Opinion ID: 4448517
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the trial issues

Text: We now turn to K.C.R.’s contentions of error involving the district court’s rulings at trial. She challenges the court’s refusal to grant her a new trial or to otherwise override the jury’s verdict that McKinney had consent to enter her 20 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 21 of 48 house. She stresses that none of the deputies, including McKinney, disputed that without consent they had entered into a screened-in porch that was in front of her house. 4 These are trial-related issues and we draw from the evidence presented at trial to tell this part of the story, making all reasonable inferences in favor of McKinney as the prevailing party. See Hubbard v. Bank Atlantic Bancorp., Inc., 688 F.3d 713, 724 (11th Cir. 2012).
In the early afternoon of October 14, 2013, McKinney called K.C.R.’s mother and asked her to bring her daughter down to the sheriff’s department for questioning. He did not tell her that he planned to arrest her daughter, though that was his plan. K.C.R.’s mother refused the request. Later that afternoon McKinney and three other sheriff’s deputies — Sergeant Deborah Hamilton, Detective Christopher Lynn, and Lieutenant Jamie Rudd — headed to K.C.R.’s house to make the arrest. McKinney testified at trial that he had time after his phone call with K.C.R.’s mother to obtain a warrant but that he and the other members of his team chose not to apply for one. Instead, he said their plan was to go to the house and ask permission to enter, and if that didn’t work they would post a deputy at the front door while they went and obtained a warrant. 4 At trial that area was at different times called a “screened-in room,” a “screened-in enclosure,” and a “screened porch.” For consistency we will call the area a “porch” or a “screened-in porch” unless we are quoting the record. 21 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 22 of 48 The deputies arrived at the house in unmarked vehicles. They wore plain clothes, and bulletproof vests with “SHERIFF” emblazoned across the front, and their weapons were holstered. McKinney, followed by Lynn and Hamilton (Rudd would join later), approached the house, opened the door to a screened-in porch in front of the house, and walked through that area and up the three steps to the front door. Then McKinney knocked and announced in a loud voice: “Polk County Sheriff’s Department.” K.C.R.’s father answered the door. McKinney told him they were there to arrest K.C.R. According to McKinney’s and Hamilton’s trial testimony, K.C.R.’s father told the deputies that he needed to put up his dog. He then shut the door. Rudd joined the other deputies while they were waiting for K.C.R.’s father to return. A few minutes later he opened the door and the deputies entered the house. To determine whether McKinney had K.C.R.’s father’s consent to cross that threshold, the jury heard from McKinney, Lynn, Rudd, Hamilton, and K.C.R.’s father. Because the jury’s factual determination of this issue is the central issue on appeal, we will quote some of that testimony at length. First, from McKinney and Hamilton: McKinney: Q. Okay. And you knocked and announced? A. Yes, sir, that’s correct. Q. Then what happened? 22 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 23 of 48 A. Then [K.C.R.’s father] opened the door. I told [him] I was there to arrest [K.C.R.]. [K.C.R.’s father] asked if I could hang on for a minute while he put the dog up, he closed the door, he went back into the house for a few moments and then he came back to the door and opened the door. Q. Okay. So he opened the door twice? A. That’s correct. Q. Okay. The first time he opened the door, you said you’re here to arrest [K.C.R.]? A. That’s correct. . . . Q. And what happened next? A. [K.C.R.’s father] opened the door wide and stepped back and I walked into the residence. Q. Okay. Did he make any gesture? A. Not that I remember. . . . Q. So how did he move back? A. He opened the door and he stepped back. Q. Okay. Did he say anything to you at that point? A. No, sir. Q. When he came b[ac]k to the door the second time, did he say anything when he opened it? A. I don’t remember if he did or not. Q. Did you ever touch the door? A. I did not. Q. How wide did he open it? A. All the way open. Q. And where was he then standing? A. Beside the door. Q. Did you ever touch him? A. I did not. Q. Make any move toward him whatsoever? A. No, sir. . . . Q. Did anyone ever touch a weapon while there? A. Absolutely not. Q. Anybody make any threatening statements? A. No. 23 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 24 of 48 Hamilton: A. Detective McKinney told [K.C.R.’s father] that we were there to arrest [K.C.R.]