Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-05-07161/USCOURTS-caDC-05-07161-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued March 19, 2007 Decided July 24, 2007

No. 05-7152 & 05-7161

CARL HUNDLEY,

AS THE PERSONAL REPRESENTATIVE OF THE ESTATE OF BRIAN

E. HUNDLEY, APPELLEE/CROSS-APPELLANT, AND

LYNNE T. HUNDLEY,

APPELLEE

v.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, ET AL.,

APPELLANTS/CROSS-APPELLEES

Appeals from the United States District Court

 for the District of Columbia

(No. 02cv00638)

Holly M. Johnson, Section Chief, Office of Attorney

General for the District of Columbia, argued the cause for

appellants/cross-appellees. With her on the briefs were Robert

J. Spagnoletti, Attorney General, Todd S. Kim, Solicitor

General, and Edward E. Schwab, Deputy Solicitor General.

Gregory L. Lattimer argued the cause for appellees/crossappellant. With him on the briefs were Janell M. Byrd and

Donald M. Temple.

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Before: GINSBURG, Chief Judge, and RANDOLPH and

KAVANAUGH, Circuit Judges.

KAVANAUGH, Circuit Judge: In the middle of a night in

March 2002, Brian Hundley and a woman were in a car parked

outside an apartment complex in Washington, D.C. Off-duty

Metropolitan Police Department Officer Marcus Gaines tapped

on the window of the car as he walked past. Hundley, who was

in the driver’s seat, began to drive the car in the direction of

Officer Gaines. Officer Gaines pulled his gun, yelled “police,”

and ordered Hundley to stop and get out of the car. Hundley

complied and exited the car. According to Officer Gaines, while

Hundley was standing outside the car, Hundley suddenly moved

his right hand from behind his back and began lunging toward

Officer Gaines, who was about 10 to 15 feet away. In apparent

self-defense, Officer Gaines shot and killed Hundley.

Hundley’s estate sued Officer Gaines, former police official

Terrance Gainer, and the District of Columbia and, as relevant

here, brought three claims: (i) a D.C. tort law claim of assault

and battery based on the fatal shot; (ii) a corresponding federal

§ 1983 claim of excessive force in violation of the Fourth

Amendment, also based on the fatal shot; and (iii) a D.C. tort

law claim of negligence based on the initial stop. The jury

found for defendants on the assault and battery and excessive

force claims, concluding that Officer Gaines was justified in

shooting Hundley in self-defense. At the same time, however,

the jury in a written interrogatory answer specifically rejected

Officer Gaines’s version of events regarding the self-defense

shooting. The jury found for plaintiffs on the negligence claim,

concluding the initial stop was unreasonable; the jury also

determined that the negligent stop proximately caused

Hundley’s death. The jury awarded damages of $242,400 to

plaintiffs.

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On appeal, Hundley’s estate challenges the assault and

battery and excessive force verdict for the defense, arguing that

the jury’s verdict for defendants on those two claims was

inconsistent with the jury’s written interrogatory answer, in

which it directly rejected Officer Gaines’s version of events.

And defendants challenge the negligence verdict, arguing that

the negligent stop did not proximately cause the shooting death

that formed the basis for the damages award.

We agree with Hundley’s estate that the jury verdict on the

assault and battery and excessive force claims was inconsistent

with the jury’s answer to the written interrogatory. We agree

with defendants that the negligent stop, as a matter of law, did

not proximately cause the shooting death and thus cannot justify

the damages for the shooting death. We therefore reverse the

judgment of the District Court and remand for a new trial for

Hundley’s estate on the assault and battery and excessive force

claims.

I

At approximately 1:30 a.m. on March 23, 2002, off-duty

Metropolitan Police Department Officer Marcus Gaines was

riding in a car driven by his brother Ronald when they arrived

in the parking lot of Marcus Gaines’s apartment building near

6th and N Streets, N.W., in Washington, D.C.

