Court Opinion

ID: 9899599
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-17 01:00:31.32198+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:20:41.853692
License: Public Domain

Case: 23-20054         Document: 00516970821             Page: 1      Date Filed: 11/16/2023

              United States Court of Appeals
                   for the Fifth Circuit                                              United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                               Fifth Circuit
                                      ____________                                           FILED
                                                                                      November 16, 2023
                                       No. 23-20054
                                      ____________                                      Lyle W. Cayce
                                                                                             Clerk
   Donna McNeal,

                                                                     Plaintiff—Appellant,

                                             versus

   City of Katy; J. Noe Diaz; Officer Rucker; Officer
   Garcia; Officer Domer; Officer Snowden; Officer
   Reyna; Officer Wiley; Officer Alvarez,

                                               Defendants—Appellees.
                      ______________________________

                      Appeal from the United States District Court
                          for the Southern District of Texas
                                USDC No. 4:21-CV-1163
                      ______________________________

   Before Jones, Barksdale, and Elrod, Circuit Judges.
   Per Curiam: *
          Plaintiff Donna McNeal appeals the district court’s grant of summary
   judgment to Officers Domer and Garcia, arguing that the district court im-
   properly granted the officers qualified immunity. She further appeals the dis-
   trict court’s grant of summary judgment in favor of Police Chief Diaz and the
   City of Katy on her § 1983 claims against those defendants. Because we hold
          _____________________
          *
              This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
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                                    No. 23-20054

   that (1) Domer and Garcia are entitled to qualified immunity, (2) McNeal has
   forfeited her claims against Chief Diaz, and (3) McNeal has failed to establish
   a genuine dispute as to any material fact concerning her Monell claim against
   the City, we AFFIRM.
                                          I
          Because video evidence is available in this case, we are required to
   “view the facts in the light depicted by the videotape.” Salazar v. Molina, 37
   F.4th 278, 280 (5th Cir. 2022) (alteration adopted) (quoting Scott v. Harris,
   550 U.S. 372, 381 (2007)). Inasmuch as that video evidence is inconclusive,
   however, the ordinary summary judgment standard applies. Aguirre v. City
   of San Antonio, 995 F.3d 395, 410 (5th Cir. 2021). Thus, the following facts
   are recounted as depicted by the footage captured by Officer Domer and
   Officer Garcia’s body cameras.       To the extent the video evidence is
   inconclusive, the disputed facts have been recounted—as they must be at
   summary judgment—in the light most favorable to McNeal. Id.
                                         A
          On March 16, 2019, Officers Garcia and Domer separately responded
   to a call concerning a disturbance at Los Cucos Mexican Restaurant in Katy,
   Texas. Garcia and Domer pursued two vehicles containing individuals
   involved in the disturbance. Upon locating the vehicles, observing two
   individuals acting suspiciously, and smelling marijuana, Garcia and Domer
   detained those two people.
          During this detention, Garcia began communicating with Donna
   McNeal, who was standing nearby, between the open driver’s door and the
   driver’s seat of a parked white SUV while another individual sat in the
   driver’s seat. The SUV was parked perpendicular to a second vehicle, a red
   sedan, with the SUV driver’s side door adjacent to the sedan’s right rear
   bumper. Owing to the relative position of the vehicles, the encounter took

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   place in close quarters. During the confrontation, McNeal, in a raised tone,
   stated “You better leave me the f—alone. Leave me alone. You don’t know
   nothing about me.”
         Officer Garcia repeatedly asked McNeal to calm down, to which she
   replied, “I don’t have to calm down.” McNeal repeatedly yelled at Garcia,
   demanding that he not touch her. Garcia also implored McNeal to not “turn
   this into a bigger problem.” Subsequently, Garcia calmly asked McNeal
   multiple times if she was at Los Cucos. Garcia then reframed the question,
   asking what was “going on at Los Cucos.” McNeal responded, beckoning
   and looking at someone off-camera, “that motherf— tried to make us pay for
   s— we didn’t get.” McNeal, Garcia, and the unnamed driver then spoke
   over one another, though McNeal can be heard stating, repeatedly, that she
   was not “with them”—presumably referencing the other individuals
   detained—and thus Garcia “ha[d] no business talking to [her].”
         After McNeal reiterated her demand that Garcia not “talk” to her,
   she slowly began to turn away from Garcia and towards the driver, who was
   sitting mere inches from her. In response, Garcia reached out and grabbed
   McNeal’s right forearm and attempted to place handcuffs on her. McNeal
   intercepted the handcuffs, holding them in her right hand, and tried to
   wriggle her arm free, though Garcia appears to have pulled her closer to his
   person. McNeal alleges that at this point, “Garcia grabbed Ms. McNeal and
   threw her to the ground.” While Appellees argue that McNeal fell on her
   own accord, the video footage is not conclusive on this point. Thus, for the
   purposes of summary judgment review, we presume that Garcia threw
   McNeal to the ground, causing her to hit her head on the sedan’s bumper
   before her elbow broke her fall on the ground. As Garcia grabbed at McNeal,
   Domer—who to this point had stood at the back of the SUV detaining
   another individual—lurched towards McNeal with his arm out, seemingly