. Q. Okay. And did [K.C.R.’s father] reply? A. Yes. Q. What did he say? . . . [A.] He said, just a moment, I need to put a dog away inside the house. . . . Q. Okay. And then what did [he] do? A. He closed the door and went to put the dog away. Q. And what did y’all do, you and Detective McKinney and Detective Lynn do at that point? A. We waited outside for him to come back. Q. And what happened next? A. He came back, he opened up the door to the house and we went in. Q. How did he open up the door? A. He just opened it up and stood back. Q. Okay. Was there plenty of room for you all to go in? A. Yes. Q. How did you proceed in at that point, in what manner? A. We just walked in, walked inside, into the living room. Lynn and Rudd both testified that they could not hear any of the conversation between K.C.R.’s father and McKinney and that they followed the other deputies into the house on the assumption that K.C.R.’s father had welcomed them in. K.C.R.’s father’s testimony differed. He said that he only heard the knock on the door, not the identifying announcement, and that he did not know who was there until he opened the door. Once he did that, he told the jury, “[the deputies] said, ‘we’re here to arrest [K.C.R.]’ and walked right in.” When asked whether the 24 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 25 of 48 deputies asked for consent to come in, or whether he “g[a]ve any indication that [he] agreed with them to come in,” he answered: “No.” But he did tell the jury that none of the deputies bumped him or pushed him on their way in, even though he had kept his hand on the door as they entered the house. As he stated on crossexamination: Q. Okay. So you opened the door. How did you open it? How wide did you open it? A. I -- I opened it like this, I stood there and then they just kind of went in and I backed up. Q. Okay. No one ever struck you -- A No. Q. -- or bumped you or pushed you or anything? A. No. Q. Is it a single door? A. Yes, sir. Q. You, not unlike me, are a pretty big man, would you agree? A. Yeah. I was a little bit lighter then though. Q. Okay. Deputy McKinney is a fairly big man too? A. Yes. Q. Okay. He was able to come through the doorway without bumping you or pushing you or doing anything? A. Yeah. It was very close though. Q. Is that because you stood back? A. It was because, yeah, basically I stood back. I mean, they had guns on them and stuff. I wasn’t going to get in front of them. Q. And you were holding onto the door at the time? A. Yes, sir, I still had it in my hand. Q. And opened it wide? A. I opened it semi-wide. Q. So there was room for you to stand there and them to all come in? A. Yeah, after the first one came in, I just -- what am I going to do? 25 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 26 of 48 Once the deputies entered the home, they found K.C.R. in her pajamas. Her mother pleaded with the officers: “Please don’t take my baby, please don’t take my baby!” The deputies let K.C.R. change into normal clothes, and then McKinney arrested her, walked her outside, and handcuffed her before putting her in the car and taking her to the Juvenile Assessment Center. She was held there for about six hours and released. All charges against her were eventually dismissed. After the jurors heard all of this evidence, they retired to deliberate on a single question: “Did the Defendant Jonathan McKinney enter Plaintiff’s house without consent in violation of Plaintiff’s civil rights?” During their deliberations, the jurors sent the judge a question based on something one of the sheriff’s deputies had said in his testimony. K.C.R.’s attorney had asked Deputy Rudd whether McKinney was already in the house when Rudd arrived, and Rudd answered that the other officers “were not in the house” but in “a screened-in room that was in the front of the home.” The attorney didn’t ask any follow-up questions about that, but the district court judge did. In response to questions from the judge, Rudd explained that the screened-in porch was in front of the house and that the deputies had to enter that porch to get to the front door. The judge wondered: “If you’re a law enforcement officer, what door do you knock on to gain entry into this residence?” Rudd responded that he wasn’t sure what door the deputies had actually knocked on, but he “would have in 26 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 27 of 48 that scenario probably knocked on the screen door.” The judge then attempted to clarify what the sheriff’s department policy was for that kind of situation. In a rather confusing exchange, Rudd answered that “we would probably knock on the front door as well as the screened-in door at some point,” and that “there would be an opportunity that you would have to knock on that front door [of the screened-in porch] to gain the attention of the homeowners themselves.” Then he reiterated: “Whether [the other deputies] knocked on that screen door or not, I don’t know.” None of the lawyers asked any questions about the screened-in porch, and, except for one very short exchange with another deputy during her testimony, the issue didn’t come up again until the second day of jury deliberations. It was at that point the jury sent the judge a note asking: “By law, is the screened-in front porch considered a part of the house?” The parties debated how the judge should answer that question. The district court, over K.C.R.’s objection, answered it this way: “For purposes of this case, no.” K.C.R. moved for a mistrial, which the district court denied. The jury then rendered a verdict for McKinney, finding that he had consent to enter K.C.R.’s home. The court denied K.C.R.’s motion for judgment as a matter of law and her motion for a new trial. 27 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 28 of 48
K.C.R. contends that the district court should have granted her a new trial or judgment as a matter of law because there was insufficient evidence for the jury to find that McKinney had consent to enter her home.
