Opinion ID: 2767413
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Claim against Hearne I.S.D.

Text: The district court dismissed the Pierces’ Section 1983 claim against Hearne I.S.D. after concluding that this court has not recognized the “statecreated danger theory” upon which the claim rested and, regardless, the Pierces failed to state such a claim because they did not allege facts 7 Case: 14-50788 Document: 00512892939 Page: 8 Date Filed: 01/07/2015 No. 14-50788 demonstrating that Hearne I.S.D. was deliberately indifferent to an immediate danger facing a known victim. See Doe ex rel. Magee v. Covington Cnty. Sch. Dist. ex rel. Keys, 675 F.3d 849, 864, 866 (5th Cir. 2012). The district court also held that Hearne I.S.D. could not be held vicariously liable because the doctrine of respondeat superior does not apply in Section 1983 cases. See Rivera v. Houston Indep. Sch. Dist., 349 F.3d 244, 247 (5th Cir. 2003). The Pierces do not contest these conclusions. Instead, they contend that the district court failed to address a separate legal theory supporting their Section 1983 claim. According to the Pierces, they asserted a traditional municipal liability theory supporting their claim in both their complaint and their response to the defendants’ motion to dismiss. Recovery under this theory “requires proof of 1) a policymaker; 2) an official policy; 3) and a violation of constitutional rights whose ‘moving force’ is the policy or custom.” Id. (citations omitted). The Pierces’ complaint does not articulate this theory as a basis for their Section 1983 claim. The complaint titles its Section 1983 claims “State Created Danger Claim[s].” Moreover, it does not make claims about policymakers, policies or customs, 5 or their relationship to the alleged constitutional violation. Instead, the allegations relate to the state-created danger and vicarious liability theories. The Pierces did, however, clearly articulate the municipal liability theory in their response to the defendants’ motion to dismiss. 5 The complaint did allege that: (1) Trojacek violated school policy by removing De’Jon from school without his parents’ permission, and that Principal McGill knowingly allowed this violation to take place; and (2) Hearne I.S.D. did not have a policy against keeping livestock at its teachers’ private residences. The former allegation suggests that Hearne I.S.D.’s policies were designed to guard against, rather than facilitate, the alleged constitutional violations. The latter allegation suggests the absence, rather than presence, of policies relating to the alleged violations. 8 Case: 14-50788 Document: 00512892939 Page: 9 Date Filed: 01/07/2015 No. 14-50788 The district court did not discuss the municipal liability theory in its order of dismissal. This may have been error. Generally, a new claim or legal theory raised in response to a dispositive motion should be construed as a request for leave to amend the complaint, and the district court should determine whether leave should be granted. 6 See Stover v. Hattiesburg Pub. Sch. Dist., 549 F.3d 985, 989 n.2 (5th Cir. 2008) (collecting cases). We have at times remanded to the district court for consideration of an issue injected into a case in this manner. See Riley v. Sch. Bd. Union Parish, 379 F. App’x 335, 341 (5th Cir. 2010). We decline to do so here because all theories of liability under Section 1983 require the plaintiff to demonstrate the violation of a constitutional right. In this case, the same alleged substantive due process violation forms the basis for all of the Pierces’ Section 1983 theories. Therefore, because we affirm the district court’s ruling that no violation of substantive due process occurred, we must necessarily conclude that granting the Pierces leave to amend would be futile.