Opinion
24-2051
12-02-2024
RUBEN SANTOYO, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. VILLAGE OF OAK LAWN, ILLINOIS, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION To be cited only in accordance with FED. R. APP. P. 32.1
Submitted December 2, 2024[*]
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. Charles P. Kocoras, Judge.
Before FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge NANCY L. MALDONADO, Circuit Judge
ORDER
Invoking 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Ruben Santoyo seeks to hold Oak Lawn, Illinois, liable for the conduct of two police officers who, relying on a report that he was trespassing in a store, asked for his identification and removed him from the store. The district court dismissed Santoyo's complaint for failure to state a claim; we agree and affirm.
Santoyo visited a Panera Bread store in Oak Lawn in February 2024. While there, store employees called the police to report that Santoyo was trespassing. Santoyo alleges that this report was a lie; he maintains that he was peacefully working on his laptop, an assertion that at this stage we take as true. Smykla v. Molinaroli, 85 F.4th 1228, 1234 (7th Cir. 2023). Following the report, two police officers came and demanded that Santoyo show them his identification. He complied, but the officers still removed him from Panera. Afterwards, Santoyo asked Oak Lawn's police department to investigate the employees for making a false report. The department never did. Santoyo then sued Oak Lawn under § 1983, contending that his constitutional rights were violated when the officers sought his identification (an alleged search) and removed him from Panera (an alleged seizure), and when the department did not investigate the false reports.
The district court screened Santoyo's complaint, see 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2), and dismissed it for failure to state a claim. It reasoned that his search-and-seizure claims failed because the officers received a report about trespassing, as Santoyo alleged happened, and they thus had probable cause for their actions; further, none of Santoyo's allegations supported an inference that the officers should have known that the report was false. Relying on Rossi v. City of Chicago, 790 F.3d 729, 735 (7th Cir. 2015), which states that the Constitution does not obligate local police to investigate a case, the court also dismissed the failure-to-investigate claim. Santoyo moved for reconsideration, but the court denied that motion. In that motion, besides repeating his original arguments, Santoyo protested that the court had not recruited counsel for him. The court explained that Santoyo had never filed the necessary motion for counsel, see N.D.Ill. R. 83.36(a), and the court knew that Santoyo was already aware of this obligation because he had filed a motion for counsel in a different case in the district.
On appeal, Santoyo renews three arguments: Rossi does not block his claims, the police lacked probable cause because the report about trespassing was false, and he deserved counsel. But his arguments are cursory, unsupported by authority, and do not engage with the district court's reasoning. Although we construe pro se briefs generously, an appellate brief must still contain a discernible argument with citations to supporting authority. See FED. R. APP. P. 28(a)(8); Anderson v. Hardman, 241 F.3d 544, 545-56 (7th Cir. 2001). We could dismiss this appeal on that basis alone, but we prefer to address the merits when possible, and we can do so here.
This appeal is frivolous. The district court properly relied on Rossi, which states that a person "does not have a constitutional right to have the police investigate his case." 790 F.3d at 735 (citing DeShaney v. Winnebago County Dep't of Soc. Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 196 (1989)). It also properly dismissed the claim that the police wrongly asked for his identification: "In the ordinary course a police officer is free to ask a person for identification without implicating the Fourth Amendment." Hiibel v. Sixth Judicial Dist. Court of Nev., 542 U.S. 177, 185 (2004). Next, because Santoyo alleged that Panera's workers called the police to report a trespassing, the officers had probable cause to arrest him for that crime. The alleged falsity of a report about a crime does not negate probable cause unless the officers had reason to know that the report was false, which Santoyo has not alleged. See Askew v. City of Chicago, 440 F.3d 894, 895-96 (7th Cir. 2006). What we have said so far shows why Santoyo fails to state a claim against the officers; also, he has not alleged any independent basis for municipal liability against Oak Lawn. See Monell v. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 694 (1978). Last, Santoyo's failure to comply with the local rule for seeking counsel justified the refusal to recruit counsel, see McDaniel v. Syed, 115 F.4th 805, 814 (7th Cir. 2024), and in any case, declining to recruit counsel for frivolous claims is never an abuse of discretion, see Watts v. Kidman, 42 F.4th 755, 766 (7th Cir. 2022).
We conclude with a warning about sanctions. In addition to this appeal, Santoyo has filed in a separate case that we ruled was frivolous a petition for a writ of mandamus. Order on Pet. for Writ of Supervisory Control, In re Ruben Santoyo, No. 23-3048 (7th Cir. Oct. 31, 2023). In another appeal from that case, we denied his request to appeal in forma pauperis because the appeal did not present any potentially meritorious arguments. Order on Mot. to Proceed In Forma Pauperis, Santoyo v. City of Chicago, No. 24-2352 (7th Cir. Sept. 20, 2024). And again in that case, the district court ruled that he has engaged in an "extended pattern" of filing frivolous motions (despite frequent warnings) that have required "considerable judicial resources to address." Minute Entry at Docket 151, Santoyo v. City of Chicago, No. 1:22-cv-03559 (N.D. Ill. Mar 6, 2024). We now warn him that any further frivolous appeals in this court may result in sanctions, including fines that, if unpaid, may result in a bar on filing papers in any court within this circuit. See Support Sys. Int'l, Inc. v. Mack, 45 F.3d 185, 186 (7th Cir. 1995).
AFFIRMED
[*] Santoyo sued the "Oak Lawn police Department" in addition to several individual officers. A police department is not a suable entity, so we have reformed the caption to reflect the municipality of which the department is a part. See Rogers v. City of Hobart, 996 F.3d 812, 819 n.13 (7th Cir. 2021). We have agreed to decide the case without oral argument because the appeal is frivolous. FED. R. APP. p. 34(a)(2)(A).