Rule 59 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure allows a district court to order a new trial based on insufficient evidence, but “only if the verdict is against the clear weight of the evidence or will result in a miscarriage of justice.” Chmielewski v. City of St. Pete Beach, 890 F.3d 942, 948 (11th Cir. 2018) (quotation marks omitted). “Because it is critical that a judge does not merely substitute his judgment for that of the jury, new trials should not be granted on evidentiary grounds unless, at a minimum, the verdict is against the great — not merely the greater — weight of the evidence.” Lipphardt v. Durango Steakhouse of Brandon, Inc., 267 F.3d 1183, 1186 (11th Cir. 2001) (quotation marks omitted). We review the denial of a motion for a new trial only for an abuse of discretion, and “[d]eference is particularly appropriate where,” as here, “a new trial is denied and the jury’s verdict is left undisturbed.” Walter Int’l Prods., Inc. v. Salinas, 650 F.3d 1402, 1407 (11th Cir. 2011) (quotation marks omitted). The Fourth Amendment provides that “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their . . . houses . . . against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be 28 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 29 of 48 violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.” U.S. Const. Amend. IV. Because “the physical entry of the home is the chief evil against which the wording of the Fourth Amendment is directed,” it is “a basic principle of Fourth Amendment law that searches and seizures inside a home without a warrant are presumptively unreasonable.” Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 585–86 (1980) (quotation marks omitted). That also means that law enforcement officers are prohibited “from making a warrantless and nonconsensual entry into a suspect’s home in order to make a routine felony arrest.” Id. at 576. But if a warrantless search is authorized by voluntary consent, the search is “wholly valid.” Schneckloth v. Bustamonte, 412 U.S. 218, 222 (1973). Because McKinney did not have a warrant to enter K.C.R.’s home, the sole question for the jury was whether he had consent to enter the house. Whether “consent to a search was in fact ‘voluntary’ or was the product of duress or coercion, express or implied, is a question of fact to be determined from the totality of all the circumstances.” Id. at 227. While we have explained that this determination is “not susceptible to neat talismanic definitions,” United States v. Blake, 888 F.2d 795, 798 (11th Cir. 1989), we have identified some factors that are relevant for the factfinder to consider, see United States v. Chemaly, 741 F.2d 29 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 30 of 48 1346, 1352 (11th Cir. 1984). Those factors include: (1) the voluntariness of the person’s custodial status, (2) “the presence of coercive police procedure,” (3) the extent of the person’s cooperation with law enforcement, (4) whether the person knew that he could refuse consent, and (5) the person’s “education and intelligence.” Id. (quotation marks omitted); see also Schneckloth, 412 U.S. at 249 (explaining that “while the subject’s knowledge of a right to refuse is a factor to be taken into account,” it is not a “prerequisite to establishing a voluntary consent”). K.C.R.’s argument hinges on the second factor: coercive procedures, conduct, or words. “Where there is coercion there cannot be consent.” Bumper v. North Carolina, 391 U.S. 543, 550 (1968); see Florida v. Bostick, 501 U.S. 429, 438 (1991) (“‘Consent’ that is the product of official intimidation or harassment is not consent at all.”). K.C.R. argues that she is due a new trial because McKinney failed to meet his burden of showing that he had voluntary consent to enter the house, and that he failed to do so because the evidence showed that K.C.R.’s father was coerced into letting the sheriff’s deputies into his home. Before exploring that fact-bound question, we address who has the burden of proving what.
