Thorpe v. Delta Air Lines, Inc.

• Court: Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit
• Decided: October 9, 2025
• Docket: 25-58
• Status: Unpublished

Opinion

25-58 Thorpe v. Delta Air Lines, Inc.

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT

SUMMARY ORDER

RULINGS BY SUMMARY ORDER DO NOT HAVE PRECEDENTIAL EFFECT. CITATION TO A SUMMARY ORDER FILED ON OR AFTER JANUARY 1, 2007, IS PERMITTED AND IS GOVERNED BY FEDERAL RULE OF APPELLATE PROCEDURE 32.1 AND THIS COURT’S LOCAL RULE 32.1.1. WHEN CITING A SUMMARY ORDER IN A DOCUMENT FILED WITH THIS COURT, A PARTY MUST CITE EITHER THE FEDERAL APPENDIX OR AN ELECTRONIC DATABASE (WITH THE NOTATION “SUMMARY ORDER“). A PARTY CITING A SUMMARY ORDER MUST SERVE A COPY OF IT ON ANY PARTY NOT REPRESENTED BY COUNSEL.

At a stated term of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, held at the Thurgood Marshall United States Courthouse, 40 Foley Square, in the City of New York, on the 9th day of October, two thousand twenty-five.

PRESENT: MYRNA PÉREZ, SARAH A. L. MERRIAM, Circuit Judges. * ------------------------------------------------------------------ QUINCY THORPE,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v. No. 25-58

DELTA AIR LINES, INC.,

Defendant-Appellee. ------------------------------------------------------------------

* Judge Alison J. Nathan, who was originally assigned to the panel, is unable to participate in consideration of this matter. Pursuant to this Court’s Internal Operating Procedures, the appeal has accordingly been heard and decided by the remaining two judges of the panel. See 2d Cir. IOP E(b). FOR PLAINTIFF-APPELLANT: NATRAJ S. BHUSHAN, Turturro Law, P.C., Staten Island, NY

FOR DEFENDANT-APPELLEE: IRA G. ROSENSTEIN, (John P. Guyette, on the brief), Morgan, Lewis & Bockius LLP, New York, NY

Appeal from a judgment of the United States District Court for the Eastern District

of New York (Gonzalez, J.).

UPON DUE CONSIDERATION, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED, ADJUDGED,

AND DECREED that the judgment of the District Court is AFFIRMED.

Quincy Thorpe appeals from a December 9, 2024 judgment of the United States

District Court for the Eastern District of New York dismissing his action against Delta Air

Lines, Inc. (“Delta”) for failure to state a claim. Thorpe appeals solely the dismissal of

his malicious prosecution claim. We assume the parties’ familiarity with the underlying

facts and the record of prior proceedings, to which we refer only as necessary to explain

our decision to affirm.

I. Background

While working for Delta at the John F. Kennedy International Airport (“JFK”),

Thorpe sustained a work-related shoulder injury. The following day, he informed Delta

of the injury and was excused from work. Delta subsequently authorized Thorpe to be

placed on medical leave.

2 On the same day as Thorpe’s injury, a bag of approximately $258,205 in cash was

stolen while being transported at JFK to a Delta aircraft. Two days later, the FBI arrested

Thorpe, while he was out on medical leave, on charges related to the stolen cash. Thorpe

was subsequently indicted by a grand jury but was acquitted of all charges after a jury

trial.

The operative complaint alleges, upon information and belief, that Delta

knowingly provided false and/or misleading information to law enforcement which was

material to Thorpe’s indictment. In relevant part, the District Court found that Thorpe

had failed to plausibly allege a malicious prosecution claim under New York law.

Thorpe timely appealed.

II. Discussion

We review a district court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim de novo. See

Costabile v. N.Y.C. Health & Hosps. Corp., 951 F.3d 77, 80 (2d Cir. 2020). “Under New York

law, a malicious-prosecution claim requires a plaintiff to show ‘(1) the initiation or

continuation of a criminal proceeding against plaintiff; (2) termination of the proceeding

in plaintiff’s favor; (3) lack of probable cause for commencing the proceeding; and (4)

actual malice as a motivation for the defendant’s actions.’” Dettelis v. Sharbaugh, 919 F.3d

161, 163–64 (2d Cir. 2019) (quoting Murphy v. Lynn, 118 F.3d 938, 947 (2d Cir. 1997)).

Because each element is essential to Thorpe’s claim, if the Court determines that one

3 element is lacking, it need not address the others. This case can be disposed of on the

third element, because of the existence of probable cause. See Savino v. City of New York,

331 F.3d 63, 72 (2d Cir. 2003) (“[T]he existence of probable cause is a complete defense to

a claim of malicious prosecution in New York.”).

Under New York law, where a plaintiff has been indicted by a grand jury, the

indictment creates “a presumption of probable cause.” Id. To ultimately prevail in

such circumstances, a plaintiff must rebut that presumption by pointing to “evidence that

the indictment was procured by fraud, perjury, the suppression of evidence or other . . .

conduct undertaken in bad faith.” Id. (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

Of course, at the pleadings stage, plaintiffs need only plausibly allege facts that allow the

Court to draw the reasonable inference that the grand jury indictment was secured

through such means. See Costabile, 951 F.3d at 80–81.

Thorpe argues the amended complaint plausibly alleges grounds for overcoming

the presumption of probable cause. He alleges Delta knowingly provided false or

misleading information to investigators regarding key facts, which he says proves the

indictment was procured through fraud, perjury, suppression of evidence, or other

conduct undertaken in bad faith. In turn, Delta argues that the amended complaint is

silent as to the evidence used to secure the indictment in the grand jury, and that Thorpe’s

allegations are no more than conjecture.

4 The amended complaint does allege that the purportedly false or misleading

information provided by Delta was “material in securing the indictment against

Plaintiff.” J. App’x at 10. Even assuming that is sufficient at the pleadings stage, the

relevant allegations suffer from a more fundamental problem: they are made on

information and belief. See id. Though allegations on information and belief may

sometimes be enough to overcome the presumption, we have held that “[t]hose magic

words will only make otherwise unsupported claims plausible when ‘the facts are

peculiarly within the possession and control of the defendant or where the belief is based

on factual information that makes the inference of culpability plausible.’” See Citizens

United v. Schneiderman, 882 F.3d 374, 384–85 (2d Cir. 2018) (quoting Arista Recs., LLC v.

Doe 3, 604 F.3d 110, 120 (2d Cir. 2010)).

Neither of those conditions is met here. First, Thorpe’s failure to allege facts

based on personal knowledge is inexcusable because Thorpe was present throughout an

entire trial based on the indictment relevant here, and that trial was completed prior to

the filing of his amended complaint. Thorpe is thus aware of the evidence that was used

to unsuccessfully prosecute him, and he can draw upon that evidence to support

allegations of bad faith conduct. Second, the amended complaint does not identify any

facts capable of plausibly suggesting that the grand jury indictment was improperly

secured.

5 Thus, Thorpe’s allegations on information and belief are insufficient to overcome

the presumption of probable cause, and as a result, he has failed to state a malicious

prosecution claim.

We have considered Thorpe’s remaining arguments and conclude that they are

without merit. For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the District Court is

AFFIRMED.

FOR THE COURT: Catherine O’Hagan Wolfe, Clerk of Court