Opinion ID: 391404
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Propriety of Summary Judgments Based on the Qualified Immunity Defense

Text: 63 1. General considerations. We begin with the familiar proposition that in reviewing a grant of summary judgment, this court will look at the record in the light most favorable to the party opposing the motion, drawing all inferences most favorable to that party. E. g., Poller v. Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc., 368 U.S. 464, 473, 82 S.Ct. 486, 491, 7 L.Ed.2d 458 (1962); O'Boyle Tank Lines, Inc. v. Beckham, 616 F.2d 207, 209 (5th Cir. 1980); Walters v. City of Ocean Springs, 626 F.2d 1317, 1322 (5th Cir. 1980) (reviewing summary judgment on section 1983 claim). Yet we are mindful of the Supreme Court's comments in Butz v. Economou, 438 U.S. 478, 98 S.Ct. 2894, 57 L.Ed.2d 895 (1978): 64 Insubstantial lawsuits can be quickly terminated by federal courts alert to the possibilities of artful pleading. Unless the complaint states a compensable claim for relief under the Federal Constitution, it should not survive a motion to dismiss. Moreover, ... damage suits concerning constitutional violations need not proceed to trial, but can be terminated on a properly supported motion for summary judgment based on the defense of (qualified) immunity. In responding to such a motion, plaintiffs may not play dog in the manger; and firm application of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure will ensure that federal officials are not harassed by frivolous lawsuits. 65 Id. at 507-08, 98 S.Ct. at 2911 (footnote and citation omitted). As we recently said in Gordon v. Watson, 622 F.2d 120, 123 (5th Cir. 1980), 66 (s)ummary judgment is an excellent device by which district courts may make expedited dispositions of those (section 1983) cases in which a trial would be fruitless. When summary judgment is inappropriate because the supporting or opposing materials are improper, the district court has ample discretion to call upon the parties to remedy the defects, by submitting affidavits or otherwise. We also noted in that case that 67 (a)lthough pro se litigants are not held to the same standards of compliance with formal or technical pleading rules applied to attorneys, we have never allowed such litigants to oppose summary judgments by the use of unsworn materials. 68 622 F.2d at 123 (footnote omitted). Further, the affidavits must affirmatively show the affiants' competence to testify as to the matters stated therein and that the facts stated in the affidavits are based on the affiants' personal knowledge. Id. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(e). 69 We emphasize that before summary judgment is proper, it first must be determined precisely what causes of action have been asserted and what issues are thus raised either by the complaint or by any defenses regardless of whether one or more parties are proceeding pro se. In cases that involve complicated fact patterns and multiple causes of action, summary judgment may be proper as to some causes of action but not as to others, or as to some issues but not as to others, or as to some parties but not as to others; the necessary predicate for a decision on a summary judgment motion is a sorting out of causes of action and defendants. This may require the court to exercise Job-like patience, particularly when dealing with pro se plaintiffs who may lack the legal reasoning skills to focus the court's attention on the nuances of their claims; further, counsel for the defendant may shortsightedly think it in the best interests of his client to remain silent when a claim is left unaddressed. Nonetheless, a careful and meticulous analysis first by the parties, but ultimately by the district court will aid significantly in preventing the waste of private and judicial resources and time. 70 2. Two threshold issues. Once the claims and the parties are sorted out, there are two threshold issues that should, for conceptual purposes, be separated from the question of the applicability of a qualified immunity defense. The first would seem rather obvious: Is there a genuine issue of material fact as to the objective conduct of the defendant? If resolution of the issue in the summary judgment proceedings turns on what the defendant actually did, rather than on whether the defendant is immunized from liability for what he actually did, and if there are conflicting versions of his conduct, one of which would establish and the other defeat liability, then the case is inappropriate for summary judgment on the basis that the defendant did not engage in conduct violative of the plaintiff's rights. This does not mean, however, that a defendant cannot pretermit the question of whether he engaged in the complained-of conduct in order to present instead the qualified immunity issue. There is no point in going to trial to determine whether the officer engaged in the complained-of conduct if the officer would be immunized from liability even if he did engage in that conduct. 71 We emphasize, too, that if the defendant has established beyond dispute that he did not engage in the complained-of conduct, then summary judgment is appropriate. A summary judgment on these grounds, however, has nothing to do with the qualified immunity defense; rather, it is based on the plaintiff's inability to prove the facts essential to recovery i. e., that the officer acted in a manner presumptively violative of the plaintiff's rights. See, e. g., Broadway v. City of Montgomery, 530 F.2d 657, 660-61 (5th Cir. 1976) (summary judgment proper on section 1983 claim founded on alleged illegal wiretapping when only summary judgment material relevant to factual issue as to whether wiretapping actually occurred was incompetent hearsay testimony). 