The Estate of Robert Ethan Saylor et al v. Regal Cinemas, Inc. et al
Filing
119
MEMORANDUM OPINION. Signed by Judge William M Nickerson on 9/9/2016. (kw2s, Deputy Clerk)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MARYLAND
THE ESTATE OF ROBERT ETHAN
SAYLOR et al.
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v.
REGAL CINEMAS, INC. et al.
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Civil Action No. WMN-13-3089
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MEMORANDUM
Before the Court are motions for summary judgment filed by:
the State of Maryland, ECF No. 98; Hill Management Services,
Inc. (Hill Management), ECF No. 99; and three Frederick County
Sheriff’s Deputies - Defendants Sgt. Richard Rochford, Lt. Scott
Jewell, and Deputy First Class (DFC) James Harris (the
Deputies), ECF No. 102.
The motions are ripe.
Also pending is
a motion to unseal filed by Plaintiffs, ECF No. 105, and a
motion for leave to file a surreply, ECF No. 117, also filed by
Plaintiffs.
Upon review of the filings and the applicable case
law, the Court determines that no hearing is necessary, Local
Rule 105.6, that the Deputies’ summary judgment motion will be
denied, the State’s summary judgment motion will be granted in
part and denied in part, and Hill Management’s summary judgment
motion will also be granted in part and denied in part.
Plaintiffs’ motion to unseal and motion for leave to file a
surreply will both be granted.
I. INTRODUCTION AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
This case arises out of the death of 26-year-old Robert
Ethan Saylor, an individual with Down syndrome, on January 12,
2013.
Mr. Saylor died after an encounter with the three
Deputies as they attempted to remove him from a movie theater
because he was attempting to view a movie for a second time
without paying for a second ticket.
When this incident began,
the Deputies were working as security guards for Defendant Hill
Management, the sub-management company for the mall in which the
movie theater was located, the Westview Promenade Mall (Westview
Mall).
A struggle ensued in the course of the attempted removal
and, by the end of that struggle, Mr. Saylor suffered a
fractured larynx and died shortly thereafter of asphyxiation.
Mr. Saylor’s parents, Patricia and Ronald Saylor, filed
this suit, individually and as personal representatives of the
Estate of Robert Ethan Saylor (the Estate), on or about October
17, 2013.
The Deputies, Hill Management, the Frederick County
Sheriff’s Office (“FCSO”), and Regal Cinemas, Inc., the owner and
operator of the movie theater (Regal Cinemas), were named as
defendants in the original Complaint.
ECF No. 1.
Plaintiffs
asserted federal claims for violations of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against
the Deputies for their use of excessive force against Mr. Saylor.
Plaintiffs asserted violations of the Americans with Disabilities
Act (“ADA”) against the FCSO based upon its alleged failure to
2
train the Deputies and its vicarious liability for the Deputies’
failure to accommodate Mr. Saylor’s disability.
Plaintiffs also
asserted state-law claims for wrongful death against all the
Defendants; negligence and gross negligence against Regal Cinemas,
the Deputies, and Hill Management; and battery claims against the
Deputies and Hill Management.
Plaintiffs subsequently amended the
Complaint to substitute the State of Maryland (the State) for
the FCSO.
ECF No. 17.
The Deputies, the State, and Regal Cinemas all filed
motions to dismiss.
In its ruling on those motions, the Court
dismissed all claims against Regal Cinemas, the negligence claim
against the Deputies, and the wrongful death claim against the
State.
Estate of Saylor v. Regal Cinemas, Inc., 54 F. Supp. 3d
409, 422, 424, 430-434 (D. Md. 2014).
The Court denied the
Deputies’ motion as to the § 1983 claim, finding that the
allegations in the Amended Complaint supported the conclusion
that the Deputies’ conduct could be found to have constituted an
unreasonable use of force under the three factor analysis set
out in Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989), and that the
Deputies were not entitled to qualified immunity under Harlow v.
Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (1982).
Id. 417-421.
The Court denied
the Deputies’ motion as to Plaintiffs’ gross negligence claim,
finding, inter alia, that the allegations in the Amended
Complaint supported the conclusion that the Deputies acted in
3
reckless disregard of the consequences of their actions.
The
Court denied the motion as to the battery claim, finding that
the alleged excessive use of force overcame the privilege to use
force in effectuating an arrest.
Id. at 423.
The Court also
rejected the Deputies’ argument that Plaintiffs’ wrongful death
claim was improperly pled as a single count.
Id. at 424.
As to
the ADA failure to train claim against the State, the Court
concluded that, from the allegations in the First Amended
Complaint, it did not appear that the Deputies were trained to,
nor did they, make any modifications in their conduct or
response to accommodate Mr. Saylor’s developmental disabilities.
Id. at 427.
The Court also found that the State, as the
statutory employer of the Deputies, would be vicariously liable
for any ADA violation made by the Deputies.
Id. at 428.
After a period of extensive discovery, all of the
Defendants remaining in this action filed the instant motions
for summary judgment.
The Court finds that the evidence
generated in discovery as to the claims against the Deputies and
the State, when viewed in the light most favorable to
Plaintiffs, generally supports the allegations and claims in the
Amended Complaint and the Court will deny their motions for
summary judgment on similar grounds as it denied the motions to
dismiss, except as to the ADA failure to train claim against the
4
State.
As to the claims against Hill Management, the Court will
deny the motion, except as to the battery claim.
II. FACTUAL BACKGROUND
The facts, viewed in the light most favorable to
Plaintiffs, are as follows.1
A. Events of January 12, 2013
Mr. Saylor had an I.Q. of about 40, the physical and facial
features common to individuals with Down syndrome, and was
readily recognizable as someone with this disability.
The
Deputies all testified that they recognized that he was an
individual with Down syndrome as did Kevin Rhodes, the Regal
Cinemas manager on the night in question.
In addition to his
Down syndrome, Mr. Saylor had been diagnosed with Attention
Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (“ADHD”) as a child, and
Oppositional Defiance Disorder (“ODD”), Impulse Control
Disorder, and Anxiety Disorder Not Otherwise Specified in
adulthood.
He was also both short and obese, standing at about
5 feet 6 inches tall and weighing almost 300 pounds.
Mr. Saylor lived in a separate apartment connected to his
mother’s home.
A full-time aide, Mary Crosby, was employed to
assist Mr. Saylor with the activities of daily living, such as
1
Many of the central facts related to this incident are
undisputed. The Court will cite to the record only when there
is a dispute about a particular allegation or when the Court is
directly quoting from the record.
5
shopping, meal preparation, and taking him on outings.
Ms.
Crosby was 18 years old at the time and had been working for Mr.
Saylor for about three months.
On the evening of January 12,
2013, Ms. Crosby took Mr. Saylor to see the film “Zero Dark
Thirty,” using cash provided by Ms. Saylor for that purpose.
Mr. Saylor was an avid movie goer and Ms. Crosby took him to the
movies most of the weekends that she worked for him, always at
Regal Cinemas.
Mr. Saylor had a regular place in the theater in
which he liked to sit.
The film, which was showing in Theater 9, ended around 10
o’clock and, according to Ms. Crosby, Mr. Saylor “stood up,
clapped and had a big smile on his face.”
ECF No. 98-3.
Crosby Dep. at 82,
As they were leaving the theater, however, Mr.
Saylor “started getting a little frustrated,” “was unhappy,” and
when Ms. Crosby asked him if he was ready to go home, he “showed
a little aggression” by punching the window of the store by
which they were walking.
Id. at 83-4.
Because Ms. Crosby was
“a little frightened” by his behavior and was uncertain as to
how to handle the situation, she called Mr. Saylor’s mother.
Id. at 85.
Ms. Crosby told Ms. Saylor that Mr. Saylor was upset
and was yelling at her because he wanted to see the movie again.
Saylor Dep. at 111.
Ms. Saylor told Ms. Crosby that “[h]e’ll be
fine,” and to “just wait him out.”
Id. at 112.
Ms. Saylor also
suggested that Ms. Crosby call Christopher Perry, another one of
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Mr. Saylor’s caregivers who had been working with him for
several years.
Ms. Crosby called Mr. Perry and he opined, based upon his
previous experience, that Mr. Saylor might be upset about having
to walk some distance to the car.
He suggested that Ms. Crosby
get the car by herself and drive to the front of the theater and
pick up Mr. Saylor there.
She followed that advice and, as she
parked in front of the theater, she observed Mr. Saylor walk
back into the theater.
Mr. Saylor walked back into Theater 9 and returned to the
same seat in which he had been sitting.
Mr. Rhodes was cleaning
that theater between showings and was told by an usher that
there was customer sitting in the theater.
Mr. Rhodes
approached Mr. Saylor and told him that, if he wanted to see the
movie again, he would need to purchase another ticket.
When Mr.
Saylor informed him that he had no money, Mr. Rhodes talked to
him about how he could purchase a ticket online using a
smartphone.
Mr. Rhodes and Mr. Saylor then walked out of the
theater together.
Mr. Rhodes went on to another theater and Mr.
Saylor went back into Theater 9 and returned to the same seat,
without buying a ticket.
After Ms. Crosby parked the car, she assumed that Mr.
Saylor had returned to Theater 9 and started to walk in that
direction.
While doing so, she called Ms. Saylor a second time
7
and informed her that Mr. Saylor had reentered the theater.
Ms.
Saylor responded that she was on her way and would be there
shortly.
As Ms. Crosby attempted to enter Theater 9, Mr. Rhodes was
on his way out and stopped her and asked if she was with the
“special needs gentleman.”
Crosby Dep. at 105.
She
acknowledged that she was and Mr. Rhodes related that Mr. Saylor
had not purchased a ticket and would need to leave.
He also
indicated that he was about to, or already had, called security.
Id. at 107.
Ms. Crosby explained that Mr. Saylor has Down
syndrome and does not understand and requested that Mr. Rhodes
just wait him out, let her handle the situation, and let her
call his mother.
Ms. Crosby called Ms. Saylor a third time and
informed her that the theater management had called security
because Mr. Saylor was in the theater and did not have a ticket.
Ms. Saylor told Ms. Crosby that she would come to the theater
and either purchase him a ticket or persuade him to leave.
She
also advised Ms. Crosby to make sure that no one goes in to
speak to Mr. Saylor.
Ms. Crosby then walked over to Mr. Rhodes who was talking
with Sgt. Rochford who, by that time, had responded to the call
for security.