According to Officer Gaines, the following events then

transpired. As Officer Gaines and his brother drove around the

lot looking for a place to park, Officer Gaines observed a man

and a woman engaging in sexual activity in a parked car. The

man was Brian Hundley (Hundley was previously unknown to

Officer Gaines); the woman was known by Officer Gaines to be

a prostitute. Ronald Gaines parked his car, and Officer Gaines

got out and walked ahead toward the apartment building. As

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Officer Gaines walked behind Hundley’s car, Hundley began to

back out of his parking space – nearly hitting Officer Gaines.

Officer Gaines believed that Hundley, the driver of the car,

simply had not seen him. Officer Gaines tapped on the

passenger-side window of the car to alert Hundley and his

passenger to Officer Gaines’s presence.

Officer Gaines then continued walking toward his building.

Just after Hundley finished backing his car out of its parking

space, Officer Gaines passed in front of the car on his way to the

building. At that point, Hundley suddenly drove his car at a

rapid speed toward Officer Gaines. Officer Gaines jumped out

of the car’s path and drew his gun. He yelled “police” and

ordered Hundley to stop and get out of the car; Officer Gaines

based his decision to order Hundley out of the car on what he

described as Hundley’s attempted assault with a deadly weapon

(namely, assault with the car).

As soon as Officer Gaines ordered Hundley to stop and exit

the car, Hundley complied and stood outside of the car with his

hands in plain view. But then, according to Officer Gaines,

Hundley stopped complying with the officer’s orders. When

Officer Gaines first ordered Hundley to place his hands on his

car, Hundley instead put his hands in his pockets. Next, Officer

Gaines ordered Hundley to take his hands out of his pockets,

which Hundley did. But when Officer Gaines again ordered

Hundley to place his hands on the car, Hundley failed to comply

and acted as though he planned to re-enter his car. Officer

Gaines then two more times ordered Hundley to place his hands

on the car. The first time, Hundley instead put his hands behind

his back. The second time, Hundley, with his right arm behind

his back, suddenly moved his right hand as he lunged toward

Officer Gaines.

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Officer Gaines then fired a single shot at Hundley, which

was fatal. Officer Gaines testified that he fired out of selfdefense based on Hundley’s lunge and sudden hand movement.

Two other witnesses saw at least some of the interaction

between Hundley and Officer Gaines and provided additional

accounts of that night’s events. Ronald Gaines did not testify at

trial, but his pre-trial statements about the incident were read to

the jury. Ronald stated that he observed none of the altercation

between Hundley and Officer Gaines until he saw Officer

Gaines yelling at Hundley to exit Hundley’s car. According to

Ronald, Officer Gaines yelled several times for Hundley to show

the officer his hands. Instead of following those orders,

Hundley reached inside his jacket, at which point Officer Gaines

shot him.

The prior testimony of a nearby resident, Linda Davis, was

also admitted at trial. According to Davis, Officer Gaines

seemed angry at Hundley and yelled three times for Hundley to

exit his car. As Hundley complied and stood outside the car

with his hands in the air, Officer Gaines shot him.

Hundley’s estate filed a lawsuit against Officer Gaines,

former Executive Assistant Chief of the Metropolitan Police

Department Terrance Gainer, and the District of Columbia. The

claims against defendants included assault and battery, a § 1983

claim of excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment,

and negligence. The first trial resulted in a hung jury.

At the second trial, the jury rejected plaintiffs’ assault and

battery and excessive force claims with respect to the shooting.

But the jury found in a written interrogatory that Hundley was

not “shot after placing his right hand behind his back and then

making a lunging motion toward Officer Marcus Gaines” – in

other words, the jury directly rejected Officer Gaines’s

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1

 Another plaintiff, Lynne Hundley in her individual capacity, did

not timely appeal the assault and battery and excessive force verdict.

testimony explaining that he had shot Hundley in self-defense.

See Verdict Form at 1, Hundley v. District of Columbia, No.

