Opinion ID: 681325
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Scope of Discretionary Authority

Text: 22 The district court held that the marshals had not established that they were acting within their discretionary authority. The court based that conclusion on the fact that the transporting marshals had not addressed whether the act of transporting [Jordan] was discretionary or not. R.2-79 at 16 n. 14. The marshals argue that the district court misinterpreted qualified immunity to protect only discretionary actions and not ministerial acts such as transporting Jordan. From the language quoted above, it does appear that the district court believed an act must be discretionary to receive the protection of qualified immunity. This is an overly narrow interpretation of the term discretionary authority. 23 In Rich v. Dollar, 841 F.2d 1558 (11th Cir.1988), we acknowledged that Zeigler provided no guidance for determining whether a government official's conduct fell  'within the scope of his discretionary authority.'  Id. at 1564. Relying on pre-Harlow cases from this circuit, however, we then defined discretionary authority in this manner: 24 [A] government official can prove he acted within the scope of his discretionary authority by showing 'objective circumstances which would compel the conclusion that his actions were undertaken pursuant to the performance of his duties and within the scope of his authority.' 25 Id. (quoting Barker v. Norman, 651 F.2d 1107, 1121 (5th Cir.1981)). We thus interpreted the term discretionary authority to include all actions of a governmental official that (1) were undertaken pursuant to the performance of his duties, and (2) were within the scope of his authority. Rich, 841 F.2d at 1564. 26 Jordan does not dispute the fact that all of the marshals were acting pursuant to their job functions and within the scope of their authority. The transporting marshals' actions in delivering Jordan from one facility to another clearly fall within the Rich definition of discretionary authority whether such actions be characterized as ministerial or discretionary in nature. Moreover, it would be unwise to engage in a case by case determination of Section 1983 immunity based upon the ministerial versus discretionary nature of the particular official act challenged. Coleman v. Frantz, 754 F.2d 719, 727 (7th Cir.1985); see also McIntosh v. Weinberger, 810 F.2d 1411, 1432 (8th Cir.1987) (finding no recent case ... in which a court has rejected qualified immunity simply because the official in question was performing a ministerial duty), vacated and remanded on other grounds sub nom. Turner v. McIntosh, 487 U.S. 1212, 108 S.Ct. 2861, 101 L.Ed.2d 898, cert. denied, 487 U.S. 1217, 108 S.Ct. 2870, 101 L.Ed.2d 905 (1988). Enders's actions in signing the contracts with county officials also fall within that definition. The district court erred in concluding that the marshals were not entitled to qualified immunity because they had not established that they were acting within the scope of their discretionary authority. 27