Zuegel v. Mountain View Police Department

Background

The parties filed ten motions in limine—requests to decide before trial whether particular evidence or testimony may be presented. Trial was scheduled to begin on November 16, 2020, and the court held a final pretrial conference on October 15, 2020. The order addressed five motions by Zuegel and five by the defendants.

Zuegel’s Motions

Motion No. 1. Zuegel sought to exclude evidence about the offense for which he was arrested, probable cause, the alleged victim’s identity and ethnicity, charges, the outcome of the criminal case, and his guilt or innocence. The court denied the request to exclude the nature of the offense and the charges because that information helped explain why the officers went to his home and could be relevant to damages. The court granted the request to exclude evidence about the alleged victim’s identity and ethnicity. It granted the request concerning evidence of probable cause and deferred the issue to a jury instruction. It deferred ruling on the ultimate outcome of the arrest, including Zuegel’s plea and sentence-related conditions. The court granted the request to exclude testimony about Zuegel’s guilt or innocence. The court’s final order described this motion as granted in part, denied in part, and deferred in part.

Motion No. 2. Zuegel sought to exclude or limit testimony from defense psychiatry expert Dr. Laura Davies. The court declined to exclude Dr. Davies entirely. It denied the requests concerning her testimony about the YMCA events and police interaction, Zuegel’s wealth and earning power, comments about women, alleged mild paranoia and grandiosity, and employment and relationships. The court deferred the issue of references to Zuegel’s marriage, stating that Dr. Davies could address it if Zuegel’s testimony or his experts opened the subject. The court granted the request to exclude Dr. Davies’s Rule 26 report and independent medical examination transcript as trial exhibits. It also granted the request to exclude videotape of contentious interactions during the first day of her deposition. The court noted that limited use of interview audio could be allowed in specified circumstances. The final order described this motion as granted in part, denied in part, and deferred in part.

Motion No. 3. Zuegel sought to restrict police-practices expert Robert J. Fonzi’s testimony, including testimony about consent to enter the home and the California Peace Officer Standards and Training Manual. The court stated that Fonzi could not testify about what the law is or give an opinion on the ultimate issue of whether there was consent to enter. It denied the request to exclude his testimony about general police practices and references to the training manual. It deferred other issues concerning Fonzi’s testimony. The final order described this motion as denied in part and deferred in part.

Motion No. 4. Zuegel sought to exclude defense expert Greg Stutchman’s testimony as unreliable. The court granted the motion as to Stutchman’s opinion about what was said on a body-camera recording because that opinion differed from the testimony of everyone in the room who heard it. The court permitted him to testify that the relevant audio could not be recovered. The final order described this motion as granted in part.

Motion No. 5. Zuegel sought to exclude an August 25, 2020 email from his wife to Deputy Police Chief Christopher Hsiung concerning their autistic son’s new supportive living home. The court deferred ruling because it needed to hear testimony from the Zuegels about their views of the police.

The Defendants’ Motions

Motion No. 1. The defendants sought to exclude evidence of other complaints, arrests, and lawsuits involving the Mountain View Police Department. The court granted the motion as to the cases identified in the opinion as Lother v. City of Mountain View and Doe v. Kamarei, finding them insufficiently probative of whether the officers had consent to enter the home and likely to consume time and confuse the jury.

Motion No. 2. The defendants sought to exclude testimony from Maurice Leibenstern, a lawyer who contacted the Zuegels after Zuegel’s arrest and went to the police station. The court granted the motion, finding that Zuegel had not connected Leibenstern’s experience to the two officers involved and that Leibenstern could not identify the person with whom he spoke.

Motion No. 3. The defendants sought to prevent cross-examination of Fonzi about his opinions in other police-shooting cases. The court denied the motion. It held that questioning about Fonzi’s prior work could be used to show possible bias, subject to objections and a possible limiting instruction that the questioning was relevant only to bias.

Motion No. 4. The defendants sought to separate punitive-damages issues from liability and to exclude evidence of their finances during the liability phase. The court granted the motion as modified. The parties agreed that the jury should decide liability and whether punitive conduct occurred before hearing evidence about defendants’ finances, if that evidence became necessary.

Motion No. 5. The defendants sought to exclude statements by dismissed officer Marco Garcia indicating that he believed 98 percent of child-abuse victims tell the truth. The court denied the motion because the statements could be relevant to the officers’ state of mind when they came to the door and to whether they believed they had consent to enter. The concluding list appears to contain a typographical omission in identifying this motion, but the body of the opinion expressly rules on the defendants’ fifth motion and denies it.

Disposition and Classification

The court entered pretrial evidentiary rulings rather than deciding the parties’ underlying claims. It ordered that Zuegel’s first motion was granted in part, denied in part, and deferred in part; his second motion was granted in part, denied in part, and deferred in part; his third motion was denied in part and deferred in part; his fourth motion was granted in part; and his fifth motion was deferred. The defendants’ first motion was granted as to the two identified cases, their second motion was granted, their third motion was denied, their fourth motion was granted as modified, and their fifth motion was denied. Because the order concerned trial evidence and did not decide the merits of the underlying claims, it is classified as a procedural order.