Ms. Crosby told Mr. Rhodes and Sgt. Rochford that
she did not have any more cash or other form of payment with
her, so she could not purchase another ticket for Mr. Saylor,
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but that his mother was on her way and that she would either pay
for Mr. Saylor’s ticket or get him to leave as soon as she
arrived.
She also tried to explain Down syndrome individuals to
Mr. Rhodes and Sgt. Rochford and related that Mr. Saylor
particularly did not like to be touched and, if touched, “[h]e
will curse at you” and “may get angry.”
Crosby Dep. at 182.
She cautioned, “[d]on’t go in there but if you do these are
going – these are going to be the results of it.”
Id.
According to Ms. Crosby, Mr. Rhodes responded that Mr. Saylor
needed to get out right away because the next showing was about
to start.
Id. at 116-17.2
Ms. Crosby testified that Sgt.
Rochford then said with a “smirk,” “[b]etter get the boys.
We’re going to have some trouble tonight.”
Id. at 121.
Sgt. Rochford then entered the theater.
The lights were
on, there were about twenty-five patrons in the theater, and Mr.
Saylor was sitting quietly in his seat.
Sgt. Rochford began to
speak with Mr. Saylor and told him that he needed to leave the
theater or else he would be removed.
Mr. Saylor refused and, as
Ms. Crosby predicted, he cursed at Sgt. Rochford and became
agitated.
He also told Sgt. Rochford that he “worked for the
CIA” and he was “done talking” to him.
Rochford Dep. at 45.
While the Deputies represented in their motion that Sgt.
2
Mr. Rhodes testified that he requested that the Deputies “help
out the caretaker” and “potentially remove” Mr. Saylor from the
theater. Rhodes Dep. at 100, ECF No. 98-4.
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Rochford attempted for ten minutes to persuade Mr. Saylor to
leave the theater, ECF No. 102-1 at 17, other testimony would
indicate that Sgt. Rochford spoke to Mr. Saylor for as little as
2 or 3 minutes before initiating his arrest.
See, e.g., Crosby
Dep. at 128.
As this verbal exchange was going on, Lt. Jewell and DFC
Harris came up alongside of Sgt. Rochford.
After they arrived,
Sgt. Rochford told Mr. Saylor that he was going to be arrested
and Sgt. Rochford placed his hands on Mr. Saylor’s arm to get
him out of his seat.
Again, as Ms. Crosby predicted, Mr. Saylor
reacted to being touched by flailing back his arm.
Lt. Jewell
and DFC Harris then assisted Sgt. Rochford in forcibly removing
Mr. Saylor from his seat.
Mr. Saylor continued to struggle,
cursed, yelled that they were hurting him, and called out for
his mother.
As the Deputies and Mr. Saylor went down the sloped
hallway leading out of the theater, they all fell to the ground.
The Deputies then attempted to handcuff Mr. Saylor and, because
of his size, eventually had to use three sets of handcuffs,
linked together, to accomplish the task.
As soon as he was handcuffed, however, Mr. Saylor became
silent and the Deputies realized that he had stopped breathing.
They immediately removed the handcuffs and attempted to
resuscitate him.
While Mr. Saylor resumed breathing on his own,
he remained unresponsive.
Emergency medical personnel arrived
10
and transported Mr. Saylor to the Frederick Memorial Hospital
where he was pronounced dead at 11:58 p.m.
An autopsy performed
the next day reported that he died of asphyxia.
B. State Training and Procedures
On the issue of the training provided to Sheriff’s
Deputies, the State represents that it does not actually train
Deputies or even create or provide the training materials.
Instead, the Maryland Police and Correctional Training
Commission (MPCTC) sets certain minimum standards for entrylevel law enforcement officers.
§ 3-207.
See Md. Code Ann., Pub. Safety
Local and county agencies operate several law
enforcement academies that do the actual training.
MPCTC
provides to those academies a list of over 500 training
“objectives” that must be included in the curriculum.
In 2011
or 2012, the MPCTC added a training objective regarding
interactions with individuals with “disabilities in general.”
Dep. of Albert Liebno at 25.3
Until 2014, after Mr. Saylor’s
death, the MPCTC did not have any training standards
specifically geared to interactions with individuals with
developmental disabilities.
3
Liebno, the deputy director of MPCTC, described this objective
as dealing with “autism, disabilities in general, not
specifically just mental disabilities, but disabilities in
general.” Id.
11
The MPCTC also requires all Maryland law enforcement
officers to complete at least 18 hours of in-service training
each year.
With the exception of the requirement that training
on sexual offenses be given at least every three years, the
MPCTC imposes no content requirements for this training.
In addition to this state mandated training, the FCSO
conducts its own in-service training.
The content of that
training is often guided by specific incidents.
For example,
after a lawsuit that arose from a deputy’s encounter with a deaf
individual, the FCSO added training material for dealing with
the deaf or hearing impaired.
The FCSO provides a block of
training on mental health issues that is repeated every three
years, the last time being in 2011.
To supplement its training, the FCSO utilizes a General
Orders manual that includes administrative and operational
directives and guidelines.
As of 2013, one of those guidelines
was titled “General Order 41.4 – Investigation of Persons with
Mental Illness.”
ECF No. 98-24.
Although the State suggests
that this General Order is broad enough to provide guidelines
for “dealing with persons with a wide range of disabilities,” it
appears more narrowly tailored to the Court.
“Mental illness”
is defined as “[a]ny of various conditions characterized by
impairment of an individual[’]s normal cognitive,
emotional, or behavioral functioning, and caused by social,
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psychological, biochemical, genetic, or other factors, such
as infection or head trauma.” Id. at 1.
For interactions
with individuals with mental illnesses, the General Order
provides the following guidelines: “Remain calm and avoid
overreacting;” “Understand that a rational discussion may
not take place;” and “Gather information from family or
bystanders.”
Id. at 3.
The General Order specifically
cautions that deputies should avoid: “Forcing discussion;”
“Touching the person (unless essential to safety);” and
“Crowding the person or moving into his or her zone of
comfort.”
Id. at 3-4.
The General Order then advises that
“[o]nce sufficient information has been collected about the
nature of the situation, and the situation has been
stabilized, there are a range of options deputies should
consider when selecting an appropriate disposition.”
at 4.
Id.
Those options include: “Outright release,” “Release
to care of family, care giver or mental health provider,”
or “Arrest, if a crime has been committed.”
Id.
As to
that last option, deputies are cautioned to “remember that
having mental illness is not a crime.
No individual should
be arrested for behavioral manifestations of mental illness
that are not criminal in nature.”
13
Id.
Prior to their encounter with Mr. Saylor, all three of
the deputies had completed their entry level training and
completed the 2011 mental health refresher training.
Sgt.
Rochford had also received in-service training on deescalation techniques, Autism awareness, and sensitivity
training.
Lt. Jewell also completed training in nonviolent
crisis intervention and Autism awareness.
DFC Harris
completed training in Autism awareness and use of force.
While the Deputies all completed this training according to
training records, Sgt. Rochford testified that the training
pertaining to mental illness was “very basic” and he did
not remember any specific training pertaining to
interactions with individuals with developmental
disabilities.
Rochford Dep. at 134-35.
Lt. Jewell did not
recall receiving, during his entry level training, any
instruction regarding developmentally or mentally disabled
individuals.
Jewell Dep. at 13.
Similarly, DFC Harris did
not recall any specific training having to do with mentally
challenged individuals.
Harris Dep. at 81.4
4
This page of Harris’s deposition is the subject of Plaintiffs’
“Motion to Unseal One Exhibit Being Filed Under Seal.” ECF No.
105. Plaintiffs’ counsel represents that this exhibit was only
marked confidential because, during the course of the
deposition, he forgot to terminate the previous confidential
14
C. The Deputies’ Employment With Hill Management
On the date of this incident, Hill Management was the
sub-management company for the owner of Westview Mall.
The
management services provided by Hill Management included
security services.
In or about 2004, Hill Management
entered into an agreement with the FCSO to permit off-duty
deputies to provide those security services.
ECF No. 98-
31, Frederick County Sheriff’s Office Sworn Security Related
Secondary Employment Employer Waiver (“Employment Agreement”).
The Employment Agreement provided:
1. Frederick County Sheriff’s Office Employees are
responsible to their positions 24 hours daily, and
shall give priority to those responsibilities in all
instances. They are subject to 24 hour emergency call
in procedures.
2. Any unlawful act brought to the attention of or
observed in the presence of a sworn officer shall be
acted upon in their official capacity.
3. Any action taken by a sworn officer in their
official capacity while on-duty or off-duty shall be
in conformance with Office policy.
. . .
7. Deputies while working secondary employment will be
considered employees of the secondary employer, not
independent contractors.
portion of the deposition. Regardless, Plaintiffs’ counsel
notes that this page contains no confidential information. The
State opposed the motion to unseal, but pointed to nothing in
the testimony that is confidential. The motion to unseal will
be granted.
15
Id.
The Employment Agreement also provided that the deputies
could use their service weapons and handcuffs while working this
secondary employment.
They could not wear their FCSO uniform,
but instead were permitted to wear a generic type shirt
reflecting “deputy sheriff” on the back and a badge or similar
symbol on the front, so long as it did not reference the FCSO or
the State of Maryland.
Id.
Hill Management determined the number of off-duty deputies
that would be working at any given time and determined their
hours.
There is evidence in the record that Hill Management
would vary the number of deputies scheduled in response to
requests for additional security coverage from mall tenants,
including Regal Cinemas.
ECF No. 106-38 (letter from Hill to
Regal Cinemas reporting the scheduling of additional security
coverage in response to a recent armed robbery in the mall).
A
FSCO deputy who also worked for Hill Management as a security
guard, Bart Rupperthol, actually scheduled the deputies.
Hill
Management had the theoretical authority to notify Rupperthol
that it did not want a particular deputy to be scheduled but
never exercised that authority.
The wages of the off-duty deputies working at the mall were
paid by Westview Mall but at least some of the employment
documents identified Hill Management as the deputies’ employer,
including the Employment Agreement.
16
ECF No. 98-31; see also ECF
No. 37 (federal income tax forms).
It is undisputed, however,
that, consistent with the provision in the Employment Agreement,
when the deputies act upon any unlawful activity reported to
them or observed by them, they are acting in their official
capacities as deputies of the FCSO.
Furthermore, once they
commence acting in their official capacities, the deputies are
no longer paid by their secondary employer.
This reversion to
official duty status was reflected in the time sheets submitted
for the date of this incident, i.e., the Deputies clocked out of
their Hill Management jobs as soon as the arrest of Mr. Saylor
commenced.
ECF No. 98-32.
