Opinion ID: 158329
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Magistrate's and District Court's Reasoning

Text: 15 In evaluating Gohier's proposed claim under Title II of the ADA, the magistrate applied the general standard of Tyler v. City of Manhattan, 849 F. Supp. 1429 (D.Kan. 1994). That standard requires a plaintiff to prove: 16
17 (2) that he [or she] was either excluded from participation in or denied the benefits of some public entity's services, programs, or activities, or was otherwise discriminated against by the public entity; and 18 (3) that such exclusion, denial of benefits, or discrimination was by reason of the plaintiff's disability. 19 Id. at 1439. This general standard, which closely tracks the statute's language, is plainly correct. See Weinreich v. Los Angeles County Metro. Transp. Auth., 114 F.3d 976, 978 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 118 S. Ct. 423 (1997) (stating essentially identical test). Colorado Springs does not contest that it is a public entity, or that Lucero had a disability. That leaves two potentially relevant questions: did the city, by reason of Lucero's disability, either (1) exclude him from participating in or deny him the benefits of services, programs, or activities whose essential eligibility requirements he met, or (2) otherwise subject him to discrimination? 20 The magistrate did not frame the inquiry in terms of those two questions. Instead, in addressing Tyler's second branch, the magistrate adopted the reasoning of an unpublished district court opinion holding that the individual [police] protection of a particular person or . . . class of persons is not . . . a municipal service, benefit, or program. Amirault v. City of Roswell, No. 6:95 CV 422, 1996 WL 391986, at  (D.N.M. July 11, 1996). 21 Amirault involved a Title II claim by a man with whom City police officers had spoken, fearing that he was a suicide risk, but whose assurances that he had changed his mind convinced them to let him go. See id. at . He soon thereafter tried to kill himself. See id. He later sued the City under the ADA, arguing that the police had violated his right to protection (from himself) by not arresting and involuntarily committing him for mental-health evaluation. See id. at . The court held that his claim failed under Tyler's second branch. See id. at -6. It relied on three overlapping rationales: no one has a right to be involuntarily committed for protection from himself; the State has no affirmative duty to protect any person not in its custody; and police protection is not an individualized benefit whose denial can be actionable. See id. The court thus held that the City . . . had no duty to protect Plaintiff from himself . . ., nor was Plaintiff denied a municipal or police service, benefit, or program to which he or any other individual or class of individuals was entitled. Id. at . 22 The magistrate in this case focused on the rule stated in the latter half of that holding, i.e., that police protection is not a municipal service, benefit, or program. He concluded that this rule bars Gohier's proposed ADA claim, which arose from police interaction with Lucero, as a matter of law. 23 Gohier pointed out to the district court that opinions from outside this circuit establish a more specifically relevant test for Title II claims arising from arrests. See Lewis v. Truitt, 960 F. Supp. 175, 178 (S.D.Ind. 1997) (Courts have held that a plaintiff may recover under the ADA where he can show that (1) he was disabled, (2) the defendants knew or should have known that he was disabled, and (3) the defendants arrested him because of legal conduct related to his disability. (citing Barber v. Guay, 910 F. Supp. 790, 802 (D.Me. 1995)); Jackson v. Town of Sanford, No. 94 12 P H, 63 U.S.L.W. 2351, 3 A.D. Cases 1366, 7 A.D.D. 211, 1994 WL 589617, at  (D.Me. Sept. 23, 1994). The district court did not deny that Lewis's test is more appropriate, instead holding only that the magistrate's decision to apply Tyler instead of Lewis had not been contrary to law or clearly erroneous. That conclusion, however, was a non sequitur: the Lewis test is not an alternative to Tyler, but a specific application of the general standard set forth in Tyler. Indeed, the Lewis court itself quoted and applied Tyler. See Lewis, 960 F. Supp. at 177. 24 The propriety of the magistrate's ruling really turns on the second step of his analysis: applying very broadly Amirault's comment that police protection is not an individualized benefit of a public entity's services, programs, or activities, as required by the ADA. Even assuming arguendo the correctness of that debatable comment, the problem with the magistrate's approach is that it ignored the second basis for a Title II claim. As noted above, Title II commands that Lucero not be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of [Colorado Springs], or be subjected to discrimination by [Colorado Springs]. 42 U.S.C. § 12132 (emphasis added). 25 The initial question is thus whether Lewis, on the one hand, or Amirault, as broadly read by the magistrate, correctly decided whether a person with a disability can state a claim under the ADA based on police conduct in an arrest or investigation. In reviewing the magistrate's order, the district court held that, while Amirault's facts are distinguishable, the quoted principle is not. The court thus concluded that denying leave to amend based on Amirault was not clearly erroneous or contrary to law. 26