Opinion ID: 767499
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Supervisory Officers' Qualified Immunity Defense

Text: 34 The doctrine of qualified immunity entitles public officials to freedom from suit for acts undertaken in their official capacity if (1) their conduct does not violate clearly established constitutional rights, or (2) it was objectively reasonable for them to believe their acts did not violate those rights. Weyant v. Okst, 101 F.3d 845, 857 (2d Cir. 1996). Without a doubt, the right not to be arrested without probable cause is clearly established. See Lee v. Sandberg, 136 F.3d 94, 102 (2d Cir. 1997); Cook v. Sheldon, 41 F.3d 73, 78 (2d Cir. 1994); Robison v. Via, 821 F.2d 913, 921 (2d Cir. 1987). Therefore, with respect to Sergeant McCauley, Captain Rosa, and Assistant Chief Simonetti -- whose decisions to detain and charge Martinez in the early morning hours of March 19, 1993 gave rise to all his claims against them -- we are called upon to review the objective reasonableness of these officers' probable cause determinations. 35 With respect to qualified immunity, the Supreme Court has recently reminded us that the appropriate question is the objective inquiry of whether a reasonable officer could have believed that [his actions were] lawful, in light of clearly established law and the information the officer[ ] possessed. Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. 603,119 S. Ct. 1692, 1700 (1999). Lawful arrest, i.e., arrest pursuant to probable cause, requires the arresting officer to have knowledge or reasonably trustworthy information sufficient to warrant a person of reasonable caution in the belief that an offense has been committed by the person to be arrested. Singer v. Fulton County Sheriff, 63 F.3d 110, 119 (2d Cir. 1995) (internal quotation omitted). Moreover, it is wellestablished that a law enforcement official has probable cause to arrest if he received his information from some person, normally the putative victim or eyewitness. Miloslavsky v. AES Eng'g Soc'y, 808 F. Supp. 351, 355 (S.D.N.Y. 1992), aff'd, 993 F.2d 1534 (2d Cir. 1993). Finally, we have said that in the context of a qualified immunity defense to an allegation of false arrest, the defending officer need only show arguable probable cause. See Lee, 136 F.3d at 103. See also Robison, 821 F.2d at 921 (qualified immunity is warranted if officers of reasonable competence could disagree on whether the probable cause test was met). With these legal standards before us, we turn to the dispositive question of whether the defendants' determination that probable cause existed to detain Martinez was objectively reasonable. 36 In undertaking this inquiry, we bear in mind that [q]ualified immunity serves important interests in our political system. Sound Aircraft Servs., Inc. v. Town of East Hampton, 192 F.3d 329, 333 (2d Cir. 1999). The defense of qualified immunity shields government officials from liability for civil damages as a result of their performance of discretionary functions, and serves to protect government officials from the burdens of costly, but insubstantial, lawsuits. See Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 817-18 (1982). We also remain mindful that in qualified immunity cases, we are not concerned with the correctness of the defendants' conduct, but rather the 'objective reasonableness' of their chosen course of action given the circumstances confronting them at the scene. Lennon, 66 F.3d at 421. 37 We hold that the decisions to detain and criminally charge Martinez, made by the three supervisory officers charged here with false arrest, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution, were objectively reasonable under the circumstances. We have previously held that police officers, when making a probable cause determination, are entitled to rely on the victims' allegations that a crime has been committed. See Singer, 63 F.3d at 119. They are also entitled to rely on the allegations of fellow police officers. See Bernard v. United States, 25 F.3d 98, 102-03 (2d Cir. 1994). 38 The accounts Sergeant McCauley relied on when he arrived at 13 Rathbun Avenue were those of Officers Fulginiti and Trapanese, who claim to be the victims here. The district court, in denying Sergeant McCauley's motion for summary judgment, incorrectly focused on his decision to send the arresting officers to the hospital, while sending Martinez to the station house for booking. This focus was based on the disparity between the apparently slight injuries suffered by the officers and Martinez' more obvious injuries. In ruling on the motion, the magistrate judge stated that Sergeant McCauley sent two uninjured officers to the hospital and cited the defendant officers' examining physician's report, which casts doubt upon the existence of their alleged injuries. It was error for the district court to rely upon that evidence in deciding that Sergeant McCauley had acted unreasonably. In evaluating the probable cause determination, we consider the facts available to the officer at the time of the arrest. Ricciuti v. N.Y.C. Transit Auth., 124 F.3d 123, 128 (2d Cir. 1997) (citing Lowth v. Town of Cheektowaga, 82 F.3d 563, 569 (2d Cir. 1996)). 