02cv638 (D.D.C. Dec. 6, 2004). The jury also found that

Officer Gaines had acted negligently in making the initial stop

of Hundley and that the negligent stop proximately caused

Hundley’s death. The jury awarded a total of $242,400 in

compensatory damages for Hundley’s death.

In this Court, Hundley’s estate challenges the assault and

battery and excessive force verdict, arguing that the jury’s

verdict was inconsistent with the written interrogatory answer.1

Defendants challenge the judgment for plaintiffs on the

negligence claim.

II

We turn first to the jury’s verdict for defendants on the

assault and battery and excessive force claims. An officer’s

unreasonable use of force violates the Fourth Amendment. See

Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 388, 395-98 (1989). The

victim therefore may sue the offending officer for damages

under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Such an unreasonable use of force also

is an assault and battery under D.C. law. See District of

Columbia v. Jackson, 810 A.2d 388, 392 (D.C. 2002).

Here, Officer Gaines testified that his use of force was

reasonable because Hundley, with his right hand behind his

back, suddenly lunged toward Officer Gaines – in other words,

Officer Gaines shot Hundley in self-defense. The plaintiffs

argued, with support from an eyewitness, that Officer Gaines

was lying and that Officer Gaines in fact shot Hundley without

justification.

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In addition to asking the jury to render a verdict on the

assault and battery and excessive force claims, the judge also

instructed the jury to answer a written interrogatory: “Do you

find that Brian Hundley was shot after placing his right hand

behind his back and then making a lunging motion toward

Officer Marcus Gaines?” Verdict Form at 1, Hundley v. District

of Columbia, No. 02cv638 (D.D.C. Dec. 6, 2004). The written

interrogatory tracked Officer Gaines’s testimony regarding the

apparent self-defense shooting. The jury answered “No.” Id.

The jury thus rejected Officer Gaines’s testimony regarding the

events that would have justified the use of force in self-defense.

At the same time, however, the jury found that defendants were

not liable for assault and battery or excessive force, even though

defendants’ argument against such liability was self-defense

based on Officer Gaines’s testimony.

On appeal, Hundley’s estate argues that the jury’s written

interrogatory response is inconsistent with the jury’s findings for

defendants on the assault and battery and excessive force claims.

See Fed. R. Civ. P. 49(b). Claims that a jury verdict is internally

inconsistent “impose a special obligation on the court to view

the evidence in a manner that reconciles the verdicts if possible,

and to grant a new trial if not.” Smith v. District of Columbia,

413 F.3d 86, 97 (D.C. Cir. 2005); see Gallick v. Baltimore &

Ohio R.R. Co., 372 U.S. 108, 119 (1963) (courts have duty to

harmonize jury’s answers “if it is possible under a fair reading

of them: Where there is a view of the case that makes the jury’s

answers to special interrogatories consistent, they must be

resolved that way.”) (internal quotation omitted); see also 9

JAMES WM. MOORE ET AL., MOORE’S FEDERAL

PRACTICE § 49.20[6][b][i] (3d ed. 1997); 9A CHARLES ALAN

WRIGHT & ARTHUR R. MILLER, FEDERAL PRACTICE AND

PROCEDURE § 2513 (3d ed. 1999).

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Although successful claims of verdict inconsistency are

rare, rare does not mean never. And this case is a classic

example of an inconsistent verdict that cannot reasonably be

reconciled or sustained. Two distinct versions of events were

presented to the jury. The jury could conclude either that

Officer Gaines shot Hundley in self-defense as described by

Officer Gaines, or that he shot Hundley without justification. In

making their cases to the jury, both sides agreed that liability

turned on which version of events the jury believed. See, e.g.,

Trial Tr. at 86-87, Hundley v. District of Columbia, No. 02cv638

(D.D.C. Nov. 29, 2004) (defense counsel arguing to court and

referring to Linda Davis’s testimony and to Officer Gaines’s

testimony: “[T]hese are the only two scenarios that were

presented to the jury.”). Yet the jury found for defendants on

the assault and battery and excessive force claims while

simultaneously answering a written interrogatory indicating that

the jury did not believe Officer Gaines’s version of events. The

two answers cannot coexist; they make no sense in the context

of the evidence presented in this case.

