Irvin v. Richardson

20 F.4th 1199

Larenzo IRVIN, Plaintiff - Appellant

v.Tyler RICHARDSON, et al., Defendants - Appellees

Derrick Jerome Bates, Plaintiff - Appellant

v.Tyler Richardson, et al., Defendants - Appellees

No. 19-2364

No. 19-2610

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

Submitted: June 15, 2021

Filed: December 16, 2021

Counsel who presented argument on behalf of the appellant and appeared on the brief was Thomas P. Frerichs, of Waterloo, IA.

Counsel who presented argument on behalf of the appellee and appeared on the brief was Elizabeth Jacobi, of Cedar Rapids, IA.

Before LOKEN, KELLY, and ERICKSON, Circuit Judges.

LOKEN, Circuit Judge

In these § 1983 actions, Larenzo Irvin and Derrick Jerome Bates sued Cedar Rapids Police Officers Tyler Richardson and Jared Jupin, Police Chief Wayne Jerman, and the City of Cedar Rapids, asserting violations of their Fourth Amendment rights and claims under Iowa law when Officers Richardson and Jupin stopped Irvin and Bates while responding to a 911 call. Irvin and Bates appeal the grant of summary judgment dismissing all claims in each case. We consolidated the appeals. Having jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we affirm the district court's grant of summary judgment dismissing Irvin's claims. We also affirm the dismissal of Bates's parallel state and federal claims, but we reverse the grant of summary judgment dismissing his federal and state law claims of false arrest after the initial encounter.

I. Background

At 3:21 p.m. on April 24, 2016, a Cedar Rapids police dispatcher issued an alert for "a disturbance with a weapon" at "Higley Avenue and Wellington Street" based on a 911 call from a complainant named Elaine. It is undisputed that the dispatch transmitted to officers reported, "Complainant stated that there are three black males they live at the corner house by the alley. They are outside arguing, one displayed a 10-32 [gun] that subject is a black male white t-shirt heavier set. Another black male is in all blue." There was no description of the third individual, nor did the dispatcher provide the complainant's name or address.

Officer Richardson responded, arriving at the scene minutes later. Driving on Higley Avenue towards the intersection of Higley and Wellington, he saw a black man enter a corner house, called out to him, but the man did not respond. Officer Richardson then saw a woman flagging him down and stopped to speak with her. The woman was the 911 caller, but that was not confirmed until after the officers' encounter with Irvin and Bates. In a ten-second exchange, the woman told Richardson that someone had gone around the corner wearing "white and black pants." Richardson asked, "white shirt, black pants?" and she responded, "er, white and blue." Officer Richardson then drove to the intersection and turned right onto Wellington. He saw two people -- later identified as Bates and Irvin -- walking away from him along the left side of the street. The dashcam video shows Bates wearing a red shirt and black pants and Irvin wearing a blue shirt and blue pants.¹

Officer Richardson got out of his car and yelled, "Stop. Stop." Irvin and Bates turned their heads, then stopped. Richardson said, "Yeah, you guys." Bates replied, "No, we didn't do nothing." Richardson yelled, "Stop right now! Stop!" and drew his gun, pointed it at Irvin and Bates, and ordered them to get on the ground. Officer Jupin, whose squad car had arrived from the opposite direction, drew his gun and did the same. Irvin and Bates slowly got down on their knees. Richardson yelled, "Face down!" Richardson handcuffed Irvin. Jupin handcuffed Bates. A pat-down determined that neither was armed.

Handcuffed and seated on the ground, 16-year-old Irvin remained quiet. Bates, 33 years old, became agitated, speaking loudly and expressing anger that the officers had pulled their guns on him. Jupin stayed with Irvin and Bates while Richardson went a block away and talked to a heavyset black man in a white t-shirt the officers spotted while detaining Irvin and Bates. Richardson ordered the man to stop and put his hands on a stone wall next to the sidewalk. The man complied. Richardson patted him down for weapons, found none, and soon released him.

Other officers arrived, giving Officer Jupin an opportunity to interview a bystander who witnessed the earlier disturbance. The witness said neither Bates nor Irvin was involved. Jupin returned to Irvin and Bates, who had been handcuffed for approximately 12 minutes, uncuffed them, and told them they were free to go. Irvin and Bates remained at the scene. Fifteen minutes later, Richardson arrested Bates for interference with official acts in violation of Iowa Code § 719.1(1).