Often when we are tasked with reviewing a determination of consent, it is because a defendant has challenged the validity of her conviction or is seeking to suppress certain evidence based on an unlawful search. See, e.g., Blake, 888 F.2d 30 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 31 of 48 at 797–98 (considering whether evidence should be suppressed on the ground that a search exceeded the scope of the defendants’ consent); United States v. Edmondson, 791 F.2d 1512, 1515 (11th Cir. 1986) (finding that the defendant’s warrantless arrest in his home was illegal because his “consent” was based on a show of official authority by police officers). We have explained that because “[a] warrantless, nonconsensual entry into a suspect’s home to make a routine felony arrest is presumed to be unreasonable,” Edmondson, 791 F.2d at 1514, the burden is on the government to rebut that presumption and prove that the consent was voluntary, Chemaly, 741 F.2d at 1352; see also United States v. Matlock, 415 U.S. 164, 177 (1974) (stating that in the case before it the government “sustained its burden of proving by the preponderance of the evidence that [a third-party’s] voluntary consent to search . . . was legally sufficient” to overcome the defendant’s motion to suppress); Coolidge v. New Hampshire, 403 U.S. 443, 455 (1971) (“[T]he burden is on those seeking the exemption to show the need for it.”). That’s all true in criminal cases. It’s not in civil cases. “[I]n a § 1983 action, the plaintiff bears the burden of persuasion on every element.” Cuesta v. Sch. Bd. of Miami-Dade Cty., 285 F.3d 962, 970 (11th Cir. 2002). That burden is on the plaintiff even where the government would be bear it in criminal case. See id. (stating that it was the plaintiff’s “burden to show that the County lacked reasonable suspicion to search 31 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 32 of 48 her” and holding that her claims failed as a matter of law because she “failed to produce any evidence indicating that the [jail] personnel lacked reasonable suspicion that she was concealing weapons or contraband”); Rankin, 133 F.3d at 1436 (“[P]laintiffs had the burden of demonstrating the absence of probable cause in order to succeed in their § 1983 claim.”); Evans v. Hightower, 117 F.3d 1318, 1320 (11th Cir. 1997) (“In order to establish a Fourth Amendment violation, [the plaintiff] must demonstrate that a seizure occurred and that it was unreasonable.”). “There is no question, therefore, that [K.C.R.] ultimately b[ore] the burden of persuasion in this case.” Am. Fed’n of State, Cty. & Mun. Emps. Council 79 v. Scott, 717 F.3d 851, 880 (11th Cir. 2013). Once a plaintiff shows that an arrest occurred in her home and that it was conducted without a warrant, it is the burden of production that shifts to the government to present evidence justifying the arrest. See Fed. R. Evid. 301 (“The party against whom a presumption is directed has the burden of producing evidence to rebut the presumption.”). Thus, for example, when a plaintiff asserts that the police conducted an unconstitutional warrantless search, and the government claims that its search was legal under an exception to the warrant requirement, . . . the plaintiff meets its initial burden by demonstrating the absence of a search warrant. At that point, it is the government that bears the burden of coming forward with evidence that an exception to the warrant requirement applied. Am. Fed’n, 717 F.3d at 881–82. 32 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 33 of 48 That shift of the burden of production, however, “does not shift the burden of persuasion, which remains on the party who had it originally.” Fed. R. Evid. 301. So here, once K.C.R. showed that there was a warrantless arrest that was presumptively unreasonable (which she did), and once McKinney came forward with some evidence that the consent exception applied (which he did), it became K.C.R’s burden once more “to show either that [her father] never consented or that the consent was invalid because it was given under duress or coercion.” Valance v. Wisel, 110 F.3d 1269, 1279 (7th Cir. 1997). In other words, it was her burden, not McKinney’s, to persuade the jury on the one question before it.5
K.C.R. contends that the jury’s verdict against her is against the great weight of the evidence. Her argument goes like this. First: Because there was no evidence that her father verbally consented to McKinney’s entry, the “sole basis” for consent “rest[ed] on the premise that after being informed that McKinney was there to arrest KCR, [her father] allegedly closed the door to go ‘put the dog up’ and then returned to the door, opened it[,] and stepped back.” Appellant’s Br. 22– 23 (footnotes omitted). Second: That premise for showing consent ignores what 5 Although Valance and American Federation involved warrantless searches instead of warrantless arrests, the same burden-shifting framework applies here. Warrantless arrests in the home, like warrantless searches, are presumptively unreasonable. See Edmondson, 791 F.2d at 1514. 