III. LEGAL STANDARD
“The court shall grant summary judgment if 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); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322
(1986) (citing predecessor to current Rule 56(a)).
The burden
is on the moving party to demonstrate the absence of any genuine
dispute of material fact.
144, 157 (1970).
Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S.
If sufficient evidence exists for a reasonable
jury to render a verdict in favor of the party opposing the
motion, then a genuine dispute of material fact is presented and
summary judgment should be denied.
See Anderson v. Liberty
Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986).
17
However, the “mere
existence of a scintilla of evidence in support of the [opposing
party's] position” is insufficient to defeat a motion for
summary judgment.
Id. at 252.
The facts themselves, and the
inferences to be drawn from the underlying facts, must be viewed
in the light most favorable to the opposing party, Scott v.
Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 378 (2007); Iko v. Shreve, 535 F.3d 225,
230 (4th Cir. 2008), who may not rest upon the mere allegations
or denials of his pleading but instead must, by affidavit or
other evidentiary showing, set out specific facts showing a
genuine dispute for trial, Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(1).
Supporting
and opposing affidavits are to be made on personal knowledge,
contain such facts as would be admissible in evidence, and show
affirmatively the competence of the affiant to testify to the
matters stated in the affidavit.
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)(4).
IV. DISCUSSION
A. Claims Against the Deputies
1. Use of Excessive Force under § 1983
To establish a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a plaintiff
must show that a person acting under color of state law deprived
him of a constitutional right or a right conferred by a law of
the United States.
Wahi v. Charleston Area Med. Ctr. Inc., 562
F.3d 599, 615 (4th Cir. 2009).
Here, there is no dispute that
the Deputies were acting under color of state law when they
attempted to arrest Mr. Saylor.
As to the constitutional right
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allegedly infringed, Plaintiffs have asserted that Mr. Saylor
was deprived of his Fourth Amendment right to be free from the
use of excessive and unreasonable force.
As the Deputies note, Plaintiffs have clarified that they
are not bringing a claim for false arrest.
While Plaintiffs are
not bringing a formal claim for false arrest, they do argue, as
discussed below, that there is a material dispute of fact as to
whether the arrest was lawful.
ECF No. 106 at 24 n.13.
To
counter the Deputies’ suggestion that Mr. Saylor’s resistance to
their efforts to arrest him somehow posed a threat to their
safety, Plaintiffs note that, under Maryland law, an individual
can resist an unlawful arrest.
Id. (citing State v. Wiegmann,
714 A.2d 841 (Md. 1998)).
Plaintiffs also do not contend that Sgt. Rochford’s initial
interaction with Mr. Saylor constituted a seizure or implicated
the Fourth Amendment.
The Deputies opine “that the earliest
time when a Fourth Amendment seizure may have occurred in this
case was when Sergeant Rochford touched Mr. Saylor’s arm,
however gently,” ECF No. 102-1 at 40, and the parties all seem
to agree with that opinion.
This demarcation as to the point at
which the arrest began has significance in determining the
specific roles in which the Deputies were functioning at
different times during the course of their interactions with Mr.
Saylor.
As also discussed below, at least during the timeframe
19
prior to the initiation of the arrest, the Deputies were
functioning as private security guards for Hill Management.
Once they commenced arresting Mr. Saylor, they took on the role
of law enforcement officers.
To establish their excessive force claim, Plaintiffs must
show that the force used by the Deputies in making the arrest
was not “objectively reasonable” in light of the facts and
circumstances confronting them.
397 (1989).
Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386,
Objective reasonableness is highly fact-specific
and requires a “totality of the circumstances” analysis.
Tennessee v. Garner, 471 U.S. 1, 8-9 (1985).
“Determining
whether the force used to effect a particular seizure is
‘reasonable’ under the Fourth Amendment requires a careful
balancing of ‘the nature and quality of the intrusion on the
individual's Fourth Amendment interests’ against the
countervailing governmental interests at stake.”
U.S. at 396 (citation omitted).
Graham, 490
The Supreme Court in Graham set
out the following three factors to be considered in conducting
that analysis: (1) “the severity of the [suspected] crime at
issue,” (2) “whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to
the safety of the officers or others,” and (3) “whether he is
actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by
flight.”
Id.
20
There is no genuine question that Mr. Saylor was not
committing a serious crime when the Deputies commenced the
arrest and, accordingly, the first Graham factor weighs strongly
in favor of Plaintiffs.
At most, Mr. Saylor was committing
minor misdemeanors – trespassing and theft of services.
If, as
the evidence could support, the Deputies were aware that his
mother was on the way to the theater and had agreed to purchase
his ticket if she could not convince him to leave, one could at
least argue that even those misdemeanors were being committed
more technically than actually.
The Deputies seek to tilt that first factor in their favor
by arguing that Mr. Saylor committed assault on Sgt. Rochford
after Sgt. Rochford touched him.
There is a genuine dispute,
however, as to whether Mr. Saylor actually struck Sgt. Rochford.
Lt. Jewell testified that he did not recall that Mr. Saylor
attempted to strike any of the Deputies but simply pulled his
arm away.
Jewell Dep. at 56-57.
DFC Harris testified that when
Sgt. Rochford grabbed Mr. Saylor’s arm, Mr. Saylor drew his arm
back and made a fist, but did not attempt to swing at Sgt.
Rochford.
Harris Dep. at 48-49.
Mr. Rhodes did testify that
Mr. Saylor “stiff-armed” Sgt. Rochford, hitting him in the
chest.
Rhodes Dep. at 53.
Sgt. Rochford testified that Mr.
Saylor “flailed his arm back” and, after the other two Deputies
started to lift Mr. Saylor out of his seat, “[a]t some point, I
21
don’t remember him hitting me, but at some point in time he, he
struck me in the chest.”
Rochford Dep. at 82.
Viewing the
evidence in the light most favorable to Plaintiffs, it is
certainly questionable as to whether Mr. Saylor intentionally
struck Sgt. Rochford or whether he simply made an involuntary
reaction to his being touched.5
Furthermore, if he did “strike”
Sgt. Rochford, it was after the decision to arrest was made and
the process of arrest had commenced.
Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to
Plaintiffs also weighs the second factor strongly in favor of
Plaintiffs.
Mr. Saylor was sitting quietly in his seat and
there is absolutely nothing in the record to support the
conclusion that, if left alone, he would not have remained there
until his mother arrived.
To support the conclusion that Mr.
Saylor somehow posed a threat to the officers or other patrons
in the theater, the Deputies claim that Ms. Crosby told Sgt.
Rochford that Mr. Saylor would become “violent” were he to be
touched.
ECF No. 102-1 at 46.
They also suggest that Ms.
Crosby appeared to be frightened and, from that, attempt to
5
Mr. Saylor’s flailing of his arms is consistent with the
description of Mr. Saylor’s movements given Mr. Perry. In
response to a question in his deposition as to whether Mr.
Saylor was ever aggressively physical, Mr. Perry responded, “he
would like swing his arms because that is how he expressed
himself, like with his arms almost like a bird ruffling his
feathers almost and – but he would never strike.” Perry Dep. at
62.
22
support the conclusion that it was reasonable for them to
believe that Mr. Saylor posed a threat to others.6
There are material disputes of fact, however, as to what
Ms. Crosby told Sgt. Rochford and whether she conveyed the
impression that she was frightened.
As noted above, Ms. Crosby
testified that she told Sgt. Rochford only that Mr. Saylor, if
confronted, “will curse at you” and “he may get angry.”
Dep. at 182.
Crosby
While she stated that she was “a little
frightened” when Mr. Saylor punched the store window, when she
spoke with Mr. Rhodes and Sgt. Rochford, she assured them that
she was able to handle the situation.
That is consistent with
Ms. Saylor’s testimony that, while Ms. Crosby sounded upset
during the first phone call, during the second phone call, which
6
In a tenuous, somewhat cryptic, and internally inconsistent
argument, the Deputies suggest that “although the Deputies did
not have personal knowledge of Mr. Saylor’s extended history of
violent conduct, it would be artificially formulaic to pretend
that this history played no part in the totality of the
circumstances.” ECF No. 102-1 at 46. They then hypothesize
that this supposed history of violent conduct “would have been
part of what the caretaker told the Deputies about Mr. Saylor
and how she described specifically what would happen if he
became angry.” Id. Not only is there no evidence that Ms.
Crosby relayed any information concerning an “extended history
of violent conduct,” there is no evidence that Mr. Saylor had
any such history. To the extent that the Deputies are referring
to Mr. Saylor’s oppositional or defiant behavior related to his
Oppositional Defiant Disorder, the Deputies acknowledge that
Sgt. Rochford “had not been told that Mr. Saylor’s behavior was
the classic symptom of Mr. Saylor’s diagnosed mental illness.”
Id. at 12. Regardless, oppositional or defiant conduct is not
synonymous with violent conduct.
23
was made about the same time that she was talking to Sgt.
Rochford, she did not sound upset.
Saylor Dep. at 126-27.
To justify their assertion that Mr. Saylor somehow posed a
threat, the Deputies focus, of course, not on the circumstances
presented when Mr. Saylor was sitting quietly in the theater
waiting for the movie to start, but instead on the situation as
it “escalated in seriousness.”
ECF No. 102-1 at 41.
Viewing
the evidence in the light most favorable to Plaintiffs, however,
one could conclude that the situation only escalated because the
Deputies proceeded to do precisely what they were told would
lead to that escalation.
Whether the subsequent actions taken
by the Deputies may have been reasonable responses to those
evolving circumstances does not render the preceding actions
reasonable.
As it did in ruling on the motions to dismiss, the Court
finds instructive the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals decision
in Rowland v. Perry, 41 F.3d 167, 173 (4th Cir. 1994), noting
that,
the Fourth Circuit has cautioned courts when analyzing
the objective reasonableness of the amount of force
used by a law enforcement officer not to adopt a
“segmented view of [a] sequence of events,” where
“each distinct act of force becomes reasonable given
what [the officer] knew at each point in this
progression.” Rowland [], 41 F.3d [at] 173. . . .
Such an approach, the court opined, “miss[es] the
forest for the trees.” Id. Instead, the Fourth
Circuit instructed, “[t]he better way to assess the
objective reasonableness of force is to view it in
24
full context, with an eye toward the proportionality
of the force in light of all the circumstances.
Artificial divisions in the sequence of events do not
aid a court's evaluation of objective reasonableness.”
Id.
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp. 3d at 417.
