Kalk v. Village of Woodmere

500 N.E.2d 384, 27 Ohio App. 3d 145, 27 Ohio B. 177, 1985 Ohio App. LEXIS 10307
CourtOhio Court of Appeals
DecidedNovember 18, 1985
Docket49670
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 500 N.E.2d 384 (Kalk v. Village of Woodmere) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Ohio Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Kalk v. Village of Woodmere, 500 N.E.2d 384, 27 Ohio App. 3d 145, 27 Ohio B. 177, 1985 Ohio App. LEXIS 10307 (Ohio Ct. App. 1985).

Opinion

Patton, J.

Plaintiff-appellant, Joseph Kalk, appeals from the decision of the Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas which denied his motion for summary judgment and granted summary judgment in favor of defendants-appel-lees, the village of Woodmere (“Wood-mere”) and various individuals associated with Woodmere’s government. 1

Appellant filed the instant lawsuit on December 9, 1982, alleging false imprisonment, assault and battery and violations of his federal constitutional rights under Section 1983, Title 42, U.S. Code stemming from a December 7, 1982 Woodmere Council meeting from which he was ejected. Appellant also alleged emotional anguish, defamation and a conspiracy against him. Appellant prayed for $250,000 in compensatory damages and $1,000,000 in punitive damages, plus costs and interest.

Although admitting that they ejected the appellant from the meeting, appellees denied any tortious conduct or violation of appellant’s constitutional civil rights, and alleged several affirmative defenses in their answer of February 24, 1983. On June 21, 1983, appellees filed a motion for summary judgment. Their brief in support of summary judgment set forth the underlying facts of this case as follows:

“Sometime prior to December 7, 1982, the Mayor of the Village of Woodmere, Raynor Smith, preferred written charges against the Chief of Police of the Village of Woodmere, Thomas McClure, seeking the removal of Chief McClure from office for ‘cause’. *146 On or about December 7,1982, a special meeting of the Council of the Village of Woodmere was called pursuant to statute to consider the charges and evidence against Chief McClure. The Council sat as a reviewing quasi-judicial body to hear and decide the merits of the case.

“At such meeting Plaintiff Joseph Kalk, an attorney and non-resident of Woodmere, appeared, purportedly to represent and speak for Mayor Smith, and attempted to speak out to prosecute the Mayor’s case against Chief McClure. In the furtherance of this prosecution Attorney Kalk addressed the Council which objected to this procedure. When Plaintiff Kalk refused to discontinue his repeated attempts to speak out against Chief McClure, after warnings to desist, the Council of the Village of Woodmere, after consultation with Solicitor Orkin, recognized that Plaintiff was disrupting the meeting and threatening Chief McClure’s right to a fair and impartial hearing on the charges, and voted * * * to eject Plaintiff Kalk from the Council chamber. Following his removal, Plaintiff commenced this action.”

Appellees argued that appellant was lawfully removed from the December 7 hearing, therefore, there could be no claim of false imprisonment; that Officer Tatum, who removed appellant from the meeting, used no more force than reasonably necessary so appellant’s assault and battery charges fail; and that appellant had no federally protected right to disrupt the hearing and thus cannot complain that his civil rights were violated. Appellees also attacked appellant’s emotional anguish and defamation claims and asserted the defense of immunity. Attached to ap-pellees’ brief in support of summary judgment were the minutes of the December 7 meeting signed by Mayor Smith, and a transcript of the December 7 proceedings.

On August 30, 1983, appellant filed a motion opposing appellees' motion for summary judgment. Appellant argued that nothing in the Revised Code or the village of Woodmere’s ordinances prohibited the mayor from obtaining legal counsel, i.e., appellant, at his own expense to appear at the December 7,1982 meeting. Appellant argued that council usurped the office of the mayor by taking over the meeting and wrongfully ousting appellant from the meeting. In support of his arguments, appellant attached an affidavit of Mayor Smith stating a history of disputes and grudges between himself and council and between appellant and appellee Orkin, and an order of the common pleas court dated January 18,1983 (case No. 52628) ordering council to hold a rehearing of the December 7, 1982 meeting and to allow appellant Kalk to represent Mayor Smith. On September 2, 1983, appellant moved for summary judgment, incorporating the arguments of his August 30 motion in opposition.

On December 4, 1984, after several more motions were filed by each side and pretrials were held, the trial court granted appellees’ motion for summary judgment. The trial court found that the essential facts precipitating the controversy were not in dispute, and that “for a variety of reasons,” appellees were entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The trial court held, “[n]ot only is Officer Tatum, the principal actor, not a named party, but also, * * * the actions of the [appellees] * * * simply do not constitute the elements of either the tort of false imprisonment or assault and battery. * * * [Appellant’s] claim for punitive damages is not well-founded, and alleged damages for defamation and/or violation of civil rights do not flow from any action allegedly committed by the governmental body or any of its officers.”

From that decision, appellant appeals. He assigns the following errors:

“I. The trial court erred to the *147 prejudice of plaintiff in granting the motion for summary judgment filed by defendants.
“II. The trial court erred to the prejudice of plaintiff in failing to grant plaintiffs motion for summary judgment.”

I and II

As both of appellant’s assigned errors relate to the cross-motions for summary judgment, we will address them together.

Civ. R. 56(C) governs summary judgment and provides in pertinent part as follows:

“* * * Summary judgment shall be rendered forthwith if the pleading, depositions, answers to interrogatories, written admissions, affidavits, transcripts of evidence in the pending case, and written stipulations of fact, if any, timely filed in the action, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving parly is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. No evidence or stipulation may be considered except as stated in this rule. A summary judgment shall not be rendered unless it appears from such evidence or stipulation and only therefrom, that reasonable minds can come to but one conclusion and that conclusion is adverse to the party against whom the motion for summary judgment is made, such party being entitled to have the evidence or stipulation construed most strongly in his favor. * * *”

A

Appellant’s Tort Claims

Appellant sued the village solicitor and several members of council in both their official and individual capacities. All the evidence presented herein concerns the actions of council and its attorney at the council meeting of December 7, 1982. Appellant has presented no evidence to show that appellees were acting in their individual capacity at the meeting. In a motion for summary judgment, such lack of evidence can only be construed against plaintiff-appellant. As nothing was presented to show ap-pellees acted in anything other than their official capacity, summary judgment in favor of appellees as individuals is affirmed.

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Bluebook (online)
500 N.E.2d 384, 27 Ohio App. 3d 145, 27 Ohio B. 177, 1985 Ohio App. LEXIS 10307, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/kalk-v-village-of-woodmere-ohioctapp-1985.