Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-casd-3_15-cv-01416/USCOURTS-casd-3_15-cv-01416-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 42:1983cv Civil Rights Act - Civil Action for Deprivation of Rights

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

LUIS JESUS LOBATON, an

individual; HEDY JULCA, an

individual; DIEGO STEVEN

LOBATON, an individual; and B.C., a

minor, by and through his guardian ad

litem, HEDY JULCA, 

Plaintiffs,

CASE NO. 3:15-cv-1416-GPC-DHB

ORDER DENYING MOTION TO

STRIKE PORTIONS OF

PLAINTIFF’S FIRST AMENDED

COMPLAINT

[ECF No. 9]

v.

CITY OF SAN DIEGO, a municipal

corporation; NATHAN PARGA, an

individual; KELVIN LUJAN, an

individual; SAM EULER, an

individual, ALI BAKHSHI, an

individual, and DOES 1 through 200,

inclusive,

Defendants.

Before the Court is Defendants’ September 23, 2015 Motion to Strike Portions

of Plaintiffs’ First Amended Complaint(“Def. Mot.”). ECF No. 9. The motion has been

fully briefed. Pl. Opp., ECF No. 11; Def. Reply, ECF No. 12. Upon consideration of

the moving papers and the applicable law, and for the following reasons, the Court

DENIES Defendants’ motion to strike.

BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs are a Hispanic family offour, mother Hedy Julca and sons Luis, Diego,

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and minor “B.C.,” who allege that San Diego police officers violated their

constitutional and state-law rights during the course of the arrest and/or detention of

Hedy, Luis, and Diego on the premises of their family store in City Heights, a

neighborhood of San Diego. Am. Compl. ¶¶ 1–2, ECF No. 3. On June 26, 2015,

Plaintiffs filed suit in federal court against the City of San Diego and a number of

individual San Diego police officers. Compl., ECF No. 1. On August 20, 2015,

Plaintiffs filed an amended complaint. Am. Compl. The amended complaint includes

nine causes of action: federal claims for (1) a § 1983 cause of action for unlawful

search and seizure and excessive force against the individual defendants by Hedy, Luis,

and Diego; (2) a Monell cause of action for failure to hire/train/supervise against the

City of San Diego by Hedy, Luis, and Diego; (3) a Monell cause of action for a pattern

and practice of illegal seizure against the City of San Diego by Luis; and state law

claims for (4) assault and battery; (5) violations of Cal. Civ. Code. § 52.1; (6) false

arrest/imprisonment; (7) negligent infliction of emotional distress; (8) invasion of

privacy; and (9) negligence. Am. Compl. ¶¶ 32–81.

On September 23, 2015, Defendants filed their motion to strike portions of

Plaintiffs’ amended complaint. See Def. Mot. 3–5. On October 16, 2015, Plaintiffs filed

an opposition. Pl. Opp. On October 28, 2015, Defendants filed a reply. Def. Reply. On

November 19, 2015, this Court vacated the scheduled hearing on the motion to strike

and submitted the motion based on the papers. Nov. 19, 2015 Minute Order, ECF No.

13. 

LEGAL STANDARD

Under Fed. R. Civ. P. Rule 12(f), a court may strike from a pleading “any

redundant, immaterial, impertinent, or scandalous matter.” “A motion to strike is a

matter of discretion for the Court and may be appropriate where it will streamline the

ultimate resolution of the action.” Griffin v. Gomez, No. C 98-21038 JW (NJV), 2010

WL 4704448, at *4 (N.D. Cal. Nov. 12, 2010) (citing Federal Savings and Loan

Insurance Corp. v. Gemini Management, 921 F.2d 241, 244 (9th Cir.1990); Fantasy,

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Inc. v. Fogerty, 984 F.2d 1524, 1528 (9th Cir. 1993), rev'd on other grounds, 510 U.S.

517 (1994)).

“However, motions to strike are generally not granted unless it is clear that the

matter sought to be stricken could have no possible bearing on the subject matter of the

litigation.” Griffin, 2010 WL 4704448, at *4 (citing LeDuc v. Ky. Cent. Life Ins. Co.,

814 F.Supp. 820, 830 (N.D. Cal. 1992));see also § 1382 Motion to Strike—Redundant,

Immaterial, Impertinent, or Scandalous Matter, 5C Fed. Prac. & Proc. Civ. § 1382 (3d

ed.) (noting that “because federal judges have made it clear . . . that Rule 12(f) motions

to strike on any of these grounds are not favored, often being considered purely

cosmetic or ‘time wasters,’ there appears to be general judicial agreement, as reflected

in the extensive case law on the subject, that they should be denied unless the

challenged allegations have no possible relation or logical connection to the subject

matter of the controversy and may cause some form of significant prejudice to one or

more of the parties to the action” (citations omitted)). “Any doubt concerning the

import of the allegations to be stricken weighs in favor of denying the motion to

strike.” Park v. Welch Foods, Inc., No. 5:12-CV-06449-PSG, 2014 WL 1231035, at *1

(N.D. Cal. Mar. 20, 2014) (quoting In re Walmart Stores, Inc. Wage &Hour Litig., 505

F.Supp.2d 609, 614 (N.D. Cal. 2007) (internal quotation marks omitted).