33 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 34 of 48 else had happened that day. McKinney had called just hours before to ask K.C.R.’s mother to bring her down to the station for questioning, but she had refused to do that. K.C.R. says that when armed deputies wearing bullet-proof vests appeared at her home thereafter, McKinney’s announcement that he was “there to arrest [K.C.R.]” became a “command” to let the deputies into the house. Id. at 24 & n.15, 27–28. Therefore, she reasons: “[T]he only reasonable interpretation of the testimony at trial was that [K.C.R.’s father] acquiesced to the show of authority demanding [that he] produce his daughter for arrest.” Id. at 24. Of course, “[t]he fact that a person answers a knock at the door doesn’t mean he agrees to let the person who knocked enter.” McClish v. Nugent, 483 F.3d 1231, 1247 (11th Cir. 2007) (quotation marks omitted). Consent is not always to be inferred from the absence of an objection, although it is a factor to consider. See United States v. Gonzalez, 71 F.3d 819, 829–30 (11th Cir. 1996) (“[W]e believe, as a matter of law, it cannot be said that failure to object to a search equals consent to the search.”) (quotation marks and alterations omitted), abrogated on other grounds by Arizona v. Gant, 556 U.S. 332 (2009). A factfinder must “analyz[e] all the circumstances” of an individual’s action to determine whether in fact there was consent and “whether in fact it was voluntary or coerced.” Schneckloth, 412 U.S. at 233; see id. at 228 (“[T]he Fourth and Fourteenth 34 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 35 of 48 Amendments require that a consent not be coerced, by explicit or implicated means, by implied threat or covert force.”). K.C.R. is right that one way consent is coerced is if it’s granted “only in submission to a claim of lawful authority.” Id. at 233. For example, “[w]hen a law enforcement officer claims authority to search a home under a warrant, he announces in effect that the occupant has no right to resist the search,” leaving no way to consent to it. Bumper, 391 U.S. at 549. A choice in which the answer is dictated by coercion is no choice at all. “For, no matter how subtly the coercion was applied, the resulting ‘consent’ would be no more than a pretext for the unjustified police intrusion against which the Fourth Amendment is directed.” Schneckloth, 412 U.S. at 228; see Moore v. Pederson, 806 F.3d 1036, 1046 (11th Cir. 2015) (holding there was no consent to enter house where officer told plaintiff he was going to arrest him and plaintiff, who was inside the doorway of his house, simply put his arms behind his back); United States v. Tovar-Rico, 61 F.3d 1529, 1535–36 (11th Cir. 1995) (holding there was no consent where five police officers knocked on defendant’s door, announced their identity, and asked for permission to enter — and then rushed into the home with guns drawn as soon as defendant opened the door); Edmondson, 791 F.2d at 1514–15 (no consent to search home where officers with guns drawn knocked on door, announced “FBI. Open the door,” and defendant opened the door and put his hands on his head). 35 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 36 of 48 And courts must not “misinterpret acquiescence to an officer’s demands as consent.” United States v. Berry, 670 F.2d 583, 596 (5th Cir. Unit B 1982) (en banc). We have “noted our hesitancy to find implied consent (i.e., consent by silence) in the Fourth Amendment context.” Gonzalez, 71 F.3d at 823, 830 (no consent where marshal followed defendant’s mother into her house when she told them she was going inside for a drink of water); see Bates v. Harvey, 518 F.3d 1233, 1244 (11th Cir. 2008) (no consent based on housemate’s “failure to object to the officers’ search”); Bashir v. Rockdale County, 445 F.3d 1323, 1328–29 (11th Cir. 2006) (no consent where officer followed plaintiff inside his house uninvited). This case is not like those. The jury heard evidence that the deputies made no show of authority to coerce K.C.R.’s father into consenting to their entry. All of the deputies testified that they did not have their guns drawn. All of them testified that they didn’t use or threaten to use any kind of force. And there is no evidence that any of them claimed to have a warrant. That distinguishes the present case from those in which we have held that the law enforcement officers’ claim of authority coerced the occupant into letting them in. Cf. Moore, 806 F.3d at 1046; Tovar-Rico, 61 F.3d at 1535–36; Edmondson, 791 F.2d at 1514–15. This case is more like United States v. Ramirez-Chilel, 289 F.3d 744 (11th Cir. 2002), and Holmes v. Kucynda, 321 F.3d 1069 (11th Cir. 2003). In RamirezChilel, four police officers approached the defendant’s residence shortly before 36 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 37 of 48 midnight, knocked on the door and identified themselves, and then asked for permission to search the house for evidence of counterfeit documents. 289 F.3d at 746–47. According to the testimony of one of the officers, the defendant “yielded the right-of-way” to allow them in. Id. at 747 (brackets omitted). The officers found evidence of a counterfeiting operation, and the defendant moved to suppress those fruits of the search based on lack of consent. Id. at 747–48. We affirmed the district court’s denial of the motion to suppress, explaining that there is “a distinction between the failure to object when officers follow someone into their home and the act of ‘yielding the right-of-way’ to officers at the person’s front door.” Id. at 752. We added: “Although the officers did not receive any explicit verbal consent from [the defendant] to enter, the officers did receive some sort of implied consent to enter from [his] body language . . . .” Id. Similarly, the law enforcement officers in Holmes responded to a domestic disturbance and knocked on the suspect’s apartment door. 321 F.3d at 1073–74. A man answered the door and the officers asked if they could enter the apartment. Id. at 1074. According to the officers’ testimony, “although [the man] did not respond verbally, he opened the door and took a step backwards, indicating acquiescence.” Id. We concluded that was sufficient evidence of consent to reject the argument of the man’s girlfriend in her § 1983 suit that the warrantless entry had violated her constitutional rights. Id. at 1078–79. 