Opinion ID: 797630
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Misrepresentation and State Created Danger

Text: 27 Only an affirmative act can amount to a violation of substantive due process, because the Due Process Clause is phrased as a limitation on the State's power to act, not as a guarantee of certain minimal levels of safety and security. DeShaney, 489 U.S. at 195, 109 S.Ct. 998. It is not enough to allege that a government actor failed to protect an individual from a known danger of bodily harm or failed to warn the individual of that danger. See Collins v. City of Harker Heights, 503 U.S. 115, 125-29, 112 S.Ct. 1061, 117 L.Ed.2d 261 (1992) (no due process violation where plaintiff alleged the city failed to properly train or warn its employees of known dangers that resulted in sanitation worker's asphyxiation). So, to the extent the plaintiffs here allege that the defendants had an affirmative duty to prevent them from suffering exposure to environmental contaminants, their claims must fail. They cannot rely on the EPA's failure to instruct workers to wear particular equipment, its failure to explain the exact limitations of its knowledge of the health effects of the airborne substances that were present, or its failure to explain the limitations of its testing technologies. 28 But the complaint goes further; it alleges that defendants' affirmative assurances that the air in Lower Manhattan was safe to breathe created a false sense of security that induced site workers to forgo protective measures, thereby creating a danger where otherwise one would not have existed. [I]n exceptional circumstances a governmental entity may have a constitutional obligation to provide . . . protection, either because of a special relationship with an individual, or because the governmental entity itself has created or increased the danger to the individual. Ying Jing Gan v. City of New York, 996 F.2d 522, 533 (2d Cir.1993) (citing DeShaney, 489 U.S. at 198, 201, 109 S.Ct. 998). The plaintiffs allege no special relationship between them and federal officials. 3 They plead that their reliance on the government's misrepresentations induced them to forgo available safeguards, and thus characterize the harm as a state created danger. 29 Where a government official takes an affirmative act that creates an opportunity for a third party to harm a victim (or increases the risk of such harm), the government official can potentially be liable for damages. See, e.g., Pena, 432 F.3d at 108; Hemphill v. Schott, 141 F.3d 412, 419 (2d Cir.1998); Dwares v. City of New York, 985 F.2d 94, 98-99 (2d Cir.1993). However, the danger alleged in this case is dissimilar from the state created dangers recognized in our precedents; in each of those cases, a third party's criminal behavior harmed the plaintiff after a government actor — always a law enforcement officer — enhanced or created the opportunity for the criminal act through some interaction or relationship with the wrongdoer. See Pena, 432 F.3d at 109 (opining that `special relationship' liability arises from the relationship between the state and a particular victim, whereas `state created danger' liability arises from the relationship between the state and the private assailant.). In Dwares, the police allegedly gave the green light for skinheads to assault a group of flag-burners; in Hemphill, the police allegedly gave back a robbery victim's gun and took him along on a chase after the robber, who was shot by the robbery victim; in Pena, the police allegedly encouraged drinking and driving by a fellow officer who hit several pedestrians while under the influence. 30 In this case, the defendants acted only after the terrorists' criminal acts were complete; i.e., plaintiffs' claims are based neither on any alleged encouragement of the terrorists nor on any relationship between defendants and the terrorists. Instead, plaintiffs appear to cast environmental conditions as the wrongdoer. They submit that the defendants, with knowledge of the serious health risks posed by these conditions, falsely represented to the public that it was safe from any such risks. 31 The closest analogy in other circuits' substantive due process case law — and it is not particularly close — is to cases in which statements by law enforcement officials give an individual a false sense of security as to the necessity of self-help. See, e.g., Kennedy v. City of Ridgefield, 439 F.3d 1055, 1062-63 (9th Cir.2006) (holding that a complaint adequately alleged state created danger where plaintiff reported to police that her neighbor was a child molester and the police violated promises to patrol the neighborhood and to warn her before they talked to the neighbor); Gazette v. City of Pontiac, 41 F.3d 1061, 1065-66 (6th Cir.1994) (holding that causation was too attenuated to support a due process claim where daughter alleged she herself would have found evidence at the site of her mother's disappearance — and had a chance of saving her mother — but for the police's false claim that they had found nothing after a search). 4 32 Depending on the circumstances, these cases furnish some support for the idea that a substantive due process violation can be made out when a private individual derives a false sense of security from an intentional misrepresentation by an executive official if foreseeable bodily harm directly results and if the official's conduct shocks the conscience. Taking the allegations of the complaint as true, as we must, we assume that a sufficient causal connection exists between the defendants' optimistic statements and the plaintiffs' exposure to toxic substances. However, the point is fairly debatable; as the Supreme Court cautioned in evaluating a substantive due process claim based on legislative action, 33 [a governmental] decision that has an incremental impact on the probability that death will result in any given situation . . . cannot be characterized as state action depriving a person of life just because it may set in motion a chain of events that ultimately leads to the random death of an innocent bystander. 34 Martinez v. California, 444 U.S. 277, 281, 100 S.Ct. 553, 62 L.Ed.2d 481 (1980). See also Bright, 443 F.3d at 281 (a state created danger cause of action is only cognizable where the harm ultimately caused was foreseeable and fairly direct) (quoting Kneipp v. Tedder, 95 F.3d 1199, 1208 (3d Cir.1996)). We put aside the vexed issue of causation 5 ; instead, we decide the case on the ground that the conduct alleged, even assuming causation, does not shock the conscience.