Steve Hobart v. City of Stafford

582 F. App'x 348
Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit·Decided September 16, 2014·No. 13-20022·Unpublished·Cited by 10 cases

Opinions

JAMES E. GRAVES, Jr., Circuit Judge: *

This is an appeal of the district court’s denial of a motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity in an excessive force case arising from the shooting death of a mentally ill teenager after the parents sought the assistance of a [350] Crisis Intervention Team officer in transporting the teenager to the hospital. Because the district court did not err and we lack jurisdiction over this appeal with regard to Officer Jesus Estrada, we DISMISS as to the first issue. A separate majority REVERSES the denial of summary judgment as to Chief Bonny Krahn, granting him qualified immunity on the claim he failed to train on the appropriate use of force.

FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Aaron Hobart was a nineteen-year-old who suffered from a schizoaffective disorder, which caused delusions. Aaron had been under the treatment of various physicians and was taking medication, but stopped taking the medication in November 2008. Aaron’s mental health was deteriorating and on February 16, 2009, his mother, Pam Hobart (Mrs. Hobart), called the office of his psychiatrist, Dr. C. Scott Moreland, to request an appointment. An appointment was scheduled for February 18. Dr. Moreland’s office instructed Mrs. Hobart to notify them if Aaron’s mental status changed and she was instructed to take Aaron to the emergency room or call 911 if he became a danger to himself or others.

On February 18, 2009, Aaron refused to leave his room to visit the doctor. Aaron’s father, Steve Hobart (Mr. Hobart) returned from work to find Aaron in his room and speaking “belligerently and abusively” in a raspy alternate voice. Dr. Moreland instructed Mrs. Hobart not to force Aaron to attend the appointment that day and emailed instructions regarding the administration of Aaron’s medication, for which Dr. Moreland called in a prescription to the local pharmacy. He also provided information on the Houston Crisis Intervention Team (CIT). The CIT program educates police officers on mental illness and tactics to verbally de-escalate situations involving individuals in serious mental health crises. The information provided by Dr. Moreland indicated that the proper course of action in an emergency situation would be to call 911 and request a CIT officer, who would have the appropriate training and could take the patient to a facility for an emergency mental health evaluation.

Mr. Hobart tried unsuccessfully to get Aaron to take the medication, despite informing Aaron that if he failed to take it he would be transported to the hospital so it could be administered and he would not have access to his laptop computer or his cellular telephone. As a result of Aaron’s deteriorating mental health crisis, Mrs. Hobart called 911 and requested a CIT officer. Mrs. Hobart advised the Stafford Police Department (SPD) that Aaron was becoming very violent and delusional, that he needed medication and needed to be in the hospital, but that he was not hurting anyone, did not have any weapons, and was not under the influence of any substance. The operator indicated that an officer would be dispatched to the home. SPD officers Garcia and Claunch were the primary officers dispatched to the house, but Officer Jesus Estrada was the first to arrive on the scene. Estrada, who was then 23 years old, admitted that he had been advised that Aaron was not armed and that he was delusional.

It is undisputed and evidenced by the patrol car dash cam video, that Estrada, who did not wait for the primary responding officers to arrive, entered the home by himself at approximately 15:07:59 and began conversing with Mrs. Hobart. At approximately 15:08:15, Estrada shouted “Stop!” three times and “Get back!” twice, while Mrs. Hobart screamed “Stop!” multiple times. At approximately 15:08:20, [351] twenty-one seconds after Estrada entered the home, gunshots are heard. Estrada then began shouting, “Goddamnit!” “Shots fired!” and “Oh my god!” and Mrs. Hobart was screaming.1 Estrada fired six or seven shots, four of which struck Aaron: one in the back of the right upper neck, which severed his spinal cord; one in the right lower back; one in the back of the right hip; and one in the right middle back. At approximately 15:08:43 the other officers arrived at the house and accompanied Estrada outside onto the lawn, where he knelt down with his head on the ground and sobbed, repeatedly saying, “Oh, my god” and later asking “what is wrong with me?” Dispatch transcripts following the shooting repeatedly indicate that no officers were injured during the incident.

As a result of Aaron’s death, his parents filed an action against the City of Stafford, Estrada, and Chief of Police Bonny Krahn for the unconstitutional use of excessive and deadly force, assault and battery, bystander injury, violations of the Americans with Disabilities Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, and various claims regarding department policy, failure to supervise and failure to train. The district court partially granted the defendants’ motion for summary judgment on various claims. Of relevance to this appeal, by orders dated April 29, 2011, April 17, 2012, and January 9, 2013, the district court denied the defendants/appellants’ motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity, with regard to Estrada’s use of excessive and deadly force and Krahn’s failure to train. Subsequently, Estrada and Krahn filed this appeal.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

This court reviews de novo a district court’s denial of a motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity. Kovacic v. Villarreal, 628 F.3d 209, 211 (5th Cir.2010): Summary judgment is appropriate when “the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R.Civ.P. 56(a). The denial of a motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity is immediately appealable, to the extent that it turns on an issue of law. Kovacic, 628 F.3d at 211. The limitation of the interlocutory appellate jurisdiction to questions of law prohibits this court’s consideration of the correctness of plaintiffs version of the facts. Good v. Curtis, 601 F.3d 393, 397 (5th Cir.2010).

This means that the district court’s finding that a genuine factual dispute exists is a factual determination that this court is prohibited from reviewing in this interlocutory appeal. But the district court’s determination that a particular dispute is material is a renewable legal determination. Thus, a defendant challenging the denial of a motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity must be prepared to concede the best view of the facts to the plaintiff and discuss only the legal issues raised by the appeal.

Id. at 397-98. (Internal marks, citations and emphasis omitted). See also Manis v. Lawson, 585 F.3d 839, 843 (5th Cir.2009) (“If a factual dispute must be resolved to make the qualified immunity determination, that fact issue is material and we lack jurisdiction over the appeal.”).

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Steve Hobart v. City of Stafford, 582 F. App'x 348 (5th Cir. 2014).

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