37 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 38 of 48 Ramirez-Chilel and Holmes show that consent need not be verbal to be valid. Non-verbal cues can signal consent. And here, the evidence at trial showed that the combination of both verbal and non-verbal cues was sufficient for a jury to find that K.C.R.’s father consented to the officers entering his home. For instance, McKinney testified that when K.C.R.’s father answered the door, McKinney told him he was there to arrest K.C.R. K.C.R’s father responded by asking if McKinney “could hang on for a minute while he put the dog up,” and then he returned a few minutes later and “opened the door wide and stepped back.” It was only at that point that McKinney entered the house. Hamilton told the jury a similar story, stating that when K.C.R.’s father “opened [the door] up and stood back,” there was plenty of room for the deputies to go in. Given the totality of the circumstances, a jury could reasonably find that K.C.R.’s father consented to the deputies’ entry. K.C.R. seeks to distinguish Ramirez-Chilel and Holmes by pointing out that in those cases the officers had explicitly asked to enter the home, which made it clear that the occupants were allowing the officers in when they opened the door and stood back. Cf. Holmes, 321 F.3d at 1078–79; Ramirez-Chilel, 289 F.3d at 746–47. By contrast, she says, McKinney and the other deputies did not ask to enter the home and simply “commanded” entry by announcing that they were there to arrest K.C.R. 38 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 39 of 48 We are not convinced that this distinction makes a difference. While K.C.R. argues that McKinney’s announcement was a coercive show of authority, the jury was free to conclude that it was instead an informative statement to explain to K.C.R.’s father why the deputies were there. And it was also free to conclude that, by opening the door and stepping back, K.C.R.’s father was giving the deputies his consent to enter his home. It is not our task to answer the question of consent in the first instance. That task fell to the jury. Lipphart, 267 F.3d at 1186 (“[I]t is critical that a judge does not merely substitute his judgment for that of the jury . . . .”). Our only task is to determine whether the district court abused its discretion when it concluded that the jury’s verdict was not against the great weight of the evidence and did not result in a miscarriage of justice. See id.; Walter Int’l Prods., 650 F.3d at 1407. It did not.
Turning now to the district court’s denial of K.C.R.’s Rule 50 motion for judgment as a matter of law on the consent to enter issue, our review is de novo. Skye v. Maersk Line, Ltd. Corp., 751 F.3d 1262, 1265 (11th Cir. 2014). But “[s]uch a motion is to be granted only if the evidence is so overwhelmingly in favor of the moving party that a reasonable jury could not arrive at a contrary verdict.” Chmielewski, 890 F.3d at 948 (quotation marks omitted). For the same 39 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 40 of 48 reasons we just explained, a reasonable jury could conclude that K.C.R.’s father consented to McKinney’s entry into the house. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 50(a)(1); Chmielewski, 890 F.3d at 948. 6
That leaves K.C.R.’s final contention, which is that the district court made two errors involving the screened-in porch that entitle her to a new trial or to judgment as a matter of law. First, she argues that the jury’s verdict went against the great weight of the evidence because there was insufficient evidence for the jury to conclude that McKinney had permission to enter the screened-in porch, regardless of whether he later had permission to enter the house proper. And second, she argues that the court prejudiced her right to a fair trial by answering the jury’s question about that porch (“By law, is the screened-in front porch considered part of the house?”) with what she describes as a factual determination (“For purposes of this case, no.”). 6 K.C.R. also challenges the grant of summary judgment against her on her official capacity claim against Sheriff Judd alleging that his office had a policy sanctioning warrantless arrests in homes. “If a person has suffered no constitutional injury at the hands of the individual police officer, the fact that the departmental regulations might have authorized [a constitutionally suspect act] is quite beside the point.” City of Los Angeles v. Heller, 475 U.S. 796, 799 (1986). Because K.C.R.’s claim against McKinney fails, her policy claim against the sheriff in his official capacity necessarily fails. 40 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 41 of 48 We review only for an abuse of discretion the denial of K.C.R.’s motions for a new trial and a mistrial. See United States v. Osmakac, 868 F.3d 937, 957 (11th Cir. 2017). 