72 The second distinct issue that may arise is whether the complained-of conduct, if it in fact occurred, violated any right of the plaintiff. It is distinctly different to say that the conduct of the defendant did not violate a constitutional right of the plaintiff then to say that the defendant's conduct violated a constitutional right but the defendant is immunized from liability by virtue of a qualified official immunity. Again, this does not mean that a defendant cannot pretermit the question of constitutional deprivation in order to proceed to analysis under the qualified immunity doctrine. But if the complained-of conduct would not, as a legal matter, amount to a violation of rights secured to the plaintiff under the Constitution of the United States, 20 then summary judgment is proper. See Parratt v. Taylor, --- U.S. ----, 101 S.Ct. 1908, 68 L.Ed.2d 420 (1981); Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 99 S.Ct. 2689, 61 L.Ed.2d 433 (1979). Compare York v. City of Cedartown, 648 F.2d 231 (5th Cir. 1981); Hernandez v. City of Lafayette, 643 F.2d 1188 (5th Cir. 1981); Suthoff v. Yazoo County Industrial Development Corp., 637 F.2d 337 (5th Cir. 1981); and Shillingford v. Holmes, 634 F.2d 263 (5th Cir. 1981) (cases finding that the plaintiff had stated a valid claim of a deprivation of his constitutional rights), with Simon v. United States, 644 F.2d 490, 496 (5th Cir. 1981); and Greer v. Turner, 639 F.2d 229 (5th Cir. 1981) (cases finding no valid claim of a constitutional deprivation). This is true no matter whether, on the one hand, the complained-of conduct is established by undisputed facts or by admission arguendo, or, on the other, there is a genuine issue of fact as to whether the complained-of conduct occurred. This summary judgment would not be based on qualified immunity grounds, but instead on the lack of a legally sufficient predicate for section 1983 or Bivens liability. 73 Qualified immunity is yet a third distinct issue. While it is a complete defense to section 1983 or Bivens liability, it may be proffered either when the plaintiff has established that the defendant has engaged in the complained-of conduct, and that this conduct violated the plaintiff's constitutional rights, or by skipping, for the moment, over these still-contested matters to consider an issue that would moot their effect if proved. In either event, analysis of the qualified immunity defense must proceed in two distinct steps. 74 3. Entitlement to claim official immunity. First, it must be determined whether the defendant, as a public official, acted within the scope of his discretionary authority. To establish this, there must be more than a bald assertion by the defendant that the complained-of actions were undertaken pursuant to the performance of his duties and within the scope of his discretionary authority; there must be a showing by competent summary judgment materials of objective circumstances that would compel that conclusion. See part III-A -1 of this opinion, supra. 75 Exactly what will suffice to establish such objective circumstances will, as Douthit and the other cases discussed in part III-A -1 above suggest, vary in proportion to the degree of discretion inherent in the defendant's office. Such objective circumstances necessarily must encompass the factual context within which the complained-of conduct took place. But also appropriate is a showing by the defendant of facts relating to the scope of his official duties e. g., a showing of the circumstances through which he initially came to believe that his lawful authority included within its scope actions of the type that are complained of by the plaintiff. The Eighth Circuit has made the following remarks concerning this topic: 76 The paradigm of reasonable grounds for a good faith belief in the propriety of official action is reliance on a state statute later declared unconstitutional. See, e. g., Pierson v. Ray, 386 U.S. 547, 556-57, 87 S.Ct. 1213 (1218), 18 L.Ed.2d 288 (1967). Reliance on less formal state provisions may also be reasonable, Eslinger v. Thomas, 476 F.2d 225, 229 (4th Cir. 1974) (longstanding custom of the South Carolina Senate); Claybrone v. Thompson, 368 F.Supp. 324 (M.D.Ala.1973) (standard operating procedures of prison), and in our view police officers may usually rely on standard operating procedures contained in their police manuals. 77 Landrum v. Moats, 576 F.2d 1320, 1327 n.14 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, 439 U.S. 912, 99 S.Ct. 282, 58 L.Ed.2d 258 (1978). 78 Once the defendant has presented competent summary judgment materials that, if uncontroverted, would establish that there were, in fact, objective circumstances which compel the conclusion that the complained-of conduct was undertaken pursuant to the performance of his duties and within the scope of his discretionary authority, he has made a prima facie showing that he is entitled to claim official immunity. At this point, the burden of proof shifts to the plaintiff, who cannot then play dog in the manger, Butz v. Economou, 438 U.S. at 508, 98 S.Ct. at 2911. To rebut the defendant's prima facie showing, the plaintiff must come forward with controverting summary judgment materials competent to raise a genuine issue of fact as to whether the defendant undertook the complained-of conduct pursuant to the performance of his duties and within the scope of his discretionary authority thereby raising a genuine issue of fact as to the validity of the prima facie case for immunity. If the prima facie showing is not rebutted by the plaintiff, then the defendant is, as a matter of law, entitled to claim official immunity from section 1983 or Bivens liability. See Henzel v. Gerstein, 608 F.2d 654, 659 (5th Cir. 1980); 10 C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2727, at 536-37 (1973). 79 But this, by itself, does not mean that the defendant will ultimately prevail. If, because of the nature of his office, the defendant enjoys only qualified (as opposed to absolute) immunity, the plaintiff still has the opportunity, discussed in part III-A -1 above, to establish that the defendant's immunity should be abrogated because the defendant harbored a subjective malicious intent to harm the plaintiff, or because the defendant knew or should have known that his actions infringed a clearly established constitutional right of the plaintiff. This means that there is necessarily a second step in summary judgment analysis based on qualified immunity grounds. 