Opinion ID: 70554
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Porras and Mull

Text: It is undisputed that Bridgwater’s supervisor, Porras, arrived at the scene very shortly before the shooting. The Ceballos Family contends that Porras (1) was directly involved in Bridgwater’s violation of Ceballos’ constitutional rights because he failed to intervene, and (2) was, as Bridgwater’s supervisor, deliberately indifferent to Ceballos’s rights. Mull’s involvement is even more remote—he was not there, and he is accused simply of not doing enough to prevent the situation by way of training and general supervision. As to the failure to intervene claim, we have held that “an officer who is present at the scene and does not take reasonable measures to protect a suspect from another officer’s use of excessive force may be liable under [§] 1983.” Hale v. Townley, 45 F.3d 914, 919 (5th Cir. 1995). As to the failure to supervise and train claim, we note that § 1983 does not provide for any form of vicarious or respondeat superior liability. See Estate of Davis v. City of N. Richland Hills, 406 F.3d 375, 381 (5th Cir. 2005). Instead, liability is proper when “(1) the supervisor either failed to supervise or train the 10 Case: 09-10076 Document: 00511011019 Page: 11 Date Filed: 01/22/2010 No. 09-10076 subordinate official; (2) a causal link exists between the failure to train or supervise and the violation of the plaintiff’s rights; and (3) the failure to train or supervise amounts to deliberate indifference.” Id. (quoting Smith v. Brenoettsy, 158 F.3d 908, 911–12 (5th Cir. 1998)). Even viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the Ceballos Family, it does not appear that Porras “failed to supervise” Bridgwater, or, if he did, that any constitutional violation followed from that failure. Neither did Porras fail to intervene: the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the Ceballos Family, does not show a course of action that Porras could have taken to stop Bridgwater from firing. The situation was tense and developing, and Bridgwater fired without warning. Even in Reyes’ version of events, it would have been patently absurd for Porras to have ordered Bridgwater to put down his gun. Less than two minutes transpired between Porras’s arrival and the shooting. The Ceballos Family has not created a genuine issue of material fact as to whether Porras had any opportunity to intervene in the situation and prevent Bridgwater from firing, let alone that he acquiesced in the use of force. Further, the standard of “deliberate indifference” required for supervisor liability to attach is a “stringent” one that is not met here. See Davis, 406 F.3d at 381. As we explained in Davis, deliberate indifference requir[es] proof that a municipal actor disregarded a known or obvious consequence of his action. For an official to act with deliberate indifference, the official must both be aware of facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of serious harm exists, and he must also draw the inference. Deliberate indifference requires a showing of more than negligence or even gross negligence. Actions and decisions by officials that are merely inept, erroneous, ineffective, or negligent do not amount to deliberate indifference and do not divest officials of qualified immunity. Id. (quotations, footnotes, and citations omitted). There is no evidence that would support a finding that Porras was actually aware that Bridgwater 11 Case: 09-10076 Document: 00511011019 Page: 12 Date Filed: 01/22/2010 No. 09-10076 presented a risk that Porras chose to disregard. Indeed, there is virtually no evidence that Porras knew of any adverse information regarding Bridgwater. We have previously rejected claims of deliberate indifference for supervisors where other officers actually knew of the shooting officer’s propensity for violence and had received citizen complaints regarding the officer. See id. at 382. Indeed, the reason that the court previously rejected these purported grounds for liability is that failure to supervise claims require “demonstrat[ion] [of] a pattern of violations” that cannot normally be proven on the basis of a single prior incident. See id. at 382–33 & n.34. There is no suggestion of a pattern of violations here; the Ceballos Family points to one dissimilar violent incident in Bridgwater’s previous employment (of which the Ceballos Family acknowledges Porras was unaware) as well as traffic violations by Bridgwater. Even drawing all inferences in favor of the Ceballos Family, these claims against Porras fail. The district court’s grant of qualified immunity to Porras was not error. Similarly, Mull’s actions do not rise to the level required by the demanding standard of deliberate indifference. The Ceballos Family points to the following evidence in opposition to summary judgment as to Mull: (1) Bridgwater’s traffic violations, of which Mull knew; (2) Bridgwater’s alleged lack of training in handling domestic disputes; and (3) Bridgwater’s prior violent incident while employed as a corrections officer, which was not adequately explored during the hiring process. This previous incident did not involve use of deadly force. Even taken together, this evidence does not support a claim of deliberate indifference. “To satisfy the deliberate indifference prong, a plaintiff usually must demonstrate a pattern of violations and that the inadequacy of the training is ‘obvious and obviously likely to result in a constitutional violation.’” Cousin v. Small, 325 F.3d 627, 637 (5th Cir. 2003) (quoting Thompson v. Upshur County, 245 F.3d 447, 459 (5th Cir. 2001)). The information known to Mull—principally 12 Case: 09-10076 Document: 00511011019 Page: 13 Date Filed: 01/22/2010 No. 09-10076 Bridgwater’s traffic violations—could not have suggested that a constitutional violation was likely to result. The district court did not err in granting Mull summary judgment on qualified immunity. C. State Claims Against Bridgwater, Porras, and Mull The district court also dismissed all of the Ceballos Family’s state-law causes of action against the individual defendants for failure to state a claim pursuant to the Texas Tort Claims Act. Under section 101.106(e) of the Texas Civil Practice and Remedies Code, “[i]f a suit is filed under this chapter [viz., the Texas Tort Claims Act] against both a governmental unit and any of its employees, the employees shall immediately be dismissed on the filing of a motion by the governmental unit.” Citing this section, the district court dismissed the state-law claims filed against the individual defendants. “We review a [Federal] Rule [of Civil Procedure] 12(b)(6) dismissal de novo. We must accept all well-pleaded facts as true, and we review them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.” Piotrowski v. City of Houston, 51 F.3d 512, 514 (5th Cir. 1995) (quotation omitted). Under section 101.106(e), a plaintiff must make an “irrevocable” election to sue either the governmental unit or its employees, but not both, whenever suit is brought against such entities. See Mission Consol. Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Garcia, 253 S.W.3d 653, 657 (Tex. 2008). It is irrelevant whether the claim is actually allowed by the Texas Tort Claims Act or not.8 Garcia, 253 S.W.3d at 658–59. The Ceballos Family argues that its claims against the various defendants are made separately by each plaintiff and preclude application of section 101.106(e) against each other; they attempt to distinguish Garcia on this basis. While the Ceballos Family may be correct that if one plaintiff chooses to sue both a 8 Many of the Ceballos Family’s claims allege intentional torts. The limited waiver of sovereign immunity provided by the Texas Tort Claims Act does not extend to intentional torts. TEX . CIV . PRAC . & REM . CODE § 101.057(2). 13 Case: 09-10076 Document: 00511011019 Page: 14 Date Filed: 01/22/2010 No. 09-10076 municipality and its employees that election should not inure to the detriment of another plaintiff in the same matter, that is definitively not the case in this litigation. Here, the Ceballos Family jointly sued and alleged the same causes of action and the same facts against the same defendants. They filed a single complaint through the same attorney. No one plaintiff has ever acted or been treated separately from another at any point in the proceedings. Garcia therefore controls this case, and the district court did not err in dismissing these claims against Bridgwater, Porras, and Mull.