Sanchez v. Chapman

ALEXANDER SANCHEZ, Plaintiff, v. STEVEN M. CHAPMAN; DAVID A. LUKE; DAWN PAGAN; OFFICER VAZQUEZ; OFFICER WILKINSON, Defendants.

No. 3:19-CV-1314 (SVN)

United States District Court, D. Connecticut

March 4, 2022

RULING AND ORDER ON DEFENDANTS' MOTIONS FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

SARALA V. NAGALA, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE.

Plaintiff Alexander Sanchez brings this action against three Connecticut State Police officers, Steven M. Chapman, David A. Luke, and Dawn Pagan (together, “the State Defendants”), and two officers with the Meriden Police Department, Raynick Vazquez and Brian Wilkinson (together “the Municipal Defendants” and collectively with the State Defendants, “Defendants”). Plaintiff has alleged a violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that Defendants violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from excessive force by pushing his face against a wall and forcing him to the ground while executing a search warrant at an apartment in Meriden, Connecticut in 2017.

Defendants seek summary judgment, contending primarily that the doctrine of qualified immunity bars Plaintiff's § 1983 claim. Plaintiff disagrees, maintaining that there are genuine issues of material fact for a jury to resolve. For the following reasons, the Court agrees with Defendants therefore enters judgment in their favor.

I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND

The record reveals the following facts, which are undisputed unless otherwise noted. The three State Defendants and two Municipal Defendants were members of the Statewide Narcotics Task Force. State Defs.' LR 56 Statement, ECF No. 32-2 ¶ 2. Defendants received credible information that crack cocaine and heroin were being sold from an apartment in Meriden, which they verified by conducting a controlled purchase. Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement, ECF No. 31-2 ¶¶ 1-2. Accordingly, they obtained a search and seizure warrant for the apartment. Id. ¶ 3.

On April 19, 2017, Defendants met to execute the search warrant, all clearly identified with raid gear and police badges. Id. ¶¶ 4-5. Although they obtained a key fob for the apartment door, they were unable to enter the apartment because the deadbolt was engaged, so they continued to knock on the door. State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶¶ 6-7. A female occupant responded and eventually opened the door. Id. ¶¶ 7, 9-10. Defendants loudly announced their presence as they moved quickly through the apartment. Id. ¶ 11. Plaintiff, who was at the time sixteen years old, ^[1]was inside the apartment. Pl.'s LR 56 Statement pt. B, ECF Nos. 33-1 & 34-1 ¶ 5.

Upon entering the apartment, Defendants quickly noticed that one room off the hallway contained “weapons hanging on the wall, ” including two M16 assault type rifles, “swords, handguns, and knives.” Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 18; State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 14. They also noticed “several knife edged type weapons lying unsecured on the floor of the [room] and in close proximity to the hallway door.” Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 19; State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 14. Defendants further noticed the sound of a toilet flush and, upon opening the bathroom door, found Plaintiff and another occupant inside.^[2] Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶¶ 24-26; State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶¶ 17-18; Wilkinson Aff, ECF No. 31-3, Ex. 1 at 3.

It is undisputed that Defendant Wilkinson^[3] “immediately gave [Plaintiff] verbal commands to stop moving and put his hands behind his back.” Wilkinson Aff., ECF No. 31-3 ¶ 13; State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 19. It is further undisputed that Plaintiff refused to comply with this command. Instead, he “immediately began to yell obscenities, ” “continued to ignore verbal commands, ” and “was verbally abusive to the officers.” Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 28; State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 21. He also attempted to walk past Defendants toward the room containing the weapons. State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 22.

At that point, Wilkinson “grabbed [Plaintiff] by the arm and pushed him against the wall in [an] attempt to control him for detainment and handcuffing.” Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 29. When Plaintiff continued to resist Wilkinson's commands, Wilkinson brought him to the ground and handcuffed him. Id. ¶¶ 30-31. After being handcuffed, Plaintiff continued to use profanities toward the officers and make threatening statements. Id. ¶ 48.

Plaintiff was then brought to the living room, where all of the other apartment occupants had been moved, and was directed to sit on the floor because there were no chairs in the room. State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 24; Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 49. When Plaintiff refused to sit on the floor as directed, Wilkinson “utilized a controlled foot sweep to seat [Plaintiff] on the floor.” State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 25.