80 4. The qualification to the immunity based on the defendant's lack of good faith. Once the defendant has established that he is entitled to claim official immunity, under Douthit the burden shifts to the plaintiff to establish that the immunity should be breached because either the defendant harbored a subjective malicious intent or he knew or should have known that his actions violated a clearly established constitutional right of the plaintiff. For summary judgment purposes, this means that here again the plaintiff may no longer rest upon the unsupported allegations of his pleadings. Instead, he must establish that there is a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the defendant lacked good faith i. e., whether the defendant knew or reasonably should have known that he was violating the constitutional rights of the plaintiff, or the defendant maliciously intended to harm the plaintiff. 81 The first component of the good faith issue whether the defendant knew or reasonably should have known under settled law at the time he acted that he was violating the plaintiff's constitutional rights is obviously more susceptible to objective means of proof than the second component of the issue, which has to do with the defendant's subjective state of mind. The first component requires the plaintiff to raise, through competent summary judgment materials, a genuine issue of fact as to what the settled law was at the time of the defendant's conduct, and whether the defendant knew or should have known that his conduct was not in conformity with that settled law. Of course, there are no bright lines for deciding whether the law's treatment of particular conduct at any given time was settled, and neither are there bright lines for deciding whether an official should have known under settled law that his conduct violated the plaintiff's constitutional rights. 82 Although the second component of the good faith issue depends on the defendant's subjective state of mind, it does not necessarily follow that there is always a genuine issue of fact as to the presence or absence of malicious intent to harm the plaintiff. The only direct evidence of a person's state of mind, of course, can come from that person's statements whether made on or off the witness stand, and whether made before, during, or after committing the complained-of conduct. But a defendant's state of mind may also be proved circumstantially through objective evidence. Indeed, factfinders can and frequently do reject on credibility grounds the only direct evidence of a person's state of mind (i. e., his own statements) in favor of compelling contrary inferences that the factfinder has drawn from the surrounding objective circumstances. 83 As to this second component of the good faith issue, it is the plaintiff's burden to raise a triable issue of fact as to the defendant's malicious intent once the defendant has established that he is entitled to claim official immunity because the complained-of conduct was undertaken pursuant to his discretionary authority. As a practical matter, the plaintiff may meet his burden of raising a triable issue of fact as to the defendant's malicious intent in either of two ways: he may introduce competent summary judgment materials, or point to summary judgment materials already in the record, that would tend to prove directly that the defendant acted with subjective malice) 21 or, he may introduce competent summary judgment materials, or point to summary judgment materials already in the record, that would tend circumstantially to prove that the defendant acted with malicious intent. 22 84 If the plaintiff can point to nothing other than his own subjective belief that the defendant intended him harm if fails to articulate any objective circumstances that could serve as a rational basis from which a factfinder could infer that the defendant acted out of malice rather than duty then the plaintiff has not raised a triable issue of fact as to the defendant's malicious intent, and summary judgment is proper. (I)f there is 'a complete absence of probative facts' to support a particular inference, or, if 'the facts and inferences point so strongly and overwhelmingly in favor of one party that the Court believes that reasonable men could not arrive at (but one) verdict,' the court may bypass the jury. Nunez v. Superior Oil Co., 572 F.2d 1119, 1124 (5th Cir. 1978) (second bracketed portion by Nunez Court; cite omitted) (reviewing grant of summary judgment on issue that involved defendant's state of mind). (E)vidence purporting to create doubts as to the facts that is too incredible to be accepted by reasonable minds will not prevent summary judgment. 10 C. Wright & A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2727, at 551 (1973). Short of this extreme, however, may summary judgment properly be granted on a state of mind issue? 85 A number of cases, including some from the Supreme Court and from this circuit, have affirmed grants of summary judgment in section 1983 actions without discussing in any detail the problem of when summary judgment can be granted on an issue or claim that involves state of mind. 23 Other cases, however, express grave doubts about the appropriateness of resolving such questions through summary judgment. 24 In the case at bar, we need not attempt to provide a definitive solution to this problem: as explained below in part IV-B -1 of this opinion, the objective circumstances upon which Barker relies could easily allow a factfinder to infer that Officer Norman acted with malicious intent, and, given other circumstances present in the case, summary judgment on that issue therefore was improper. 86