Opinion
No. 1:93CV376-D-D.
March 20, 2001.
BENCH OPINION
Presently before the court is the motion of the individual Defendants Alan Maxwell, Ed Needham, and Dana Dickson for judgment as a matter of law, at the conclusion of the Plaintiff's case-in-chief, pursuant to Rule 50 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Upon due consideration, the court finds that the motion should be granted because the individual Defendants are entitled to qualified immunity.
In the case sub judice, this court, in a November 2, 1998, opinion, stated that the Plaintiffs have alleged violations of clearly established constitutional rights.
At this juncture in the proceeding, the court looks to the evidence pursuant to the seminal case of Boeing v. Shipman, 411 F.2d 365 (5th Cir. 1969). In following Boeing and its progeny, the court must determine if there is evidence in the record upon which the minds of reasonable jurors could differ. Then, in that event, the matter should go to the jury. Otherwise, the motion for judgment as a matter of law should be sustained.
If there's any trial court in the Fifth Circuit that should be aware of the two-pronged test for qualified immunity, it's this court, as evidenced by the series of appeals in the case of Hare v. City of Corinth, 135 F.3d 320 (5th Cir. 1998). The bifurcated test for qualified immunity is quite familiar. One, whether the plaintiff has alleged a violation of a clearly established constitutional right; and two, if so, was the defendants' conduct objectively unreasonable in light of clearly established law at the time of the incident.
In Robertson v. Plano City, 70 F.3d 21 (5th Cir. 1995), the Fifth Circuit stated that in determining whether the constitutional line has been crossed, the claimed wrong must be viewed in the context in which it occurred. See McFadden v. Lucas, 713 F.2d 143 (5th Cir. 1983). The context in which the this case arose and all of the testimony that the court has heard so far concerns the treatment of Adnan and Lynn Awad, in the context and setting of Adnan Awad's participation in the witness protection program, as defined at 18 U.S.C. § 3521.
Garcia v. United States, 666 F.2d 960, 963 (5th Cir. Unit B 1982), andJet Indus., Inc. v. United States, 777 F.2d 303 (5th Cir. 1985), stand for the proposition that the Attorney General of the United States and his delegated agency, the United States Marshals Service, have broad discretion in the operation of the witness protection program, and the selection and supervision of participants in the federal witness protection program constitute discretionary functions on the part of the Attorney General of the United States and his designee.
The court must look at the Plaintiffs' evidence in light of its setting and context, and the court notes that these three individual defendants, Maxwell, Needham and Dickson, are line officers — officers out in the field. Considering that, the court must look to the second prong of the qualified immunity test, that being whether the defendants' conduct was objectively unreasonable in light of clearly established law at the time of the incident.
This rationale comes from the United States Supreme Court. The two prong qualified immunity test, delineated above, comes from the case ofHarlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982); see Salas v. Carpenter, 980 F.2d 299 (5th Cir. 1992). That the constitutional right must clearly put a reasonable officer on notice that his conduct violates that right comes from the case of Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987); see Melear v. Spears, 862 F.2d 1177 (5th Cir. 1989).
Further, the Supreme Court has warned against vague or general assertions of constitutional rights and requires the 1983 plaintiff (the case here is against federal officers under the Bivens doctrine, but the same test for qualified immunity applies) to state with specificity the constitutional rights that have been allegedly violated. Otherwise, liability would be imposed in every case.
The federal courts of appeal have taken an especially strict approach to determining when a constitutional right is cognizable, thus resolving any doubts in the law against 1983 plaintiffs. The court is following that guidance, and is mindful that a constitutional violation does not occur every time someone feels they have been wronged or treated unfairly. Shinn v. College Station Indep. Sch. Dist., 96 F.3d 783 (5th Cir. 1996). The foregoing addresses the first prong of the qualified immunity defense.
Second, a public official may successfully assert the defense of qualified immunity even though the official violates a person's civil rights, provided the official's conduct was objectively reasonable.Mouille v. City of Live Oak, 918 F.2d 548 (5th Cir. 1990); Pfannstiel v. City of Marion, 918 F.2d 1178 (5th Cir. 1990).
Whether an official's conduct is objectively reasonable depends upon the circumstances confronting the official as well as clearly established law in effect at the time of the official's actions. Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. at 641. The subjective intent of the public official is irrelevant and the official's knowledge of relevant law need not rise to the level of a constitutional scholar. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 815-17.
Given the proof before the court at this juncture, the court rules that these officials, the individual Defendants Maxwell, Needham and Dickson, are entitled to have the claims against them dismissed on the basis of qualified immunity. The court holds that these three officials, in the setting of this case, were merely doing their job and had very little discretion to do anything different. Accordingly, the motion to grant judgment as a matter of law for the three individual Defendants is sustained.
And in so ruling, the court must take into account the testimony primarily of Adnan Awad who testified that, in his opinion, Agent Maxwell was only doing his job. In light of Awad's testimony, the court finds that these individual Defendants have not violated the Plaintiffs' clearly established constitutional rights. As such, the individual Defendants are entitled to qualified immunity.
A separate order in accordance with this opinion shall issue this day.
ORDER
Pursuant to a bench opinion heretofore issued, it is hereby ORDERED that
(1) the individual Defendants Alan Maxwell, Ed Needham, and Dana Dickson's motion for judgment as a matter of law based upon qualified immunity is GRANTED; and
(2) the Plaintiffs' claims against the individual Defendants Alan Maxwell, Ed Needham, and Dana Dickson are hereby DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE.