Liggins v. City of Chicago

MICHAEL LIGGINS, Plaintiff, v. THE CITY OF CHICAGO, RUSSELL EGAN, VINCENT ALONZO, Defendants.

No. 1:20-cv-04085

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division

July 9, 2021

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

MARY M. ROWLAND, United States District Judge.

Plaintiff Michael Liggins (“Liggins”) alleges that Detective Russell Egan (“Egan”), and Detective Vincent Alonzo (“Alonzo”) violated 42 U.S.C § 1983 by depriving him of his right to a fair trial under the Fourteenth Amendment; depriving him of liberty under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendment; conspiring to deprive him of his constitutional rights; and failing to intervene when his constitutional rights were violated (Counts I-IV). He also alleges that they violated Illinois state law by engaging in malicious prosecution; intentional infliction of emotional distress; and civil conspiracy (Counts VI-VIII). Liggins asserts a Monell claim against the City of Chicago (“the City”) alleging that it had a policy or practice of condoning these constitutional violations that is cognizable under § 1983 (Count V). Finally, he seeks to hold the City responsible for the detectives' state law violations via respondeat superior and seeks indemnification from the City (Count IX-X).

The City has filed a motion to dismiss the Monell claim pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6). (Dkt. 19). Defendants Egan and Alonzo have filed a motion to dismiss Counts I, II, III and VIII pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6). (Dkt. 20). For the reasons stated herein, the City's motion to dismiss is denied and the individual Defendants' motion to dismiss is granted in part and denied in part.

I. Background

The following factual allegations are taken from the Complaint (Dkt. 1) and are accepted as true for the purposes of these motions to dismiss. See W. Bend Mut. Ins. Co. v Schumacher, 844 F.3d 670, 675 (7th Cir. 2016). In 2008, two unidentified men attempted to rob a grocery store on the west side of Chicago, shooting and killing one employee. Immediately after the incident, witnesses described the offenders as African American men, approximately 5'11” and 5'9” in height. Five years later Michael Liggins, was arrested and charged with first degree murder related to the attempted robbery and murder in 2008. He was jailed in Cook County Jail from May 2014 to July 2019 awaiting trial, and eventually acquitted.

A few days after the 2008 grocery store murder, a 19-year-old named Jacob Tolbert was arrested for an unrelated crime. Tolbert could neither read nor write. He had an eighth-grade education and a mental disability, and was under the influence of narcotics when he was arrested. Egan and Alonzo nevertheless fed Tolbert information about the grocery store murder before questioning him about it. They also offered to give Tolbert $2, 500 and help him avoid being charged with the crime for which he was arrested in exchange for identifying Liggins from a photo array. Egan threatened Tolbert with additional (false) criminal charges if he did not identify Liggins. Although Tolbert was not at the grocery store at the time of the murder and did not know Liggins, he ultimately identified Liggins in a photo array provided by Egan and Alonzo.

Defendants Egan and Alonzo then contacted the owner of the grocery store and asked him to identify the robbers from the same photo array. The grocery store owner was unable to make an identification from the photo array, which included Liggins. Liggins himself was not contacted about this case until years later.

In 2014, after the case had been cold for six years, Egan and Alonzo contacted Ronald Ruff, a witness who had seen the perpetrators flee. Ruff identified Liggins from a photo array. Defendants Egan and Alonzo helped Ruff prepare a written statement in which Ruff said that the man he identified as the perpetrator was shorter than his height, 5'11”. Liggins is 6'3”. Ruff viewed a physical lineup that included Liggins. Liggins was the only participant in the lineup required to wear a hooded sweatshirt (which the perpetrators had worn in 2008). Several of the other lineup participants did not resemble Liggins.

Egan and Alonzo also initiated contact with Shannon Alexander, who had given a television interview in 2008 stating that she had witnessed the crime but was not interviewed by police at the time. By 2014 Alexander was in custody for an unrelated offense. Egan and Alonzo showed her a photo array. Alexander told the Defendants that she was unable to identify anyone because the offenders' faces had been obscured by the hoods of their sweatshirts. Egan falsely reported that Alexander identified Liggins from the photo array, but that she refused to memorialize her identification by signing her name to Liggins' photograph.