1. Motion for New Trial Based on Insufficient Evidence According to K.C.R., McKinney violated her constitutional rights by opening the door to the screened-in porch and walking through it to knock on the front door of the house. The way she sees it, that porch is considered curtilage, which means that McKinney needed a warrant or an exception to the warrant requirement to enter it. And, she argues, the district court should have granted her a new trial because “there was not even a scintilla of evidence which rebutted the presumption that McKinney’s conduct violated the Fourth Amendment.” There’s a simple reason K.C.R. can’t find a “scintilla of evidence” in the record about whether the screened-in porch constituted part of the house and whether McKinney could walk through it. She didn’t raise the issue. It’s not in her complaint, it’s not in any of her pre-trial motions, and it’s not in her proposed jury instructions.7 And as the district court found in denying her motion for a new 7 There is no mention of the “screened-in” porch or of the word “curtilage” in the amended complaint or in any of the pre-trial motions. In her response to McKinney’s motion for summary judgment, K.C.R. did not mention that McKinney and the other officers had to go through the screened-in porch to get to the front door. Instead, she started her story about the warrantless entry with the deputies already at the front door: “The deputies knocked hard on the door to KCR’s home at nighttime.” Her description of the case in the parties’ Joint Pretrial Statement also left out any mention of the screened-in porch. 41 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 42 of 48 trial, K.C.R. didn’t raise the issue in any way at any point anywhere in the case before the jury returned its verdict. The first mention of the screened-in porch was during Lieutenant Rudd’s testimony. K.C.R. asked Rudd whether McKinney was already in the house when he arrived on the scene, and Rudd answered that the other deputies “were not in the house,” but instead were in “a screened-in room that was in the front of the home.” K.C.R. continued her questioning without asking any more questions about the screened-in porch. After K.C.R. was done, the court asked Rudd some questions, including whether the deputies knocked or should have knocked on the screen door before they entered the porch and proceeded to the main door of the house. Rudd responded that he “believe[d] that there would be an opportunity that you would have to knock on that front door [of the screened-in porch] to gain the attention of the homeowners,” but he wasn’t sure whether the other deputies had done that. The next time the issue surfaced was during the testimony of Hamilton. During her cross-examination of Hamilton, K.C.R. asked whether Hamilton had opened the screen door. Hamilton said that McKinney had opened it. K.C.R. then asked whether McKinney had authorization to go “into their porch, screened porch area.” McKinney objected to the question on relevance grounds, the district court sustained the objection without any argument from K.C.R., and K.C.R. moved on to a different line of questioning. 42 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 43 of 48 The issue did not come up again until the jury sent its note asking whether “[b]y law” the screened-in porch was considered part of the house. (More about that later.) But even after the jury asked that, it was not until K.C.R.’s post-verdict motions for a new trial and judgment as a matter of law that she argued the screened-in porch was relevant to the case. Of course, that was too late for her Rule 50 motion. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(b) talks of “renewing” an earlier Rule 50(a) motion for judgment as a matter of law, meaning that “a district court can grant a Rule 50(b) motion only on grounds advanced in the pre-verdict Rule 50(a) motion.” McGinnis v. Am. Home Mortg. Servicing, Inc., 817 F.3d 1241, 1260 (11th Cir. 2016) (quotation marks and alterations omitted). Because K.C.R. did not make her curtilage argument in her pre-verdict motion, she could not make it in her post-verdict motion. K.C.R. does not take issue with that. Instead she points out that her motion for a new trial, unlike her motion for judgment as a matter of law, did not require a pre-verdict counterpart. True enough. See Urti v. Transp. Commercial Corp., 479 F.2d 766, 769 (5th Cir. 1973) (“We have previously held that motions [for judgment as a matter of law] are not prerequisites to a motion for a new trial.”). But that does not mean a plaintiff can proceed on one theory of the case throughout the trial and then be entitled to a do-over under a different theory. See Del Rio Distrib. Inc. v. Adolph Coors Co., 589 F.2d 176, 178–79 (5th Cir. 1979). As the 43 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 44 of 48 party alleging that her constitutional rights were violated, it was K.C.R.’s burden to “demonstrate that a seizure occurred and that it was unreasonable.” Evans, 117 F.3d at 1320 (emphasis added). K.C.R. objects to that characterization, relying on Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(b)(2) for cover. It provides: “When an issue not raised by the pleadings is tried by the parties’ express or implied consent, it must be treated in all respects as if raised in the pleadings.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(b)(2). K.C.R. says that’s what happened here because the deputies’ testimony about the screened-in porch “must have been sufficient to raise the issue by implication since the jury itself took note of the evidence enough to ask the District Court questions about its relevance during deliberations.” But here again, a look at the record shows that K.C.R. rejected whatever lifeline the jury’s question might have thrown her way (and we don’t think it was a stout line to begin with). Upon receiving the jury’s note, the court told the attorneys that it was going to inform the jury that the screened-in porch was not part of the house. K.C.R.’s attorney objected — but only because he did not consider the issue to be relevant to the claim. Here’s the exchange: THE COURT: All right. There’s been no allegation in the case or argument in the course of the trial that opening of the screen door was in any way a violation of the plaintiff’s rights, so I’m going to tell the jury “no” as relates to the