“Redundant matter consists of allegations that constitute a needlessrepetition of

other averments in the pleading.” Moreno v. USG Corp., No. CIV 06-CV-2196BPCL,

2007 WL 951301, at *1 (S.D. Cal. Mar. 19, 2007) (quoting 5C Fed. Prac. & Proc. Civ.

§ 1382) (internal quotation marks omitted). “‘Immaterial’ matter is that which has no

essential or important relationship to the claim for relief or the defenses being

pleaded.” Fogerty, 984 F.2d at 1527 (quoting 5C Fed. Prac. & Proc. Civ. § 1382).

“‘[I]mpertinent’ matter consists ofstatementsthat do not pertain, and are not necessary,

to the issues in question.” Id. (quoting 5C Fed. Prac. & Proc. Civ. § 1382).

“Scandalous matter isthat which improperly casts a derogatory light on someone, most

typically on a party to the action.” Moreno, 2007 WL 951301, at *1 (quoting 5C Fed.

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Prac. & Proc. Civ. § 1382). “It is not enough that the matter offends the sensibilities of

the objecting party if the challenged allegations describe acts or eventsthat are relevant

to the action.” 5C Fed. Prac. & Proc. Civ. § 1382 (citing cases). 

DISCUSSION

Defendants move to strike the following paragraphs from Plaintiffs’ Amended

Complaint. Paragraphs 16 to 19 of the amended complaint describe a March 17, 2015

report on the San Diego Police Department (“Department”) undertaken by the

Department of Justice’s (“DOJ”) Office of Community Oriented Policing Services,

which examined seventeen police misconduct cases involving the Department and

made reformatory suggestions. Paragraphs 21 and 22 describe one of the alleged

“catalysts” for the issuance of the DOJ report, the arrest and eventual conviction of a

San Diego police officer for repeated sexual assaults of female detainees. Paragraph

24 describes allegations of racial bias by the Department, including data suggesting

that San Diego police officers disproportionately stop Hispanic and African American

drivers in traffic stops. Paragraph 27 describes allegations that San Diego police

officers disproportionately use force when compared to other cities of similar size, the

number of recent officer-related shootings in San Diego over the past three years, and

recent community protests over a police shooting in City Heights. See Am. Compl. ¶¶

16–19, 21–22, 24, 27. 

Defendants describe these portions of the amended complaint as “essentially an

anti-San Diego Police Department tirade with no substantive allegations against any

particular defendant.” Def. Mot. 4. Defendants argue that “[n]one of these allegations

contained in any of these paragraphs bear any connection to a single cause of action

against any of the Defendants,” and that “not one of them are relevant and all of them

are immaterial to Plaintiff’s claims.” Id.

Plaintiffs respond that the contested portions of the amended complaint support

their second and third causes of action for Monell liability on the part of the City of San

Diego for allegedly unconstitutional policies that led to the unlawful arrest and/or

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detention of three of the Plaintiffs. See Pl. Opp. 5–12. Under Monell v. Dept. of Social

Servs. of City of New York, a municipality like the City can be sued for “constitutional

deprivations visited pursuant to governmental custom.” 436 U.S. 658, 690 (1978). To

establish municipal liability where a municipality’s inaction in failing to protect the

plaintiffs’ constitutionalrights isthe source ofthe deprivation, the plaintiffs must show

that (1) they were deprived of a constitutional right; (2) the County had a policy; (3)

the policy amounted to a deliberate indifference to the constitutional right; and (4) the

policy was the “moving force behind the constitutional violation.” Mabe v. San

Bernardino Cnty., Dep't of Pub. Soc. Servs., 237 F.3d 1101, 1111 (9th Cir. 2001)

(citing Van Ort v. Estate of Stanewich, 92 F.3d 831, 835 (9th Cir. 1996)). 

First, Plaintiffs argue that Paragraphs 16 to 19 of the amended complaint

describing the DOJ report on the Department bolster their contentions that the City has

“policies, customs, or usages that have resulted in the inadequate hiring, training, and

supervision of officers, including a failure to properly investigate citizen complaints

and discipline offending officers.” Pl. Opp. 7. Second, Plaintiffs argue that Paragraphs

19, 21, and 22 support Plaintiffs’ contention in the amended complaint that a “code of

silence” and “culture of coverup” led to the individual Defendants in this case

“falsif[ying] their official reports and . . . not report[ing] any misfeasance among

themselves.” Id. at 9–11. Third, Plaintiffs argue that Paragraphs 24 and 27 support

their allegations that customs of racial bias and the use of disproportionate force,

particularly in the neighborhood where the present eventstook place, contributed to the

violation of Plaintiffs constitutional rights in the present case. Id. at 11–12. 

Viewing the challenged paragraphs, the Court finds that Defendants have failed

to establish that these portions of the amended complaint “have no possible relation or

logical connection” to the subject matter of this case. Plaintiffs have made colorable

arguments that the allegations in the contested paragraphs could have some relevance

to their Monell claims that the City of San Diego’s policies, customs, or usages were

the moving force behind the violation of their constitutional rights. Since “[a]ny doubt

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concerning the import of the allegations to be stricken weighs in favor of denying the

motion to strike,” the Court declines to exercise its discretion to strike the contested

portions of the Complaint at the present time. 

CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Defendants’

Motion to Strike Portions of Plaintiffs’ First Amended Complaint, ECF No. 9, is

DENIED.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

DATED: December 2, 2015

HON. GONZALO P. CURIEL

United States District Judge

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