IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 12-30196

Summary Calendar

MARIE REED,

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

versus

MIKE EDWARDS, Officer of the Baton Rouge Police Department; 

CHARLES MONDRICK, 

Interim Chief of the Baton Rouge Police Department; 

HEATH SOILEAU, 

Officer of the Probation and Parole Officer of East Baton Rouge Parish;

JAMES M. LEBLANC, Secretary of the Louisiana Department of Corrections;

BRIAN BLACHE, Detective of East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office; 

SID GAUTREAUX, East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff; 

CHASITY SANFORD, 

Deputy of the East Baton Rouge Parish Sheriff’s Office,

Defendants-Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Louisiana

No. 3:11-CV-30

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

F I L E D

August 27, 2012

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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No. 12-30196

Before REAVLEY, SMITH, and PRADO, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

I.

Marie Reed asserted false-arrest and false-imprisonment claims under 42

U.S.C. § 1983 and various state-law claims. She alleged that the defendants,

who are law enforcement and probation officers, conspired to bring false charges

against her, which resulted in her arrest and extended imprisonment. Defendants moved to dismiss for failure to state a claim, arguing that Reed’s claims

were time-barred. The district court determined that the false-arrest and

imprisonment claims accrued at her bond hearing, which was no later than

August 15, 2009; the one-year statute of limitations rendered her January 2011

filing untimely. The court dismissed Reed’s federal claims with prejudice and

declined to exercise jurisdiction over the supplemental state-law claims. Reed

appeals.

II.

Reed contends that her Fourth Amendment claim for unlawful seizure was

not time-barred, because although the limitations period is governed by state

law, Cuadra v. Hous. Indep. Sch. Dist., 626 F.3d 808, 814 n.7 (5th Cir. 2010), the

accrual date is governed by federal law, which dictates that a § 1983 claim

accrues when a “plaintiff knows or has reason to know of the injury which is the

basis of the action,.” Lavellee v. Listi, 611 F.2d 1129, 1130-31 (5th Cir. 1980)

 Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not *

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH CIR.

R. 47.5.4.

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(internal citations and quotations omitted). For false-arrest and false-imprisonment claims, the limitations period accrues when the plaintiff “becomes held

pursuant to [legal] processSSwhen, for example, [s]he is bound over by a magistrate or arraigned on charges.” Wallace v. Kato, 549 U.S. 384, 389-90 (2007)

(emphasis omitted). Although the district court found that Reed was detained

pursuant to legal process at her bond hearing, she asserts that that hearing did

not constitute “legal process,” because the record does not reveal whether the

hearing included a determination of the legality of her detention. Reed instead

asks to file an amended complaint adding further details about the bond hearing

and whether it constituted legal process.

Our caselaw indirectly addresses this issue and suggests that a bond hearing constitutes legal process under Wallace. In Terry v. Hubert, 609 F.3d 757,

763 (5th Cir. 2010), we held that a warden who was sued under § 1983 “could

reasonably have concluded that [the plaintiff’s] detention was pursuant to process,” because the plaintiff was “afforded a bond hearing on his charges.” Reed

argues that Hubert is not controlling, because the issue there pertained to an

inquiry regarding whether the warden had violated clearly established law and

not to the Wallace legal-process requirement. 

Instead, Reed points to Mondragon v. Thompson, 519 F.3d 1078 (10th Cir.

2008), to suggest that a bond hearing does not constitute legal process. The

plaintiff in that case alleged that he appeared at “some sort of hearing” but contended that it did not constitute legal process, because the record did not indicate what kind of hearing it was. Id. at 1081. Because the arrest warrant was

forged and there was no information regarding what kind of hearing the plaintiff

received, the court expressed doubt that the plaintiff had received legal process

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within the meaning of Wallace, so it remanded for the district court to make the

determination. Id. at 1083-84. The court noted, however, that the Wallace

requirement would have been satisfied if the arrest warrant had not been forged

or if there were more information surrounding the plaintiff’s hearing. Id. 

Reed appeared at a bond hearing and posted bond no later than August

2009. Because she appeared before a judge, acknowledged the claims against

her, and posted bail, we can ascertain the kind of hearing she received. We

conclude that a bond hearing satisfies the definition of legal process within the

meaning of Wallace, so we need not remand to allow Reed to amend. 

Even if the bond hearing did not meet the legal-process requirement of

Wallace, Reed attended several later revocation hearings that constituted legal

process. The first, in which Reed was represented by counsel, was held in September 2009, so Reed’s claims expired, at the latest, in September 2010. Because

she did not sue until January 2011, her Fourth Amendment claims are timebarred, even using the later accrual date.1

III.

Reed alternatively argues that, even if her Fourth Amendment claim is

time-barred, she can state a viable claim under the Due Process Clause if permitted to amend. Although Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(a) “declares that

leave to amend ‘shall be freely given when justice so requires,’” Foman v. Davis,

371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962), Reed never asked the district court for leave to amend

Despite the bond hearing and the subsequent revocation hearings, Reed insists that 1

the only hearing this court should consider for accrual purposes is the one held in January

2010. Reed has offered no support for that assertion, and we see no reason to consider the

bond hearing or the September revocation hearing insufficient under Wallace.

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or sought to raise a due process claim during the more than one year that suit

was pending. Therefore, the court did not deprive her of an opportunity to

amend.

Reed also claims that, even though she failed to raise a due-process claim

in her initial pleading or to move to amend, justice requires that this court permit her to raise a due-process claim. As a general rule, “[a] party cannot raise

a new theory on appeal that was not presented to the court below,” Capps v.

Humble Oil & Refining Co., 536 F.2d 80, 82 (5th Cir. 1976), but Reed contends

that these are “exceptional circumstances” that allow an appellate court to hear

an issue for the first time on appeal if “no further factual development is

required and a miscarriage of justice would otherwise result,” Payne v. McLemore’s Wholesale & Retail Stores, 654 F.2d 1130, 1144-45 (5th Cir. Unit A Sept.

1981). 

There is no miscarriage of justice. First, it is not certain that Reed would

have succeeded on this theory if she had raised it in district court. See id. at

1146 (declining to consider a new theory on appeal, because it was not certain

that the appellant would have prevailed on that theory in the lower court). Second, the due-process claim that Reed wishes to raise is not a pure question of law

but instead would require further factual findings regarding Reed’s arrest and

imprisonment to determine whether they in fact violated due process. Reed has

presented only conclusional allegations that her arrest was concocted through

a conspiracy, so no miscarriage of justice would result from following our general

rule and refusing to hear her new claim. 

AFFIRMED.

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