WARNER v. TOWNSHIP OF SOUTH HARRISON et al
Filing
71
MEMORANDUM OPINION FILED. Signed by Chief Judge Jerome B. Simandle on 9/17/12. (js)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY
MATTHEW WARNER,
HON. JEROME B. SIMANDLE
Plaintiff,
Civil No. 09-6095 (JBS/JS)
v.
MEMORANDUM OPINION
TOWNSHIP OF SOUTH HARRISON, et
al.,
Defendants.
SIMANDLE, Chief District Judge:
This matter is before the Court upon the motion of
Defendants South Harrison Township, Warren Mabey, Colleen Bianco,
James McCall and Gary Spinner ("Defendants") for reconsideration
[Docket Item 60] of this Court's order granting in part and
denying in part the Defendants' previous motion for summary
judgment [Docket Item 58].
1.
The Court finds as follows:
The Plaintiff Matthew Warner ("Plaintiff") performed a
port scan on the Township of South Harrison's computer network at
the request of Deputy Mayor Robert Campbell but without the
permission of the Township Committee.
This incident resulted in
a state police investigation to determine whether the Plaintiff
unlawfully breached the Township's computer network.
The state
police concluded that there was no criminal activity involved in
this incident and that the Plaintiff was asked to scan the
network and believed he had the proper authority to do so.
The
matter was then referred back to the Township for any further
action.
The Township formed a subcommittee comprised of
Defendants Spinner and McCall to investigate the incident and
subsequently the subcommittee issued its own report and findings.
Attached to this report was an unredacted copy of the state
police investigation report which included Plaintiff's social
security number, home address, date of birth, driver's license
number and personal telephone numbers.
Defendants Spinner and
McCall handed a copy of the report with the incorporated exhibits
to the Municipal Clerk.
This report contained Plaintiff's
unredacted personal information and was later made available to
the public through Open Public Records Act requests.
2.
The Plaintiff filed the instant action against the
Defendants Township of South Harrison, Jeannine Campbell, Colleen
Bianco, Gary Spinner, James McCall and Warren Mabey.
In the
First Amended Complaint, the Plaintiff alleged Defendants
violated his right to privacy under both the Federal and State
Constitutions.
The Plaintiff also brought a Fourteenth Amendment
defamation claim against the Defendants.
Lastly, the Plaintiff
brought a Monell claim for violation of federal rights against
the Township of South Harrison and maintained that the
municipality failed to train, supervise and/or discipline the
individual defendants.
3.
Defendants then filed a motion for summary judgment,
which this Court granted in part and denied in part. [Docket Item
2
58.]
The court granted Defendants' motion for summary judgment
as to the Plaintiff's defamation claim.
The court dismissed
Plaintiff's constitutional right to privacy claim against
Defendant Bianco and Defendant Mabey in its entirety.
The court
also granted summary judgment and dismissed Plaintiff's right to
privacy claim against Defendants McCall and Spinner in their
individual capacities.
However, the court denied summary
judgment as to the Plaintiff's right to privacy claim against
Defendants McCall and Spinner in their official capacities.
The
court also denied summary judgment as to Plaintiff's Monell claim
against the Township.
4.
Specifically, the court concluded that the Plaintiff
produced evidence from which a jury could conclude his federal
rights were violated by Defendants McCall and Spinner, who were
policy makers for the Township.
The court found that there was
evidence from which a jury could find the disclosure of
Plaintiff's personal information in the unredacted police report
was not negligent.
The record showed that Defendants McCall and
Spinner were told numerous times by multiple individuals that the
information included in the report was confidential.
McCall and
Spinner's own investigatory subcommittee report summarized the
state police report.
Consequently, the court found it was
evident McCall and Spinner read the unredacted report and were
aware of its sensitive contents.
However, Defendants McCall and
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Spinner failed to properly redact the report prior to attaching
it as an exhibit to their public subcommittee findings.
Therefore, the court held that a reasonable jury could find that
the disclosure by McCall and Spinner was not negligent; thus
Plaintiff's right to privacy claim remained viable.
5.
Defendants now move for reconsideration and argue that
there was not sufficient evidence that McCall and Spinner's
disclosure was non-negligent.
In particular, the Defendants
argue that the court improperly relied upon the Plaintiff's
suspicion that Defendants Spinner and McCall could be lying about
how they ultimately received a copy of the unredacted police
report.
