Vargas v. City of L. A.

LUIS LORENZO VARGAS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF LOS ANGELES; et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 19-55967

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

Argued and Submitted: April 12, 2021

May 20, 2021

NOT FOR PUBLICATION

D.C. No. 2:16-cv-08684-SVW-AFM

MEMORANDUM^*

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California

Stephen V. Wilson, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted April 12, 2021 Pasadena, California

Before: PAEZ and VANDYKE, Circuit Judges, and KORMAN,^** District Judge.

Memorandum joined by Judge VANDYKE and Judge KORMAN, and joined in part by Judge PAEZ

Concurrence by Judge KORMAN

Dissent in part by Judge PAEZ

Appellant Luis Lorenzo Vargas appeals five district court rulings pertainingto his claims raised under 42 U.S.C. § 1983: (1) the court's dismissal of his claim alleging that the identification procedures used during his criminal proceeding violated due process; (2) the court's summary judgment ruling pertaining to his claims raised under Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963);¹ (3) the court's dismissal of the jury prior to a trial on his claims raised under Monell v. Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978); (4) the court's exclusion of evidence pertaining to his innocence; and (5) the court's exclusion of his proffered expert testimony. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand for further proceedings.²

First, the district court correctly determined that issue preclusion barred re-litigation of Vargas's identification procedures claim. See Ayers v. City of Richmond, 895 F.2d 1267, 1270 (9th Cir. 1990) (holding that preclusion issues are reviewed de novo). "State law ... governs the application of collateral estoppel to a state court judgment in a federal civil rights action." Mills v. City of Covina, 921 F.3d 1161, 1169 (9th Cir. 2019).

California's collateral estoppel requirements are met here. See id. The issuelitigated in Vargas's motion to suppress in his criminal case (where he moved to suppress the victims' identifications of Vargas) and in this § 1983 lawsuit is identical: in both instances, Vargas challenged whether the witness identification procedures violated his constitutional right to due process. See Ayers, 895 F.2d at 1271; Textron Inc. v. Travelers Cas. & Sur. Co., 259 Cal. Rptr. 3d 26, 36-37 (Cal. Ct. App. 2020), review denied (July 8, 2020). And the state court's denial of Vargas's motion to suppress was sufficiently final for the purposes of collateral estoppel: it was not avowedly tentative, the parties were fully heard, and the trial court's reasoned decision was affirmed by the California Court of Appeal. See Border Bus. Park, Inc. v. City of San Diego, 49 Cal. Rptr. 3d 259, 280 (Cal. Ct. App. 2006); Schmidlin v. City of Palo Alto, 69 Cal. Rptr. 3d 365, 370, 401-02 (Cal. Ct. App. 2007). Vargas also had a fair and full opportunity to litigate the issue in his criminal proceeding because the trial court fairly and fully entertained his oral and written arguments, and Vargas does not complain of any procedural unfairness or defect with respect to that proceeding. See Ayers, 895 F.2d at 1271-72. And while Vargas argues that the defendants' alleged suppression of other assaults renders the application of collateral estoppel inequitable, evidence of other assaults is irrelevant to the procedures used in facilitating the three independent victim identifications that he seeks to relitigate. See United States v. Bagley, 772 F.2d 482, 492 (9th Cir. 1985); People v. Cook, 157 P.3d 950, 963-64 (Cal. 2007). Moreover, applying collateralestoppel here furthers California's public policies by preventing duplicate litigation over conduct that concluded over 20 years ago, particularly when Vargas had a full and fair opportunity to litigate the relevant facts and arguments at that time. See Rodriguez v. City of San Jose, 930 F.3d 1123, 1136 (9th Cir. 2019); Direct Shopping Network, LLC v. James, 143 Cal. Rptr. 3d 1, 10 (Cal. Ct. App. 2012).³

The dissent argues that "allowing Vargas to litigate this claim in a civil suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 is not a significant burden on the judicial system." We disagree. Re-litigating the same issue would pose a substantial burden: not only would it require another trial, but it would also necessitate the unearthing of evidence, witnesses (who are victims of sexual assaults), and materials pertaining to identification processes that took place over 20 years ago.