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   trying to break her fall. Upon impact, McNeal exclaimed “Oh sh—!” Once
   on the ground, McNeal reached for her head and yelled “Oh my G—!”
         With McNeal on the ground, Domer tried to grab her wrists, place her
   arms behind her back, and handcuff her. As McNeal again resisted being
   handcuffed by flexing her biceps and preventing her arms from being placed
   behind her, Domer took both of McNeal’s arms over her head, dragging her
   on the ground toward the back of the SUV. Once she was clear of the car,
   Domer stopped dragging her and again attempted to handcuff her. In
   response, McNeal did not resist, stating only that she would “put [her arms]
   back” behind her and imploring Domer to not “squish” or twist her arms.
   With McNeal face-down on the ground, Domer secured her by handcuffing
   her with her arms behind her, then helping her off the ground.
          Now on her feet, McNeal again disavowed a relationship with the
   individuals detained and yelled at the officers not to touch her. Garcia then
   escorted McNeal to the back of his police cruiser. After speaking with
   McNeal—who declined Garcia’s offer to secure medical assistance—other
   detained individuals, officers on the scene, and members of McNeal’s family
   over the course of several minutes, Garcia released McNeal. No charges were
   filed against McNeal.
                                        B
         McNeal filed suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in state court, asserting vi-
   olations of her Fourth, Fourteenth, and Eighth Amendment rights against
   Katy Police Chief J. Noe Diaz; Katy Police Officers Rucker, Garcia, Domer,
   Snowden, Reyna, Wiley, and Alvarez; and the City of Katy. Appellees re-
   moved the action to federal court the following month. Chief Diaz and the

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   City of Katy jointly filed for summary judgment, as did the Officers. The
   district court granted summary judgment on all claims. 1
                                                  II
           “This court reviews a grant of a motion for summary judgment de
   novo, and applies the same standard as the district court, viewing the evidence
   in the light most favorable to the nonmovant.” Clark v. Dep’t of Pub. Safety,
   63 F.4th 466, 469 (5th Cir. 2023) (citation omitted) (italics added). Because
   video evidence is available, we are required to “view the facts in the light
   depicted by the videotape.” Salazar, 37 F.4th at 280 (alteration adopted)
   (quoting Scott, 550 U.S. at 381). Inasmuch as that video evidence is incon-
   clusive, however, the ordinary summary judgment standard applies. Aguirre,
   995 F.3d at 410. Ultimately, summary judgment is proper “if the movant
   shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant
   is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
                                                 III
           On appeal, McNeal expressly waives all claims against Officers Snow-
   den, Reyna, Wiley, and Alvarez, appealing only claims against Chief Diaz,
   Officers Domer and Garcia, and the City of Katy. Likewise, while McNeal
   does not expressly waive claims raised under the Eighth and Fourteenth
   Amendments, she fails to mention them, much less brief them, which forfeits
   those claims. DeVoss v. Sw. Airlines Co., 903 F.3d 487, 489 n.1 (5th Cir. 2018)
   (concluding that failure to adequately brief a claim on appeal forfeits it).
   Thus, we focus on McNeal’s claims against Diaz, Domer, Garcia, and the
   City.

           _____________________
           1
               The parties consented to trial before a magistrate judge.

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                                           A
            McNeal appeals the district court’s grant of qualified immunity to
   Domer and Garcia. We affirm, because the officer’s actions did not violate
   clearly established law.
            “The doctrine of qualified immunity protects government officials
   from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly
   established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person
   would have known.” Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231 (2009) (citation
   and quotation marks omitted). “Qualified immunity includes two inquiries.
   The first question is whether the officer violated a statutory or constitutional
   right.    The second question is whether the right at issue was clearly
   established at the time of the alleged misconduct.” Morrow v. Meachum, 917
   F.3d 870, 874 (5th Cir. 2019) (alteration adopted) (quotation marks omitted)
   (quoting Pearson, 555 U.S. at 232).
            “To prevail on an excessive force claim, a plaintiff must show:
   (1) injury, (2) which resulted directly and only from a use of force that was
   clearly excessive, and (3) the excessiveness of which was clearly
   unreasonable.” Tarver v. City of Edna, 410 F.3d 745, 751 (5th Cir. 2005)
   (citation omitted). “Fourth Amendment jurisprudence has long recognized
   that the right to make an arrest or investigatory stop necessarily carries with
   it the right to use some degree of physical coercion or threat thereof to effect
   it.” Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396 (1989). Thus, a reasonable amount
   of force may be used to detain a subject even if that subject is not being
   arrested.
            To “gauge the objective reasonableness of the force used by a law
   enforcement officer, we must balance the amount of force used against the
   need for force[,]” paying “careful attention to the facts and circumstances of
   each particular case.” Flores v. City of Palacios, 381 F.3d 391, 399 (5th Cir.

