Ahmed v. The City of Houston

Filing 24

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER Granting 20 MOTION for Summary Judgment (Signed by Judge Ewing Werlein, Jr) Parties notified. (wbostic, 4)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF TEXAS
HOUSTON DIVISION
SYED F. AHMED,
Plaintiff,

v.
THE CITY OF HOUSTON,
Defendant.

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CIVIL ACTION NO. H-13-1111

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
Pending is Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment (Document
No. 20), to which Plaintiff has filed his Response in opposition.
After carefully considering the motion,

response,

and applicable

law, the Court concludes that the motion should be granted.
I. Background
In 2008, Plaintiff Syed F. Ahmed ("Plaintiff") was arrested
and convicted for installing a tracking device on his estranged
wife's car, which conviction was later set aside because Plaintiff
was a joint owner of the car at the time of the alleged offense.
The initial complaint was made by Plaintiff's then estranged wife,
Denise Michelle Ahmed ("Ms. Ahmed"),

who reported to the Houston

Police Department in May 2008 that she had discovered a GPS device
on her car and that Plaintiff was stalking her. 1

1

The case was

Document No. 20, ex. C at 000070-72, 000086-87.

assigned to Officer Robert Brown, who worked in the Homicide Unit
investigating

family

violence

cases. 2

Officer Brown contacted

Plaintiff, who came to the police station for an interview. 3

After

Officer Brown explained that Plaintiff was neither charged nor
arrested, Plaintiff confirmed that he was married to Ms. Ahmed but
estranged from her, and admitted that he had placed two tracking
devices on Ms. Ahmed's car and had been tracking her since 2006
without her consent or knowledge. 4

Officer Brown confirmed that

the car was registered to Ms. Ahmed. 5
Officer Brown conferred with Harris County Assistant District
Attorney Barron ("Barron")
pursue a

charge

of

about the case, and Barron decided to

unlawfully installing a

violation of Texas Penal Code § 16.06. 6

tracking device

in

Officer Brown prepared and

signed a probable cause statement in support of this charge, which
stated that Ms. Ahmed was the "sole owner" of her vehicle and that

2

Document No. 21, ex. 1 at 10:16-11:9.

3

Id., ex. 1 at 20:7-8.

4 Document No.
20, ex. A at 80:3-13; id., ex. C at 000062-63;
Document No. 21, ex. 1 at 21:8-19.

5

Document No. 21, ex. 1 at 29:22-30:5.

6 Id.,
ex. 1 at 24:4-14; Document No. 20, ex. C at 000063.
Texas Penal Code § 16.06 makes it a Class A misdemeanor to
"knowingly install[] an electronic or mechanical tracking device on
a motor vehicle owned or leased by another person." TEX. PENAL CODE
§ 16.06 (b) .

2

Plaintiff was her estranged husband.?

On May 30,

2008,

a Harris

county Magistrate found probable cause, and an arrest warrant was
issued for Plaintiff.8

Three days later, after learning that he

had an outstanding Harris County warrant, Plaintiff turned himself
into the Harris County Jail and was detained there for six or seven
hours before bonding out.

9

Plaintiff later obtained counsel and,

based on her advice,

pled guilty to a violation of Texas Penal Code

§

16.06.

Plaintiff

was placed on deferred adjudication probation for 18 months and was
fined $500. 10

Plaintiff completed his probation period in 2010, and

later filed an application for writ of habeas corpus. l l

On May 19,

2011 his conviction was set aside based on actual innocence and

Document No. 21, ex. 3.
Officer Brown testified in his
deposition that when he prepared the probable cause statement, he
had in mind the charge of stalking rather than unlawful
installation of a tracking device.
Id., ex. 1 at 24: 18 -25: 5.
However, the probable cause statement he signed states that
"AFFIANT BELIEVES AND HAS REASON TO BELIEVE THAT DEFENDANT, SYED
FARUK AHMED, COMMITTED CLASS A UNLAWFUL INSTALLATION OF TRACKING
7

DEVICE.

1/

rd., ex. 3.

8 Document No. 21, ex. 3.
9 Document No.
20, ex. A at 102:2-12, 104:8-105:14; id., ex.
H at 000244.

10

Document No. 20, ex. D.

11

Id., ex. H.
3

ineffective assistance of counsel because Plaintiff was a joint
owner of Ms. Ahmed's car at the time of the alleged offense. 12
On April 18,
alleging

2013,

malicious

Plaintiff filed this Section 1983 claim

prosecution

against

the

City

of

Houston

("Defendant"),13 arising from a violation of his Fourth Amendment
right

to be

free

from unlawful

arrest. 14

Defendant moves

for

summary judgment, arguing that Plaintiff's claim is barred by the
statute of

limitations,

that

Plaintiff

has

not

identified any

denial of rights by Defendant, that any deprivation of rights was
not the result of any policy of Defendants, that Defendant did not
arrest Plaintiff, and that there is no evidence of a failure to
train Defendant's police officers. 15
II. Legal Standard
Rule 56(a)

provides that "[t]he 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."
this

burden,

the

FED. R.