The dissent also contends that the pre-discovery dismissal of Vargas's identification procedures claim in this case prejudiced him by precluding him from gaining new information pertaining to his wrongful identification. But nothing prevented Vargas from requesting and obtaining evidence relevant to his identification procedures claim in his prior criminal case, which Vargas admitted at oral argument. See also Magallan v. Superior Ct., 121 Cal. Rptr. 3d 841, 845, 856-57 (Cal. Ct. App. 2011) (acknowledging "the defendant's procedural due process right to a full and fair suppression hearing" and concluding that a magistrate judge had the power to grant a motion for discovery in support of a suppression motion). While Vargas asserts he was prejudiced by the inability to obtain discovery in this lawsuit, he fails to point to any new relevant evidence that he could now obtain through discovery that he was barred from obtaining in his criminal case. Thus, the only prejudice collateral estoppel caused to Vargas is the same prejudice every litigant experiences from collateral estoppel: he doesn't get another bite at the apple. But neither Vargas nor the dissent can explain how this bite would produce materially different results than the previous discovery opportunities afforded to Vargas.

Ultimately, the dissent's collateral estoppel analysis makes the same mistake that infects Vargas's arguments—that is, assuming that the later vacatur of Vargas's conviction based on recent DNA evidence must somehow be relevant to the identification procedures. It's not. The fact that other later-discovered evidence now supports the conclusion that Vargas did not commit the crimes says nothing about whether the identification procedures themselves were problematic. Completely proper identification procedures may still result in an incorrect identification. Beyond mere speculation, Vargas has provided no indication that there was something improper about the identification procedures in this case thathe did not already have the opportunity to pursue in his prior criminal case.

Second, the district court did not err in granting partial summary judgment on Vargas's Brady claims because the district court did not actually grant partial summary judgment. Instead, the court explicitly denied summary judgment. The district court did not prevent Vargas from attempting to present evidence of those assaults at trial, and subsequent representations by the district court and Vargas support the conclusion that they understood the summary judgment order to constitute a full denial. See Bordallo v. Reyes, 763 F.2d 1098, 1102 (9th Cir. 1985) (looking to the district court's subsequent statements to determine the nature of an order).

Third, the district court erred in dismissing Vargas's Monell claims, which it did by dismissing the jury prior to any trial on those claims. The district court predicated its dismissal on City of Los Angeles v. Heller, 475 U.S. 796 (1986) (per curiam), but Heller concerns excessive force claims that are not at issue here. See Fairley v. Luman, 281 F.3d 913, 916-17 (9th Cir. 2002) (per curiam). Because Heller does not present a categorical bar to Monell liability in the absence of individual liability, we reverse and remand for a final adjudication of Vargas's Monell claims, including the scope of the remaining Monell claims. But while Vargas is entitled to a final judgment on these claims, we take no position as to whether his Monell claims must be tried or whether they could be properlyadjudicated prior to trial.

Fourth, the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding evidence of Vargas's factual innocence. See C.B. v. City of Sonora, 769 F.3d 1005, 1021 (9th Cir. 2014) (en banc) (recognizing that evidentiary rulings are reviewed for abuse of discretion). Regardless of whether Vargas invited this alleged error, the district court reasonably excluded evidence of his innocence because that evidence could have confused the issues for the jury, as the trial only concerned liability for the Brady claims. See Nationwide Transp. Fin. v. Cass Info. Sys., Inc., 523 F.3d 1051, 1060 (9th Cir. 2008); Martinez v. Ryan, 926 F.3d 1215, 1228 (9th Cir. 2019) (holding that Brady concerns the evidence available at the time of trial, not "exculpatory evidence [that] later surfaces").

Fifth, the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding Vargas's proffered expert testimony. United States v. Arvin, 900 F.2d 1385, 1388-89 (9th Cir. 1990) (noting that the exclusion of expert testimony is reviewed for abuse of discretion). It reasonably concluded that the experts would inappropriately usurp the jury's function, especially given the trial's first-phase focus on the detectives' credibility. See Nationwide Transp. Fin., 523 F.3d at 1058-59 (the district court did not abuse its discretion in excluding expert witness testimony offering legal conclusions). And even if the district court had erred, the error was harmless. SeeUnited States v. Hermanek, 289 F.3d 1076, 1092-93 (9th Cir. 2002).⁴

In conclusion, we affirm the district court's dismissal of Vargas's identification claim, its denial of summary judgment issued on August 7, 2018, and its exclusion of evidence pertaining to Vargas's innocence and expert testimony. The district court's dismissal of Vargas's Monell claims is reversed and remanded for further proceedings consistent with this disposition.

AFFIRMED in part, and REVERSED and REMANDED in...