Larios v. Lunardi, et al
Filing
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MEMORANDUM AND ORDER signed by District Judge Morrison C. England, Jr. on 4/18/2017 GRANTING 24 Defendants' Motion to Dismiss, with LEAVE to AMEND; Plaintiff may file an amended complaint not later than 20 days following the date this Memorandum and Order is electronically filed. (Reader, L)
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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
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EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
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TIMOTHY LARIOS,
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Plaintiff,
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No. 2:15-cv-02451-MCE-CMK
v.
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
SCOTT LUNARDI, et al.,
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Defendants.
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Plaintiff Timothy Larios originally initiated this lawsuit against six defendants—
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Scott Lunardi, Mel Hutsell, T.A. Garr, Lieutenant Foster, R.J. Jones, and Joseph A.
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Farrow—claiming they violated his rights by searching his personal cellular phone.
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Defendants, however, filed a Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 15, which was granted in part
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and denied in part, ECF No. 22. All of Plaintiff’s claims except those premised on the
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Fourth Amendment were dismissed for failure to state a claim. The motion also
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eliminated Plaintiff’s claims in their entirety against Defendants Hutsell, Garr, and
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Farrow. Plaintiff was given leave to amend his claims against Hutsell and Garr, but the
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claims against Farrow were dismissed with prejudice. He then filed a Second Amended
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Complaint (“SAC”), ECF No. 23, which re-alleges claims against Hutsell, but not against
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Garr. Currently before the Court is Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss those remaining
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claims. ECF No. 24. For the reasons that follow, that Motion is GRANTED.1
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BACKGROUND2
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Plaintiff was an officer with the California Highway Patrol (“CHP”) and was
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assigned to the Shasta Interagency Narcotics Task Force. While working for the CHP,
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Plaintiff had both a cell phone issued to him by the CHP and a personal cell phone.
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In September 2013, Plaintiff was removed from his position and was told that he
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was the subject of an internal investigation. The investigation was led by Defendants
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Lundardi and Hutsell. During the course of those proceedings, Plaintiff was originally
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ordered to relinquish only his state-issued phone for searching. However, on
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November 6, 2014, Plaintiff was also ordered to hand over his personal phone.
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On that day, Plaintiff met with Lieutenant Foster, Officer Lunardi, and an
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unidentified officer in Lieutenant Foster’s office. Despite Lieutenant Foster having
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advised Plaintiff that he would not need a union representative to accompany him,
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Plaintiff’s union representative was also present. Plaintiff initially refused to give up his
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phone on grounds that it contained purely personal information. In response, Lunardi
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provided Plaintiff with a memorandum that was written by Jones and directed Plaintiff to
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relinquish his phone so that the CHP could “conduct a data extraction to retrieve all work
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product.” ECF No. 23, ¶ 18. The memorandum warned that Plaintiff would be subject to
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“charges/disciplinary action” if he failed to cooperate. Id.
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Plaintiff continued to object and offered to voluntarily show Officer Lunardi any
and all work product stored on Plaintiff’s personal phone. Officer Lundardi rejected
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Because oral argument would not have been of material assistance, the Court ordered this
matter submitted on the briefs. See E.D. Cal. Local R. 230(g).
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The following recitation of facts is taken, sometimes verbatim, from the allegations contained in
Plaintiff’s SAC.
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Plaintiff’s offer and assured Plaintiff that his personal phone would only be confiscated
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for three to four hours. Because Plaintiff was concerned he might be subject to criminal
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prosecution if he failed to obey his superior’s directives, he eventually relinquished his
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personal phone to Officer Lunardi.
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Plaintiff’s phone was returned to him approximately eight hours later. Upon its
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return, Plaintiff noticed that phone calls had been made from his device after he had
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turned it over and that all of the information stored on the phone had been searched and
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downloaded.
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Plaintiff was subsequently informed that he was suspected of violating a number
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of sections of the California Penal Code. On two separate occasions, Plaintiff was
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issued Miranda warnings and interrogated by Defendants. Officers Lunardi and Hutsell
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questioned Plaintiff about personal information discovered on his phone, and Officer
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Hutsell admitted that the reason Plaintiff’s phone had been searched was to gather that
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personal information. As a result of the investigation, Plaintiff was terminated. This
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action followed.
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STANDARD
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On a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim under Federal Rule of Civil
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Procedure 12(b)(6), all allegations of material fact must be accepted as true and
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construed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Cahill v. Liberty Mut. Ins.