question about is the screen door part of the house, because even if it is, there’s been no argument, and there is specific case law to establish whether a porch is or isn’t subject to 44 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 45 of 48 Fourth Amendment protection, but it requires some evidence as to the content of the porch, the use of the porch, the appearance of the porch, none of which has been introduced into evidence in this case. So if it was your intention to raise something about the porch, then it has failed for lack of evidence. [K.C.R.’s attorney]: Let me -- for the record, Your Honor, we asked them questions, it was a screened-in porch, and they went through a screen door, and, you know, for the record, we didn’t allege in the Complaint the front door, we alleged they didn’t have consent to enter the premises or the house, period, whether it was screen door, back door or side door. . . . I’d also request that [the jurors] be brought in and asked if they did any research last night, if anybody got on the computer, because you gave them explicit jury instructions on what the single issue of this case is, and we’re getting questions unrelated to what the jury instructions are. . . . I just think it’s irrelevant to their determination here ultimately, but -- I think you’re telling them something that, you know, hasn’t been briefed and, you know, I’m pretty sure a screened porch with a door on it is -- in an enclosed area is part of the house. THE COURT: And you are pretty sure to be wrong about that unless there’s certain clear indicia that this is part of the living space of the house, and there’s been no evidence of it, so for purposes -- [K.C.R.’s attorney]: I understand that, Your Honor, so you can’t say yes or no, it’s just irrelevant to the issue of this case. . . . [T]he issue relating to consent to enter and go into the home to arrest is unrelated to the screen door, unrelated to the front door really, either they could come in or they couldn’t come in, and they did, and so it’s just not something for them to consider, not that it’s no. THE COURT: So what do you want me to say? [K.C.R.’s attorney]: That it’s not relevant to the issues in this case and follow the jury instructions. 45 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 46 of 48 (Emphasis added.) In short, through her attorney K.C.R. told the court that the question of whether the screened-in porch was part of the house was “irrelevant” — that the answer to the question had no bearing on the jury’s determination of whether McKinney had consent to enter the house. K.C.R. cannot now argue that it was reversible error for the court to take her attorney at his word. See United States v. Carpenter, 803 F.3d 1224, 1236 (11th Cir. 2015) (“It is by now a cardinal rule of appellate review that a party may not challenge as error a ruling or other trial proceeding invited by that party.”) (quotation marks omitted); United States v. Dennis, 786 F.2d 1029, 1042 (11th Cir. 1986) (“To preserve an issue at trial for later consideration by an appellate court, one must raise an objection that is sufficient to apprise the trial court and the opposing party of the particular grounds upon which appellate relief will later be sought. A general objection or an objection on other grounds will not suffice.”). The district court did not abuse its discretion by denying K.C.R.’s motion for a new trial based on her belated curtilage argument, which was not presented to the jury. 2. Motion for a New Trial Based on the District Court’s Response to the Jury’s Question K.C.R. also argues that she is entitled to a new trial because of the district court’s response to the jury’s question about the screened-in porch. We will reverse a district court’s supplemental instructions only “when we are left with a 46 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 47 of 48 substantial and ineradicable doubt as to whether the jury was properly guided in its deliberations.” United States v. Grigsby, 111 F.3d 806, 814 (11th Cir. 1997) (quotation marks omitted); see United States v. Lopez, 590 F.3d 1238, 1247–48 (11th Cir. 2009) (“While the district court has considerable discretion regarding the extent and character of supplemental jury instructions, it does not have discretion to misstate the law or confuse the jury.”). When the jury asked whether, “[b]y law[,] is the screened-in front porch considered a part of the house?” the judge answered: “For purposes of this case, no.” K.C.R. says that answer was not only legally wrong but also instructed the jury how to answer the fact question of whether McKinney had consent to enter the house. Appellant’s Br. 41. According to her, the court’s response “indicated to the Jury that McKinney’s actions in approaching the door were lawful, and suggested that any consent he thereafter obtained would likewise be lawful.” Id. at 43. We disagree. K.C.R.’s attorney objected to the exact wording of the answer. But the alternative answer he proposed conveyed the same sentiment as the one the court gave. When the court asked, “So what do you want me to say” to the jury about whether the porch was part of the house, the attorney stated: “That it’s not relevant to the issues in this case and follow the jury instructions.” That is essentially what the court told the jury. And K.C.R.’s attorney had made the porch irrelevant, by leaving it out of the case and by insisting that it was irrelevant to the 47 Case: 17-14525 Date Filed: 10/21/2019 Page: 48 of 48 only issue before the jury. K.C.R. cannot now argue that the porch issue was not only relevant but was so much so that we should reverse the district court’s judgment. AFFIRMED. 48