Opinion ID: 200053
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Clearly established at the time

Text: 40 Both defendants say there was sufficient ambiguity as to the scope of familial integrity rights when they acted in 1998 that they are entitled to immunity because the right was not clearly established at the time. This court has held that, at least as of 1992, the dimensions of this right [to familial integrity] have yet to be clearly established. Frazier, 957 F.2d at 931. Articulating the right as one of familial integrity casts too broad a net. The inquiry into whether a right is clearly established must be undertaken in light of the specific context of the case, not as a broad general proposition. Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201, 121 S.Ct. 2151; see also Wilson, 526 U.S. at 615, 119 S.Ct. 1692. The constitutional right at issue here is the right to procedural and substantive due process before the state takes a child away from his or her parent. 41 One tried and true way of determining whether this right was clearly established at the time the defendants acted, is to ask whether existing case law gave the defendants fair warning that their conduct violated the plaintiff's constitutional rights. Hope, 122 S.Ct. at 2522. This inquiry encompasses not only Supreme Court precedent, but all available case law. Hatch, 274 F.3d at 23. 42 A parent's liberty interest in the care and custody of her child was established long before the facts of this case arose. The Supreme Court has noted that [t]he liberty interest ... of parents in the care, custody, and control of their children ... is perhaps the oldest of the fundamental liberty interests recognized by this Court. Troxel, 530 U.S. at 65, 120 S.Ct. 2054. Applying this substantive due process right in Troxel, four members of the Court found it unconstitutional for a state to fail to give weight to a custodial parent's interests in determining the care of her children when adjudicating a grandparent's contested petition for visitation because the presumption is that a fit parent will act in their child's best interests. Troxel, 530 U.S. at 70-73, 120 S.Ct. 2054 (plurality opinion). 43 The long-standing acknowledgment of a substantive due process interest in familial integrity, e.g., Meyer, 262 U.S. 390, 43 S.Ct. 625, 67 L.Ed. 1042, formed the backdrop for the Supreme Court's 1972 opinion in Stanley v. Illinois, 405 U.S. 645, 92 S.Ct. 1208, 31 L.Ed.2d 551 (1972), in which the Court held that procedural due process demanded that a parent be given a hearing on his fitness as a parent before his children were taken from him, id. at 649, 92 S.Ct. 1208. This principle was further developed by the Court in Santosky, in which the Court held that procedural due process required that a person's parental rights not be terminated unless the state's allegations of unfitness were supported by clear and convincing evidence. 455 U.S. at 769, 102 S.Ct. 1388. The Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court has long recognized parents' rights to procedural due process in cases in which the state intervenes in the care and custody of their children, citing often to the Stanley and Santosky decisions. See, e.g., Opinion of the Justices, 691 N.E.2d at 913; Adoption of Eugene, 415 Mass. 431, 614 N.E.2d 645, 647 (1993); Dep't of Pub. Welfare v. J.K.B., 379 Mass. 1, 393 N.E.2d 406, 407-08 (1979). 44 We have no doubt that there is a clearly established constitutional right at stake, although we have found no case exactly on all fours with the facts of this case. The difference in contexts in which the right is discussed in the case law does not mean such a right does not exist. See Hope, 122 S.Ct. at 2515-16 (rejecting requirement that facts of previous cases be materially similar to instant case as an overly rigid gloss on qualified immunity determinations). [O]fficials can still be on notice that their conduct violates established law even in novel factual circumstances.... [T]he salient question ... is whether the state of the law [at the time of the action] gave [the defendants] fair warning that their alleged treatment of [the plaintiff] was unconstitutional. Id. at 2516. 45 As the district court stated, [i]t is clearly established that a parent cannot be deprived of custody of a child absent notice and a hearing unless there are exigent circumstances of abuse or neglect. Suboh, 141 F.Supp.2d at 143 (citing Stanley, 405 U.S. at 650-57, 92 S.Ct. 1208). Even when there are such exigent circumstances, there must be an adequate post-deprivation hearing within a reasonable time. The cases discussing this right are not new and existed long before the events in this case. E.g., Hooks, 771 F.2d at 942; Duchesne, 566 F.2d at 826-28. 46 Our precedent in Hatch settles the matter. Hatch involved the standard (reasonable suspicion of imminent danger) by which a state actor would be justified in temporarily taking a child from her parent pending a hearing. 274 F.3d at 23-24. Hatch, decided in 2001, found the right clearly established by the time of the events in question there, which occurred in 2000. Our case concerns events in May 1998. Nonetheless, Hatch relied on cases dating from the early and mid 1990s that established due process protections for even temporary removals of children pending a due process hearing. Id. at 20, 23. 47 Moreover, long before the events at issue in this case, many of our sister circuits had articulated a constitutional right to procedural due process when the state transfers custody from a custodial parent. See, e.g., Weller, 901 F.2d at 393, 398 (finding that complete denial of a hearing following emergency transfer of custody violated due process); see also Wooley, 211 F.3d at 917, 924 (finding that mother's and child's due process rights not to have state deprive mother of custody absent court order or emergency circumstances were clearly established in 1995). In particular, the 1985 Hooks case bears marked factual similarities to this case. 771 F.2d 935. In Hooks, the noncustodial father, who resided out of state, informed the local police of an outstanding warrant against the custodial mother. Id. at 939. The mother attempted to make interim care arrangements for her children, but the police refused to allow her to do so. Id. at 940. She was released on her own recognizance within a few hours of arrest, but, in the meantime, the police had turned the children over to her ex-husband, who had immediately left the state with them. Id. at 939. The court held that a transfer of custody that effectively eliminat[ed] the opportunity for ... a post-deprivation hearing violated the mother's due process rights. Id. at 942. 48 It follows from Santosky and Stanley, reinforced by the cases cited in Hatch and those from our sister circuits, that it was clearly established in 1998 that a state official could not effectively resolve a disputed custody issue between a parent and another without following any due process procedures at all. Defendants had fair warning of the existence of these rights. Hope, 122 S.Ct. at 2516. 49