The Deputies suggest that the Fourth Circuit, in Waterman
v. Batton, 393 F.3d 471 (4th Cir. 2005), subsequently “clarified
the holding in Rowland” to confirm “the notion that the
reasonableness of force employed can turn on a change of
circumstances during an encounter lasting only a few seconds.”
ECF No. 102-1 at 43 (quoting Waterman, 393 F.3d at 481).
As
quoted by the Deputies, the Fourth Circuit did hold in Waterman
that
“[i]t is established in this circuit that the
reasonableness of an officer’s actions is determined
based on the information possessed by the officer at
the moment that force is employed. . . . To simply
view all of the force employed in light of only the
information possessed by the officer when he began to
employ force would limit, for no good reason, the
relevant circumstances to be considered in judging the
constitutionality of the officer’s actions.”
Id.
This Court notes that, if the testimony of Ms. Crosby is
believed, the “information possessed by the officer[s]” at each
step of the escalation included the information that it was the
Deputies’ own actions that were causing that escalation.
As to the last Graham factor, whether Mr. Saylor was
resisting arrest, Mr. Saylor certainly was resisting being
dragged out of the theater.
There is some question, though, if
25
a developmentally disabled individual who had just declared that
he “worked for the CIA” understood that he was being arrested.7
Nor could it be inferred that Mr. Saylor was “attempting to
evade arrest by flight.”
His clear goal was to remain in the
theater and it could be readily inferred, from information
possessed by the Deputies, that his resistance was resistance to
being touched, not resistance to arrest.
One could conclude
that, like the mentally disabled individual who was suddenly
grabbed by a police officer in Rowland, Mr. Saylor did not
resist arrest but was simply frightened and “instinctively tried
to free himself.”
Rowland, 41 F.3d at 172.
In addition to the Graham factors, courts have also
considered the extent of the injury caused by the use of force
in determining whether the use of that force was unreasonable.
Jones v. Buchanan, 325 F.3d 520, 527 (4th Cir. 2003).
As this
Court previously noted, while the extent of Mr. Saylor’s injury
was not foreseeable, “the possibility of significant injury
would certainly have been evident when the decision was made to
drag an obese individual with a mental disability out of his
7
As noted above, in discussing whether the arrest of Mr. Saylor
was lawful, Plaintiffs posit that, if unlawful, Mr. Saylor would
have been permitted to resist. ECF No. 106 at 24 n.13. The
Court finds this discussion somewhat irrelevant. If, as the
evidence suggests, Mr. Saylor may have been unable to understand
that he was being arrested, it seems highly unlikely that he
would have been able to discern if the arrest was lawful or
unlawful and tailor his response accordingly.
26
chair and down a ramp, particularly when the Deputies were told
that, because of his disability, Mr. Saylor was likely to become
upset and angry.”
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp. 3d at 418.
Plaintiffs also suggest in opposing the Deputies’ Motion for
Summary Judgment that the Deputies were aware of the particular
danger of positional asphyxia when they restrained Mr. Saylor on
his stomach and yet they restrained him in that manner,
nevertheless.
ECF No. 106 at 31 (citing Rochford Dep. at 89;
Jewell Dep. at 78; Harris Dep. at 83).
While the actions that
led up to Mr. Saylor and the Deputies struggling and then
stumbling on the ramp may have been unreasonable, the evidence
does not support the conclusion that the Deputies caused the
fall itself or that their brief restraint of Mr. Saylor after
the fall was objectively unreasonable.
Mr. Saylor was not
“positioned” on his stomach, he fell on his stomach and was kept
there for less than a minute.
While one witness stated that,
while trying to handcuff Mr. Saylor, one of the Deputies had his
knee in Mr. Saylor’s lower back, pinning him to the ground, ECF
No. 106-14 at State 0047, the Fourth Circuit has held, under
similar circumstances, that applying “just enough weight to
immobilize an individual continuing to struggle during
handcuffing is not excessive force.”
Estate of Armstrong ex.
rel. Armstrong v. Vill. of Pinehurst, 810 F.3d 892, 906 n.11
(4th Cir. 2016) (internal quotations omitted).
27
As highlighted in the discussion above, Mr. Saylor’s
development and mental disabilities were a significant part of
the “totality of the circumstances” confronting the Deputies and
their conduct must be assessed in light of their awareness of
those disabilities.
Relying on Bates ex rel. Johns v.
Chesterfield County, Virginia, 216 F.3d 367, 372 (4th Cir.
2000), the Deputies argue that the Fourth Circuit has “refused
to create a special exception to the generally applicable Fourth
Amendment use of force analysis for mentally ill or mentally
disabled individuals.”
ECF No. 102-1 at 50.
In Bates, a police
officer responded to a 911 call and was told that there was a
teenage boy running through the woods, acting crazy, maybe on
drugs or alcohol.
216 F.3d at 369.
The officer located the
boy, spoke to him, but the boy walked away.
The officer ordered
him to return and the boy then sat on the officer’s motorcycle,
without permission.
The officer pushed him off the motorcycle,
the boy then pushed the officer and then walked away.
The
situation escalated with the boy ultimately scratching, spitting
and biting the officer before the officer, with the assistance
of another officer, managed to handcuffed the boy.
The officers
did not learn until after the boy was restrained and his parents
arrived at the scene that the boy suffered from autism.
369-70.
28
Id. at
The Deputies posit that the Fourth Circuit in Bates
“refused to hold law enforcement officers responsible for taking
into consideration possible or apparent mental disabilities of
those individuals with whom they are dealing.”
50.
ECF No. 102-1 at
As support for that proposition, however, they cite the
following language from Bates, “‘in the midst of a rapidly
escalating situation, the officers cannot be faulted for failing
to diagnose Bates’ autism.
Indeed, the volatile nature of a
situation may make a pause for psychiatric diagnosis impractical
and even dangerous.’”
372).
Id. at 50-51 (quoting Bates, 216 F.3d at
Here, however, if Ms. Crosby told the officers the nature
of Mr. Saylor’s disabilities and the likely outcome of their
actions because of those disabilities, there was no need for any
diagnosis, and, as noted above, the rapid escalation was the
result of the Deputies’ action, not Mr. Saylor’s.
The Deputies also suggest that Bates stands for the
proposition “that an individual with a mental disability is
subject to no different legal standards for his or her conduct
than other members of the public.”
ECF No. 102-1 at 51.
While
that is true, Bates does not permit an officer to ignore the
implications of a known disability.
“Just like any other
relevant personal characteristic – height, strength,
aggressiveness – a detainee’s known or evident disability is
29
part of the Fourth Amendment circumstantial calculus.”
Bates,
216 F.3d at 373.
Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to
Plaintiffs and resolving the material disputes of fact in their
favor, the Court concludes that the force used by the Deputies
in making the arrest was not objectively reasonable in light of
the facts and circumstances confronting them.
2. Qualified Immunity
The Deputies next argue that they are shielded from
liability under the doctrine of qualified immunity.
The
qualified immunity analysis consists of a two-pronged inquiry:
(1) Did a constitutional or statutory violation occur?; and (2)
If so, was the right violated clearly established at the time of
the officer’s conduct?
Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201
(2001), overruled in part by Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223
(2009).
As this Court has concluded that a jury could find that
the Deputies violated Mr. Saylor’s right to be free from the use
of excessive and unreasonable force, the Court turns to the
second prong.
In ruling on the Deputies’ motion to dismiss, the
Court found that Fourth Circuit’s decision in Rowland gave fair
warning to the Deputies that their conduct was unreasonable, at
least if the allegations in the First Amended Complaint were
true.
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp. 3d at 421.
As there is
evidence in the record that generally supports those
30
allegations, the Court again concludes that the Deputies are not
entitled to summary judgment.
The Deputies suggest that a recent Supreme Court decision,
City and County of San Francisco, California v. Sheehan, 135 S.
Ct. 1765 (2015), should direct the Court to a different
conclusion.
The plaintiff in that action lived in a group home
for individuals with mental illness.
When she began acting
erratically and threatened to kill her social worker, two
officers were dispatched to help escort her to a facility for
temporary evaluation and treatment.
When the officers first
entered her room, she grabbed a knife and threatened to kill
them.
They retreated, closed the door, and called for backup.
Concerned that the door was closed and worried that she might be
gathering more weapons or attempting to flee out of the window,
they decided to reenter her room.
still holding the knife.
When they did so, she was
One of the officers pepper sprayed her
in the face but, when she would not drop the knife, the other
officer shot her several times.
She survived and brought suit
under § 1983 alleging that the officers violated her Fourth
Amendment rights.
The district court granted summary judgment for the
officers, holding that they did not violate the Fourth
Amendment.
The Ninth Circuit reversed that decision, holding
that a jury could find that the officers “provoked” the
31
plaintiff by needlessly forcing the second confrontation and
that it was clearly established that an officer cannot “forcibly
enter the home of an armed, mentally ill subject who had been
acting irrationally and had threatened anyone who entered when
there was no objective need for immediate entry.”
Sheehan v.
City & Cty. of San Francisco, 743 F.3d 1211, 1229 (9th Cir.
2014).
The Supreme Court held that the officers were entitled
to qualified immunity, distinguishing the case before it from
other Ninth Circuit decisions and concluding that “no precedent
clearly established that there was not ‘an objective need for
immediate entry’ here.”
135 S. Ct. at 1777.
“Considering the
specific situation confronting [the officers], they had
sufficient reason to believe that their conduct was justified.”
Id. at 1778 (emphasis added).
The Deputies appear to suggest that Sheehan stands for the
proposition that it was not, and is not, clearly established
that police officers need to make any accommodation in any
circumstances for an individual’s disabilities.
They argue that
the Sheehan Court’s qualified immunity holding did not
turn on the specific circumstances of that case which
differed from the circumstances here, such as the fact
Sheehan had knives and Mr. Saylor did not. The
question in Sheehan was whether the officers violated
the Fourth Amendment when they decided to reopen her
door and confront her rather than attempt to
accommodate her disability, and the Court’s holding
was that any such Fourth Amendment right was not
clearly established. Therefore, even if to this Court
it appears that a jury could find the Deputies’
32
failure to wait instead of confronting or arresting
Mr. Saylor was objectively unreasonable, the Deputies
would be entitled to qualified immunity because they
did not violate clearly established law, under the
ruling in Sheehan.
ECF No. 116 at 27 (citing Sheehan, 135 S. Ct. at 1775).
This Court does not read Sheehan so broadly.
Throughout
its opinion, the Supreme Court focused on the particular
circumstances confronting the officers and whether the officers
should have known that making the accommodation of not
reentering Sheehan’s room was required under those
circumstances.
