Maughan v. Gomez

• Court: District Court, D. Arizona
• Decided: August 2, 2023
• Docket: 2:21-cv-00882
• Status: Unknown

Opinion

1 WO 2 3 4 5 6 IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 7 FOR THE DISTRICT OF ARIZONA

9 Aaron Maughan, No. CV-21-00882-PHX-DLR

10 Plaintiff, ORDER

11 v.

12 Jacob Gomez, et al.,

13 Defendants. 14 15 16 At issue is Defendants Jacob Gomez and City of Maricopa’s motion for summary 17 judgment. (Doc. 62.) Summary judgment is appropriately granted when there’s no genuine 18 dispute as to any material fact and, viewing those facts most favorably to the nonmoving 19 party, the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). Plaintiff 20 Aaron Maughan, who’s represented by counsel, chose not to respond to this motion, even 21 after requesting and receiving an extension of time in which to respond (Docs. 64-65), and 22 even when, months later, Defendants noted Maughan’s failure to respond in a notice to the 23 Court (Doc. 66). The Local Rules allow the Court to treat a party’s failure to file and serve 24 a response brief as a consent to the granting of the underlying motion. LRCiv 7.2(i). Despite 25 the Local Rule, the Court may not grant summary judgment simply because the opposing 26 party violated this type of local rule. See Marshall v. Gates, 44 F.3d 722, 725 (9th Cir. 27 1995); Henry v. Gill Indus., Inc., 983 F.2d 943, 950 (9th Cir. 1993). In the summary 28 judgment context, the Court must examine the unopposed motion to ensure that the movant 1 is entitled to judgment, even if the nonmoving party, with ample notice of the dispositive 2 motion, has chosen not to respond. In performing this review, the Court may deem all the 3 movant’s facts undisputed, given the nonmovant’s failure to controvert them. See Fed. R. 4 Civ. P. 56(e)(2); Szaley v. Pima Cnty., 371 Fed. App’x 734, 735 (9th Cir. 2010); (Doc. 30 5 at 5 (“Any fact that is ignored may be deemed uncontested.”)). 6 Because the facts are undisputed, the Court eschews their recitation and goes 7 straight to the law. The Court grants Defendants’ unopposed motion. 8 Count I arises under the Fourth Amendment1 and alleges that Officer Gomez 9 impermissibly extended the traffic stop and lacked probable cause to execute the dog sniff 10 and search Maughan’s vehicle. Count II alleges false imprisonment and asserts Maughan 11 was unlawfully detained. Defendants are entitled to judgment on these claims. 12 An officer may conduct a traffic stop on reasonable suspicion that a motorist has 13 committed a civil traffic violation, Arizona v. Johnson, 555 U.S. 323, 333 (2009), but the 14 stop may last only as long as reasonably necessary to effectuate the traffic-enforcement 15 purpose of the stop and take “negligibly burdensome precautions in order to complete” the 16 stop safely, Rodriguez v. United States, 575 U.S. 348, 356 (2015). So long as it doesn’t 17 prolong the traffic stop, an officer may conduct an open-air dog sniff for narcotics. Illinois 18 v. Caballes, 543 U.S. 405, 410 (2005). When a motorist has committed a criminal traffic 19 violation, the officer has probable cause to arrest the motorist. Devenpeck v. Alford, 543 20 U.S. 146, 153-155 (2004) (holding that probable cause supports an arrest so long as the 21 arresting officers had probable cause to arrest the suspect for any criminal offense). 22 Here, Officer Gomez stopped Maughan for committing two criminal traffic 23 violations. (Doc. 62-1 at 48.) Maughan was therefore subject to arrest and not free to leave. 24 The 26-minute detention—when he could’ve been arrested—was not unlawful because the

25 1 The Court notes that Count I also references the Fourteenth Amendment, but because Maughan’s claim challenges Officer Gomez’s search and seizure, the Fourth 26 Amendment grounds his claim, not the Fourteenth. Albright v. Oliver, 510 U.S. 266, 273 (1994) (“Where a particular Amendment provides an explicit textual source of 27 constitutional protection against a particular sort of government behavior, that Amendment, not the more generalized notion of substantive due process in the Fourteenth 28 Amendment must be the guide of analyzing these claims.” (quoting Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 395 (1989)). 1 stop would’ve been lawful even if it were based solely on a civil traffic violation. The 2 traffic stop included the stop itself, calling for backup to ensure officer safety, a 3 conversation with Maughan about his license, temporary registration, and home address 4 (which didn’t match up), a backup officer manually filling out each required field of the 5 warning ticket because the temporary registration lacked a bar code that would’ve allowed 6 the fields to auto-populate, printing and reviewing the ticket, giving the ticket to Maughan, 7 and orally warning him to drive at lawful speeds in a safer manner. (Id. at 16, 19, 24; Doc. 8 62-2 at 45.) Given the undisputed facts and unopposed argument, this was a reasonable 9 duration for the traffic stop. 10 During these 26 minutes, Officer Gomez conducted a 59-second, open-air dog sniff 11 for narcotics after confirming with Maughan that he didn’t have marijuana in his vehicle 12 or on his person. (Doc. 62-1 at 57-58.) The K-9 unit alerted. (Id. at 63-64.) Officer Gomez 13 and his K-9 unit had the appropriate training and demonstrated competence to detect 14 cocaine, heroin, and methamphetamine. The K-9 completed the sniff in 59 seconds and 15 alerted. The sniff happened while the backup officer continued to diligently fill out the 16 warning ticket field by field and therefore didn’t prolong the traffic stop. (Id. at 59-60.) 17 The alert gave Officer Gomez reasonable suspicion of the presence of narcotics and 18 justified his further search of the vehicle and Maughan’s pockets. 19 In sum, the traffic stop was lawful based on Maughan’s speeding and reckless 20 driving. Its duration was a reasonable amount of time to ensure officer safety and issue the 21 warning ticket. The dog sniff, which doesn’t require reasonable suspicion, didn’t extend 22 the duration of the traffic stop. Finally, because the K-9 alerted to the scent of contraband, 23 Officer Gomez had reasonable suspicion of the presence of narcotics that justified the 24 search of Maughan’s vehicle and person. For these reasons Officer Gomez is entitled to 25 judgment on Count I. 26 Officer Gomez also is entitled to judgment on Count II because he had lawful 27 authority to detain Maughan during all relevant times. Slade v. City of Phoenix, 541 P.2d 28 550, 552 (Ariz. 1975). The City of Maricopa can’t be vicariously liable for nothing, and so 1 || it too is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. 2 Because Defendants’ unopposed moving papers are sufficient to support the motion || and don’t on their face reveal a genuine dispute of material fact, Henry, 983 F.2d at 950, 4 IT IS ORDERED that Defendants’ unopposed motion for summary judgment || (Doc. 62) is GRANTED. The Clerk of the Court shall enter judgment accordingly and 6 || terminate the case. 7 Dated this 2nd day of August, 2023. 8 9 10 {Z, 11 _- Ae 12 Upited States Dictric Judge 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28

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