Court Opinion

ID: 9484308
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:47:54.480828+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:09.267872
License: Public Domain

HEANEY, Senior Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
We should not substitute our judgment in this case for that of the trial court and the jury. Diane Woods clearly presented sufficient facts both before and during trial to make a submissible case to the jury. A properly instructed jury1 found that Woods *503did not voluntarily waive her right to sue the defendants and awarded her $200,000 in compensatory damages and $1 in punitive damages.
I agree that Town of Newton v. Rumery, 480 U.S. 386, 107 S.Ct. 1187, 94 L.Ed.2d 405 (1987), controls this case. There, the Supreme Court made it abundantly clear that whether a release in a particular case is valid or not depends on an examination of all of the circumstances. Justice O’Connor, whose vote was the deciding vote in Rumery, set forth a list of factors that bear on whether a release is voluntary and not the product of overreaching:
The knowledge and experience of the criminal defendant and the circumstances of the execution of the release, including, importantly, whether the defendant was counseled, are clearly relevant. The nature of the criminal charges that are pending is also important, for the greater the charge, the greater the coercive effect. The existence of a legitimate criminal justice objective for obtaining the release will support its validity. And, importantly, the possibility of abuse is clearly mitigated if the release-dismissal agreement is executed under judicial supervision.
Id. at 401-02, 107 S.Ct. at 1196 (O’Connor, J., concurring).
If we view the material submitted for summary judgment in the light most favorable to Woods and give her, as we must, the benefit of all inferences drawn therefrom, the district court was clearly correct in denying summary judgment. Woods stated her reasons for signing the release in a pretrial deposition:
A. I was threatened. If I didn’t sign it I would be going to jail. I was threatened with the fact that they would bring Jay Rhodes back and I was terrified of him. I was informed that it would cost a lot of money to pursue a lawsuit. And I had no money without putting my family’s security in jeopardy.
Q. Who made the threat that you might spend time in jail?
A. The first time it was Dennis Mahr that said I could go to jail for six months. I received a telephone call at home from a man that identified himself from the county attorney’s office that said he would personally bring Jay Rhodes back and he would personally see that I was — it would go the full extent of the law and that he would see that I went to jail if I did not sign the release.
Woods Dep., April 4, 1989, at 10-11. Raymond Lester Reel stated in his pretrial deposition that “the possibility is yes, I did [contact Woods'], but I don’t recall doing it.” Reel Dep., March 24, 1989, at 25. Reel even edneeded that it would have been improper for him to have contacted Woods directly during the pendency of this case if she had an attorney. Reel Dep. at 25. Moreover, not only was the release-dismissal drafted by Reel, unlike in Rumery, it also appears to have been initiated by Reel as well. Reel Dep. at 12-15; Jack Faith Dep., March 2, 1989, at 8-9.2
Reel acknowledged in his deposition that one of his objectives in obtaining the release from Woods was the protection of the Sioux City police officers from any civil liability associated with her arrest. Reel Dep. at 6, 13-16. Strangely, Reel’s concern only appears to have become manifest after he *504viewed pictures of Woods’s alleged injuries resulting from the arrest:3
Q. Okay. When you — when you first looked at those pictures, did they have any impact on you in terms of your thoughts towards disposition of the case?
A. Yes, yes. I think in looking at those pictures, I — Well, I grew apprehensive of the fact that this woman might come back into court and file an action against the city and the police officers for some type of mistreatment.
Q. Okay. And you thought to yourself ... “Oh, oh. I better get a release.”
A. Well, I could have — That’s basically what I could have been thinking, because at that time, we knew Jay Rhodes was not in town.
Reel Dep. at 13-14.
It may well have been that Reel was also concerned about the fact that a key witness would have to be flown in from Alabama to testify in the matter. This issue, however, was submitted to the jury, and the jury refused to excuse Reel’s conduct on this basis. Certainly this expense paled in comparison to the severe injuries that Woods allegedly received at the hands of the officers.
The majority points out that Woods was represented at the time she signed the release. In contrast to Rumery, however, the county prosecutor prepared the release, and also unlike Rumery, Woods was an unsophisticated criminal defendant.
Rumery makes it clear that the nature of the pending criminal charge is also important because “the greater the charge, the greater the coercive effect.” Rumery, 480 U.S. at 401, 107 S.Ct. at 1196 (O’Connor, J., concurring). Here, the combined charges against Woods were significant: (1) speeding, Iowa Code Ann. § 321.285 (West 1985); (2) failure to obey a peace officer, Iowa Code Ann. § 321.229 (West 1985); (3) operating while under the influence of alcohol (OWI), Iowa Code Ann. § 321J.2 (West 1993); (4) assault, Iowa Code Ann. § 708.1(1) (West 1993); (5) disorderly conduct, Iowa Code Ann. § 723.4 (West 1993); and (6) eluding a peace officer in violation of the Municipal Code of Sioux City, Iowa.4 Certainly the nature of these charges had an impact on the voluntariness of the release.
Finally, Reel made no attempt to mitigate the possibility of abuse by having the release-dismissal agreement executed under judicial supervision. In view of the gravity of the charges against Woods and in light of the serious injuries she allegedly suffered at the hands of the officers, judicial supervision should have been a necessary step.
While there is an important public interest in release-dismissal agreements that protect public officials from the substantial burdens of defending marginal and frivolous section 1983 lawsuits, Rumery, 480 U.S. at 395-96, 107 S.Ct. at 1193, that interest does not appear to be implicated in the case before us. There is also a strong public interest in the vindication of constitutional rights and the exposure of official misconduct. Id. Especially in today’s society, exposure and vindication of excessive force claims against police officers serve important public interests. This, along with the public interest in the nature of the charges against Woods, when weighed against the prosecutorial reasons for obtaining the release (cost and difficulty of success), leads me to the conclusion that the interest in the enforcement of the release-*505dismissal is outweighed by the harm to public policy from its enforcement.5
The district court’s denial of the defendants’ motion for summary judgment was clearly sustained by the record. Therefore, I respectfully dissent.