In distinguishing the case before it from
Graham, the Court noted, Graham “did not involve a dangerous,
obviously unstable person making threats, much less was there a
weapon involved.”
135 S. Ct. at 1776.
In distinguishing the
case before it from another Ninth Circuit decision, the Court,
after reciting the particular facts confronting the officer in
interacting with an unarmed emotionally disturbed person who had
not committed any serious offence, opined, “the differences
between that case and the case before us leap from the page.”
135 S. Ct. at 1776 (citing Deorle v. Rutherford, 272 F.3d 1272
(9th Cir. 2001)).
The Supreme Court’s citation to the Fourth
Circuit’s decision in Bates, noted by the Deputies, speaks only
to whether the officers should have known that making an
accommodation was required under the particularly dangerous
circumstances confronting the officers: “‘Knowledge of a
33
person’s disability simply cannot foreclose officers from
protecting themselves, the disabled person, and the general
public.’”
Id. at 1778 (quoting Bates, 216 F.3d at 372); see
also id. (citing Menuel v. Atlanta, 25 F.3d 990 (11th Cir.
1994), as “upholding use of deadly force to try to apprehend a
mentally ill man who had a knife and was hiding behind a door”).
This Court concludes that Rowland continues to provide fair
and clear warning of what the constitution requires of officers
confronted with an individual with disabilities who is not
endangering the officers or others.
As recently recounted by
the Fourth Circuit:
our determination that the officer was not entitled to
qualified immunity in Rowland was not based on any
case that was factually on all fours. Rather, it was
based on the simple fact that the officer took a
situation where there obviously was no need for the
use of any significant force and yet took an
unreasonably aggressive tack that quickly escalated it
to a violent exchange when the suspect instinctively
attempted to defend himself.
Smith v. Ray, 781 F.3d 95, 104 (4th Cir. 2015).
For these reasons, the Court will deny the Deputies’ motion
as to the § 1983 claim (Count IX).
3. State Law Claims
In ruling on the motions to dismiss, the Court denied the
Deputies’ motion as to Plaintiffs’ gross negligence (Count V),
battery (Count VII), and wrongful death (Count XII) claims.
34
The
Court will deny the Deputies’ motion for summary judgment as to
those claims for similar reasons.
As the Maryland Court of Appeals recently reiterated, gross
negligence under Maryland law:
“is an intentional failure to perform a manifest duty
in reckless disregard of the consequences as affecting
the life or property of another, and also implies a
thoughtless disregard of the consequences without the
exertion of any effort to avoid them. Stated
conversely, a wrongdoer is guilty of gross negligence
or acts wantonly and willfully only when he inflicts
injury intentionally or is so utterly indifferent to
the rights of others that he acts as if such rights
did not exist.”
Beall v. Holloway-Johnson, 130 A.3d 406, 415 (Md. 2016) (quoting
Barbre v. Pope, 935 A.2d 699, 717 (Md. 2007)).
While it is
true, as the Deputies assert, that a claim of gross negligence
“‘sets the evidentiary hurdle at a higher evidentiary
elevation’” than a claim of negligence, ECF No. 116 at 28
(quoting Beall, 130 A.3d at 415), the Maryland Court of Appeals
also noted that “[t]he distinction between negligence and gross
negligence [] can be a difficult one to establish in practice,
[and a] legally sufficient case of ordinary negligence will
frequently be enough to create a jury question of whether such
negligence was or was not gross.”
Beall, 130 A.3d at 415.
Here, the Court finds that the question as to whether the
Deputies’ conduct rises to the level of gross negligence should
go to the jury for many of the same reasons discussed above in
35
reference to the § 1983 claim.
The evidence, viewed in the
light most favorable to Plaintiffs, could support the conclusion
that the Deputies acted with a “thoughtless disregard of the
consequences.”
Despite the lack of any exigent circumstances
compelling them to act, they proceeded to do exactly those
things that they were told would escalate the situation.
The Deputies move for summary judgment on the battery claim
arguing that, unless the arrest of Mr. Saylor was a false
imprisonment, then the physical force used to effectuate that
arrest does not constitute a battery.
ECF No. 102-1 at 58.
Plaintiffs counter that, even where there is no claim of false
arrest, if the evidence supports a claim that excessive force
was used to effectuate the arrest, then the state law battery
claims should also go forward as well.
(citing Rowland, 41 F.3d at 174).
ECF No. 106 at 42
In their Reply, the Deputies
do not dispute that principle, but simply argue that the
evidence does not support an excessive force claim.
116.
ECF No.
Because the Court concludes that the evidence, viewed in
the light most favorable to Plaintiffs, does support an
excessive force claim, then the battery claim will go forward as
well.
As to Plaintiffs’ wrongful death action, the Deputies do
not dispute that Plaintiffs can bring such an action based upon
the state law claims for gross negligence or battery.
36
ECF No.
102-1 at 59.
They do challenge this action to the extent it is
based upon the alleged constitutional claim asserted under §
1983.
They argue that there is no allegation that Plaintiffs’
constitutional rights were violated and that Plaintiffs have no
standing to bring a wrongful death action premised on the
violation of Mr. Saylor’s constitutional rights.
Id.
In the
alternative, the Deputies submit that, should the Court permit
such an action, the action would be subject to the same state
law statutory defenses, immunities, and limitations applicable
to other state law statutory causes of action.
Id. at 60-61.
Maryland’s Wrongful Death Statute provides that “[a]n
action may be maintained against a person whose wrongful act
causes the death of another.”
§ 3-902(a).
Md. Code Ann., Cts. & Jud. Proc.
The statute authorizes an action “for the benefit
of the wife, husband, parent, and child of the deceased person.”
Id. § 3-904(a)(1).
Significantly, a wrongful death action is
“separate, distinct, and independent from a survival action,”
and “[w]hile certainly based on the death of another person, . .
. is not brought in a derivative or representative capacity to
recover for a loss or injury suffered by that person but,
rather, is brought by a spouse, parent, or child, or a secondary
beneficiary who was wholly dependent on the decedent, to recover
damages for his or her own loss accruing from the decedent's
death.”
FutureCare Northpoint, LLC v. Peeler, No. 2602, Sept.
37
Term 2014, 2016 WL 4061381, at *9 (Md. Ct. Spec. App. July 28,
2016) (internal quotation omitted).
Plaintiffs readily acknowledge that they are not asserting
that their own constitutional rights were violated.
at 43 n.25.
ECF No. 106
Instead, they posit that the violation of their
son’s constitutional rights was the “wrongful act” which
supports their wrongful death action.
The Wrongful Death
Statute defines “wrongful act” as “an act, neglect, or default .
. . which would have entitled the party injured to maintain an
action and recover damages if death had not ensued.”
901(e).
Id. § 3-
The Deputies proffer no compelling argument that the
constitutional violation supporting the § 1983 survivor claim
does not satisfy that definition.8
The Court, however, does
agree that this state statutory claim would be subject to the
same state law statutory defenses, immunities, and limitations,
8
The Deputies cite Moor v. County of Alameda, 411 U.S. 693
(1973) and Bell ex rel. Bell v. Board of Education of County of
Fayette, 290 F. Supp. 2d 701 (S.D.W. Va. 2003), for the
proposition that Plaintiffs “cannot bring a wrongful death
action as a new and independent cause of action under Section
1983.” ECF No. 116 at 30. Three years after the issuance of
the Bell decision, another decision of that same court roundly
criticized it as misreading Moor and being at odds with the
decisions of every circuit court to have addressed the issue.
Green ex rel. Estate of Green v. City of Welch, 467 F. Supp. 2d
656, 663 (S.D.W. Va. 2006); see also, Baker v. Putnal, 75 F.3d
190, 195 (5th Cir. 1996) (holding that “individuals who are
within the class of people entitled to recover under Texas’s
wrongful death statute have standing to sue under § 1983 for
their own injuries resulting from the deprivation of decedents’
constitutional rights”).
38
regardless of the wrongful act on which it is based.
See Momot
v. City of Philadelphia, Civ. No. 11-7806, 2012 WL 1758630, at
*4 (observing that “[c]ourts have uniformly treated wrongfuldeath claims in the context of civil-rights cases as state-law
claims” and concluding that such a claim, if recognized, would
be subject to the state’s municipal tort claims act).
In defense of all the state law claims asserted against
them, the Deputies raise the defenses of qualified statutory
immunity, contributory negligence, and assumption of risk.
As
to the qualified immunity defense, the Maryland Tort Claims Act
provides that state personnel are immune from tort liability for
any acts or omissions that are within the scope of their public
duties and that are “made without malice or gross negligence.”
Md. Code Ann., Cts. & Jud. Proc. § 5-522(b).
As the Court has
concluded that the evidence could support a finding that the
Deputies acted with gross negligence, they are not entitled to
judgment on the issue of immunity at this stage of the
litigation.9
As to the contributory negligence and assumption of risk
defenses, the Court has already held that those defenses are not
9
Plaintiffs argue that the evidence also supports a finding of
malice on the part of the Deputies. While malice might be
inferred from Sgt. Rochford’s smirking comment, “Better get the
boys. We’re going to have some trouble tonight,” it is a tenuous
argument. To defeat immunity, however, Plaintiffs need only
establish gross negligence or malice, not both.
39
applicable to claims of battery.
3d at 423.10
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp.
Regarding the claims brought on behalf of the
Estate, the Deputies assert that Mr. Saylor may be barred from
recovery by his own contributory negligence.
Noting that, under
Maryland law, a child of five years of age or over can be guilty
of contributory negligence, and positing that “Mr. Saylor was in
many ways more responsible for himself than a 5-year old,” the
Deputies argue that by “voluntarily def[ying] his caretaker and
the Deputies” and “voluntarily choos[ing] to resist the Deputies
when they tried to escort him out,” Mr. Saylor was
contributorily negligent in causing his own death.
ECF No. 102-
1 at 64 (citing Taylor v. Armiger, 358 A.2d 883, 889 (Md.
1976)).
Regarding the wrongful death claim brought on
Plaintiffs’ own behalf, the Deputies argue that Plaintiffs
contributed to their son’s death and/or assumed the risk of his
death by sending him to a violent “R” rated movie with an
inexperienced caregiver and no extra money and then failing to
give that caregiver appropriate instructions to deal with the
evolving situation.
Id. at 64-65.
10
This Court also noted that the question as to whether
contributory negligence can be a bar to a gross negligence claim
is an unsettled question under Maryland law. Id. Because the
Court concludes that neither Mr. Saylor nor his parents could be
found contributorily negligent as a matter of law on the current
record, the Court will leave that as an open question at this
time.