56 (a)

burden shifts

Once the movant carries

to

Crv. P.

nonmovant

the

summary judgment should not be granted.

12

Document No. 21, ex. 4.

13

Document No. 1 (Orig. Compl. )

14

Document No. 19 (2d Am. Compl. )

15

Document No. 20.
4

to

show that

Morris v. Covan World Wide

Moving, Inc., 144 F.3d 377, 380 (5th Cir. 1998).

A party opposing

a properly supported motion for summary judgment may not rest upon
mere allegations or denials

in a pleading,

and unsubstantiated

assertions that a fact issue exists will not suffice.

Id.

"[T]he

nonmoving party must set forth specific facts showing the existence
of a
case.

'genuine'
/I

Id.

issue concerning every essential component of its
"A party asserting

that

a

fact

cannot be or is

genuinely disputed must support the assertion by:
particular parts of materials in the record .

(A)

citing to

or (B)

showing

that the materials cited do not establish the absence or presence
of a

genuine dispute,

or that an adverse party cannot produce

admissible evidence to support the fact./I

FED. R. Cry. P. 56(c) (1).

"The court need consider only the cited materials,
consider other materials in the record./I

Id. 56

(c)

In considering a motion for summary judgment,

but

it may

(3).
the district

court must view the evidence "through the prism of the substantive
evidentiary burden./I
2505, 2513 (1986).

Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 106 S. Ct.

All justifiable inferences to be drawn from the

underlying facts must be viewed in the light most favorable to the
nonmoving party.
Corp.,

106 S.

Ct.

Matsushi ta Elec.
1348, 1356

(1986)

Indus.

Co.

v.

Zenith Radio

"If the record, viewed in

this light, could not lead a rational trier of fact to find" for
the nonmovant, then summary judgment is proper.

Kelley v. Price-

Macemon, Inc., 992 F.2d 1408, 1413 (5th Cir. 1993).

5

On the other

hand, if "the factfinder could reasonably find in [the nonmovant' s]
favor,

then summary judgment

standards of Rule 56 are met,

is

improper."

Even if

the

a court has discretion to deny a

motion for summary judgment if it believes that "the better course
would be to proceed to a full trial."

Anderson,

106 S.

Ct.

at

2513.
III. Analysis
Plaintiff seeks damages under Section 1983, alleging a single
cause of action,
Plaintiff's
arrest. 16

entitled "Malicious Prosecution,"

Fourth

Amendment

right

to

be

free

premised on

from

unlawful

"Malicious prosecution" as such and standing alone, "is

no violation of the United States Constitution," and thus provides
no basis for relief under 42 U.S.C.
352

F.3d 939,

942

(5th Cir.

§

1983.

2003).

Castellano v. Fragozo,

" [C] ausing charges

to be

filed without probable cause will not without more violate the
Constitution.

So defined, the assertion of malicious prosecution

states no constitutional claim."

Id.

at 953.

However,

"[t] he

initiation of criminal charges without probable cause may set in
force events that run afoul of explicit constitutional protection--

16
Document No. 19.
Oddly and presumably inadvertently,
Plaintiff in the Jurisdiction section of his Second Amended
Complaint recites that "this case arises under the equal protection
clause of
the Fourteenth Amendment
to the United States
Constitution," but the pleading neither describes nor alleges any
equal protection claim and none is argued in Plaintiff's opposition
to Defendant's Motion for Summary Judgment.

6

the Fourth Amendment if the accused is seized and arrested,
example."

Id.

for

"Such claims of lost constitutional rights are for

violation of rights locatable in constitutional text, and some such
claims may be made under 42 U.S.C.

§

1983.

Regardless, they are

not claims for malicious prosecution and labeling them as such only
invites confusion."

Id. at 953-54.

Plaintiff's Second Amended Complaint pleads that his malicious
prosecution claim is grounded in the

"violation of

Amendment

right

constitutionally

protected

to

be

his

Fourth

free

from

unreasonable seizures (e.g. an unlawful arrest) and the deprivation
of liberty without due process of law." 17

Plaintiff contends that

Officer Brown should have known that Plaintiff was an owner of the
vehicle and therefore that no crime had occurred, that his failure
adequately to investigate this issue was a result of inadequate
training,

and

that

Plaintiff's

violated when Plaintiff

Fourth

Amendment

"was ultimately processed,

rights
booked,

were
and

jailed for hours before bonding out based upon a warrant issued on
a flawed probable cause statement" signed by Officer Brown. 18

17

Id. at 4.

