Case ID: f-appx_694/html/0615-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
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Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Gary KLEIN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. CITY OF BEVERLY HILLS; Daniel Chilson; Michael Publicker; David L. Snowden, Chief, Defendants-Appellees.
    No. 15-56279
    United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
    Argued and Submitted March 10, 2017 Pasadena, California
    Filed August 4, 2017
    Joseph Scott Klapach, Attorney, Kla-pach & Klapach, Beverly Hills, CA, Daniel J. Yourist, Yourist Law Corporation APC, Los Angeles, CA, for Plaintiff-Appellant
    Daniel Kevin Spradlin, Esquire, Attorney, M. Lois Bobak, Attorney, Woodruff, Spradlin & Smart, Costa Mesa, CA for Defendants-Appellees
    Before: TASHIMA and NGUYEN, Circuit Judges, and MARBLEY, District Judge.
    
      
       The Honorable Algenon L. Marbley, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.
    
   MEMORANDUM

Gary Klein appeals the district court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Defendants on his judicial deception claims. Klein argues that Defendants violated his Fourth Amendment rights by obtaining three search warrants through judicial deception. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

1. Klein argues that Detective Chilson, the affiant on all three warrants, “misled the magistrate judge when applying for the warrant[s].” Smith v. Almada, 640 F.3d 931, 937 (9th Cir. 2011). Klein has failed to show a triable issue of material fact that Detective Chilson made deliberately or recklessly false statements, and that, but for his dishonesty, the warrants would not have been issued. See Chism v. Washington, 661 F.3d 380, 386 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting Liston v. Cty. of Riverside, 120 F.3d 965, 973 (9th Cir. 1997)). Klein’s judicial deception claims fail at the first step because many of Detective Chilson’s statements were not deliberately or recklessly false. For example, Detective Chil-son correctly noted Klein’s request that no autopsy be performed on his wife’s body and Klein’s suggestion that his wife be placed on dialysis treatment.

2. Even assuming the affidavits contained misstatements or omissions, they were not “material to the magistrate judge’s probable cause determination.” Id. at 388-89; see also Lombardi v. City of El Cajon, 117 F.3d 1117, 1126 (9th Cir. 1997) (“[WJhen it is not plain that a neutral magistrate would not have issued the warrant, the shield of qualified immunity should not be lost.”). The affidavits contain ample probable cause separate and apart from any purported misrepresentations, including: the fact that Klein’s wife was ■seeking a divorce; his wife’s statements to others that, three weeks before her death, Klein had threatened her, claiming that he could “get rid of her” and that “no one would know how she died;” Klein’s anger at the prospect of a full autopsy; Klein’s phone call to his probate attorney less than twenty-four hours after his wife’s death to ask about her financial situation; and the forged signatures on the codicil to his wife’s will.

AFFIRMED in part; REVERSED in part. 
      
       This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
     
      
      . In a concurrently filed per curiam opinion, we reversed the district court’s conclusion that Klein's claim as to the first warrant issued and executed on August 3, 2009, is time-barred. As we explain here, however, Klein’s claims of judicial deception fail on the merits,