40
Under Maryland law, “[c]ontributory negligence is the
failure to observe ordinary care for one's own safety.
It is
the doing of something that a person of ordinary prudence would
not do, or the failure to do something that a person of ordinary
prudence would do, under the circumstances.”
Menish v. Polinger
Co., 356 A.2d 233, 236 (Md. 1976) (internal quotations omitted).
Maryland courts have found that “contributory negligence is
ordinarily a jury question” although they “have not hesitated to
find a plaintiff contributorily negligent as a matter of law
where common experience reveals the foreseeable dangers of the
plaintiff's actions.”
Reid v. Washington Overhead Door, Inc.,
122 F. Supp. 2d 590, 593-94 (D. Md. 2000).
“To prevail on the
defense of assumption of the risk, the defendant must show that
the plaintiff: ‘(1) had knowledge of the risk of the danger; (2)
appreciated that risk; and (3) voluntarily confronted the risk
of danger.’”
Blood v. Hamami P’ship, LLP, 795 A.2d 135, 141
(Md. Ct. Spec. App. 2002) (quoting Liscombe v. Potomac Edison
Co., 495 A.2d 838, 843 (Md. 1985)).
In considering the applicability of these defenses to Mr.
Saylor’s causes of actions, the finder of fact must take into
account his cognitive disabilities.
Mr. Saylor’s ability to
understand the foreseeable risks of his conduct was certainly
different than the ability of someone not similarly disabled.
Likewise, there is a question as to whether his acts of defiance
41
were truly voluntary or were simply the result of his
disability.
The case that the Deputies cite for the proposition
that a child of five years of age or older may be guilty of
contributory negligence, also notes that a child over five “is
bound only to use that degree of care which ordinarily prudent
children of that age and like intelligence are accustomed to use
under the circumstances, and they assume the risk only of
dangers the existence of which they know, or which, in the
exercise of this degree of care, they ought to have known.”
Taylor, 358 A.2d at 889.
A child “is not held to the same
degree of care required of a reasonably prudent adult.”
Id.
While Mr. Saylor was not a child, his ability to foresee risk
and take voluntary action was certainly less than a non-disabled
adult.
How much less is a disputed question of fact.
As to the wrongful death claim, Plaintiffs argue that no
precedent indicates that Plaintiffs’ own contributory negligence
or assumption of the risk could serve to bar that claim.
Instead, Plaintiffs maintain it is only the decedent’s conduct
that can serve as such a bar.
disagrees.
ECF No. 106 at 48-49.
The Court
The principle behind the defense of contributory
negligence is that no individual should recover damages for an
injury for which that individual was a material cause.
In their
wrongful death action, Plaintiffs are seeking damages for their
own loss because of the death of their child and if their own
42
negligent acts contributed to his death, the same principle
would apply.
See Hall v. United States, 381 F. Supp. 224
(D.S.C. 1974) (applying this reasoning and holding that a parent
of an adult child, suing under a wrongful death statute, can be
barred from recovery by his own contributory negligence).
While the Deputies point to no Maryland decision holding
that a parent’s contributory negligence can bar their wrongful
death claim, and the Court is aware of no decision directly so
holding, Judge Howard Chasanow, of the Maryland Court of Appeals
has noted that that court has “never before held that a parent's
contributory negligence in the death of a child does not bar or
at least reduce the parent's own recovery for the wrongful death
of a child.”
Matthews v. Amberwood Associates Ltd. P'ship, Inc.
719 A.2d 119, 152 (Md. 1998) (dissent).
In Matthews, because
the majority held that the trial judge did not abuse her
discretion in refusing to permit the defendants to amend their
answer on the eve of trial to add the defenses of contributory
negligence and assumption of the risk, it did not reach the
issue of whether they would be viable defenses.
In his dissent,
Judge Chasanow argued that the jury should have been permitted
to determine whether the mother’s negligence was a contributing
cause of the death of her child.
While acknowledging that the
mother’s contributory negligence would not affect the survival
action or the father’s recovery, he opines that it would be a
43
potential defense against the mother’s wrongful death claim.
Id.
Although the Court believes that contributory negligence
and assumption of the risk are theoretical defenses to the
Plaintiffs’ wrongful death claim, the record does not support
the establishment of either as a matter of law.
The Deputies
submit no evidence or argument regarding any act or omission of
Ronald Saylor that contributed to Mr. Saylor’s death.
Nor is
there evidence that Patricia Saylor could have foreseen the risk
in sending Mr. Saylor to an “R” rated movie with a trained
caregiver.11
Accordingly, the Court will deny the Deputies’ motion in
its entirety.
B. Claims Against the State
The two remaining claims against the State are both claims
for violations of Title II of the ADA.
Title II of the ADA
provides that “no qualified individual with a disability shall,
by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in
11
In their Reply, the Deputies attempt to foist responsibility
for Mr. Saylor’s death on Ms. Crosby, asserting that she made a
series of “poor choices” with “disastrous consequences.” See
ECF No. 116 at 2-5. Plaintiffs moved for leave to file a
surreply, ECF No. 117, primarily to respond to this newly
intensified attack on Ms. Crosby. The Court finds that this is
a sufficiently new attack warranting a response and will grant
the motion for leave to file a surreply. The Court also finds,
as Plaintiffs set out in their surreply, that the Deputies’
attack on Ms. Crosby is not supported by the record.
44
or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or
activities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination
by any such entity.”
42 U.S.C. § 12132.
To establish a claim
under Title II, Plaintiffs must prove that (1) Mr. Saylor was
disabled, (2) he was otherwise qualified to receive the benefits
of a public service, program, or activity, and (3) he was
excluded from participation in or denied the benefits of such
service, program, or activity, or otherwise discriminated
against, on the basis of his disability.
Constantine v. Rectors
& Visitors of George Mason Univ., 411 F.3d 474, 498 (4th Cir.
2005).
To recover damages for a violation of Title II of the
ADA, Plaintiffs must show that the State “intentionally or with
deliberate indifference fail[ed] to provide meaningful access or
reasonable accommodation to [Mr. Saylor].”
Paulone v. City of
Frederick, 787 F. Supp. 2d 360, 373 (D. Md. 2011).
There is no dispute that Mr. Saylor was disabled within the
meaning of the ADA.
Plaintiffs assert that the State violated
Title II in two ways.
First, Plaintiffs argue that Mr. Saylor
was qualified to receive the benefit of law enforcement officers
who were properly trained to interact with individuals with
developmental disabilities but the State failed to provide that
proper training (Count X).
While the Fourth Circuit has yet to
explicitly recognize a failure to train claim under Title II,
this Court has opined that there is no reason to believe that
45
the Fourth Circuit would not follow other courts that have
recognized such a claim.
426.
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp. 3d at
Second, Plaintiffs assert the Deputies denied Mr. Saylor
the reasonable accommodation requested by Ms. Crosby, that he be
permitted to remain sitting quietly in the theater until his
mother arrived to either convince him to leave or pay for
another ticket (Count XI).
Because the Fourth Circuit has held
that there is respondeat superior liability under Title II of
the ADA, the State would be liable for any violation committed
by the Deputies regardless of whether Plaintiffs prevail on
their failure to train claim.
1. Failure to Train
Failure to train claims under the ADA are generally
analyzed under the same framework as failure to train claims
brought against municipalities under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
J.V. v.
Albuquerque Pub. Sch., 813 F.3d 1289, 1298 (10th Cir. 2016);
Green v. Tri-County Metro. Transp. Dist. of Oregon, 909 F. Supp.
2d 1211, 1220 (D. Ore. 2012).
Under that framework,
establishing liability requires a showing not only that the
defendant failed to implement proper training but that the
failure to train amounted to “deliberate indifference,” which is
“a stringent standard of fault, requiring proof that a [State]
actor disregarded a known or obvious consequence of his action.”
Bd. of Cty. Comm'rs of Bryan Cty., Oklahoma v. Brown, 520 U.S.
46
397, 410 (1997).
The Court assumes, without deciding, that
training provided for dealing with individuals with mental
illnesses, discussed above, was inadequate as training for
dealing with individuals with developmental disabilities.
The
question then is whether the State was aware of a need for such
training to which it was deliberately indifferent.
The obviousness of the need for training is typically
established by pointing to a pattern of similar violations by
untrained employees.
Thomas v. Cumberland Cty., 749 F.3d 217,
223 (3rd Cir. 2014).
The Supreme Court has posited, however,
that in certain situations, the need for training “can be said
to be ‘so obvious,’ that failure to do so could properly be
characterized as ‘deliberate indifference’ to constitutional
rights” even without a pattern of constitutional violations.
City of Canton, Ohio v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 390 n.10 (1989).
In this “narrow range of circumstances,” a pattern of violations
might not be necessary if plaintiffs could demonstrate with a
single violation that the entity has failed to train its
employees to handle recurring situations presenting an obvious
potential for a violation.
Bryan Cty., 520 U.S. at 398.
Because there is no pattern of similar violations of the
ADA in this action, Plaintiffs rely on this single-incident
method of proof.
Plaintiff’s only support for the conclusion
that the need for training was obvious, however, is a statistic
47
from a 2012 report of the U.S. Census Bureau which states that,
“as of 2010, a full 18.7% of the U.S. civilian noninstitutionalized population had a disability.”
ECF No. 106 at
58 (citing “Americans With Disabilities: 2010,” by Matthew
Brault).
The State challenges the obviousness of the need for
training regarding interactions with the developmentally
disabled, suggesting that “general statistics concerning
unspecified disabilities within the general population
nationwide” are not probative of any “‘recurring situation’ in
Maryland, much less Frederick County specifically.” ECF No. 113
at 5.
Most significantly, this statistic reports disabilities
of all types, not specifically developmental disabilities.
The
State also notes that, prior to this incident, it had never
received a request to generate a policy for encounters with the
developmentally disabled, nor was it otherwise put on notice of
the need for this specific training.
The Court finds that the evidence in the record is
insufficient for a jury to conclude that there was an obvious
potential that such a violation would occur such that the
failure to train to prevent it amounted to “deliberate
indifference.”
As the Supreme Court in City of Canton
cautioned,
[it will not] suffice to prove that an injury or
accident could have been avoided if an officer had had
better or more training, sufficient to equip him to
48
avoid the particular injury-causing conduct. Such a
claim could be made about almost any encounter
resulting in injury, yet not condemn the adequacy of
the program to enable officers to respond properly to
the usual and recurring situations with which they
must deal. And plainly, adequately trained officers
occasionally make mistakes; the fact that they do says
little about the training program or the legal basis
for holding the city liable.