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   2004) (alteration adopted) (citation and quotation marks omitted). The
   Supreme Court’s decision in Graham v. Connor guides the reasonableness
   inquiry, pointing us to several factors: “[T]he severity of the crime at issue,
   whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or
   others, and whether he is actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade
   arrest by flight.” 490 U.S. at 396.
          McNeal argues that Officers Garcia and Domer both used excessive
   force in violation of clearly established law during their interaction with her.
   First, she argues that Officer Garcia used excessive force when he
   “intentionally grabbed and jerked Ms. McNeal towards the vehicle, causing
   her head to strike against a car.” Further, she argues that Officer Domer
   used excessive force when he dragged her by both arms out from between the
   two vehicles. Specifically, McNeal argues that both uses of force were
   unconstitutional because any use of force would have been unconstitutional
   in these circumstances because “there was no filed criminal complaint” and
   McNeal was not under arrest.
          None of McNeal’s cited cases establish, much less clearly establish,
   that the officers used excessive force. Citing Ware v. Reed, 709 F.2d 345 (5th
   Cir. 1983), she argues that “the use of nearly any amount of force may result
   in a constitutional violation when a suspect ‘poses no threat to [the officers’]
   safety or that of others, and [the suspect] does not otherwise initiate action
   which would indicate to a reasonably prudent police officer that the use of
   force is justified.’” She also cites Ikerd v. Blair, 101 F.3d 430 (5th Cir. 1996),
   for the proposition that a constitutional violation occurs where the amount of
   force used is more than necessary. In Ikerd, the Court held that a reasonable
   jury could conclude that an officer who violently jerked a ten-year-old child
   out of her living room chair and dragged her across a room used excessive
   force when the officer came into the home to arrest the child’s father. Id.
   These cases fall short of clearly establishing that Officers Domer and Garcia

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   used excessive force when detaining McNeal. See Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563
   U.S. 731, 742 (2011) (instructing courts not to “define clearly established law
   at a high level of generality”).
          Indeed, this Court’s precedent forecloses McNeal’s argument.
   Consider, for example, Solis v. Serrett, 31 F.4th 975 (5th Cir. 2022), in which
   our Court recently concluded that qualified immunity applied in similar
   circumstances.     There, this Court held that it was not objectively
   unreasonable for officers to restrain an individual’s arms and force her to the
   ground in a “takedown” maneuver to handcuff her because the individual
   was belligerent prior to her arrest for public intoxication and resisted arrest—
   albeit mildly—by struggling against the officers as they tried to grab her arms.
   Id. at 983. While the Court acknowledged that the individual “did not pose
   an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others,” it reasoned that
   the officers’ action could still be perceived as reasonable. Id. at 981–83.
   Accordingly, the Court held that “even viewing the facts in the light most
   favorable to Solis, we cannot say that the officers violated her constitutional
   right to be free from excessive force.” Id. at 983.
          Solis and other similar precedents support the district court’s
   determination that the force Garcia and Domer deployed in this case did not
   clearly violate McNeal’s Fourth Amendment rights. See, e.g., Craig v.
   Martin, 49 F.4th 404, 411 (5th Cir. 2022) (holding “it was not objectively
   unreasonable” for an officer to “push[] [an arrestee] to the ground while
   maintaining a hold on [his] left arm and releasing it as she slowly descends to
   the ground” following the arrestee’s vocal but non-physical belligerence).
   Moreover, upon review of both officers’ body camera footage, we conclude
   that no reasonable juror could conclude that either officer deployed excessive
   force against McNeal. Scott, 550 U.S. at 381.

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                                            B
          McNeal also appeals the dismissal of her claims against Chief Diaz.
   We affirm, as McNeal forfeited her claim.
          In her opening brief, as Appellees note, McNeal fails to make an argu-
   ment regarding Chief Diaz’s liability. Rather, McNeal only scantly refer-
   ences Chief Diaz in the Statement of Facts, noting that he had a duty to in-
   vestigate the incident, did so, was new to the Katy Police Department, and
   later promoted Domer. In reply, McNeal attempts to remedy her oversight,
   arguing that Diaz had “the authority to retrain, discipline, or ratify the ac-
   tions of Officers Garcia and Domer” but failed to do so, thus ratifying their
   allegedly illegal conduct and giving rise to liability. This effort is too little too
   late. “An appellant abandons all issues not raised and argued in its initial brief
   on appeal.” Cinel v. Connick, 15 F.3d 1338, 1345 (5th Cir. 1994) (emphasis in
   original).
                                            C
          Finally, McNeal appeals the district court’s grant of summary
   judgment against the City of Katy.
          Under the Supreme Court’s decision in Monell, “[m]unicipalities can
   be held liable for violating a person’s constitutional rights under § 1983.”
   Est. of Bonilla by & through Bonilla v. Orange County, 982 F.3d 298, 308 (5th
   Cir. 2020) (citation omitted); see also Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S.
   658, 694 (1978). We need not discuss Monell’s elements let alone whether
   McNeal established them, however: “without a predicate constitutional
   violation, there can be no Monell liability.” Loftin v. City of Prentiss, 33 F.4th
   774, 783 (5th Cir. 2022) (citing Garza v. Escobar, 972 F.3d 721, 734 (5th Cir.
   2020)).      Because we hold that McNeal has failed to establish any
   constitutional violation, “the associated Monell claims must also fail.” Id.

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                            *        *         *
         We AFFIRM.

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