Opinion ID: 196071
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Officers' Immunity Claims

Text: 16 We review a summary judgment order de novo, under the identical criteria governing the district court, to determine whether the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); see Jirau-Bernal v. Agrait, 37 F.3d 1, 3 (1st Cir.1994). All contested facts are viewed in the light most favorable to the party resisting summary judgment. Id.
17 Like other government officials performing discretionary functions, law enforcement officers hailed into court in their individual capacities to respond in damages are entitled to qualified immunity from suit in civil rights actions under section 1983, provided their conduct did not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable [police officer] would have known. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982); Burns v. Loranger, 907 F.2d 233, 235 (1st Cir.1990). In Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987), the Supreme Court refined the focus of the policy considerations underlying the qualified immunity doctrine. 18 When government officials abuse their offices, action[s] for damages may offer the only realistic avenue for vindication of constitutional guarantees. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S., at 814 [102 S.Ct. at 2736]. On the other hand, permitting damages suits against government officials can entail substantial social costs, including the risk that fear of personal monetary liability and harassing litigation will unduly inhibit officials in the discharge of their duties. Ibid. Our cases have accommodated these conflicting concerns by generally providing government officials performing discretionary functions with a qualified immunity, shielding them from civil damages liability as long as their actions could reasonably have been thought consistent with the rights they are alleged to have violated. See, e.g., Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 [106 S.Ct. 1092, 1096, 89 L.Ed.2d 271] (1986).... 19 Anderson, 483 U.S. at 638, 107 S.Ct. at 3038. 3 As this court has explained, 20 appellate assessment of [a] qualified immunity claim is apportioned into two analytic components. First, if the right asserted by the plaintiff was clearly established at the time of its alleged violation, we are required to assume that the right was recognized by the defendant official, see Harlow, 457 U.S. at 818, 102 S.Ct. at 2738; Rodriguez v. Comas, 888 F.2d 899, 901 (1st Cir.1989); second, we will deny the immunity claim if a reasonable official situated in the same circumstances should have understood that the challenged conduct violated that established right, see Anderson, 483 U.S. at 640-41, 107 S.Ct. at 3039; Rodriguez, 888 F.2d at 901. 21 Burns, 907 F.2d at 235-36. 22 The Hegartys correctly contend, of course, that the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution prohibited a warrantless entry into the Hegarty cabin to effect Katherine's arrest, except in exigent circumstances and with probable cause. See Welsh v. Wisconsin, 466 U.S. 740, 749, 104 S.Ct. 2091, 2097, 80 L.Ed.2d 732 (1984); Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 586, 100 S.Ct. 1371, 1380, 63 L.Ed.2d 639 (1980); Buenrostro v. Collazo, 973 F.2d 39, 43 (1st Cir.1992). Indeed, the constitutional rights allegedly violated were clearly established long before this tragic incident occurred. Accordingly, the defendant officers are deemed to have been on notice of the relevant constitutional protections constraining their actions. Burns, 907 F.2d at 235-36. Therefore, qualified immunity affords the defendant officers no safe haven unless an objectively reasonable officer, similarly situated, could have believed that the challenged police conduct did not violate the Hegartys' constitutional rights. Id. at 236. 23 Thus, the qualified immunity inquiry does not depend on whether the warrantless entry was constitutional, but allows as well for the inevitable reality that law enforcement officials will in some cases reasonably but mistakenly conclude that [their conduct] is [constitutional], and ... that ... those officials--like other officials who act in ways they reasonably believe to be lawful--should not be held personally liable. Anderson, 483 U.S. at 641, 107 S.Ct. at 3039-40 (emphasis added); Burns, 907 F.2d at 237. In other words, qualified immunity sweeps so broadly that all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law are protected from civil rights suits for money damages. Hunter v. Bryant, 502 U.S. 224, 229, 112 S.Ct. 534, 537, 116 L.Ed.2d 589 (1991) (quoting Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341, 106 S.Ct. 1092, 1097, 89 L.Ed.2d 271 (1986)); cf. Roy v. City of Lewiston, 42 F.3d 691, 695 (1st Cir.1994) ([T]he Supreme Court's standard of reasonableness is comparatively generous to the police where potential danger, emergency conditions or other exigent circumstances are present.). 24 Lastly, we assess the challenged police conduct with a view to determining its objective legal reasonableness, Anderson, 483 U.S. at 639, 107 S.Ct. at 3039 (emphasis added), which entails two pivotal features. First, the qualified immunity inquiry takes place prior to trial, on motion for summary judgment, see Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 2815, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985) (qualified immunity provides a shield against the burdens of litigation, not merely a defense against liability for money damages), and requires no factfinding, only a ruling of law strictly for resolution by the court, see Amsden v. Moran, 904 F.2d 748, 752-53 (1st Cir.1990), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 1041, 111 S.Ct. 713, 112 L.Ed.2d 702 (1991); Hall v. Ochs, 817 F.2d 920, 924 (1st Cir.1987). Thus, under the policy-driven objective legal reasonableness analysis governing our inquiry, even expert testimony relating to appropriate police procedures in the circumstances confronting the officers may not afford certain insulation against summary judgment in the qualified immunity context. 25 We turn then to consider whether an objectively reasonable police officer could have believed--in the circumstances prevailing before Katherine Hegarty was mortally wounded--that exigent circumstances and probable cause existed for the forcible, warrantless, nighttime entry into the Hegarty cabin.