The parties dispute the severity of Plaintiff's injuries resulting from these encounters. Defendants contend that Plaintiff sustained “a small scratch and bleeding to his nose area, ” while Plaintiff suggests that his injuries were not “as minimal as alleged” by Defendants. Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 32; Pl.'s LR 56 Statement pt. A ¶ 32. Rather, he identifies his injuries as:

“[b]leeding from [his] nose, facial and nose bruising, head trauma, [and] loss conscious[.]” Mun. Defs.' Ex. C, Pl's Resp. to Interrogs. at 4. Defendants aver that Plaintiff refused medical treatment onsite both directly and through his mother, which Plaintiff denies. State Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶ 23; Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶¶ 33, 51-54; Pl.'s LR 56 Statement re: State Defs. ¶ 23; Pl.'s LR 56 Statement re: Mun. Defs. ¶¶ 33, 52-54. Although the record reflects that Plaintiff sought treatment in an emergency room later the same day, the document submitted by Plaintiff appears to be an incomplete hospital discharge summary and does not indicate any injuries with which Plaintiff might have been diagnosed. Opp. to Mot. for Summ. J., Ex. 1, ECF No. 33-2. Moreover, Plaintiff's briefing does not delineate between injuries he might have received from the scuffle before he was handcuffed and injuries he might have received as a result of the foot sweep. At oral argument, Plaintiff clarified that his claim rests substantially on the incident in the hallway that preceded his handcuffing.

The parties also dispute the evidence recovered during the course of the search, such as a roll of U.S. currency, drug paraphernalia, and a K9 alert indicating the detection of narcotics. Mun. Defs.' LR 56 Statement ¶¶ 38-43; Pl.'s LR 56 Statement, pt. A ¶¶ 38-43. Plaintiff contends this evidence was not contained in any police reports, but the report attached to the Wilkinson Affidavit discusses all of this information. Wilkinson Aff., ECF No. 31-3, Ex. 1 at 4. In addition, Plaintiff alleged in the amended complaint that one of the Defendants issued him a Juvenile Summons requiring him to report to Juvenile Court, which was signed and accepted by his mother during the search. Compl. ¶ 8. Defendants' LR 56 Statements do not address this fact.

II. PROCEDURAL HISTORY

In 2019, Plaintiff filed the present action, alleging that Defendants “beat [Plaintiff] about his face and head, inflicting cuts, scratches, contusions and bruises and causing him to suffer loss of blood, pain, and terror.” Compl. ¶ 9. In his complaint, Plaintiff acknowledged that he “was cursing at [Defendants] because of his fear and his medical disabilities, ” but maintained that the force employed against him was unreasonable and excessive because “he was not physically threatening or resisting them in any way.” Id. ¶ 10. He brought one count of excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Id. ¶ 11. Plaintiff also brought one count of assault and battery under Connecticut common law. Id. Following a period of discovery, the State and Municipal Defendants each moved for summary judgment. ECF Nos. 31, 32. At oral argument on the present motions, Plaintiff informed the Court that he is withdrawing the assault and battery count of his Complaint.

III. LEGAL STANDARD

A. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a)

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56(a) provides, in relevant part, that a court “shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” With respect to materiality, a fact is “material” only if a dispute over it “might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing law[.]” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). With respect to genuineness, “summary judgment will not lie if the dispute about a material fact is ‘genuine,' that is, if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.” Id. In considering a motion for summary judgment, a court “must construe the facts in the light most favorable to the non-moving party and must resolve all ambiguities and draw all reasonable inferences against the movant.” Kee v. New York, 12 F.4th 150, 158 (2d Cir. 2021) (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

The movant bears an initial burden of “informing the district court of the basis for its motion, and identifying those portions of ‘the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any,' which it believes demonstrate the absence of a genuine issue of material fact.” Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323 (1986). However, a movant “need not prove a negative when it moves for summary judgment on an issue that the [non-movant] must prove at trial. It need only point to an absence of proof on [the non-movant's] part, and, at that point [the non-movant] must ‘designate specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial.'” Parker v. Sony Pictures Ent., Inc., 260 F.3d 100, 111 (2d...