Opinion ID: 205434
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Qualified Immunity Merits

Text: Since the issue of qualified immunity was not waived, we will proceed to address the merits. Generally, qualified immunity protects government agents from liability when their actions do not violate  `clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.'  Purvis v. Oest, 614 F.3d 713, 720 (7th Cir.2010) (quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982)). This involves two questions: (1) whether the facts, taken in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, show that the defendant violated a constitutional right; and (2) whether that constitutional right was clearly established at the time of the alleged violation. Wheeler v. Lawson, 539 F.3d 629, 639 (7th Cir.2008) (citing Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151, 150 L.Ed.2d 272 (2001)). Whether the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity will depend on what constitutional affronts the plaintiffs argue.
We have formulated the inquiry into a public employee's First Amendment rights as follows: To determine whether a public employee has a protected First Amendment right, we undertake a two part inquiry, known as the Connick-Pickering [ [10] ] test. First, the court must determine whether the plaintiff's speech addressed a matter of public concern. If it did, the court must then apply the Pickering balancing test to determine whether the interests of the [plaintiff] as a citizen in commenting upon the matters of public concern are outweighed by the interest of the state, as an employer, in promoting the efficiency of the public services it performs through its employees. Coady v. Steil, 187 F.3d 727, 731 (7th Cir.1999) (internal citations omitted). If, on the other hand, a public employee's speech does not implicate a matter of public concern, the Pickering balancing test is not reached because the Constitution does not insulate [the employee's] communications from employer discipline. Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410, 421, 126 S.Ct. 1951, 164 L.Ed.2d 689 (2006). In Spiegla v. Hull, 481 F.3d 961 (7th Cir.2007), we explained that Garcetti stands for the proposition that public employees speaking `pursuant to their official duties' are speaking as employees, not citizens, and thus are not protected by the First Amendment regardless of the content of their speech. Spiegla, 481 F.3d at 965. In all cases, we consider only the speech that resulted in the adverse action against the employee. We have stated that [t]he scope of our inquiry is defined by the number of instances in which the plaintiff has produced `specific, nonconclusory allegations' reasonably linking her speech to employer discipline. Wright v. Ill. Dep't of Children & Family Servs., 40 F.3d 1492, 1500 (7th Cir.1994) (citing O'Connor v. Chicago Transit Auth., 985 F.2d 1362, 1368-71 (7th Cir.1993)).
The second inquiry, see Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151, is whether the constitutional standards at issue were clearly established at the time the alleged violation occurred. See Purvis, 614 F.3d at 720. The relevant, dispositive inquiry... is whether it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted. Saucier, 533 U.S. at 202, 121 S.Ct. 2151. Most of the defendants' arguments here in favor of qualified immunity are addressed to this latter part of the Saucier inquiry, in that they revolve around reasons why the defendants might have been objectively reasonable in investigating and sanctioning the plaintiffs following the jailbreak. This court has explicitly reserved the question whether government defendants per se avoid First Amendment § 1983 claims by demonstrating that they had probable cause. See Abrams v. Walker, 307 F.3d 650, 657 (7th Cir.2002), overruled on other grounds by Spiegla v. Hull, 371 F.3d 928, 941-42 (7th Cir.2004) ( Spiegla I ). So it would be fruitless to pursue probable cause as such. Nevertheless, it is clear that evidence of probable cause may act as highly valuable circumstantial evidence that the complained-of conduct would have occurred without a retaliatory motive. Hartman v. Moore, 547 U.S. 250, 261, 126 S.Ct. 1695, 164 L.Ed.2d 441 (2006). Therefore, facts which would be relevant to probable cause in a Fourth Amendment case will also be relevant to the reasonableness of the defendants' actions in a First Amendment case. See, e.g., Purtell v. Mason, 527 F.3d 615, 622, 626 (7th Cir.2008).

We are able to determine as a matter of law, based purely on the undisputed facts presented to the district court, that the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity as to the plaintiffs' claim of retaliation based on workplace complaints. As noted, the district court reviewed the facts and concluded that based on the undisputed facts, the plaintiffs were acting as public employees when they complained about unsafe conditions at the jail. Specifically, in complaining about overcrowding, the lack of supervision and the need for Plexiglas, the plaintiffs were acting pursuant to their duties as set forth in the CCSO's General Orders. Therefore, consistent with Spiegla I, 371 F.3d at 936, [11] the district court concluded that the plaintiffs did not enjoy First Amendment protections. The conclusion based on undisputed fact that the plaintiffs acted as public employees in complaining, which the district court found to be dispositive of the merits, is equally dispositive of the qualified immunity question that the district court might have been asking. The district court properly determined that there was no violation of a constitutional right; therefore, the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity on this claim as a matter of law. See Terry v. Richardson, 346 F.3d 781, 782 (7th Cir.2003).
As to the political retaliation-based claims (i.e., claims one and three), we will not attempt to determine whether, as a matter of law, the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity. We have no decision to review because the court, having decided the matter was waived, never reached the question whether the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity and consequently to summary judgment. In its short summary judgment memorandum, the district court did not determine which facts were disputed and undisputed in connection with the political retaliation claims, or whether any disputed facts were material to the question of qualified immunity. The court made no comment about the plaintiffs' assertions that they were openly supportive of Remus, or that the defendants knew of that support or that the support motivated an overly vigorous investigation and harsh penalties. [12] The district court also did not inquire into facts which, for purposes of the second Saucier inquiry, might have made the defendants objectively reasonable in believing that they were not violating the plaintiffs' First Amendment rights. This oversight is especially problematic given the simple facts of a serious jailbreak and the suspicion of internal cooperation, which are undisputed and which make the undertaking of a vigorous investigation unsurprising. We are not reassured by the district court's statement that the record is rife with genuine issues of material fact regarding [the First Amendment political retaliation] claim. Although this statement was perfectly adequate to explain why summary judgment on the merits ought to be denied, it is too conclusory to serve as a basis for this court to find against qualified immunity, particularly when we do not have the benefit of reviewing the district court's determinations of disputed versus undisputed fact, or materiality to qualified immunity. [13] Issues relating to whether facts are disputed are appropriately determined in the first instance by the district court. This procedure is consistent with our present reluctance to adjudicate those issues which have not been addressed by the district court. We cannot easily determine whether the defendants are entitled as a matter of law to qualified immunity, and we remand for the district court to reconsider whether the defendants are entitled to summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity as to the political retaliation claims. The denial of summary judgment with respect to the political retaliation claims is REVERSED and the case REMANDED for proceedings consistent with this opinion.