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27 The probable cause requirement was met if the officers at the scene collectively possessed, Burns, 907 F.2d at 236 n. 7, reasonably trustworthy information [sufficient] to warrant a prudent [person] in believing that [Katherine Hegarty] had committed or was committing a [criminal] offense. Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91, 85 S.Ct. 223, 225, 13 L.Ed.2d 142 (1964). As the Supreme Court has explained, [i]n dealing with probable cause, ... as the very name implies, we deal with probabilities. These are not technical; they are the factual and practical considerations of everyday life on which reasonable and prudent men, not legal technicians, act. Illinois v. Gates, 462 U.S. 213, 231, 103 S.Ct. 2317, 2328, 76 L.Ed.2d 527 (1983) (quoting Brinegar v. United States, 338 U.S. 160, 176, 69 S.Ct. 1302, 1311, 93 L.Ed. 1879 (1949)). See also Burns, 907 F.2d at 236 (quoting Gates ). 28 On appeal, the plaintiff contests the assumption--indulged arguendo by the district court--that there was probable cause for Katherine Hegarty's arrest. He argues that no competent officer in these circumstances reasonably could have believed that Katherine--a crack shot--intended to harm the campers, especially since no bullets struck the trucks and boat behind which the campers took cover. We do not agree. Rather, based on the information that Katherine may have been intoxicated, an objectively reasonable officer could have concluded that her errant aim was not attributable to a lack of intent to endanger. Consequently, we conclude, based on the reasonably trustworthy information available to the defendant officers at the scene, see supra pp. 1370-71, that an objectively reasonable police officer could have formed the belief that there was probable cause to arrest Katherine Hegarty for the offense of reckless endangerment. See, e.g., Me.Rev.Stat.Ann. tit. 17-A, Sec. 211 (A person is guilty of reckless conduct if he recklessly creates a substantial risk of serious bodily injury to another person.); Sec. 15 (authorizing warrantless arrests for reckless conduct with a firearm). 29
30 A warrantless, forcible entry of a private residence is permissible in certain limited circumstances, including: (1) hot pursuit of a fleeing felon; (2) threatened destruction of evidence inside a residence before a warrant can be obtained; (3) a risk that the suspect may escape from the residence undetected; or (4) a threat, posed by a suspect, to the lives or safety of the public, the police officers, or to herself. See Minnesota v. Olson, 495 U.S. 91, 100, 110 S.Ct. 1684, 1690, 109 L.Ed.2d 85 (1990). We have held that a cognizable exigency must present a compelling necessity for immediate action that w[ould] not brook the delay of obtaining a warrant. United States v. Almonte, 952 F.2d 20, 22 (1st Cir.1991), cert. denied, 503 U.S. 1010, 112 S.Ct. 1776, 118 L.Ed.2d 434 (1992) (quoting United States v. Adams, 621 F.2d 41, 44 (1st Cir.1980)). Conversely, certain mitigating factors may undermine a showing of exigent circumstances; for example, where the criminal offense was not sufficiently serious (a traffic violation), Welsh, 466 U.S. at 753 n. 6, 104 S.Ct. at 2099 n. 6, the opportunity afforded the suspect for peaceable surrender was inadequate, or the entry occurred in the nighttime. See generally United States v. Adams, 621 F.2d 41, 44 (1st Cir.1980). 31 The defendant officers challenge the district court ruling that no competent police officer could have formed an objectively reasonable belief that exigent circumstances justified a forcible, warrantless entry for the purpose of effecting Katherine Hegarty's immediate arrest. They argue that it was reasonable to believe--based on the reasonably trustworthy information available to them at the time--that Katherine posed an imminent and unpredictable threat to their safety, and to herself. 32 Earlier in the day, Katherine had engaged in violent, life-threatening conduct against peaceable, unarmed campers. She was known to have demonstrated emotional instability and hostility toward law enforcement personnel in the past, which had prompted her to attack and threaten State Trooper Wright on two separate occasions. At the cabin, she pointed a rifle directly at Sergeant Crawford, exhibited irrational and possibly suicidal behavior (laughing like a witch) in response to the officers' repeated requests that she discuss matters with them. The defendant officers maintain that she could have decided at any time to fire at them through the paper thin cabin walls or as they attempted to retreat across the moonlit clearing. Consequently, the officers contend, there was an ongoing exigency which made it reasonable to attempt to disarm Katherine whenever it appeared least likely that she possessed or could retrieve a weapon. 