Defendants gamely try to justify the verdict by arguing that

the jury could have concluded that Officer Gaines’s use of force

was reasonable while concluding that Officer Gaines’s

explanation for why he shot Hundley was inaccurate.

Defendants argue, for example, that the jury could have found

that Hundley lunged toward Gaines but did not place his hand

behind his back. Or perhaps the jury found that Hundley’s hand

was behind his back, but he did not lunge. Or perhaps Hundley

reached inside his jacket. Those hypothetical reconstructions

are utterly unpersuasive in light of the record in this case and the

way the case was tried to the jury. If the defendants thought the

evidence supported alternative self-defense scenarios other than

the one described by Officer Gaines and presented in the written

interrogatory, they should have timely made that point in the

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district court, especially with respect to the written interrogatory

presented to the jury. Cf. Fed. R. Civ. P. 49(b), 51(c).

The bottom line is that the written interrogatory called for

the jury to decide whether Officer Gaines’s account was true.

And the jury rejected his account. Officer Gaines’s testimony

was the basis on which defendants argued they were not liable

for assault and battery and excessive force. The jury

nonetheless found defendants not liable for assault and battery

and excessive force. There is no coherent or reasonable way to

reconcile the jury’s two conclusions.

In an attempt to sustain the unsustainable, defendants resort

to the argument that Hundley’s estate waived its objection to the

irreconcilable verdict. This argument takes some chutzpah

given that plaintiffs repeatedly objected at trial to the proposed

written interrogatory. See Denny v. Ford Motor Co., 42 F.3d

106, 111 (2d Cir. 1994) (no Rule 49 waiver when defendant

objects to relevant jury instructions before jury deliberations);

see also Fed. R. Civ. P. 51(c). Indeed, even defense counsel

during the trial acknowledged and foreshadowed the potential

for inconsistency if the jury answered no to the written

interrogatory and no to assault and battery and excessive force –

in other words, found defendants not liable on assault and

battery and excessive force but rejected Officer Gaines’s version

of events. The scenario identified at trial by both plaintiffs’

counsel and defense counsel as a potential (if unlikely to occur)

problem is exactly what subsequently happened in the jury’s

verdict.

After the jury delivered its verdict, the District Court

dismissed the jury almost immediately. Consistent with

ordinary practice, the District Court did not ask the parties

whether they further “objected” in some way to that verdict. In

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2

 This Court has not resolved whether we can consider an

inconsistent verdict claim, other than for plain error, when a party

failed to object in any way before the district court’s entry of

judgment. Cf. Smith, 413 F.3d at 97. In light of the repeated objection

to the written interrogatory in this case, which was the source in part

of the inconsistent verdict, we again need not reach that question.

3

 Because of our holding, we need not decide whether the

inconsistency in the verdict constituted plain error. Cf. Armstrong v.

Brookdale Univ. Hosp. & Med. Ctr., 425 F.3d 126, 136 (2d Cir. 2005)

(failure to object prior to jury dismissal is waiver “absent a showing

of fundamental error,” which occurs when error is “so serious and

flagrant that it goes to the very integrity of the trial or deprive[s] the

jury of adequate legal guidance to reach a rational decision”) (internal

quotations omitted) (alteration in original); Johnson v. ABLT Trucking

Co., Inc., 412 F.3d 1138, 1141 (10th Cir. 2005) (failure to object to

verdict inconsistency prior to discharge of jury is waiver “unless the

verdict is inconsistent on its face such that the entry of judgment upon

the verdict is plain error”) (internal quotation omitted); Strauss v.

Stratojac Corp., 810 F.2d 679, 683 (7th Cir. 1987) (noting that court

might in future “encounter a case where the inconsistency in the

special interrogatories is so obvious that it would be proper to hold

their post-trial motion, plaintiffs raised the argument that the

verdict was inconsistent.