39 When Sergeant McCauley arrived at 13 Rathbun Avenue, he was told by all officers present that Martinez was the aggressor, was injured as officers attempted to subdue him, and that Martinez had already been arrested. That Martinez was severely injured is not inconsistent with the officers' account that he was resisting arrest, nor does it undermine a conclusion that he committed a crime. Moreover, it is immaterial to Martinez' claim of false arrest that the arresting officers were sent to the hospital while Martinez was first sent to the station house; the issue pertinent to Martinez' claim is whether there were reasonable grounds on which to detain him, not whether it was appropriate to send the other officers to the hospital. We conclude that reasonably competent officers in Sergeant McCauley's position would, at the least, disagree about the probable cause determination under these circumstances. Because summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity is appropriate when the only conclusion a rational jury could reach is that reasonably competent police officers could under the circumstances disagree about the legality of the arrest, id. (citing Lennon, 66 F.3d at 421), we find that Sergeant McCauley is immune from suit in this action. 40 Furthermore, we think that it was error for the trial court to conclude that, once at the station house, Captain Rosa and Assistant Chief Simonetti had a duty to conduct an independent investigation of the physical evidence before deciding to charge Martinez. It is not unreasonable for police officers to rely on the accounts provided by other officers at the scene, even when confronted with conflicting accounts. See id. (holding that arresting officer was entitled to rely on version of altercation given by fellow officer, despite plaintiff's protestations of innocence). Here, Captain Rosa and Assistant Chief Simonetti had a reasonable basis for making the probable cause determination; the version of events as narrated by the officers present at the scene was not clearly implausible, and they had no reason to question the officers' veracity. See id. 41 Captain Rosa heard consistent versions of the events from at least three eyewitnesses, who said that Martinez punched one officer and bit another, while only one eyewitness, Sinagra, provided a different version of events. While the magistrate judge emphasized that Sinagra's prompt assertion that plaintiff was assaulted should have aroused Captain Rosa's suspicions, we note that he undertook to interview Sinagra twice, suggesting that he took her story seriously and made every attempt to weigh it in the balance. We also emphasize that Captain Rosa was deprived of the opportunity to speak with Martinez, who declined to make statements at the 123rd Precinct. 42 We have said that a police officer is not required to explore and eliminate every theoretically plausible claim of innocence before making an arrest. Id. We have also noted that making the probable cause determination does not require or allow police officers to sit as prosecutor, judge, or jury. Krause v. Bennett, 887 F.2d 362, 372 (2d Cir. 1989) (stating that it is the factfinder who ultimately decides whether the defendant's story holds up). In that vein, we also take note that Captain Rosa, together with Assistant Chief Simonetti, consulted with an Assistant District Attorney, who concurred with the propriety of bringing charges based on the evidence at hand. 43 Assistant Chief Simonetti was the supervisory officer furthest removed from the events at 13 Rathbun Avenue, having been called to the station house some hours after Martinez was brought in. Because his role was limited to approving the decision to file charges, we question whether Assistant Chief Simonetti even had the kind of personal involvement in Martinez' case that is required to sustain an action for damages under 1983. See Wright v. Smith, 21 F.3d 496, 501 (2d Cir. 1994); Williams v. Smith, 781 F.2d 319, 323-24 (2d Cir. 1986). In any event, since we deem his behavior objectively reasonable with respect to the arrestee, it is not necessary to decide that question. 44 Given the circumstances at 13 Rathbun Avenue and the preliminary investigation undertaken at the 123rd Precinct, we cannot say that the conduct of these three supervisory officers was objectively unreasonable. We have not adopted a legal standard that would require supervisory officers to conduct an independent evidentiary investigation before authorizing charges against an arrestee whom all arresting officers have agreed was violent in resisting arrest. Furthermore, we are confident that competent officers standing in the place of Sergeant McCauley, of Captain Rosa or of Assistant Chief Simonetti would, at the very least, disagree about whether probable cause was lacking in these circumstances. See Robison, 821 F.2d at 921. We therefore find that the district court erred in concluding that a rational jury could fail to find their behavior objectively reasonable; accordingly, Sergeant McCauley, Captain Rosa and Assistant Chief Simonetti are entitled to immunity from suit in this action. Because the federal claims against them must be dismissed, we also direct dismissal of the supplemental state law claims for false arrest, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. 1367(c)(3). See United Mine Workers of America v. Gibbs, 383 U.S. 715, 726 (1966). See also Smith, 175 F.3d at 107; Tierney, 133 F.3d at 199; Salim, 93 F.3d at 92; Lennon, 66 F.3d at 426.