4 33 Plaintiff acknowledges that the officers did not use excessive force to protect themselves after they forcibly entered the cabin and were confronted by Katherine, with rifle raised. Cf. Roy, 42 F.3d at 695-96. Rather, he contends that their precipitous and ill-conceived strategy--arrived at before the officers ever left the truck stop--deviated unreasonably from standard police tactics in crisis situations and inexorably led to Katherine's death. Cf. United States v. Curzi, 867 F.2d 36, 43 n. 6 (1st Cir.1989) (police may not manipulate events to create an exigency justifying warrantless entry). 34 William McClaran, plaintiff's expert, testified that the defendant officers deviated in two fundamental respects from standard police practice in a crisis. First, they failed to define their exact chain of command before setting out to effect Katherine's arrest. Consequently, each officer at the scene was left to determine his own movements on an ad hoc basis (free-lancing), without adequate coordination among them. 5 Second, the officers eschewed accepted rules of containment by needlessly placing themselves in peril against the paper thin outer walls of the cabin. Plaintiff opines that upon approaching the cabin, the officers harbored a reasonable belief that Katherine was inside, given the music blaring from within the cabin and the presence of her truck in the cabin clearing. Consequently, and since the officers knew Katherine was armed and appeared to be acting irrationally, two officers should have taken concealed positions at the edge of the woods surrounding the cabin clearing, thereby cutting off any attempted escape. Thereafter, from a safer distance, other officers could have begun the effort to coax Katherine to come outside, while another officer returned to the police cruisers and radioed for assistance from the Maine State Tactical Team. 35 We must isolate all reasonably reliable information collectively known to the officers at the time their challenged conduct occurred, without indulging hindsight, see Hunter, 502 U.S. at 227, 112 S.Ct. at 536, to determine whether an objectively reasonable officer, with the identical information, could have concluded that there were exigent circumstances sufficient to support an immediate forcible entry of the Hegarty cabin to effect Katherine's warrantless arrest. See Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396, 109 S.Ct. 1865, 1872, 104 L.Ed.2d 443 (1989). Any genuine dispute as to what the officers knew or did must be resolved in the plaintiff's favor. See Fonte v. Collins, 898 F.2d 284, 285 (1st Cir.1990). Even then, however, summary judgment for the defendant officers would be appropriate if any such factual dispute were immaterial as a matter of law; that is, if it would not alter the required analysis as to the legal reasonableness of their conduct. See, e.g., Prokey v. Watkins, 942 F.2d 67, 73 (1st Cir.1991) (citing cases in which material factual disputes precluded summary judgment on qualified immunity claim); see also Cameron v. Seitz, 38 F.3d 264, 273 n. 2 (6th Cir.1994) (same). 6 36 Following a careful examination of the applicable law and all competent evidence presented to the district court at summary judgment, we conclude that the benchmark against which plaintiff would have us evaluate the challenged police conduct is impermissibly stringent for the qualified immunity context, since it fails to acknowledge an overarching reality confronting the officers at the most critical moment of decision; viz., until Sergeant Crawford saw Katherine Hegarty through the bedroom window of the cabin, there was no conclusive evidence that their suspect had been located or contained at all. 37 The officers initially devised a plan which they characterized as locate, identify, contain, negotiate, and arrest. Obviously, location and identification would be imperative before any other element in their plan could proceed. The officers knew that Katherine had fired approximately thirty rounds toward the campers earlier in the evening. And, in addition to their collective knowledge of her erratic, unlawful behavior in the recent past, the officers had learned from the campers that Katherine was last seen driving her truck. A competent police officer in these circumstances--possessed of this disturbing information--certainly could harbor an objectively reasonable concern that Katherine might yet remain mobile, thereby posing a continuing danger to other persons in the vicinity. 38 Several other campsites in the vicinity of the Hegarty cabin were occupied, and without knowing the precise motivation for Katherine's unprovoked, armed response to the peaceable presence of the four campers earlier in the evening, an objectively reasonable officer prudently could presume that other campers might be at similar risk. In fact, their use of the police dog while proceeding along the woods road toward the cabin attests to the officers' alertness to the possibility that Katherine could be lying in wait in the woods. Deciding not to take the risk attendant upon the delay necessarily entailed in obtaining a warrant, the officers accordingly placed top priority on conclusively locating their suspect at the earliest possible time so as to minimize the threat posed to the safety of other campers. See Olson, 495 U.S. at 100, 110 S.Ct. at 1690 (exigent circumstances include the need to safeguard against threats to life or safety of others); Almonte, 952 F.2d at 22. 