Jones v. J.C. Penny's Department Stores Inc.

317 F. App'x 71
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Second Circuit
DecidedMarch 25, 2009
DocketNo. 07-2870-cv
StatusPublished

This text of 317 F. App'x 71 (Jones v. J.C. Penny's Department Stores Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Jones v. J.C. Penny's Department Stores Inc., 317 F. App'x 71 (2d Cir. 2009).

Opinion

SUMMARY ORDER

Nakiesha Jones brought a complaint alleging various causes of action under federal and New York law related to her arrest for alleged shoplifting at a J.C. Penney’s department store. Jones, who is an African-American female, alleges that she was targeted for surveillance, falsely arrested, falsely imprisoned, and maliciously prosecuted on account of her race by J.C. Penney’s Department Stores Inc., J.C. Penney’s employees Paul Meerboth and Nicholas Goodwin, and Erie County Deputy Sheriff Scott Piel. She appeals from a May 31, 2007, 2007 WL 1577758, order of the district court adopting the report and recommendations of Magistrate Judge Leslie G. Foschio granting defendants’ motion for summary judgment and dismissing the complaint. The issues on appeal are whether the district court erred in (1) granting summary judgment for defendants and (2) imposing various scheduling and discovery orders. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying [73]*73facts, procedural history, and specification of issues for review.

We review a grant of summary judgment de novo, Havey v. Homebound Mortgage, Inc., 547 F.3d 158, 163 (2d Cir.2008), and discovery rulings for abuse of discretion, In re “Agent Orange Prod. Liab. Litig., 517 F.3d 76, 102 (2d Cir.2008).

Jones argues that the district court erred in concluding that there was probable cause for her arrest, but she failed to come forward with any facts creating a genuine issue with respect to this question. Probable cause exists where “officers have knowledge or reasonably trustworthy information of facts and circumstances that are sufficient to warrant a person of reasonable caution in the belief that the person to be arrested has committed or is committing a crime.” Weyant v. Okst, 101 F.3d 845, 852 (2d Cir.1996) (citations omitted). Jones does not dispute that, from the store surveillance tape, it appears that she went into a fitting room with five items of J.C. Penney’s merchandise, that she emerged with only three items, and that a price tag could be seen protruding from her bag, which appeared to be fuller than it had been when she entered the fitting room. She does not dispute that a J.C. Penney’s employee informed Deputy Sheriff Piel that the missing items were not found in the fitting room immediately after Jones’s departure. Piel reasonably relied on these statements and the videotape in determining that there was probable cause to arrest Jones. Jones faults Piel for relying on the eyewitness reports of the J.C. Penney’s employees, but she fails to argue that there were any “circumstances [which] raise doubt as to the ... veracity” of those reports. Curley v. Vill. of Stiffen, 268 F.3d 65, 69-70 (2d Cir.2001).

Jones also argues that there was no probable cause because, some time after she had left J.C. Penney’s, she was stopped by officers at another store, at which time she was accused of another incident of shoplifting, but the missing J.C. Penney’s merchandise was not found in her bag. However, in light of the videotape and other evidence from which the J.C. Penney’s employees and Piel could reasonably have concluded that Jones had stolen the J.C. Penney’s merchandise, the fact that the lost goods were not ultimately recovered by defendants is not so exculpatory that it undermines probable cause for Jones’s prosecution; Jones could have hidden the items elsewhere. Thus, we agree with the district court that there was probable cause for Jones’s arrest and prosecution. See Curley, 268 F.3d at 69-70.

The district court’s conclusion that the officers had probable cause required dismissal of her federal and state law claims for false arrest, false imprisonment, and malicious prosecution.1 See Bonide Prods., Inc. v. Cahill, 223 F.3d 141, 145 (2d Cir.2000) (“To prove a § 1983 or state law claim of malicious prosecution, [a plaintiff] must establish [inter alia] ... that there was no probable cause for the criminal proceeding; ... ”); Weyant, 101 F.3d at 852 (“The existence of probable cause to arrest constitutes justification and is a complete defense to an action for false arrest, whether that action is brought under state law or under § 1983.” (quotation marks and citation omitted)); Zanghi v. Inc. Vill. of Old Brookville, 752 F.2d 42, 45 [74]*74(2d Cir.1985) (“It is abundantly clear that a finding of probable cause will defeat state tort claims for false arrest, false imprisonment and malicious prosecution.”). Thus, we do not reach the issues with respect to the other elements of these claims.

Although the complaint does not characterize the claims as such, Magistrate Judge Foschio analyzed Jones’s arguments that she was singled out by the J.C. Penney’s defendants due to her race as a claim of selective prosecution. Probable cause for arrest is not a complete defense to a selective prosecution claim. See United States v. Armstrong, 517 U.S. 456, 464, 116 S.Ct. 1480, 134 L.Ed.2d 687 (1996). “The requirements for a selective-prosecution claim draw on ‘ordinary equal protection standards.’ ” Id. at 465, 116 S.Ct. 1480. A successful selective prosecution claim based on race requires that the plaintiff show “that similarly situated individuals of a different race were not prosecuted.” Id. The Magistrate Judge concluded that “the record is utterly devoid of any evidence demonstrating that Defendants selectively prosecuted African-Americans for shoplifting, while not pursuing similar charges against white shoplifters.”

Jones presented no direct evidence that the defendants harbored animus towards her based on her race. However, Jones points to a statement by Meerboth that he began monitoring her with the store’s surveillance cameras because she was shopping in a department that did not seem “age appropriate,” among other reasons. Jones stated that she was shopping in the women’s clothing department at the time. Assuming Jones is correct, this fact could suggest that one of Meerboth’s race-neutral reasons for focusing surveillance on Jones was pretense. But this suggestion of pretense is not sufficient to allow a reasonable jury to conclude that the J.C. Penney’s defendants identified Jones to the police due to her race, rather than due to reasonable suspicion that she had been shoplifting after they saw her emerge from the dressing room. A “scintilla of evidence” is insufficient to defeat a motion for summary judgment. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 252, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986).

Jones argues that there is a genuine dispute as to whether she was singled out by the J.C. Penney’s defendants due to her race based on the surveillance videotape, which shows that officers zoomed the camera in on African American female shoppers engaged in innocent conduct at least three times during the ninety minutes pri- or to Jones’s arrival at the store. However, Jones does not dispute that the cameras also tracked white shoppers engaged in similar behavior. Jones also submitted the affidavit of Marquita Sharp, a J.C.

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317 F. App'x 71, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/jones-v-jc-pennys-department-stores-inc-ca2-2009.