Court Opinion

ID: 9475970
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 05:44:09.236027+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:45:03.352649
License: Public Domain

COFFEY, Circuit Judge,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I concur in the Majority opinion insofar as it holds that neither the individual defendants nor the Village of Robbins has presented adequate grounds to justify this court vacating the default judgment entered in the district court. However, for the reasons set forth in my dissenting opinion in Hibma v. Odegaard, 769 F.2d 1147, 1161 (7th Cir.1985), I do not join that part of the Majority’s opinion holding that the Village is liable for acts of its officials that are clearly outside the scope of their employment.
In Hibma, this court interpreted a Wisconsin indemnification statute “almost identical” (as the Majority opinion concludes, supra at 1148) to the Illinois indemnification statute involved herein as requiring a county to indemnify three deputy sheriffs for a tort judgment against the deputies that was the result of conduct clearly outside the deputies’ scope of employment. The three deputies had framed Hibma to cover up for burglaries the deputies had committed. This court allowed indemnification, ruling that even though the objectives of the deputies “were unquestionably designed to further their own objectives of escaping punishment, they were also designed to further the objectives of Sawyer County.” 769 F.2d at 1152. I dissented since I failed to understand how the deputies furthered the objectives of Sawyer County in acting to cover up their criminal conduct. The record in Hibma established that the deputies had violated their oath of office and abused the authority of the sheriff's office. Furthermore, the deputies admitted at trial that their actions were conceived and carried out for the exclusive, unlawful purpose of removing themselves as suspects in the previous burglaries.
The acts of the Robbins Village officials that gave rise to liability here, while not as clearly outside the scope of their employment as were the acts of the deputies in Hibma, still represent acts which should preclude liability on the part of the Village. The record reveals that when Mayor Smith fired Coleman from his job as special investigator, it was done to avoid public scrutiny as well as the risk of criminal indictment that might have resulted from Coleman’s investigation. It is also clear from the record that other actions of Smith and Police Chief Frierson — refusing to approve Smith’s reappointment as special investigator by the board of trustees, destroying *1151records relating to Coleman’s employment and his investigation, and arresting Coleman for impersonating a police officer— were done in retaliation for Coleman’s investigation. The actions were in no way related to their official duties and were not done to further the purposes of the Village of Robbins, which employed them. I fail to see how these unlawful actions fall within “the scope of employment” of the defendants. I explained in Hibma that this type of reasoning “punishes the taxpayers” for the unlawful acts of its officials and is contrary to “the sound public policy that [officials] who unlawfully act outside the scope of their employment for their own personal interest must be held personally responsible.” 769 F.2d at 1172. I see no logical or legal reason for forcing taxpayers to bear the ultimate responsibility for the acts of public officials that are not within the scope of the officials’ employment and do not further the interests of the governmental unit that employs them.
Accordingly, for the reasons I set forth in my dissent in Hibma, I would affirm the district court’s decision and deny indemnification from the Village of Robbins.