7 39 Quite contrary to the major premise for William McClaran's expert opinion, by the time they arrived at the Hegarty cabin the officers had received decidedly mixed signals concerning their suspect's location. The parked truck suggested that Katherine might be inside the cabin, but the lack of artificial illumination suggested otherwise. The blaring music did not conclusively disprove either hypothesis. Nor had Katherine been seen or heard entering or moving about inside the cabin. Thus, it was in no sense improbable that Katherine, a licensed guide and experienced hunter, had left her vehicle and departed the cabin site on foot. 40 Nor was the alternative police strategy posited by Mr. McClaran without its shortcomings. Of course, had the officers chosen to cordon off the cabin from a safe distance, and begun calling out to Katherine in the hope they might negotiate her surrender--and had she responded--the containment phase could have proceeded apace. On the other hand, had she simply failed to respond--either because she could not hear their calls above the blaring music, or because she had fully expected them to investigate the campers' allegations and wanted to keep them off guard--the officers still would be left to speculate whether she was in the cabin. 41 Since time was of the essence, and it was imperative that they locate and identify their suspect so as to rule out the continuing danger she could pose to others in the vicinity, the officers then would have faced an irreconcilable quandary. They could undertake a containment strategy along the lines propounded by McClaran, which would necessitate a delay of several hours for the Maine State Tactical Team to reach the cabin, thereby countenancing the realistic risk that their suspect might be elsewhere at that very moment jeopardizing the safety of others. 8 Or, having heralded their arrival, the officers could have attempted to confirm Katherine's presence through visual contact, by approaching the outer walls of the darkened cabin across the moonlit clearing, thereby exposing themselves to gunfire from their armed and unpredictable suspect--by then forewarned and concealed. 42 Law enforcement officers quite often are required to assess just such probabilities, and to weigh the attendant contingencies. And it is precisely such spontaneous judgment calls--borne of necessity in rapidly evolving, life-endangering circumstances--that the qualified immunity doctrine was designed to insulate from judicial second-guessing in civil actions for money damages, unless the challenged conduct was clearly incompetent or undertaken in plain violation of established law. See Hunter, 502 U.S. at 229, 112 S.Ct. at 537; Anderson, 483 U.S. at 638, 107 S.Ct. at 3038. 43 Thus, we do not determine which of these strategies represented the more prudent course or posed the least serious risk to the suspect, the officers or others in the vicinity. See Scott v. Henrich, 39 F.3d 912, 915 (9th Cir.1994) (noting that [o]fficers need not avail themselves of the least intrusive means of responding to an exigent situation; they need only act within that range of conduct [which is] ... reasonable; contrary rule would inevitably induce tentativeness by officers). Rather, we consider only whether a competent police officer in these circumstances reasonably could have opted for an unannounced approach to the cabin walls forthwith. 44 As we conclude that a competent police officer reasonably could have believed that exigent circumstances warranted approaching the cabin walls-- forthwith and unannounced--we turn to the remaining question: whether the defendant officers--once committed, and assured that Katherine was inside the cabin where she no longer posed a viable threat to other campers--reasonably could have believed that she represented an imminent physical threat to their own safety. 9 See Olson, 495 U.S. at 100, 110 S.Ct. at 1690. 45 The expert testimony on which plaintiff relies makes much of the notion that the entire plan for approaching the outer cabin walls was ill-conceived and uncoordinated ab initio, whereas the officers plausibly contend that they had worked together as a team so often in the past that their basic plan and tactics were implicitly understood. But even accepting William McClaran's prescription as to an appropriate police procedure for use in these circumstances, plaintiff does not explain how a differently formulated plan--devoid of the suggested deficiencies in the officers' plan--inevitably would have averted the exigency ultimately confronting them. See supra notes 5 & 8. Indeed, none of the consequences McClaran attributed to the alleged absence of a chain of command, or to lack of coordination in the officers' plan, clearly constituted a causative factor in Katherine's death. 