NOT FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

JUAN FRANCISCO MARTINEZ,

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

 v. 

LOS ANGELES POLICE DEPARTMENT, 

Defendant-Appellee.

No. 22-15509

D.C. No. 2:18-cv-00964-TLN-AC

MEMORANDUM*

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of California

Troy L. Nunley, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted March 10, 2023

Submission Vacated September 1, 2023

Resubmitted July 25, 2024**

Pasadena, California

Before: COLLINS, LEE, and BRESS, Circuit Judges.

Juan Martinez (“Martinez”) was arrested by an officer of the Stockton Police 

Department (“SPD”) on the basis of a warrant abstract transmitted from the Los 

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as 

provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.

** This case was originally argued and submitted to a panel consisting of Judges 

Kleinfeld, Watford, and Collins. After Judge Watford resigned from the court and 

Judge Kleinfeld became unavailable, Judges Lee and Bress were drawn to replace 

them pursuant to General Order 3.2(h), and the submission to the prior panel was 

vacated. Judges Lee and Bress have reviewed the briefs, record, and video 

recording of the prior oral argument. The reconstituted panel has unanimously 

concluded that this case is suitable for decision without further oral argument. See 

FED. R. APP. P. 34(a)(2)(C).

FILED

JUL 25 2024

MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK

U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
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Angeles Police Department (“LAPD”). The warrant abstract described a different 

Juan Martinez who happened to share Martinez’s name and birthdate. Martinez 

sued LAPD and several others under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for his mistaken arrest. As 

to LAPD, Martinez claimed that it had “failed to train its personnel” to verify 

identifying information in an arrest warrant “with the arresting agency.” Martinez 

claims that, had LAPD personnel discussed with SPD the identifiers in the warrant 

abstract, SPD would have realized that Martinez’s fingerprints and other identifiers

did not match those of the Juan Martinez described in the warrant. The district 

court granted LAPD’s motion for summary judgment, and Martinez timely 

appealed from the final judgment. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. 

Reviewing the district court’s decision de novo, Donell v. Kowell, 533 F.3d 762, 

769 (9th Cir. 2008), we affirm.

1. “Plaintiffs who seek to impose liability” on local governmental entities 

such as LAPD “under § 1983 must prove that ‘action pursuant to official municipal 

policy’ caused their injury.” Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51, 60–61 (2011) 

(quoting Monell v. Department of Soc. Servs. of the City of N.Y., 436 U.S. 658, 691 

(1978)). “In limited circumstances, a local government’s decision not to train 

certain employees about their legal duty to avoid violating citizens’ rights may rise 

to the level of an official government policy for purposes of § 1983.” Id. at 61. 

But to satisfy Monell’s municipal-policy requirement, “a municipality’s failure to 
3 

train its employees in a relevant respect must amount to ‘deliberate indifference to 

the rights of persons with whom the [untrained employees] come into contact.’” 

Id. (quoting City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 388 (1989)). The standard of

deliberate indifference usually requires a plaintiff to show “[a] pattern of similar 

constitutional violations by untrained employees.” Id. at 62. In the absence of 

such a pattern, Monell liability on a failure-to-train theory will lie only if “the 

unconstitutional consequences of failing to train” were “patently obvious.” Id. at 

64.

As noted, the basis for Martinez’s § 1983 claim is that LAPD failed to train 

its employees to take steps to ensure that an arresting agency properly compared an 

arrested suspect’s identifying information against the identifying information 

contained in a warrant abstract that LAPD had sent to an outside police 

department. But Martinez has introduced no evidence that this purported failure to 

train has produced a pattern of constitutional violations. Nor has he shown that it 

was “patently obvious” that he or others like him would be wrongfully arrested 

simply because LAPD did not discuss the identifying information in the warrant

abstract with the arresting agency. The warrant abstract here, by itself, gave SPD 

everything it needed to conclude, with sufficient certainty, that Martinez was not 

the Juan Martinez described in the warrant. Martinez was eight inches taller and 

90 pounds heavier than the warrant subject. Moreover, the warrant abstract 
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included other information about the subject that was sufficient to distinguish him 

from Martinez, such as the subject’s Social Security number and his unique 

fingerprint identifier. Given that the warrant abstract made clear that Martinez was 

the wrong man, it was not patently obvious that Martinez would be arrested by 

SPD simply because LAPD personnel did not go over the warrant information with 

SPD. Martinez has not shown that it is patently obvious that, unless LAPD 

affirmatively assists the arresting agency in evaluating the details of a warrant 

abstract, the agency will be so incompetent that it will not be able to make 

appropriate use of the amply sufficient information that LAPD has provided.1

Because LAPD cannot be held liable under Monell, we need not determine 

whether Martinez’s underlying constitutional claim has any merit. The judgment 

of the district court is affirmed.

AFFIRMED.

1 Martinez contends that LAPD’s conduct contravened various California state 

laws and policies, but even if he is correct, violations of state law do not, without 

more, establish a violation of federal constitutional rights. See Samson v. City of 

Bainbridge Island, 683 F.3d 1051, 1060 (9th Cir. 2012); Miller v. Stagner, 757 

F.2d 988, 993 (9th Cir. 1985).