The Defendants argue that the court overlooked facts in
the record which supported the Defendants' contention that McCall
and Spinner received the report from the State Police after
submitting a $16 money order.
The Defendants argue the court
improperly relied on Plaintiff's supposition that Defendant Mabey
furnished the report, not the state police, and erroneously held
McCall and Spinner's disclosure was not negligent.
Therefore,
the Defendants maintain reconsideration is proper.
6.
The Plaintiff filed opposition to Defendants'
reconsideration motion.
First, the Plaintiff maintains that this
motion is untimely because it was not filed within fourteen (14)
days of the court's June 26, 2012 order in compliance with L.
Civ. R. 7.1(i).
Instead, it was filed twenty-eight (28) days
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after the court's decision.
Therefore, Plaintiff argues the
court should deny the motion on timeliness grounds alone.
As to
the merits, the Plaintiff argues the Defendants misconstrue the
court's decision.
The Plaintiff maintains that the court's
finding that the disclosure of Plaintiff's personal identifiers
was not negligent did not depend on how Defendants McCall and
Spinner received the unredacted report.
Rather, the court's
holding relied on the fact that it was clear Defendants McCall
and Spinner had read the report, were aware of its sensitive
contents and failed to redact it prior to publishing it as an
exhibit to their subcommittee findings.
Thus, Plaintiff
maintains that the Defendants' motion lacks merit and should be
denied.
7.
Local Civil Rule 7.1(i) governs the Court’s review of
Plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration.
Rule 7.1(i) requires the
moving party to set forth the factual matters or controlling
legal authorities it believes the Court overlooked when rendering
its initial decision.
L. Civ. R. 7.1(i).
To prevail on a motion
for reconsideration, the movant must show:
(1) an intervening change in the controlling law; (2)
the availability of new evidence that was not
available when the court . . . [rendered the judgment
in question]; or (3) the need to correct a clear error
of law or fact or to prevent manifest injustice.
Max’s Seafood Café ex rel. Lou-Ann, Inc., v. Quinteros, 176 F.3d
669, 677 (3d Cir. 1999); see also Tehan v. Disability Management
5
Services, Inc., 111 F. Supp. 2d 542, 549 (D.N.J. 2000).
prevail under the third prong, the
To
movant must show that
“dispositive factual matters or controlling decisions of law were
brought to the court’s attention but not considered.”
P.
Schoenfeld Asset Management LLC v. Cendant Corp., 161 F. Supp. 2d
349, 353 (D.N.J. 2001) (internal
omitted).
quotations and citations
The standard of review involved in a motion for
reconsideration is high and relief is to be granted sparingly.
United States v. Jones, 158 F.R.D. 309, 314 (D.N.J.1994);
Maldonado v. Lucca, 636 F. Supp. 621, 629 (D.N.J. 1986).
8.
As an initial matter, Defendants' motion for
reconsideration is untimely as it was filed outside the fourteen
day period prescribed by L. Civ. R. 7.1(i).
The Defendants'
argument that the twenty-eight day period in Fed. R. Civ. P.
59(e) applies to this motion is unpersuasive.
The provisions of
Rule 59 are designed to address orders rendering a final
judgment, not interlocutory orders partially denying summary
judgment.
Because no final judgment has been entered in this
action pursuant to Rule 54(b), the provisions of Rule 59, and its
28-day time limit, are inapplicable here.
Juzwin v. Amtorg
Trading Corp., 718 F. Supp. 1233, 1235 (D.N.J. 1989).1
1
The
In addition, the cases cited by the Defendants in support
of their argument that Rule 59(e) applies to all motions for
reconsideration in fact hold that Rule 59(e) only applies to
final judgments and not interlocutory orders. Peterson v.
Brooks, No. 07-2442, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 66904 (E.D. Pa.
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proper procedural mechanism for reconsideration of this
interlocutory order is Local Civil Rule 7.1(i).
Motions under L.
Civ. R. 7.1(i) must be served and filed within 14 days after the
entry of the order, and therefore Defendant’s motion was
untimely.
9.
Notwithstanding the timeliness issue, the Defendants'
motion for reconsideration lacks merit.
First, the Defendants
have not presented evidence which the court overlooked; instead,
the Defendants disagree with the court's interpretation of the
evidence.
