Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca6-18-06167/USCOURTS-ca6-18-06167-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Shaun Burgett
Appellee
Anthony H. Heavner
Appellant
Kenneth Wilber
Appellant

Document Text:

NOT RECOMMENDED FOR FULL-TEXT PUBLICATION

File Name: 19a0368n.06

No. 18-6167

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

SHAUN BURGETT,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

KENNETH WILBER, et al.,

Defendants-Appellants.

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ON APPEAL FROM THE UNITED 

STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR 

THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF 

TENNESSEE

OPINION

Before: SILER, COOK, and NALBANDIAN, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM. Kenneth Wilber and Anthony H. Heavner appeal the district court’s order 

denying their motion for summary judgment, asserting their entitlement to qualified immunity 

from Shaun Burgett’s retaliation claim brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The parties have waived 

oral argument, and this panel unanimously agrees that oral argument is not needed. See Fed. 

R. App. P. 34(a).

In his complaint, Burgett, a former police officer, alleged that Wilber, mayor of Portland, 

Tennessee, recommended that the City Council terminate Burgett’s employment. Burgett invoked 

the city’s internal appeal process and asked the City Council to reject that recommendation. After 

an evidentiary hearing, the City Council overruled Wilber’s decision to terminate. Wilber then 

consulted with Heavner, the police chief, and then placed Burgett on unpaid suspension, mandated 

counseling and a psychological examination, noted that they would discuss job assignments, and 

warned of potential disciplinary action if standards were not met. When Burgett’s suspension 

ended, Heavner informed Burgett of changes to his job assignment, including his patrol unit 

assignment and his responsibility for special events and animal control calls, among other things. 

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Burgett further alleged that his new assignments made him the subject of ridicule and compelled 

him to resign as a police officer.

Burgett claimed, in pertinent part, that Wilber and Heavner were liable under § 1983 

because they retaliated against him for requesting a hearing before the City Council and prevailing. 

Wilber and Heavner—along with a co-defendant who did not join in this appeal—moved for 

summary judgment, arguing that Burgett’s retaliation claim failed and that they were entitled to 

qualified immunity. The district court determined that neither Wilber nor Heavner was entitled to 

qualified immunity. This appeal followed.

An order denying qualified immunity is immediately appealable and our review is de novo. 

Jacobs v. Alam, 915 F.3d 1028, 1039 (6th Cir. 2019). Once a government official claims he is 

entitled to qualified immunity, the plaintiff must show that he is not entitled to qualified immunity 

by establishing “that the official violated a statutory or constitutional right” and “that the right was 

clearly established at the time of the challenged conduct.” Id. (quoting Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563 

U.S. 731, 735 (2011)). The latter prong sets up an exacting standard in which the plaintiff must 

show that “every reasonable official would understand that what he is doing is unlawful.” District 

of Columbia v. Wesby, 138 S. Ct. 577, 589 (2018) (internal citations and quotation marks omitted). 

“It is not enough that the rule is suggested by then-existing precedent—it must be “beyond debate” 

and “settled law.” Id. at 589–90 emphasis added) (quoting Hunter v. Bryant, 502 U.S. 224, 228 

(1991)).

On appeal, Wilber and Heavner primarily argue that they were entitled to qualified 

immunity because Burgett was not engaged in protected conduct when he appealed to the City 

Council.

1

 In general, a constitutional retaliation claim under § 1983 requires proving that “(1) [the 

plaintiff] engaged in protected conduct; (2) the defendant took an adverse action against him ‘that 

 

1 Burgett claims that the defendants waived this argument by not presenting it below. 

Appellee Br. at 19. But in their motion for summary judgment, the officers raised this precise point. 

They argued that “no reasonable public official could have concluded that Plaintiff was exercising 

a protected constitutional right when he requested and received a hearing before the City Council 

appealing the Defendant Wilber's termination decision.” R. 30 at pp. 23–24. That’s the argument 

raised again on appeal.

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would deter a person of ordinary firmness from continuing to engage in that conduct’; and (3) that 

the adverse action was taken (at least in part) because of the protected conduct.” Thomas v. Eby, 

481 F.3d 434, 440 (6th Cir. 2007) (quoting Thaddeus-X v. Blatter, 175 F.3d 378, 394 (6th Cir. 

1999) (en banc)). But that standard only describes the general contours of a retaliation claim. 

Thaddeus-X, 175 F.3d at 394. And as we have previously explained, it “will yield variations in 

different contexts.” Id.

This poses a problem for Burgett, who must show that “every reasonable official would 

understand that what [the defendants did] was unlawful.” Wesby, 138 S. Ct. at 589. Ordinarily, a 

claim for retaliation under § 1983 sounds in the First Amendment. See, e.g., Thomas, 481 F.3d at 

440. In those cases, we ask whether the employee “spoke as a citizen on a matter of public 

concern.” Borough of Duryea, Pa. v. Guarnieri, 564 U.S. 379, 386 (2011). But here, Burgett makes 

no argument that the First Amendment applies or that he spoke on a matter of public concern. 

Rather, he asserts that the city retaliated against him for invoking his right to procedural due 

process (a dubious proposition on its own).2 Yet he cites no caselaw clearly establishing that the 

defendants can be liable under § 1983 for retaliating against Burgett after he invoked the city’s 

internal appeal process to review the termination decision. See Wesby, 131 S. Ct. at 589 (“To be 

clearly established, a legal principle must have a sufficiently clear foundation in then-existing 

precedent.”).The failure to point to any such retaliation law prevents Burgett from overcoming 

qualified immunity. Id. (“The precedent must be clear enough that every reasonable official would 

interpret it to establish the particular rule the plaintiff seeks to apply.”).

The district court made a similar error below. In addressing the defendants’ argument that 

Burgett has no constitutionally protected right to appeal his termination proceeding, the district 

court only cited cases arising from the First Amendment. See R. 42, PageID 1154–55. But, again,

 

2 While the Fourteenth Amendment requires that public employees with a property interest 

in their job receive a due-process hearing before (or sometimes after) a termination decision, we’re 

doubtful it creates a constitutionally protected interest in the internal appeal process that the 

employer might have enacted after providing a hearing. See Mitchell v. Fankhauser, 375 F.3d 477, 

481 (6th Cir. 2000) (“This is not to say that two hearings are always required to satisfy due 

process.”).

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Burgett has not made a First Amendment argument. And so those cases would not put “every 

reasonable official” on notice that the alleged retaliation was unlawful. See Wesby, 131 S. Ct. at 

589.

The defendants are entitled to qualified immunity. We therefore REVERSE the district 

court’s order denying summary judgment.3

 

3 Because he is entitled to qualified immunity for other reasons, we need not address 

Heavner’s alternative argument that he cannot be liable under an “influential recommender” 

theory. 

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