

In 2014, Enoch and Corbin visited the county courthouse in Hamilton County, Ohio to attend a pretrial hearing in the criminal prosecution of Tracie Hunter, a local juvenile court judge. Corbin was a bailiff for Judge Hunter before she was removed from the bench. Enoch was in court that day conducting a case study of the prosecution of Judge Hunter. At the conclusion of the day's proceedings, Enoch and Corbin exited the courtroom and, using their iPads, began taking videos and photos in the hallway.

Enoch and Corbin stood with others congregated outside the courtroom. When Kimball Perry, a reporter for the Cincinnati Enquirer, exited the courtroom, Corbin pointed the iPad towards Perry. As Perry walked down the hallway and turned down a different hallway, Corbin followed, taking pictures of and video recording the reporter. Perry then called out to the Deputies—here, acting as court security officers—that Corbin was taking pictures in the hallway. All the while, Enoch was also taking pictures on her iPad. The Deputies responded to the commotion. Deputy Hogan ordered Corbin and Enoch to stop recording and to turn off their devices, insisting that a local court rule prohibited photography or video recording anywhere in the courthouse. The Deputies also demanded that Corbin and Enoch provide photo identification. After Corbin did so, he argued with the Deputies that he was permitted to take pictures and record videos in the hallway because the judge only prohibited photography inside the courtroom, not in the hallways.

While the Deputies were discussing Corbin's conduct that had led to the commotion, Corbin took out his iPad again to take a picture of the courtroom door. On the door was posted anotice stating that "use of cell phones, pagers, cameras, electronic devices are prohibited without permission of the Court." R. 84-11 at PageID 1236.

Local Rule 33(D)(6) prohibits recording "in any courtroom or hearing room, jury room, judge's chambers or ancillary area (to be determined in the sole discretion of the Court) without the express permission of the Court." Hamilton Cty. Common Pleas Court R. 33(D)(6).¹ Judge Nadel, who presided at the Hunter trial, gave an instruction in his courtroom pursuant to Rule 33(D)(6), but did not reference "hallways" in those instructions. However, when deposed in this case, Judge Nadel testified that he understood that "the hallway" was an "adjacent area[]" that was "ancillary to the courtroom" and that he thought that this understanding was implicit in his order. Neither Hogan nor Nobles had seen an order from Judge Nadel defining "ancillary areas" to include the hallways of the courthouse.

The Deputies charged both Corbin and Enoch for disorderly conduct under Ohio Rev. Code § 2917.11. Enoch also was charged with failure to disclose information under Ohio Rev. Code § 2921.29, on the basis that she had refused to identify herself. The Deputies later testified that they arrested the pair for taking photographs in violation of Local Rule 33(D)(6). All charges were subsequently dismissed.

Enoch and Corbin filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 alleging First and Fourth Amendment claims and pendent state-law claims against Deputies Hogan and Nobles, the Hamilton County Sheriff's Office, and County Sheriff Jim Neil, along with four other employees of the Sheriff's Office who have since been dismissed. As part of their claims, Enoch and Corbin maintained that they were singled out and arrested because they were African American. Although several other individuals—most of them white—were using cameras and other recording devicesin the hallways, they were not prohibited from doing so by the Deputies, and none of them were arrested.

The Deputies moved for judgment on the pleadings for the federal-law claims on the basis of qualified immunity. The district court granted the motion as to Enoch and Corbin's excessive-force claims (Count IV), but concluded that they were not entitled to qualified immunity on the remaining claims at the pleading stage. The district court also granted the motion as to Enoch and Corbin's state-law malicious-prosecution claim (Count VII), state-law false-imprisonment claim (Count IX), and state-law assault and battery claim (Count XI). We affirmed in Enoch I, 728 F. App'x at 457, holding that Enoch and Corbin had plausibly alleged violations of their First and Fourth Amendment rights, and remanded to the district court for further proceedings on Counts I-III, V, VI, VIII, and X.

After the close of discovery, both sides moved for partial summary judgment. The district court again denied the Deputies qualified immunity on the First and Fourth Amendment claims, denied summary judgment to Sheriff Neil and the Sheriff's Office on a claim of supervisory liability under the First and Fourth Amendments, and granted summary judgment to Enoch and Corbin on certain First and Fourth Amendment claims (Counts I, II and III), reserving for trial a Fourth Amendment malicious-prosecution claim (Count V), the supervisory-liability claim (Count VI), and state-law claims of negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress (Count VIII) and invasion of privacy (Count X). The district court held that Defendants-Appellants were not entitled to state-law statutory immunity on the invasion-of-privacy claim. In addition, the district court held that Defendants-Appellants were not entitled to Eleventh Amendment immunity. Finally, the district court declined to rule on Enoch and Corbin's First Amendment claims to theextent they were predicated on racial animus, purporting to reserve them for trial.² Defendants-Appellants filed this timely appeal.

II.

There are five major arguments made for reversal of the district court's rulings. First, Defendants-Appellants claim that they are entitled to sovereign immunity under the Eleventh Amendment because, as court security officers, the Deputies were acting as arms of the state, rather than the county. Second, the Deputies argue that they are entitled to qualified immunity on the First and Fourth Amendment claims. Third, Sheriff Neil and the Deputies contend that they are entitled to summary judgment for the official-capacity claims. Fourth, Defendants-Appellants maintain that they are entitled to state-law immunity for the state-law claims. Finally, the Sheriff's Office argues that the district court erred in denying summary judgment on the municipal-liability claim. We address each argument in turn.

A.

Defendants-Appellants contend that, because the Deputies were acting as court security officers, they are officers of the Court of Common Pleas, and thus Defendants-Appellants, whose liability is derived from actions of the Deputies, are entitled to sovereign immunity under the Eleventh Amendment.³ See S.J. v. Hamilton Cty., Ohio, 374 F.3d 416, 421 (6th Cir. 2004).Whether sovereign immunity exists in a given case "is a question of constitutional law that we review de novo." Ernst v. Rising, 427 F.3d 351, 359 (6th Cir. 2005) (en banc).

The States' immunity from suits in federal court applies to claims against a State by citizens of the same State as well as to claims against a State by citizens of another State. See Hans v. Louisiana, 134 U.S. 1, 15, 21 (1890). This immunity "also applies to actions against state officials sued in their official capacity for money damages." Ernst, 427 F.3d at 358 (emphasis added) (citing Lapides v. Bd. of Regents, 535 U.S. 613, 616 (2002). However, state officials sued in their individual capacities may not avail themselves of the State's sovereign immunity. See Hafer v. Melo, 502 U.S. 21, 31 (1991). Here, Enoch and Corbin sued the Deputies for money damages in their individual capacities. See Appellee's Br. at 12-13. Therefore, Defendants-Appellants' defense of immunity under the Eleventh Amendment fails as a matter of law. Hafer, 502 U.S. at 31.

B.

The Deputies contend that the district court erred in denying them qualified immunity on Enoch and Corbin's First and Fourth Amendment claims. We review a district court's denial of qualified immunity de novo. Binay v. Bettendorf, 601 F.3d 640, 646 (6th Cir. 2010). "A defendant enjoys qualified immunity on summary judgment unless the facts alleged and the evidence produced, when viewed in the light most...