[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 21-13393

Non-Argument Calendar

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CHARLES THOMPSON, 

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

SHERIFF OF INDIAN RIVER COUNTY, FLORIDA, 

ANDREW DEAN, 

MICHAEL SCOTT, 

Defendants-Appellees.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Southern District of Florida

D.C. Docket No. 2:21-cv-14184-KMM

____________________

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2 Opinion of the Court 21-13393

Before WILSON, GRANT, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

Charles Thompson made a furtive offer in what he thought 

was the secluded privacy of a spa massage room. But unbeknownst 

to him, the county sheriff’s office had made a few surreptitious 

arrangements of its own. Thompson was arrested for soliciting 

prostitution based on footage from a surveillance camera that 

county officials had hidden at the spa. The officials had acted 

pursuant to a warrant, but Florida state courts concluded that the 

surveillance operation had violated the Fourth Amendment and 

that the evidence had to be suppressed.

Thompson sued two detectives and the county sheriff 

seeking damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. He now appeals the 

district court’s dismissal of his action for failure to state a claim. But

Thompson failed to show that the detectives violated a clearly 

established constitutional right, so the district court properly 

concluded that the detectives are entitled to qualified immunity. 

And Thompson also failed to identify a custom or policy 

constituting deliberate indifference to his constitutional rights, so 

he cannot succeed on his claim against the sheriff. We therefore 

affirm the district court’s dismissal of Thompson’s case.

I. 

The Indian River County Sheriff’s Office began hearing 

rumors that the East Sea Spa offered more than just ordinary 

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21-13393 Opinion of the Court 3

massages. In late 2018, it opened an investigation into possible 

prostitution and human trafficking activities taking place at the spa. 

When a health inspection revealed evidence that spa workers were 

living at their place of business, the sheriff’s office sought a “visual 

surveillance warrant” to allow the installation of four hidden video 

cameras in the spa. A state judge granted the warrant and further 

ordered that “[w]hile monitoring the premises to be searched, the 

Sheriff shall take steps to minimize the invasion of privacy to any 

parties not engaged in the unlawful acts set forth in the affidavit.”

Detectives set up cameras in four of the spa’s massage 

rooms. They monitored and recorded those rooms for 13 of the 60 

days they were permitted to do so. The detectives were targeting 

spa employees and male customers in their investigation. But their 

surveillance equipment did not allow for a fine-tuned operation. 

The cameras enabled the detectives to record one room, all four 

rooms, or no rooms; it was not possible to stop recording a single

room and continue recording the others. So during recording 

sessions when the massage rooms were being used by both male 

and female customers at the same time, the detectives recorded 

them all. An assistant state attorney advised the lead detective that 

the team could continue this practice, which occurred four times 

in total. Although the sheriff’s office obtained newer cameras 

capable of more targeted surveillance, the investigation team did 

not stop its investigation and reapply for a warrant using the new 

cameras.

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Thompson was arrested for soliciting prostitution based on 

evidence obtained from the surveillance videos. During the 

subsequent state criminal proceedings, he argued that the spa 

surveillance operation had violated the Fourth Amendment and 

that the videos should be suppressed. The trial court agreed, 

finding that Thompson had a legitimate expectation of privacy and 

that the sheriff’s office had failed to minimize invasions of privacy 

as it had been ordered to do. A state appellate court upheld the 

order to suppress the video footage.

Emboldened by his success in state court, Thompson 

brought a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action in federal court seeking damages 

from Sheriff Eric Flowers (in his official capacity) and Detectives 

Andrew Dean and Michael Scott. The district court dismissed the 

case for failure to state a claim, concluding that the detectives were 

protected by qualified immunity and that the sheriff could not be 

held liable for failure to train his officers. Thompson now appeals.

II. 

“We review de novo the district court’s grant of a motion to 

dismiss under 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim, accepting the 

allegations in the complaint as true and construing them in the light 

most favorable to the plaintiff.” Lanfear v. Home Depot, Inc., 679 

F.3d 1267, 1275 (11th Cir. 2012) (quotation omitted). The same 

standard applies when a district court grants qualified immunity at 

the motion to dismiss stage. Davis v. Carter, 555 F.3d 979, 981 

(11th Cir. 2009).

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21-13393 Opinion of the Court 5

To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must “state a 

claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Bell Atl. Corp. v. 

Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007). That is, it must allow a court 

to “draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for 

the misconduct alleged.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 

(2009). While we accept all the complaint’s allegations as true, we 

are “not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a 

factual allegation.” Id. (quotation omitted).

III. 

Thompson has sued Detectives Dean and Scott in their 

individual capacities and Sheriff Flowers in his official capacity, 

alleging that all three officials violated his Fourth Amendment 

rights. None of his claims survive dismissal.

Thompson’s first two claims fail because both detectives are 

protected by qualified immunity. Qualified immunity balances 

accountability for public officials who abuse their power with 

protection for officials who make mistakes while reasonably 

performing their duties. Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231

(2009). “We are required to grant qualified immunity to a 

defendant official unless the plaintiff can demonstrate two things: 

(1) that the facts, when construed in the plaintiff’s favor, show that 

the official committed a constitutional violation and, if so, (2) that 

the law, at the time of the official’s act, clearly established the 

unconstitutionality of that conduct.” Singletary v. Vargas, 804 F.3d 

1174, 1180 (11th Cir. 2015). We may consider these two 

requirements in any order. Pearson, 555 U.S. at 227.