489 U.S. at 391.
In each of the “single-incident” cases relied upon by
Plaintiffs there was significantly more evidence from which a
jury could posit the inevitability of the violation.
In
Williams v. City of New York, a deaf individual brought a
failure to train claim based upon the circumstances of her
arrest and overnight detention.
2015).
121 F. Supp. 3d 354 (S.D.N.Y.
In denying the defendant’s motion for summary judgment,
the court did note, as Plaintiffs selectively quote, that
“it would be preposterous to believe that given the
diversity of the population in the City of New York,
the [New York Police Department (NYPD)] did not know
full well that its officers would encounter persons
with hearing impairments in connection with protecting
and defending the City and that some of those people
would need accommodation in order to interact with the
police.”
ECF No. 106 at 58-59 (quoting Williams, 121 F. Supp. 3d at 375).
The court also noted, however, that the NYPD had previously
received numerous complaints from deaf individuals that actually
gave rise to a settlement agreement between the City of New York
and the United States under which the city agreed to provide
49
auxiliary aids to persons with hearing disabilities, an
agreement which the city subsequently failed to implement.
The
court concluded that, in light of those prior incidents and the
settlement agreement, “a jury could easily find that the City
was fully on notice of the need to have effective policies and
procedures for dealing with hearing impaired individuals prior”
to the incident involving the plaintiff.
122 F. Supp. 3d at 375
n.23.
In Russo v. City of Cincinnati, which involved the fatal
shooting of a mentally ill individual, the defendant police
officers conceded that they were “frequently called upon to deal
with mentally and emotionally disturbed and disabled
individuals.”
953 F.2d 1036, 1046 (6th Cir. 1992).
In Thomas
v. Cumberland County, an inmate brought a § 1983 action after
being attacked by another inmate.
749 F.3d 217 (3rd Cir. 2014).
The Third Circuit Court of Appeals held that the single-incident
failure to train claim should have been permitted to go to the
jury after noting that the plaintiff “put forward evidence that
fights regularly occurred in the prison” and that the “frequency
of fights” along with “the volatile nature of the prison” made a
violation of rights likely to occur if the guards were not given
de-escalation and intervention training.
Id. at 225-26.
Young
v. City of Providence ex rel. Napolitano, arose out of a
“friendly fire” accidental shooting of an African American off50
duty police officer by on-duty officers.
2005).
404 F.3d 4 (1st Cir.
The First Circuit held that the claim that the defendant
failed to train its officers on on-duty/off-duty interactions
and misidentifications should have gone to a jury after noting
that, while there was no evidence of a prior friendly fire
shooting, “it was common knowledge within the [police
department] that misidentifications of off-duty officers
responding to an incident often occurred in Providence,
particularly misidentification of minority officers.”
Id. at
28.
Here, there is no similar evidence from which a jury could
conclude that there was an obvious potential for this kind of
violation.
Thus, the Court finds that this is not one of the
“rarest of circumstances” where the State could be found liable
without proof of a pre-existing pattern of violations.
The
State’s motion will be granted as to Count X.
2. Failure to Accommodate
The Court finds that there is more than enough evidence,
however, to support Plaintiffs’ failure to accommodate claim.
There is no dispute that Title II requires public entities to
make reasonable accommodations for persons with disabilities.
Paulone v. City of Frederick, 787 F. Supp. 2d 360, 371 (D. Md.
2011).
Under the regulations implementing Title II, the
reasonable accommodations that are required to be made include
51
“reasonable modifications in policies, practices, or procedures
when the modifications are necessary to avoid discrimination on
the basis of disability, unless the public entity can
demonstrate that making the modifications would fundamentally
alter the nature of the service, program, or activity.”
C.F.R § 35.130(b)(7).
28
When considering the failure to
accommodate claim at the motion to dismiss stage, the Court
concluded that “following the advice of the caregiver of a
clearly disabled individual and simply waiting would have been
the most logical accommodation.”
3d at 427.
Estate of Saylor, 54 F. Supp.
While recognizing that Title II does not require
States to employ “any and all means to make . . . services
accessible to persons with disabilities,” or to create “an
exhaustive set of particular accommodations and policies to be
proactively implemented with respect to every conceivable
disability,” the Court found that the requested accommodation
came nowhere near to approaching those limits.
Id.
Thus, under
the facts as alleged in the First Amended Complaint, the Court
found the requested accommodation to be reasonable.
Now at the summary judgment stage, the conclusion that the
requested accommodation was reasonable is further bolstered by
the report of Plaintiffs’ expert witness, Andrew Scott.
Mr.
Scott notes that the International Association of Chiefs of
Police (“IACP”) National Law Enforcement Policy Center has a
52
separate Model Policy specifically addressing “Encounters with
the Developmentally Disabled” that instructs:
“Taking custody of a developmentally disabled person
should be avoided whenever possible as it will
invariably initiate a severe anxiety response and
escalate the situation. Therefore, in minor offense
situations, officer shall explain the circumstances to
the complainant and request that alternative means be
taken to remedy the situation. This normally will
involve the release of the person to an authorized
caregiver.”
ECF No. 106-33 at 10 (quoting Model Policy).
As noted above,
the FCSO’s own General Order 41.4 offers similar options
including “Outright release,” and “Release to care of
family, care giver or mental health provider.”
24 at 4.
ECF No. 98-
The finder of fact could conclude that the Deputies
never considered these options set out in the General Order.
In moving for summary judgment on this claim and in an
effort to explain the Deputies’ failure to consider those other
options, the gravamen of the State’s argument is that Sgt.
Rochford was told that Mr. Saylor could become violent and that
“[o]nce Sgt. Rochford heard that under some circumstance, Mr.
Saylor could become violent, removing him from the movie theater
without further delay was necessary.”
ECF No. 100 at 22 n.6.
The States repeats throughout its motion that Ms. Crosby said
Mr. Saylor “could become violent.”
Id. at 19, 22, 23, 29, & 30.
The opinion of the State’s expert that leaving Mr. Saylor in the
53
theater was not a reasonable accommodation is clearly based upon
that same factual conclusion.
He stated, “it is my opinion that
once the Deputies were on notice of Saylor’s potential violent
tendencies as related by his care giver Ms. Crosby, and the
response to the [D]eputies by Saylor, the Deputies had limited
recourse given the public venue, the on-going business nature of
the theater, and the safety of the public.”
ECF No. 98-26 at 5.
As noted above, however, there is a factual dispute if Ms.
Crosby ever said anything about Mr. Saylor becoming violent.
In
an attempt to obscure the nature of this dispute, the State
materially misquotes Ms. Crosby’s testimony regarding what she
told Sgt. Rochford.
The State characterizes the dispute as
“Plaintiffs will predictably point out that there is a dispute
about whether Ms. Crosby said that Mr. Saylor could be violent,
as Sgt. Rochford recalls, or whether she qualified her statement
by saying that he could be violent if touched.”
22 n.6.
ECF No. 100 at
What Ms. Crosby testified she told Sgt. Rochford is
that if touched, “[h]e will curse at you” and “may get angry.”
Crosby Dep. at 182.
Hopefully, the Deputies understand that
one can be angry without being violent.
If not, their failure
to grasp that distinction might explain the course of events.
The State’s other primary argument appears to be that, once
the theater manager told the Deputies that Mr. Saylor “must be
removed” from the theater, they no longer had the discretion to
54
permit him to remain.
ECF No. 100 at 15 n.5, 22; see also ECF
No. 113 at 13-15, n.8, n.9.
The State supports this argument
with inapt hypotheticals that misconstrue the nature of the
requested accommodation.
In response to the opinion of Mr.
Scott, Plaintiffs’ expert, that a reasonable course of action
would have been to issue a summons to Mr. Saylor and allow him
to remain in the theater, the State counters in its motion,
“[i]f someone was trespassing in Mr. Scott’s home and the police
were called to respond and remove the trespasser, it is unlikely
that Mr. Scott would be satisfied with the trespasser being
issued a summons but being left in his home - particularly
someone with a propensity for aggression and even violence.”
ECF No. 100 at 15 n.5.
In its Reply, the State queries, what if
Mr. Saylor’s mother was unsuccessful in coaxing Mr. Saylor from
the theater, “Plaintiffs might suggest that the ADA requires the
theater to allow Mr. Saylor to remain there in perpetuity.”
No. 113 n.8.
ECF
Mr. Saylor, of course, was not in a private home,
but was in a public movie theater and Ms. Crosby’s request was
not that he be permitted to remain in the theater “in
perpetuity” but simply for the few minutes until his mother
arrived.
Furthermore, there is a dispute of fact as to whether
Mr. Rhodes actually requested that Mr. Saylor be removed from
the theater or simply requested that the Deputies “help out” Ms.
55
Crosby and “potentially” remove him.
Rhodes Dep. at 100, ECF
No. 98-4.
The State’s motion will be denied as to Count XI.
C. Claims Against Hill Management
Plaintiffs have asserted three state law claims against
Hill Management: negligence (Count III), gross negligence (Count
VI), and battery (Count VIII).
These claims are premised on the
contention that, as the Deputies’ secondary employer, Hill
Management was vicariously liable for all aspects of the conduct
of the Deputies.
In moving for summary judgment, Hill
Management focuses on the fact that, once the Deputies commenced
the arrest of Mr. Saylor, i.e., when Sgt. Rochford touched Mr.
Saylor’s arm, they were no longer employed by Hill Management
but were functioning exclusively in their official capacities as
sheriff’s deputies.
As for Sgt. Rochford’s conduct prior to the
initiation of the arrest, Hill Management contends that simply
talking to Mr. Saylor could not be construed as grossly
negligent conduct, or even negligent conduct.
Regardless, Hill
Management proffers that Sgt. Rochford’s engagement in that
conversation with Mr. Saylor was not the proximate cause of Mr.
Saylor’s death.
Plaintiffs do not dispute that, once the Deputies commenced
the arrest of Mr. Saylor, the Deputies were functioning in their
official capacities as sheriff’s deputies.
56
Their claims against
the State are directly premised on that proposition.
Plaintiffs
contend, however, that under Maryland law, Hill Management
remained a “joint employer” of the Deputies.
In making this
argument, Plaintiffs rely heavily on a decision of the Maryland
Court of Appeals, Lovelace v. Anderson, 785 A.2d 726 (Md. 2001).