Defendants have cited no case supporting waiver when:

(i) a party objected to a written interrogatory; (ii) the district

court dismissed the jury after receiving the verdict without

asking the parties whether they had any objections to the verdict;

and (iii) the party raised an inconsistent verdict argument –

based on the previously objected-to written interrogatory – in its

post-trial motion for a judgment as a matter of law or new trial.2

Under these narrow circumstances, we agree with Hundley’s

estate that a party has not waived its objection to an inconsistent

verdict caused in part by a written interrogatory. See Fed. R.

Civ. P. 49(b), 51(c).3

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that the trial judge had an independent responsibility to act despite

trial counsel’s silence”).

We hold that the assault and battery and excessive force

verdict was inconsistent with the written interrogatory answer

and that a new trial is warranted for Hundley’s estate on the

assault and battery and excessive force claims.

III

Even assuming defendants were not liable for assault and

battery and excessive force (because Gaines fired the shot in

self-defense), plaintiffs offered a separate theory of liability at

trial: that Officer Gaines was liable for the shooting death

because he was negligent in stopping Hundley in the first place,

and was therefore responsible for the harm that followed.

The jury found that defendants were not liable for assault

and battery and excessive force, but the jury found for plaintiffs

on the negligence claim – namely, that Officer Gaines acted

unreasonably in initially approaching Hundley in the parking lot.

The jury also found that the negligent stop proximately caused

Hundley’s death.

On appeal, defendants contend that the initial stop – even

if negligent – was not a proximate cause of Hundley’s death as

a matter of law. We agree.

Given the procedural posture of this case, the precise

question before us is whether plaintiffs can recover damages

arising out of Hundley’s death because of Officer Gaines’s

initial negligent stop even if defendants are not liable on the

assault and battery and excessive force claims – in other words,

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4

 If the jury had found for plaintiffs on assault and battery and

excessive force, the negligence claim would be irrelevant because it

would add nothing to plaintiffs’ damages for the shooting death.

even if Officer Gaines shot Hundley in self-defense.4 We think

the answer to that question is quite clear: In such a scenario, it

cannot be said that Officer Gaines’s negligence in approaching

Hundley proximately caused the shooting death of Hundley. See

District of Columbia v. Price, 759 A.2d 181, 184 (D.C. 2000)

(proximate cause requires both (i) causal relationship between

negligent act and plaintiff’s harm and (ii) foreseeability of

injury); see also Butts v. United States, 822 A.2d 407, 418 (D.C.

2003). Rather, it was Hundley’s intervening intentional

misconduct that caused Officer Gaines’s intervening shooting,

which in turn caused the death of Hundley.

D.C. follows the black-letter tort law principle that an

intervening force breaks the chain of proximate causation when

that intervening force is sufficiently unforeseeable as to

constitute a superseding cause. See Butts, 822 A.2d at 418; see

also Majeska v. District of Columbia, 812 A.2d 948, 951 (D.C.

2002) (“We have held that a defendant may not be held liable

for harm actually caused where the chain of events leading to

the injury appears highly extraordinary in retrospect.”) (internal

quotations omitted); District of Columbia v. Carlson, 793 A.2d

1285, 1290 (D.C. 2002). It is only “where misconduct was to be

anticipated, and taking the risk of it was unreasonable, that

liability will be imposed for consequences to which such

intervening acts contributed.” W. PAGE KEETON ET AL.,

PROSSER AND KEETON ON THE LAW OF TORTS § 44, at 313 (5th

ed. 1984); see RESTATEMENT (SECOND) OF TORTS § 448 (1965)

(“The act of a third person in committing an intentional tort or

crime is a superseding cause of harm . . . unless the actor at the

time of his negligent conduct realized or should have realized

the likelihood that such a situation might be created, and that a

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third person might avail himself of the opportunity to commit

such a tort or crime.”); see generally RESTATEMENT (SECOND)