See G-69 v. Degnan, 748 F. Supp. 274, 275 (D.N.J.
1990)("A party seeking reconsideration must show more than a
disagreement with the Court's decision, and recapitulation of the
cases and arguments considered by the court before rendering its
original decision fails to carry the moving party's burden.").
10.
Further, the manner in which Defendants McCall and
Spinner received the unredacted police report was irrelevant to
September 2, 2008) (applying Rule 59(e) to reconsideration of
final judgment); Peterson v. Brennan, No. 97-3477, 2004 U.S.
Dist. LEXIS 11860 (E.D. Pa. June 15, 2004)(applying Rule 59(e) to
reconsideration of final judgment); Mainguth v. Packard, No.
4:05-0256, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 34115 (M.D. Pa. May 23,
2006)(noting that Rule 59 does not govern motion for
reconsideration of denial of motion for summary judgment which is
an interlocutory order, but ultimately using court's discretion
to grant reconsideration). The court was unable to find the
final case cited by Defendants, Clapsad v. Shannon, 2003 U.S.
Dist. LEXIS 22255 (D.N.J. 2003), as the citation given is not
accurate.
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the court's conclusion that McCall and Spinner's ultimate
disclosure was not negligent.
Specifically, the court held:
The Township Committee in this case requested the state
investigatory report and were told on multiple occasions
that the content of this report was confidential. It is
unclear how Defendants Spinner and McCall ultimately
obtained the report as the New Jersey State Police
refused to disclose it and the deposition testimony of
Defendants Spinner and McCall is inconsistent.
The
inclusion of the state investigatory report as an exhibit
to the Subcommittee's report was intentional and
deliberate. It is evident that the Subcommittee read and
summarized the report in their own findings and were
therefore aware of the sensitive personal information
contained therein. While the Subcommittee may not have
included the state investigatory report as an exhibit
with the intent of disclosing Plaintiff's social security
number, home address and birth date, such specific intent
is not required to trigger the protections of the Due
Process Clause.
It is sufficient if evidence
demonstrates that a defendant acted knowingly in
disclosing the private information, that is, that the
official knew that the document contained such private
information and that the official acted to disclose the
document to the general public. Thus, an inadvertent or
negligent disclosure does not violate a constitutionallyprotected privacy right.
What matters is that this
disclosure was not negligent, and therefore the
Plaintiff's
right
to
informational
privacy
was
implicated.
Warner v. Twp. of South Harrison, No. 09-6095, 2012 WL 2466573,
*10 (D.N.J. June 26, 2012).
Indeed, the court granted
Defendants' motion for summary judgment as to Chief Warren Mabey
even assuming Defendant Mabey had disclosed the unredacted report
to McCall and Spinner.
In finding that such disclosure would not
violate Plaintiff's right to privacy, the court reasoned:
Assuming Defendant Mabey was the source of the unredacted
state investigatory report, his disclosure of the report
to Defendants McCall and Spinner did not violate
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Plaintiff's constitutional right to privacy.
In
particular, Defendants McCall and Spinner were not
members of the public, but rather were functioning as
governmental officials vested with the authority to
investigate the April 16, 2008 incident. The sharing of
law enforcement investigative information with other
government
officials
is
not
prohibited
by
the
constitution, nor should it be. See Philadelphia Yearly
Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends v. Tate, 519
F.2d 1335, 1338 (3d Cir. 1975)(holding that the sharing
of information by a law enforcement authority with other
agencies
of
government
having
a
legitimate
law
enforcement
function
does
not
give
rise
to
a
constitutional violation). Here, Defendants McCall and
Spinner, as members of the Investigative Subcommittee,
were legitimately investigating Plaintiff's involvement
in the April 16, 2008 incident and consequently were
entitled to have access to the report.
Warner, 2012 WL 2466573 at *12.
Accordingly, Defendants' motion for reconsideration on the
basis that the court unduly relied on Plaintiff's supposition
that McCall and Spinner received the unredacted report from
Defendant Mabey is without merit.
11.
For the reasons set forth above, the Plaintiff's motion
for reconsideration will be denied.
The accompanying Order will
be entered.
September 17, 2012
Date
s/ Jerome B. Simandle
JEROME B. SIMANDLE
Chief U.S. District Judge
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