By 2014 Tolbert was also incarcerated for an unrelated offense. Egan and Alonzo brought him by writ from prison for a second interview, which took place without his attorney present. According to Egan and Alonzo, in this interview Tolbert stated for the first time that he knew Liggins from high school and that he had lived near the grocery store. Tolbert then reidentified Liggins from a photo array.

At trial, Tolbert testified that he had no knowledge of the crime or Liggins' involvement. Tolbert also testified that he identified Liggins as the perpetrator only after Egan pressured him to do so and gave him with details of the crime. Both of the witnesses to the 2008 shooting, Ruff and Alexander, testified at trial. Before testifying, Alexander confirmed to the prosecutors that she could not identify the perpetrator and did not know whether Liggins was the perpetrator. Alexander testified at trial but was not asked to identify Liggins or questioned about her previous identification of Liggins. Ruff testified that he had correctly identified Liggins from the photo array. The jury returned a verdict of not guilty and Liggins was released.

Liggins alleges that his arrest and many others were caused by policies and practices of the City of Chicago and the Chicago Police Department including failure to adequately train and discipline officers and enforcement of a code of silence protecting officers accused of misconduct such as fabricating evidence or manipulating witness identifications. Liggins cites several reports and sources documenting police misconduct and the failure to investigate and discipline officers who engage in such misconduct.

II. Standard

A motion to dismiss tests the sufficiency of a complaint, not the merits of the case. See Gibson v. City of Chi., 910 F.2d 1510, 1520 (7th Cir. 1990). “To survive a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), the complaint must provide enough factual information to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face and raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Haywood v. Massage Envy Franchising, LLC, 887 F.3d 329, 333 (7th Cir. 2018) (quotations and citation omitted). See also Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2) (requiring a complaint to contain a “short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.”). A court deciding a Rule 12(b)(6) motion accepts plaintiff's well-pleaded factual allegations as true and draws all permissible inferences in plaintiff's favor. See Fortres Grand Corp. v. Warner Bros. Entm't Inc., 763 F.3d 696, 700 (7th Cir. 2014). A plaintiff need not plead “detailed factual allegations”, but “still must provide more than mere labels and conclusions or a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action for her complaint to be considered adequate under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8.” Bell v. City of Chi., 835 F.3d 736, 738 (7th Cir. 2016) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

Dismissal for failure to state a claim is proper “when the allegations in a complaint, however true, could not raise a claim of entitlement to relief.” Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 558, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 1966 (2007). Deciding the plausibility of the claim is “‘a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common sense.'” McCauley v. City of Chi., 671 F.3d 611, 616 (7th Cir. 2011) (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 679, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 1950 (2009)).

III. Analysis

A. Counts I and II: Right to a Fair Trial and Right to Liberty

Liggins alleges in Counts I and II that Defendants violated his right to a fair trial under the Fourteenth Amendment and of his right to liberty under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments by fabricating evidence against him that resulted in his pre-trial detention for years. The factual allegations underlying these two Counts overlap. Egan and Alonzo argue that claims about unconstitutional pretrial detention caused by the fabrication of evidence are only cognizable under the Fourth Amendment.

Prior to 2017, courts in the Seventh Circuit routinely held that “once detention by reason of arrest turns into detention by way of arraignment-once police action gives way to legal process-the Fourth Amendment falls out of the picture and the detainee's claim that the detention is improper becomes a claim of malicious prosecution violative of due process.” Llovet v. City of Chicago 761 F.3d 759, 763 (7th Cir. 2014). In 2017, however, the Supreme Court held in Manuel v. City of Joliet, Ill., that a § 1983 plaintiff who spent seven weeks in pre-trial detention based on fabricated evidence before his case was dismissed had a viable Fourth Amendment claim, but not a viable Fourteenth Amendment claim. 137 S.Ct. 911 (2017). This case resolved a circuit split about whether pre-trial detention was governed by the Fourth or Fourteenth Amendments. Id. at 917. The Manuel Court held that plaintiff had been “seized” for Fourth Amendment purposes for the duration of his pre-trial detention,...