In Lovelace, an off-duty Baltimore City police officer was
employed by a hotel in Baltimore County as a private security
guard.
While working at the hotel, the officer became involved
in a gun battle with two individuals who were attempting to rob
the hotel.
The plaintiff, a guest of the hotel, was
accidentally struck by a bullet fired from the officer’s service
weapon.
The plaintiff brought claims of negligence and gross
negligence against, inter alia, the officer, the owners of the
hotel,12 and the State of Maryland, asserting that both the hotel
owners and the State were the employers of the officer at the
time of the shooting and, thus, were vicariously liable for his
injury.
The State was dismissed from the action on a motion to
dismiss.
After discovery, the Circuit Court dismissed the
officer on the ground of qualified immunity, finding his conduct
did not amount to gross negligence.
12
The court also granted
Because, by happenstance, the ownership of the hotel changed
on the day of the incident, there was some dispute, not relevant
to this discussion, as to which entity owned the hotel at the
time of the incident.
57
summary judgment for the owners of the hotel on the ground that
the officer’s qualified immunity extended to his hotel employer.
The Court of Special Appeals affirmed the grant of summary
judgment for the hotel owners, but on different grounds than
that of the trial court.
The Court of Special Appeals held
that, when the gun battle began, the officer “reverted to his
police officer status” and was no longer the employee of the
hotel and thus, the hotel owners were not vicariously liable for
his conduct.
Lovelace v. Anderson, 730 A.2d 774, 786 (Md. Ct.
Spec App. 1999)).
In reversing the decision of the Court of Special Appeals
as to the grant of summary judgment for the hotel owners, the
Court of Appeals noted that the Court of Special Appeals
overlooked “the settled principle of Maryland law that ‘[a]
worker may simultaneously be the employee of two employers.’”
785 A.2d at 741 (quoting Whitehead v. Safway Steel Products,
Inc., 497 A.2d 803, 809 (Md. 1985)).
While the court assumed,
arguendo, that the officer was acting in the scope of his
employment as a Baltimore City police officer during the
incident, that assumption did not foreclose the possibility that
he was also acting within the scope of his employment with the
hotel.
Id.
The Court then identified the factors or criteria used for
determining whether an employer-employee relationship existed at
58
a particular time and whether an employee's actions were within
the scope of that employment relationship.
Those criteria
include: “(1) the power to select and hire the employee, (2) the
payment of wages, (3) the power to discharge, (4) the power to
control the employee's conduct, and (5) whether the work is part
of the regular business of the employer.”
742.
Lovelace, 785 A.2d at
In determining whether a particular action is within the
scope of the employment relationship, the Court of Appeals
identified numerous considerations, including:
whether the action was in furtherance of the
employer's business or was personal to the employee,
whether it occurred during the period when the
employee was on duty for the employer, whether it
related to the employee's duties, whether the action
was in a broad sense authorized by the employer,
whether the employer had reason to expect that the
type of action might occur, [and] whether it occurred
in an authorized locality.
Id.
Examining those factors in the context of the officer’s
hotel employment, the Maryland Court of Appeals concluded “the
evidence that was before the Circuit Court for purposes of the
motions for summary judgment was more than sufficient to show an
employment relationship between [the officer] and the hotel
during the attempted robbery, and to show that [the officer] was
acting within the scope of that employment relationship, even
assuming arguendo that he was also acting as a Baltimore City
police officer.”
Id.
The court noted that the evidence showed
59
that “providing security for the hotel and its guests was part
of the hotel’s business;” the officer was told, when hired,
“that one of his duties for the hotel was to prevent robberies
if he could;” the hotel had the authority to discharge him, and
the hotel controlled the manner of the dress of the security
guards, required that they keep their weapons concealed, and
gave them particular security assignments.
Id. at 742-43.
The court also noted, however, that the officer was “paid
by the hotel for the entire period of time in question” and was
on duty as a hotel employee at the time he first confronted the
robbers.
Id. at 742.
Although the court assumed for the
purposes of the appeal that the security guard was acting within
the scope of his employment as a Baltimore City police officer
during the incident, it also observed that “[i]n light of the
evidence presented in the Circuit Court, as well as the
pertinent regulations and statutory provisions, [the plaintiff]
makes a forceful argument in support of the Circuit Court's
holding that [the officer] was acting entirely as a private
security guard for the hotel and not as a Baltimore City police
officer.”
Id. at 740-41 (emphasis added).
This observation was
based upon the evidence that, while the officer had received
permission from the Baltimore City Police Department to work as
a security officer at that hotel, he had not obtained the
requisite permit to carry a handgun while engaged in that
60
employment.
This observation was also based upon the testimony
of a former Superintendent of the Maryland State Police that the
officer’s “secondary employment was in violation of Baltimore
City Police Department regulations concerning secondary
employment [and] that he was not acting as a Baltimore City
Police Officer during the gun battle.”
Id. at 733.
In arguing that this case is distinguishable from Lovelace,
Hill Management focuses on the language of the Employment
Agreement that expressly provides that, when responding to a
report of an unlawful act, the deputies shall be acting in their
official capacity as FCSO deputies.
As a result of this
reversion to deputy status, unlike the officer in Lovelace, the
Deputies were no longer being paid by a secondary employer once
the arrest was initiated.
Of greater significance, under the
terms of the Employment Agreement, once the arrest was
initiated, the Deputies were no longer under the control of Hill
Management but were obliged to conform their conduct to FCSO
policy.
While Maryland courts have identified the five criteria
listed above as relevant to whether there is an employeremployee relationship, they have also stressed that “the factor
of control stands out as the most important.”
A.2d at 809.
Whitehead, 497
Whether the employer “has the right to control and
direct the employee in the performance of the work and in the
61
manner in which the work is to be done is the ‘decisive,’ or
‘controlling’ test.”
Id. (citations omitted).
Here, by
expressed agreement between FCSO and Hill Management, Hill
Management relinquished all control over the Deputies’ actions
once any law enforcement activities commenced.
Although one
might ponder whether some representative of Hill Management
might have been able to ask or demand that the Deputies stop
effecting the arrest once it was commenced, there is no evidence
in the record that Hill Management retained any element of such
control and the Court cannot simply speculate that it might
have.
For these reasons, the Court concludes, as a matter of
law, that once the arrest began, the Deputies were no longer the
agents of Hill Management and, therefore, no liability extends
to Hill Management based upon the Deputies’ conduct from that
point forward.
As for the pre-arrest conduct, the questions are whether
that conduct was negligent and/or grossly negligent13 and whether
that conduct was a proximate cause of Mr. Saylor’s injury.
For
all the reasons discussed above, viewing the evidence in the
13
Plaintiffs make no argument that this pre-arrest conduct could
give rise to a claim of battery and the Court finds no support
for such a claim. See Sumpter v. Ahlbrecht, Civ. No. 10-580,
2012 WL 252980, at *17 (D. Colo. Jan. 26, 2012) (finding no
authority to support the argument that “any person who helps set
in a motion a series of events that eventually leads to physical
contact can be liable for battery”). The battery claim against
Hill Management will be dismissed.
62
light most favorable to Plaintiffs, a jury could find that it
was negligent if not grossly negligent for Sgt. Rochford to
enter the theater and confront a developmentally disabled
individual after having been told that doing so would create an
adverse reaction, particularly when there was no exigent need
for any immediate intervention.14
Whether Sgt. Rochford’s
decision to confront Mr. Saylor was a proximate cause of his
injury is perhaps a closer question.
In ruling on the motions to dismiss, this Court discussed
at some length the principles of proximate cause under Maryland
law in considering the claims against Regal Cinemas.
of Saylor, 54 F. Supp. 3d at 431-33.
See Estate
The Court noted that “the
proximate cause analysis is generally ‘reserved for the trier of
fact.’”
Id. at 433 (quoting Pittway Corp. v. Collins, 973 A.2d
771, 792 (Md. 2009)).
Nonetheless, the Court concluded that the
extremely limited conduct of Regal Cinemas - which consisted of
Mr. Rhodes telling Mr. Saylor he needed to purchase a second
14
Hill Management makes a somewhat spurious argument that
Sgt. Rochford’s activity in talking and reasoning with
Mr. Saylor cannot reasonably be construed as
negligent. That is exactly what he was hired by Hill
Management to do. If he had not talked and reasoned
with Mr. Saylor, then he would have had ignored the
security concerns of the Regal tenant, which would
have then breached Hill Management’s responsibilities
to Regal.
ECF No. 112 at 5. The fact that he was hired to do a particular
task does not forego the possibility that he might perform that
task negligently.
63
ticket and then calling for the assistance of the mall security
guards when he did not - was not a legally cognizable cause of
Mr. Saylor’s death in that it was “‘highly extraordinary and
unforeseeable’” that Mr. Saylor would be harmed as a result of
that limited conduct.
Id.
A jury could reach a different conclusion as to Sgt.
Rochford’s conduct as an agent of Hill Management.
When Sgt.
Rochford approached Mr. Saylor, he was aware from his
conversation with Ms. Crosby that Mr. Saylor might react
negatively if confronted.
If the jury credits Ms. Crosby’s
testimony that Sgt. Rochford remarked before going in to speak
with Mr. Saylor that he needed the assistance of other officers
because “[w]e’re going to have some trouble tonight,” the jury
could conclude that it was highly foreseeable that he was
anticipating a confrontation.
It is also difficult for Hill
Management to argue that intervening negligent acts rose to the
level of a superseding cause when the actor committing those
intervening negligent acts was Sgt. Rochford, albeit in a
different capacity.
Sgt. Rochford could certainly foresee what
his own next steps might be.
As an experienced law enforcement
officer, Sgt. Rochford could also foresee the possibility of
injuries that could arise while making an arrest.
Accordingly, Hill Management’s motion for summary judgment
will be denied as to Plaintiffs’ negligence and gross negligence
64
claims.
Hill Management’s liability will be limited, however,
to liability for the conduct of Sgt. Rochford prior to his
initiation of the arrest of Mr. Saylor.
V. CONCLUSION
For the above stated reasons the Deputies’ motion for
summary judgment will be denied in its entirety.
The motion for
summary judgment filed by the State will be granted as to the
ADA failure to train claim (Count X), but denied as to the ADA
reasonable accommodation claim (Count XI).
Hill Management’s
motion for summary judgment will be granted as to the battery
claim (Count VIII), but denied as to the negligence and gross
negligence claims (Counts III and VI).
A separate order will
issue.
_______________/s/________________
William M. Nickerson
Senior United States District Judge
DATED: September 9, 2016
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