18
Document No. 21 at 7; Document No. 20, ex. A at 138:22139: 3 .
Plaintiff does not allege- -and the summary judgment
evidence does not show--that Defendant was at any time involved in
Plaintiff's prosecution except for Officer Brown's signing of the
probable cause statement.
See Document No. 21, ex. 1 at 24:7-14
(the district attorney made the decision to file the particular
charge against Plaintiff); Document No. 20, ex. A at 122:19-123:22
(same); Document No. 21, ex. 1 at 34:21-35:1 (Officer Brown did not
participate as a witness in the prosecution of Plaintiff) .

7

Plaintiff's improbable theory is that his voluntary surrender
at the Harris County Jail--after learning that Harris County had
issued an arrest warrant for him--should be considered an unlawful
arrest by the City of Houston, notwithstanding his admission that
no one

from the Houston Police Department ever arrested him. 19

According to the supplemental Offense Report, dated June 10, 2008,
Plaintiff was placed in the Harris County jail on June 2,

2008.

The circumstances of this allegedly false arrest in violation of
the Fourth Amendment, according to Plaintiff himself, are that he
voluntarily turned himself in at the jail after he had learned of
the warrant for his arrest.

He walked in and "told them, I have a

warrant on my name and I would like to, you know, process it and
get out on bond."

Plaintiff reports the paperwork was processed,

he was detained in the jail "for like, six, seven hours," and was
bonded out and departed.

Plaintiff was never again arrested or

detained on this charge, and there is no claim of any lack of due
process in the criminal proceedings that followed.
Given the summary judgment evidence viewed in the light most
favorable to Plaintiff, the statute of limitations on Plaintiff's
§

1983 suit for damages based on false arrest began when Plaintiff

was detained on June 2,

2008.

See Wallace v.

Kato,

127 S.

Ct.

19 See Document No.
20, ex. A at 105:17-106:20 (Officer Brown
was not present when Plaintiff turned himself in at the jail) i id.,
ex. A at 130:4-8 ("Q. Did anybody from the Houston Police
Department ever arrest you? A. For this? Q. Uh-huh. A. Nope.
fJ

).

8

1091, 1100 (2007)
§

("We hold that the statute of limitations upon a

1983 claim seeking damages for a false arrest in violation of the

Fourth

Amendment,

proceedings,

where

begins

to

the
run

arrest
at

the

is

followed

time

detained pursuant to legal process.").

the

criminal

claimant

In Texas,

statute of limitations applies and hence,

by

becomes

the two year

Plaintiff's claim--not

filed until April 2013 - -was time barred.

Price v.

Antonio, Tex., 431 F.3d 890,892 (5th Cir. 2005)

City of San

("The limitations

period for a claim brought under section 1983 is determined by the
general statute of limitations governing personal injuries in the
forum state."); TEX. CIV.

PRAC.

&

REM. CODE

§

16.003 (two-year statute

of limitations for personal injury claims); see also Castellano,
352 F.3d at 959 ("[W]e adhere to the view that the umbrella of the
Fourth Amendment, broad and powerful as it is, casts its protection
solely over the pretrial events of a prosecution.").
Plaintiff

argues

under Heck v.

Humphrey,

114

S.

Ct.

2364

(1994), that his claim was not untimely because he filed suit less
than two years after his conviction was set aside in May 2011.
That

same

argument

was

rejected by the Court.

made by the plaintiff
See Wallace,

in Wallace,

and

127 S. Ct. at 1097-1100.

Moreover, to the extent Plaintiff possibly asserts a state law
claim for malicious prosecution,

his state law claim is barred

because he did not file suit until more than one year after his
conviction was set aside.

See TEX. CIV.

9

PRAC.

&

REM. CODE

§

16.002(a)

("A person must bring suit for malicious prosecution .

. not

later than one year after the day the cause of action accrues.")

i

Torres v. GSC Enterprises, Inc., 242 S.W.3d 553, 561 (Tex. App.-El
Paso 2007)

(statute of limitations on malicious prosecution claim

begins to run when the criminal prosecution is terminated) .
IV.

Order

For the foregoing reasons, it is
ORDERED that Defendant City of Houston's Motion for Summary
Judgment

(Document

No.

20)

is

GRANTED,

and

Plaintiff

Syed

F.

Ahmed's claims are DISMISSED with prejudice.
The Clerk will enter this Order, providing a correct copy to
all parties of record.
SIGNED at Houston, Texas, on

thiS~~Y of October,

2014.

,.
NG WERLEIN, JR.
STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

10