10 Rather, the causative exigency derived primarily from three factors over which the officers never had exclusive control: the need to ascertain Katherine's precise location as soon as possible, her unpredictable behavior, and the lack of protective cover for their own movements in locating and containing her. 46 Second, though plaintiff argues that the officers delayed their forcible entry until they were safest--when it appeared to Officer Guay that Katherine was unarmed and beyond arm's reach from a firearm--surely this argument exaggerates their on-the-spot sense of personal security by failing to assess the imminence of a perceived danger in light of the totality of the circumstances. See United States v. Veillette, 778 F.2d 899, 902 (1st Cir.1985) (exigency is assessed by viewing totality of circumstances), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1115, 106 S.Ct. 1970, 90 L.Ed.2d 654 (1986). 47 Katherine moved freely about the unilluminated interior of the locked cabin, which contained deadly firearms whose exact number and location were unknown to the officers. Cf., e.g., United States v. Smith, 797 F.2d 836, 841-42 (10th Cir.1986) (exigency established for warrantless entry where agents approached aircraft with probable cause to believe it might harbor armed drug dealers); United States v. Guarente, 810 F.Supp. 350, 352-53 (D.Me.1993) (exigency established for warrantless entry where officers remained uncertain about the intentions of armed suspects who might remain inside structure). Only minutes before, Katherine had pointed her rifle at Sergeant Crawford. Cf. O'Brien v. City of Grand Rapids, 23 F.3d 990, 997 (6th Cir.1994) (qualified immunity claim disallowed where suspect had taken no action against the officers and did not point the gun at anyone; noting that threat to police must be immediate). 11 Prior to their forced entry, the officers realized that the cabin walls were paper thin, 12 thus affording insufficient cover should Katherine decide to fire from inside the cabin--a serious contingency that competent officers reasonably could take into account given the violent, irrational and unpredictable behavior recently exhibited by their barricaded suspect, including her peculiar bouts of laughter, history of emotional instability and demonstrated antagonism toward law enforcement personnel. In such circumstances, competent police officers reasonably could conclude that to announce their intention to place the barricaded suspect under arrest--dispensing with their ruse that they were there only to help her--might well spark renewed violence. 48 Finally, once their objectively reasonable locate-and-contain strategy had positioned several officers in unexpectedly vulnerable positions against the thin cabin walls, cf. Curzi, 867 F.2d at 43, they could neither remain in their positions indefinitely nor safely terminate the impasse by attempting to retreat across the moonlit cabin clearing without directly exposing themselves to potential gunfire. Thus, safe and indefinite containment--either from their vulnerable positions against the cabin walls or from a safer distance--no longer remained a practicable alternative. Cf. United States v. Wilson, 36 F.3d 205, 210 (1st Cir.1994) (upholding denial of motion to suppress evidence because police officers should not be required to remain indefinitely outside apartment located in building which was well-known site of prior drug sales and police shootings); Guarente, 810 F.Supp. at 352-53 (finding it reasonable for police to enter building in circumstances where their alternative was to remain potential targets for any concealed armed suspect who might be inside); cf. also United States v. Hardy, 52 F.3d 147, 149 (7th Cir.1995) (finding exigent threat to officer safety where armed suspect, with known history of violence and drug use, was inside locked motel room and within easy reach of powerful firearm); Russo v. City of Cincinnati, 953 F.2d 1036, 1044-45 (6th Cir.1992) (finding that no unreasonably excessive force had been used against an armed and suicidal person--barricaded inside apartment--who had made threatening statements toward police officers while in intermittent close proximity to them, and showed signs of serious mental instability); Smith, 797 F.2d at 841 (exigency established where officers had probable cause to believe aircraft, which had landed at isolated airfield after dark, might harbor armed drug dealers). 49 We therefore conclude that a competent police officer--possessing the same information the defendant officers had on May 15, 1992--reasonably could have believed both that there existed probable cause to arrest Katherine Hegarty and exigent circumstances justifying their immediate warrantless entry. Consequently, the summary judgment order entered by the district court must be vacated, and summary judgment must be entered for the defendant officers.