OF TORTS §§ 440-453. Although cases applying that doctrine

typically involve the intervening acts of third parties, the

principles underlying the doctrine logically apply to this twoparty situation as well. As a matter of law, it is not ordinarily

reasonable to foresee that a citizen will react to a police stop by

attacking the detaining officer, thereby triggering a situation that

requires the officer to use deadly force in self-defense. On the

contrary, citizens have a duty to obey a police officer’s orders,

and officers are entitled to assume that citizens will comply with

their orders. Cf. Majeska, 812 A.2d at 951 (“There is a general

proposition that an individual is presumed to exercise reasonable

care and obey the law.”). And police officers could not protect

the public if tort law deterred them from approaching and

detaining potentially violent suspects. For purposes of D.C. tort

law, therefore, Hundley’s failure to comply with Officer

Gaines’s orders was akin to an intervening force that, as a matter

of law, was sufficiently unforeseeable that it constituted a

superseding cause breaking the chain of proximate causation

between the negligent stop and the shooting death.

The strained nature of plaintiffs’ negligence-and-proximatecause theory in this case is also underscored by comparison to

the contributory negligence doctrine. Under that doctrine, which

the District of Columbia follows, the plaintiff’s contributory

negligence ordinarily “bars recovery against a defendant whose

negligent conduct would otherwise make him liable to the

plaintiff for the harm sustained by him.” RESTATEMENT

(SECOND) OF TORTS § 467; see Massengale v. Pitts, 737 A.2d

1029, 1031-32 (D.C. 1999). If a plaintiff’s negligent act

eliminates a defendant’s liability for the plaintiff’s harm, it

follows that a plaintiff’s intentional wrongful act also eliminates

a defendant’s liability for the plaintiff’s harm. Any other

conclusion would be entirely illogical.

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5

 Even if Officer Gaines had shot Hundley without justification,

the negligent stop could not be considered the proximate cause of the

shooting death. Rather, in such a scenario, Officer Gaines’s

The flaw in plaintiffs’ negligence-and-proximate-cause

theory is perhaps best illustrated by a hypothetical rather than by

dry recitation of black-letter tort principles. Suppose, for

example, that A unintentionally but negligently drives into B’s

car. Suppose that B then gets out of his car and attacks A with

a knife. What can A do in those circumstances? Under

plaintiffs’ theory, A could not lawfully defend herself and thus

would be liable for any injuries she inflicted on B while fending

off B’s attack. Such a result is obviously absurd, and further

makes clear that the negligent stop here cannot be the basis for

plaintiffs to recover damages for the shooting death.

One final point warrants mention. Hundley’s estate cites

D.C. precedent indicating that officers may be liable when they

negligently approach or detain mentally ill or otherwise mentally

impaired individuals, who in turn cause a disturbance requiring

the use of force against them. See District of Columbia v.

Evans, 644 A.2d 1008, 1019, 1021-22 (D.C. 1994); cf. District

of Columbia v. Peters, 527 A.2d 1269, 1272-73 (D.C. 1987).

But that narrow exception does not apply here. No evidence

suggests that Hundley was mentally ill at the time of the stop, or

that Officer Gaines knew or should have known as much.

Therefore, this case is governed by general principles of tort

law: It was not legally foreseeable that Hundley would threaten

Officer Gaines as a result of Officer Gaines’s initial stop – and

the stop therefore cannot be a proximate cause of Hundley’s

death.

In sum, applying D.C. law, we conclude as a matter of law

that plaintiffs cannot establish that the initial negligent stop

proximately caused the shooting death.5

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intentional shooting would be analogous to the intervening act. Of

course, this point is somewhat theoretical because defendants in such

a scenario would be directly liable for assault and battery with respect

to the wrongful intentional shooting.

* * *

We reverse the judgment of the District Court and remand

for a new trial for Hundley’s estate on the assault and battery

and excessive force claims.

So ordered.

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