. Jury instruction number 29 reads as follows:
You have heard evidence in this case that Diane Woods signed a release (Exhibit 7) whereby the criminal charges against her would be dropped if she promised not to file a civil suit against the City of Sioux City or the defendant police officers.
A release agreement of this nature is enforceable against the plaintiff if you find that plaintiff made a voluntary choice to sign the agreement. In determining the voluntariness of this release agreement you should consider the knowledge and experience of the criminal defendant in that case, Diane Woods, and the circumstances of the execution of the release, including, whether the defendant was counseled, the nature of the criminal charges that are pending against the defendant, the existence of a legitimate criminal justice objective for obtaining the release, and whether the release agreement was judicially su-*503pcrvised. In this case, the parties have agreed that the release was not judicially supervised. However, that is just one factor to be considered.
The defendants contend that the real reason for agreeing to the dismissal of the charges was to save the airplane expenses of bringing Officer Rhodes back from Alabama. The plaintiff contends that the defendants' real reason was to unfairly put her in a situation where she had to sign the waiver. , The burden of proving the agreement's validity and enforceability rests on the defendants here.
If you find that plaintiff's decision to sign the agreement was not voluntary, then plaintiff will be entitled to damages if you have also found in her favor on one or more of- the claims outlined above in these instructions. If you find that plaintiff’s decision to sign the agreement was voluntary, then you must find in favor of the defendants on all counts.

. Unlike the present case, the only evidence of prosecutorial misconduct in Rumery was the release-agreement itself. Rumery, 480 U.S. at 397, 107 S.Ct. at 1194.

. The plurality in Rumery notes, which the majority in the present case acknowledges, that release-dismissal agreements that tempt prosecutors to dismiss meritorious charges in order to protect the interests of other officials "properly have been recognized as unethical.” Rumery, 480 U.S. at 394 n. 4, 107 S.Ct. at 1192 n. 4. Here, there is a question whether the charges against Woods were meritorious. See Reel Dep. at 14 ("Q. Arc one of your concerns in the disposition of a case such as [Woods's] protecting the officers from civil liability? A. That’s not— certainly not a primary concern of mine. It’s in those cases where I have to dismiss charges, that I believe arc otherwise valid, that it does come in — at least it came into play that time.”).

. Woods also has a prior criminal record: in 1981 she was arrested for "another [OWI]” by the Sioux City Police Department, but was later found innocent, and in 1987 she was arrested for shoplifting for which she paid a fine. Woods Dep. at 27.

. See Rumery, 480 U.S. at 392, 107 S.Ct. at 1191 ("[A] promise is unenforceable if the interest in its enforcement is outweighed in the circumstances by a public policy harmed by enforcement of the agreement.” (footnote omitted)).