Opinion ID: 618647
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Claims Against the County of Santa Barbara Defendants[5]

Text: The Bravos also contend that SBSO agents are liable for the unreasonable manner in which the warrant was executed by the SBPD SWAT team, arguing that the SBSO's role in initially scouting the Bravo residence amounted to integral participation in the unlawful search. Their argument is without merit. Section 1983 liability extends to those who perform functions integral to an unlawful search, even if their individual actions do not themselves rise to the level of a constitutional violation. See Boyd v. Benton Cnty., 374 F.3d 773, 780 (9th Cir.2004); Chuman v. Wright, 76 F.3d 292, 294 (9th Cir.1996). However, the integral participant doctrine does not implicate government agents who are mere bystanders to an unconstitutional search. Compare Blankenhorn v. City of Orange, 485 F.3d 463, 481 n. 12 (9th Cir.2007) (identifying as an integral participant an officer who helped in handcuffing the plaintiff); Boyd, 374 F.3d at 780 (same for officers who were aware of the decision to use the flash-bang, did not object to it, and participated in the search operation knowing the flash-bang was to be deployed); James ex rel. James v. Sadler, 909 F.2d 834, 837 (5th Cir.1990) (same for officers who provided armed backup during unconstitutional search); Melear v. Spears, 862 F.2d 1177, 1186 (5th Cir.1989) (same for officer who did not enter apartment but stood armed at the door during the search); with Torres v. City of Los Angeles, 548 F.3d 1197, 1206 (9th Cir.2008) (finding that an officer who neither instructed others to make the arrest nor was present during the arrest was not an integral participant); Blankenhorn, 485 F.3d at 481 n. 12 (same for an officer who arrived at the scene after completion of allegedly unlawful arrest and an officer who provided at most crowd control); Motley, 432 F.3d at 1082 (same for an officer who remained primarily in the living room during an allegedly unlawful bedroom search). The district court correctly determined that SBSO agents were not even bystanders to the search of the Bravo residence. The undisputed evidence establishes that no SBSO agents were present during either the SBPD SWAT team's entry into the Bravos' residence or the SMPD officers' subsequent search of the property. To the contrary, the undisputed evidence establishes SBSO's own Special Enforcement Team was at the exact same time executing the warrant for a different Tanglewood residence. It is further undisputed that SBSO neither had tactical command over service of the warrant on the Bravo residence nor supervised the SBPD SWAT agents in their execution of the warrant. SBSO's short-lived role with respect to the Bravo residence was limited to conducting a background investigation on Javier Jr. before handing responsibility for execution of the warrant over to SBPD. `Effective and efficient law enforcement requires cooperation and division of labor to function, and SBSO was entitled to rely on information obtained from [SMPD] when it received the request to assist with nighttime SWAT service of the Bravo residence warrant. Motley, 432 F.3d at 1081 (citing Whiteley v. Warden, 401 U.S. 560, 568, 91 S.Ct. 1031, 28 L.Ed.2d 306 (1971)). SBSO was responsible neither for the decisions to use SWAT forces and nighttime service nor for the specific tactical decision to perform a no-knock entry, and thus it cannot be liable for the constitutional violations that may have occurred in the course of the warrant's execution. [6]
The Bravos accuse the SBSO and the County of Santa Barbara of maintaining a policy that permitted the unreasonable use of SWAT tactics in violation of their Fourth Amendment rights. However, because the Bravos fail to establish a triable issue of fact as to any individual SBSO officer's liability under § 1983 for unconstitutional conduct, a fortiori, they cannot establish that a policy or practice of the SBSO caused any such constitutional violation. See City of Los Angeles v. Heller, 475 U.S. 796, 799, 106 S.Ct. 1571, 89 L.Ed.2d 806 (1986) (per curiam); Simmons v. Navajo Cnty., 609 F.3d 1011, 1021 (9th Cir.2010).