16-3882-cv

Uzoukwu v. Krawiecki

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED

BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY

MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRON IC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “SUMMARY ORDER”). A PARTY CITING A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY

OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL.

At a stated Term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at the 1 Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York on the 2
1 st day of December, two thousand seventeen. 3

4 Present: ROSEMARY S. POOLER, 5 RICHARD C. WESLEY, 6 PETER W. HALL, 7 Circuit Judges

. 8

9

_____________________________________________________ 10

11 AFAM UZOUKWU, 12

13 Plaintiff-Appellant

, 14

15
v. 16-3882-cv 16

17 CITY OF NEW YORK, MICHELE KR AWIECKI, CARL MILUSO, 18

19 Defendants-Appellees

. 20

_____________________________________________________ 21

22 Appearing for Appellant: Gre gory Antollino (Daniela Nanau, on the brief ), New York, N.Y. 23

24 Appearing for Appellees: Da niel Matza-Brown, Assistant Co rporation Counsel (Richard 25 Dearing, Fay Ng, Assistan t Corporation Counsels, on the brief ), for 26 Zachary W. Carter, Corporation C ounsel of the City of New York, 27 New York, N.Y. 28

29 Appeal from the United States Di strict Court for the Southern Di strict of New York (Abrams, J. ). 30

312 ON CONSIDERATION WHEREOF, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED, 1
AND DECREED that the order of said Dist rict Court be and it hereby is AFFIRMED

. 2

3 Appellant Afam Uzoukwu appeals from the May 12, 2016 judgment entered by the 4
District Court for the Southern District of New York (Abrams, J .) dismissing his claims 5 following a jury trial. Uzoukwu brought a Section 1983 suit, alleging false arrest. We assume the 6 parties’ familiarity with the underlying facts, pr ocedural history, and specification of issues for 7
review. 8

9 “We review a denial of a Rule 50(b) moti on de novo and the denial of a Rule 59 motion 10
for abuse of discretion.” Hicks v. Tug PATRIOT , 783 F.3d 939, 942 (2d Cir. 2015), cert. denied 11 sub nom. Vane Line Bunkering, Inc. v. Hicks , 136 S. Ct. 211 (2015) (citing Fabri v. United 12 Techs. Int’l, Inc. , 387 F.3d 109, 119 (2d Cir. 2004)). Judgment as a matter of law should be 13 granted “only if there is such a complete ab sence of evidence supporti ng the verdict that the 14 jury’s findings could only have been the result of sheer surmis e and conjecture, or such an 15 overwhelming amount of evidence in favor of the movant that reasonable and fair minded men 16
could not arrive at a verdic t against the moving party.” Yurman Design, Inc. v. PAJ, Inc. , 262 17 F.3d 101, 108 (2d Cir. 2001) (quoting Diesel v. Town of Lewisboro , 232 F.3d 92, 103 (2d Cir. 18 2000)) (internal punctuation omitted). “We will revers e the judgment of the district court if a 19 party has been fully heard on an i ssue during a jury trial and the court finds that a reasonable jury 20 would not have a legally sufficient evidentiar y basis to find for the party on that issue.” Harris v. 21
O'Hare , 770 F.3d 224, 231 (2d Cir. 2014), as amended (Nov. 24, 2014) (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 22 50(a)(1)) (internal punc tuation omitted). 23

24 Uzoukwu primarily argues that the district co urt erred by declining to find as a matter of 25 law that the officers lacked probable cause. “The existence of probable cause to arrest—even for 26 a crime other than the one identified by the arre sting officer—will defeat a claim of false arrest 27
under the Fourth Amendment.” Figueroa v. Mazza , 825 F.3d 89, 99 (2d Cir. 2016) (citing 28 Devenpeck v. Alford , 543 U.S. 146, 152–54 (2004)). “Probable cause to arrest exists when the 29 arresting officer has knowledge or reasonably trustworthy informa tion of facts and circumstances 30
that are sufficient to warrant a person of reasonable caution in the belief that the person to be 31 arrested has committed or is committing a crime.” Escalera v. Lunn , 361 F.3d 737, 743 (2d Cir. 32 2004) (internal quotation marks omitted). 33

34 We see no error. New York City Rules T it. 56, § 1-03(c)(3) provides that “[n]o person 35 shall fail to comply with or obey any instruct ion, direction, regulation, warning, or prohibition, 36 written or printed, displayed or appearing on a ny park sign.” The officers’ testimony, which the 37 jury was entitled to credit, established that Uzou kwu appeared to be in the park without children, 38 in contravention of the rules displayed on signs posted at the park entrances. According to the 39 officers, they observed that Uzoukwu was focuse d on eating Jell-O, was not interacting with 40 children and did not appear to be supervising an y. The officers further testified that Uzoukwu did 41 not have any items that might indicate he was wi th children. When he was asked whether he was 42 with children, Uzoukwu began yelling, but never identified or otherwise signaled a relationship 43 with a child in the park. Fina lly, the officers did not observe any children approach over the 44
course of the officers’ interaction with Uzoukw u and his ensuing outburst. On these facts, the 45 officers had every reason to believe there was a “fair probability” that Uzoukwu was in the park 463 without children. Florida v. Harris , 568 U.S. 237, 244 (2013). Having determined that the 1 officers adequately established pr obable cause for the violation of the park rule, we need not 2 examine the other asserted grounds for proba ble cause—namely, disorderly conduct and 3 obstruction of governme ntal administration. See Dickerson v. Napolitano , 604 F.3d 732, 752 (2d 4 Cir. 2010) (“[P]robable cause is based on the facts warranting arrest and not the statute pursuant 5 to which a plaintiff was charged.”). 6

7 Uzoukwu also challenges the admission of te stimony from a Customs and Border Control 8 agent as unduly prejudicial. We review the dist rict court’s evidentiary rulings for abuse of 9
discretion. Crawford v. Tribeca Lending Corp. , 815 F.3d 121, 124 (2d Cir. 2016). 10

11 The agent testified to the fact that there was no immigration record of Uzoukwu’s 12 children entering the country in or around the years he had claimed they entered. Uzoukwu 13 asserts that this evidence inflamed anti-immigran t bias. While there may be a risk that members 14 of the jury harbored such sentiments, Uzoukwu fa ils to grapple with the clear evidentiary value 15 of the immigration records. Uzoukw u’s theory of the case was that his children had entered the 16 country a few months prior to the incident, and they were with him in the park at the time of the 17 officers’ approach, making him fully compliant w ith the park rules. The immigration evidence 18 tended to undercut Uzoukwu’s claims, by showi ng both that he may have provided inaccurate 19
information about the children’s en try into the U.S., and that the children likely were not in the 20 country at the time of the incident—much less in the park. As a result, the evidence was not 21 unduly prejudicial, and the district court did not err by admitting it. See Leopold v. Baccarat, 22

Inc. , 174 F.3d 261, 269-70 (2d Cir. 1999) (evidence that “easily might have cr eated feelings of 23 antagonism and even disgust” admissible for probative value). 24

25 We have considered the remainder of appella nt’s arguments and find them to be without 26 merit. Accordingly, the order of the district court hereby is AFFIRMED. 27

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FOR THE COURT: 30 Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk 31

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