Buckner v. Kilgore

36 F.3d 536, 1994 WL 530736
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit
DecidedOctober 3, 1994
DocketNo. 93-5833
StatusPublished
Cited by49 cases

This text of 36 F.3d 536 (Buckner v. Kilgore) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Buckner v. Kilgore, 36 F.3d 536, 1994 WL 530736 (6th Cir. 1994).

Opinion

HOOD, District Judge.

The defendant-appellant, Stewart Kilgore, II [Kilgore], an officer of the Greeneville, Tennessee Police Department appeals the district court’s denial of his motion for summary judgment based on the defense of qualified immunity in this action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. For the following reasons, we affirm.

I.

This § 1983 suit arises from a roadblock established by Kilgore. Two juveniles, N.L. Buckner, Jr. [Buckner] and George D. Silver [Silver], were injured when the motorcycle [538]*538on which they were riding collided with Kil-gore’s police cruiser.

Around midnight on August 30, 1991, the plaintiffs drove Silver’s stepfather’s motorcycle to the Lil’ Orange Market on the Highway 11-E bypass [the bypass] on state Highway 70 in Greeneville, Tennessee while intoxicated with alcohol and without helmets. The two boys were observed at the market by Greene County Deputy Sheriff Dale Dodds [Dodds]. Dodds radioed the Greene-ville Police Department that he had seen two apparently intoxicated persons, not wearing helmets, on a motorcycle at the Lil’ Orange Market. Kilgore proceeded to investigate the call.

As the boys left the market, another officer attempted to pull them over by activating his cruiser’s blue lights. When Buckner and Silver failed to stop and proceeded to elude the police, a chase ensued up the two northbound lanes of the bypass. Buckner estimates that his speed reached as high as 100 miles per hour during the chase.

A third officer, Jeff Craft, observing that Silver and Buckner were not yielding to the pursuing officer’s blue lights, alerted other units in the vicinity of the chase. Kilgore testified that after this call, he heard the motorcycle approaching at what seemed to be a high rate of speed. Kilgore responded by driving his police cruiser across the two southbound lanes of the bypass onto the median separating the four lane divided thoroughfare and then parked his seventeen foot long cruiser across the two northbound lanes on the bypass on which the boys were proceeding. It is undisputed that the width of the two northbound lanes of the bypass, including the shoulders, was 43.5 feet. Buckner and Silver hit Kilgore’s cruiser shortly thereafter, apparently suffering severe and permanent injuries.1

The parties have contested the circumstances surrounding the collision, particularly the amount of time between Kilgore’s placement of the cruiser across the two northbound lanes and the collision. The plaintiffs allege that Kilgore pulled across the northbound lanes, without his blue lights operating, just seconds prior to impact and thereby failed to give them enough time to either stop or go around the police cruiser safely. An eyewitness, unaffiliated with either of the parties, testified that Kilgore’s cruiser was stopped for only approximately two seconds before the crash occurred. Another non-party witness testified that Kilgore’s cruiser shot straight out from the Amoco station, across the median and then there was a flash — meaning the collision. Kilgore, on the other hand, professes a different version of events. Kilgore admitted in a juvenile proceeding, as well as in his deposition in this case, that he intended to either slow down or stop the boys by establishing the roadblock. He claims, however, that when he parked the cruiser, with the blue lights flashing, across the two northbound lanes, he had enough time to go around the cruiser and wave his flashlight in an attempt to stop the boys. Kilgore states that when he realized that the boys were not going to stop, he slid over the hood of the cruiser, got back in and was attempting to engage the car in reverse when the collision occurred. He further contends that his cruiser should have been visible for approximately 1,500 feet.

Silver and Buckner filed separate § 1983 suits against Kilgore and the City of Greene-ville, alleging that the defendants violated their Fourth Amendment right to be free from unreasonable search and seizures. After the actions were subsequently consolidated, Kilgore filed a motion for summary judgment, asserting qualified immunity, the absence of a seizure under the Fourth Amendment, and the absence of any contravention of a clearly established constitutional right. Upon consent of the parties, the matter was referred to United States Magistrate Judge Joe A. Tilson for disposition pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(c). The magistrate judge denied Kilgore’s motion for summary judgment. Kilgore then brought this interlocutory appeal.

II.

On appeal, Kilgore argues that the district court erred in denying his defense of quali[539]*539fied immunity. Kilgore contends (1) that the plaintiffs failed to state a claim under § 1983 by presenting no evidence such that a reasonable jury could find that the plaintiffs were unreasonably seized within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment, and (2) even if Kilgore violated the plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment rights, he was entitled to qualified immunity because reasonable officers could have disagreed on the lawfulness of his conduct.

Government officials performing discretionary functions have qualified immunity shielding them from civil liability if their actions did not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). In Russo v. Cincinnati, 953 F.2d 1036, 1043 (6th Cir.1992), this Court found that when a defendant moves for summary judgment based on qualified immunity, a plaintiff must effectively pass two hurdles. First, the allegations must state a claim of the violation of clearly established law. Second, the plaintiff must present evidence sufficient to create a genuine issue as to whether the defendant in fact committed the acts that violated the law. Id. (citing Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526, 105 S.Ct. 2806, 2815-16, 86 L.Ed.2d 411 (1985)). Both questions are questions of law which are reviewed de novo. Tucker v. Callahan, 867 F.2d 909, 913-14 (6th Cir.1989); Dominque v. Telb, 831 F.2d 673, 677 (6th Cir.1987). In analyzing a claim of qualified immunity, a court must determine whether the defendant’s alleged conduct violated clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. at 818, 102 S.Ct. at 2738; Russo, 953 F.2d at 1038-40; Birrell v. Brown, 867 F.2d 956, 958 (6th Cir.1989). The burden is on the plaintiff to allege and prove that the defendant official violated a clearly established constitutional right. Tucker v. Callahan, 867 F.2d 909, 913-14 n. 3 (6th Cir.1989).

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36 F.3d 536, 1994 WL 530736, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/buckner-v-kilgore-ca6-1994.