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Co., 80 F.3d 336, 337–38 (9th Cir. 1996). Rule 8(a)(2) “requires only ‘a short and plain
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statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief’ in order to ‘give the
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defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is and the grounds upon which it rests.’” Bell
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Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007) (quoting Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41,
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47 (1957)). A complaint attacked by a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss does not require
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detailed factual allegations. However, “a plaintiff's obligation to provide the grounds of
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his entitlement to relief requires more than labels and conclusions, and a formulaic
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recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do.” Id. (citation omitted). A court
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is not required to accept as true a “legal conclusion couched as a factual allegation.”
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Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555).
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“Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level.”
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Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555 (citing 5 Charles Alan Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal
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Practice and Procedure § 1216 (3d ed. 2004) (stating that the pleading must contain
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something more than “a statement of facts that merely creates a suspicion [of] a legally
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cognizable right of action”)).
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Furthermore, “Rule 8(a)(2) . . . requires a showing, rather than a blanket
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assertion, of entitlement to relief.” Id. at 555 n.3 (citation omitted). Thus, “[w]ithout some
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factual allegation in the complaint, it is hard to see how a claimant could satisfy the
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requirements of providing not only ‘fair notice’ of the nature of the claim, but also
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‘grounds’ on which the claim rests.” Id. (citing Wright & Miller, supra, at 94–95). A
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pleading must contain “only enough facts to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its
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face.” Id. at 570. If the “plaintiffs . . . have not nudged their claims across the line from
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conceivable to plausible, their complaint must be dismissed.” Id. However, “[a] well-
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pleaded complaint may proceed even if it strikes a savvy judge that actual proof of those
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facts is improbable, and ‘that a recovery is very remote and unlikely.’” Id. at 556 (quoting
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Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 236 (1974)).
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A court granting a motion to dismiss a complaint must then decide whether to
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grant leave to amend. Leave to amend should be “freely given” where there is no
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“undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, . . . undue prejudice
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to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, [or] futility of the
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amendment . . . .” Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962); Eminence Capital, LLC v.
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Aspeon, Inc., 316 F.3d 1048, 1052 (9th Cir. 2003) (listing the Foman factors as those to
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be considered when deciding whether to grant leave to amend). Not all of these factors
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merit equal weight. Rather, “the consideration of prejudice to the opposing party . . .
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carries the greatest weight.” Id. (citing DCD Programs, Ltd. v. Leighton, 833 F.2d 183,
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185 (9th Cir. 1987)). Dismissal without leave to amend is proper only if it is clear that
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“the complaint could not be saved by any amendment.” Intri-Plex Techs. v. Crest Grp.,
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Inc., 499 F.3d 1048, 1056 (9th Cir. 2007) (citing In re Daou Sys., Inc., 411 F.3d 1006,
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1013 (9th Cir. 2005); Ascon Props., Inc. v. Mobil Oil Co., 866 F.2d 1149, 1160 (9th Cir.
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1989) (“Leave need not be granted where the amendment of the complaint . . .
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constitutes an exercise in futility . . . .”)).
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ANALYSIS
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In its prior Order, the Court found the following allegations against Hutsell
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insufficient to state a claim that Hutsell had violated Plaintiff’s Fourth Amendment rights:
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“Hutsell led the investigation into Plaintiff’s conduct, questioned Plaintiff after he was
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mirandized, and advised Plaintiff at some point after Plaintiff’s phone had been searched
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that the purpose of examining the cell phone was to gather personal information.” Mem.
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& Order, ECF No. 22, at 10. These allegations were insufficient because “Plaintiff d[id]
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not allege that Officer Hutsell was involved in the search or knew that it occurred until
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after the fact.” Id.
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Seemingly to remedy this error, Plaintiff amended his complaint to include the
following allegation:
On information and belief, OFFICERS, including but not
limited to HUTSELL and LUNARDI, searched the entirety of
the telephone and downloaded and kept personal and private
information of plaintiff.
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SAC, ¶ 23. This purely conclusory statement, however, is insufficient to state a claim
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against Hutsell. Plaintiff’s bald assertion that Hutsell searched his personal phone fails
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to contain enough factual allegations to “nudge[] [his] claims across the line from
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conceivable to plausible.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570. In contrast, to support his claims
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against other Defendants, Plaintiff either alleges that they were present when Plaintiff
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was told to hand over his cell phone (Lunardi and Foster) or that they wrote the
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memorandum directing Plaintiff to relinquish it (Jones). Plaintiff fails to provide any
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similar factual allegations to make his claim that Hutsell searched his personal cell
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phone sufficiently plausible under the Twombly/Iqbal standard.
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CONCLUSION
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For the reasons above, Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 24, is GRANTED
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with leave to amend. Plaintiff may (but is not required to) file an amended complaint not
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later than twenty (20) days following the date this Memorandum and Order is
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electronically filed. If no amended pleading is timely filed, the causes of action
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dismissed by virtue of this order will be deemed dismissed with prejudice upon no further
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notice to the parties.
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IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated: April 18, 2017
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