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Thompson has not shown that the officers’ acts were 

violations of clearly established law. In determining whether a 

right is clearly established, we ask “whether it would be clear to a 

reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he 

confronted.” J W by & Through Tammy Williams v. Birmingham 

Bd. of Educ., 904 F.3d 1248, 1259 (11th Cir. 2018). Legal precedent 

can show that a right is clearly established, but not just any case 

will do—the plaintiff must “point to a materially similar case 

decided at the time of the relevant conduct by the Supreme Court, 

the Eleventh Circuit, or the relevant state supreme court.” Id.

Thompson does not do so. Instead he offers a single Tenth 

Circuit case as proof that the right the detectives allegedly violated 

was clearly established. SeeUnited States v. Mesa-Rincon, 911 F.2d 

1433 (10th Cir. 1990). Thompson argues that the fact that other

jurisdictions have found United States v. Mesa-Rincon persuasive 

should be enough to elevate it to “clearly established” status. But 

Thompson’s view is not the law. Our precedent is clear: if there is

no United States Supreme Court, Eleventh Circuit, or Florida 

supreme court case on point, the law is not clearly established. See

J W, 904 F.3d at 1259.

Thompson further argues that the officers’ conduct “so 

obviously violated the Constitution” that he need not point to a 

factually similar precedent. In rare cases, a plaintiff may establish 

that an officer’s behavior was so egregious that he “had to know he 

was violating the Constitution even without caselaw on point.”

Lee v. Ferraro, 284 F.3d 1188, 1199 (11th Cir. 2002) (quotation 

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omitted). For example, we have sometimes denied qualified 

immunity to police officers who inflicted serious physical injury on 

secured, nonthreatening arrestees, even when no prior case law 

closely matched the specific facts at issue. See id. (collecting cases). 

Here no such egregious behavior is alleged. The detectives 

conducted their investigation in accordance with the law as a 

reasonable officer would understand it. They obtained a warrant 

and sought legal advice from an assistant state attorney about the 

proper scope of surveillance. Nothing alleged by Thompson 

suggests that they “had to know” their actions were unlawful. 

We hold that Detectives Dean and Scott are entitled to 

qualified immunity. Because we conclude that Thompson’s 

Fourth Amendment rights were not clearly established here, we 

need not ask whether the officers actually violated them. See Fils 

v. City of Aventura, 647 F.3d 1272, 1287 (11th Cir. 2011).

Thompson’s claim against Sheriff Flowers in his official 

capacity is similarly flawed. A municipality may only be found 

liable under § 1983 where its official policy or custom is the 

“moving force” of a constitutional violation. Monell v. New York 

City Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 694 (1978). And as 

Thompson himself concedes, “the inadequacy of police training 

may serve as the basis for § 1983 liability only where the failure to 

train amounts to deliberate indifference to the rights of persons 

with whom the police come into contact.” City of Canton v. 

Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 388 (1989). In short, liability only attaches 

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where “a failure to train reflects a ‘deliberate’ or ‘conscious’ choice 

by a municipality.” Id. at 389.

As the Supreme Court has explained, a “pattern of similar 

constitutional violations” is “ordinarily necessary” to establish 

liability for failure to train. Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51, 62 

(2011). But not always. Where a plaintiff can produce “evidence 

of a single violation of federal rights” along with “a showing that a 

municipality has failed to train its employees to handle recurring 

situations presenting an obvious potential for such a violation,” a 

municipality can still be found liable. Bd. of Cnty. Comm’rs of 

Bryan Cnty. v. Brown, 520 U.S. 397, 409 (1997); see also Cooper v. 

Dillon, 403 F.3d 1208, 1222–23 (11th Cir. 2005) (finding municipal 

liability where city official with policymaking authority enforced 

unconstitutional statute one time).

That is not the case here. Thompson alleges a single 

constitutional violation: Sheriff Flowers’s failure to ensure that his 

officers were properly trained before conducting the surreptitious 

video surveillance that resulted in Thompson’s arrest. But even 

assuming that the officers committed a constitutional violation, 

Thompson has not shown that the sheriff’s office has “failed to 

train its employees to handle recurring situations” that will

obviously lead to similar violations in the future. To the contrary, 

he alleges that it has procured cameras that will allow for less 

intrusive surveillance, suggesting that its future investigations will 

be more narrowly targeted.

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At bottom, Thompson simply argues that Sheriff Flowers 

should be liable because his officers are not required to read MesaRincon, the Tenth Circuit case from which Thompson draws his 

understanding of Fourth Amendment rights. But as we have 

explained, Mesa-Rincon is not binding law in this Circuit. We 

cannot hold a county official liable for failing to establish a training 

program that fully incorporates the law of other jurisdictions. 

Thompson has thus failed to state a claim against the sheriff.

* * *

Detectives Dean and Scott are protected by qualified 

immunity, and Thompson has not sufficiently alleged a 

failure-to-train claim against Sheriff Flowers. We therefore 

AFFIRM the district court’s order dismissing the case.

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