Mosgrove v. County of Santa Clara

Background

Tom Mosgrove brought a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law allowing claims for constitutional violations by government actors. He alleged that Morgan Hill police officers arrested him after responding to a domestic-violence incident and that the arrest violated the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable seizures. He alleged that officers told him that someone had to be arrested whenever the Morgan Hill Police Department responded to a domestic-violence incident, regardless of probable cause. Mosgrove was arrested for domestic-violence battery and false imprisonment, spent about six days in the Santa Clara County main jail, and was not prosecuted.

Mosgrove alleged that the arrest resulted from a Domestic Violence Protocol developed in 1993 at the request of the Police Chiefs’ Association of Santa Clara County and the Santa Clara Domestic Violence Council. He claimed that the County, the Association, and other police agencies periodically reviewed, approved, and adopted the Protocol, and that they failed to train or supervise officers adequately.

The Morgan Hill defendants answered the First Amended Complaint. The County and District Attorney Jeffrey F. Rosen filed one motion to dismiss, and the Police Chiefs’ Association filed another. Both motions were brought under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), which permits dismissal when a complaint does not state a legally sufficient claim.

Claims Against the County and the Police Chiefs’ Association

Mosgrove relied on municipal-liability principles from Monell v. Department of Social Services. Under those principles, a government entity may be liable under Section 1983 when an official policy, custom, or practice causes a constitutional violation. The alleged policy may include a written policy, an established unwritten practice, or a deliberately inadequate failure to train or supervise employees.

The court stated that the Protocol did not expressly authorize arrests without probable cause. At the hearing, Mosgrove acknowledged that the Protocol was not unconstitutional on its face. The court therefore analyzed only his theories that the County and the Association failed to train or supervise officers or maintained an unconstitutional unwritten custom or practice.

As to failure to train or supervise, the court found Mosgrove’s allegations insufficient. He did not allege facts showing that the Morgan Hill officers were employees of the County or the Association. The court also found that his assertions that the police agencies and officers were agents of the County or the Association, and that the entities had participated in or aided a constitutional violation, were not supported by enough additional factual allegations.

As to an unwritten custom or practice, the court explained that a plaintiff generally must allege a widespread and persistent practice rather than an isolated incident. Mosgrove relied on his own arrest and did not sufficiently allege other examples of domestic-violence arrests without probable cause. Declarations describing other arrests, submitted with his opposition to the motions, could not supply new allegations for purposes of deciding a Rule 12(b)(6) motion. The court advised that any amended claim would need facts connecting conduct by independent police agencies to the Morgan Hill Police Department.

The court dismissed Mosgrove’s claims against the County and the Police Chiefs’ Association with leave to amend, but only as to the failure-to-train-or-supervise and unwritten-policy-or-custom theories.

Claim Against District Attorney Rosen

District Attorney Rosen argued that Mosgrove’s claim was barred by the statute of limitations and could not relate back to the filing of the earlier complaint under Rule 15(c)(1)(C). At the hearing, Mosgrove agreed to voluntarily dismiss the claim against Rosen. The court therefore granted Rosen’s motion to dismiss without leave to amend.

Disposition

The court ordered: (1) the County’s motion to dismiss was granted with leave to amend; (2) the Police Chiefs’ Association’s motion to dismiss was granted with leave to amend; and (3) District Attorney Rosen’s motion to dismiss was granted without leave to amend. Any amended complaint had to be filed within 60 days of the order. The court stated that failure to meet the deadline or cure the identified deficiencies would result in dismissal of the deficient claims with prejudice, and that amendment was limited to the defects addressed in the order.