Irvin and Bates filed administrative complaints with the Cedar Rapids Police Department, which ruled them unfounded, and these § 1983 actions. In addition to state-law claims for false arrest, Irvin and Bates asserted multiple Fourth Amendment violations: the officers lacked reasonable suspicion for an investigative Terry stop; the stop became an arrest without probable cause; Bates was later arrested without probable cause; and Chief Jerman and the City of Cedar Rapids failed to properly train the officers and ratified their unconstitutional conduct. The district court granted summary judgment dismissing all claims concluding, inter alia , that the officers did not violate plaintiffs' Fourth Amendment rights and therefore they are entitled to qualified immunity. These consolidated appeals followed.

"We review de novo the district court's grant of summary judgment based on qualified immunity." Robbins v. City of Des Moines, 984 F.3d 673, 677-78 (8th Cir. 2021), quoting Duffie v. City of Lincoln, 834 F.3d 877, 881 (8th Cir. 2016). We view the evidence in the light most favorable to Irvin and Bates, giving them the benefit of all reasonable inferences. Edwards v. Byrd, 750 F.3d 728, 731 (8th Cir. 2014). "Summary judgment is proper if the pleadings, the discovery and disclosure materials on file, and any affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Torgerson v. City of Rochester, 643 F.3d 1031, 1042 (8th Cir.) (en banc) (cleaned up), cert. denied, 565 U.S. 978, 132 S.Ct. 513, 181 L.Ed.2d 349 (2011).

Qualified immunity shields government officials from civil damage liability for a discretionary act that "does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). Qualified immunity is an immunity from suit, not merely a defense to liability. The Supreme Court has "stressed the importance of resolving immunity questions at the earliest possible stage in litigation." Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 232, 129 S.Ct. 808, 172 L.Ed.2d 565 (2009) (quotation omitted). To avoid pretrial dismissal, a plaintiff must present facts showing the violation of a constitutional right that was clearly established at the time of the defendant's act. Id. at 232-33, 236, 129 S.Ct. 808.

II. Discussion

A. The Investigative Stop of Irvin and Bates. A police officer "may, consistent with the Fourth Amendment, conduct a brief, investigatory stop when the officer has a reasonable, articulable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot." Illinois v. Wardlow, 528 U.S. 119, 123, 120 S.Ct. 673, 145 L.Ed.2d 570 (2000), citing Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 30, 88 S.Ct. 1868, 20 L.Ed.2d 889 (1968). In conducting a Terry stop, the officer may make a protective pat-down search if the officer "has a reasonable, articulable suspicion that the person may be armed and presently dangerous." United States v. Davison, 808 F.3d 325, 329 (8th Cir. 2015) (citations omitted). Reasonable suspicion is a fact-specific inquiry, determined by the totality of the circumstances, taking account of an officer's deductions and rational inferences resulting from relevant training and experience. United States v. Arvizu, 534 U.S. 266, 273-74, 122 S.Ct. 744, 151 L.Ed.2d 740 (2002). It requires "some minimal level of objective justification," but a series of acts may be "innocent if viewed separately, but ... taken together warrant [ ] further investigation." United States v. Sokolow, 490 U.S. 1, 7, 9-10, 109 S.Ct. 1581, 104 L.Ed.2d 1 (1989) (cleaned up). We review the determination of reasonable suspicion de novo , "tak[ing] care both to review findings of historical fact only for clear error and to give due weight to inferences drawn from those facts by resident judges and local law enforcement officers." Ornelas v. United States, 517 U.S. 690, 699, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996).

When the issue is whether a § 1983 defendant police officer violated a clearly established Fourth Amendment right, if we determine that the officer lacked reasonable suspicion and thus conducted an unlawful Terry stop, he "may nonetheless be entitled to qualified immunity if [he] had arguable reasonable suspicion -- that is, if a reasonable officer in the same position could have believed [he] had reasonable suspicion." Waters v. Madson, 921 F.3d 725, 736 (8th Cir. 2019) ; see Watson v. Boyd, 2 F.4th 1106, 1113-14 (8th Cir. 2021) (vacating and remanding the denial of qualified immunity); Robbins, 984 F.3d at 679.

The district court concluded that Officer Richardson had reasonable suspicion to stop and detain Irvin and Bates to determine whether they were involved in an unlawful firearm display during a public disturbance minutes earlier at a location they were walking away from. "Considering that [Bates] and Irvin were found in the vicinity to which Officer Richardson was dispatched and directed, that Irvin's clothing reasonably matched the description Officer Richardson had of one of the three males, and that [Bates] could have been the third male for whom no description was provided, the Court finds that Officer Richardson could reasonably believe that [...