B. v. City of Oakland

Background

Plaintiffs Phyllis A. Thomas, Charles A. Thomas, Sr., Brian A. Thomas, Racheal D. Colston, Zelda B., and Cynthia M. attended a middle-school girls’ basketball game at McClymonds High School. The game was part of Oakland’s Citywide Youth Basketball League. LaRichea Smith, an Oakland employee and the site director, enforced a League rule requiring spectators to sit on the opposite side of the gym from the teams and coaches.

Several plaintiffs stated that they had physical disabilities or mobility limitations and sat in a section marked for people with disabilities because the other bleachers were crowded and reaching the available seating would have required climbing stairs or several rows. They alleged that Smith ordered them to move, berated them, used racial slurs, accused Colston of lying about her disability, threatened to bar family members from future games, and struck C. Thomas’s hand, knocking his cellphone away when he tried to photograph her in a hallway. Smith disputed important parts of their account. She said she was enforcing the spectator-seating rule, that open seating was available on the other side, and that a referee eventually escorted C. Thomas and Colston from the gym.

The operative complaint contained two claims: a race-based equal-protection claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Smith and a disability-discrimination claim under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act against Oakland. The defendants moved for summary judgment, which asks whether the evidence presents a genuine factual dispute requiring a trial.

Court’s analysis

The court first granted summary judgment on the plaintiffs’ request for injunctive relief. The plaintiffs did not respond to the defendants’ argument that they lacked standing because they could not show a real and immediate threat of future injury, and the court treated the issue as conceded.

Equal protection

For the race-based equal-protection claim, the plaintiffs needed evidence that Smith intentionally treated them differently because of race. The court explained that evidence of a similarly situated person of another race receiving better treatment can help prove discrimination, but Ninth Circuit law does not make comparator evidence mandatory. The court instead had to consider the available direct and circumstantial evidence of discriminatory intent.

The court granted summary judgment on the claims brought by P. Thomas, Cynthia, and Zelda. P. Thomas left the gym and had no further interaction with Smith; Cynthia denied that Smith did anything discriminatory to her; and although Zelda observed Smith’s conduct, Zelda testified that Smith never spoke to her. The court found no evidence that Smith directed the offensive remarks or future-game ban to those three plaintiffs.

The court also granted summary judgment on C. Thomas, Colston, and B. Thomas’s claims to the extent they were based on Smith’s demand that they move to the other bleachers or on unspecified “menacing behavior.” The plaintiffs did not provide evidence that Smith enforced the seating rule differently because of race. The court also granted summary judgment on B. Thomas’s claim that he was excluded from the game because the record did not show that he was excluded.

The court denied summary judgment on other parts of the equal-protection claims. A reasonable jury could find that Smith prevented C. Thomas from re-entering the gym and attending the game, and that she effectively had Colston ejected. The court found that this evidence, combined with Smith’s alleged racially offensive language directed at them, could support a finding of an equal-protection violation. A jury could also consider evidence that Smith told C. Thomas, Colston, and B. Thomas they would not be allowed to attend future games. The defendants did not show that qualified immunity—a protection from damages for officials who did not violate clearly established law—required judgment for Smith on these remaining theories.

Americans with Disabilities Act

The plaintiffs’ disability claim included allegations that Oakland failed to supervise, discipline, or train Smith and also directly discriminated against C. Thomas, P. Thomas, and Colston by denying access to the game and failing to provide reasonable seating accommodations. The court granted summary judgment on the claim to the extent it relied on inadequate supervision, discipline, or training because the plaintiffs had not submitted enough evidence to create a factual dispute on that theory.

The court denied summary judgment on the remaining Title II disability-discrimination claims by C. Thomas, P. Thomas, and Colston. The evidence could support their allegations that they had disabilities, were entitled to participate in the public basketball program, needed an accommodation to attend the game, and were excluded, denied access, or harassed because of their disabilities. The court rejected the defendants’ argument that Smith would have accommodated them by asking other spectators to move because there was no evidence that Smith actually offered that accommodation.

Disposition

The court granted in part and denied in part the defendants’ motion for summary judgment. It granted judgment on the plaintiffs’ claims for injunctive relief; P. Thomas, Cynthia, and Zelda’s equal-protection claims; specified portions of C. Thomas, Colston, and B. Thomas’s equal-protection claims; B. Thomas’s claim based on exclusion from the game; and the portion of the ADA claim based on Oakland’s alleged failure to train, supervise, or discipline Smith. The remaining claims were C. Thomas and Colston’s equal-protection claims based on exclusion from the game, C. Thomas, Colston, and B. Thomas’s claims based on the alleged ban from future games, and C. Thomas, P. Thomas, and Colston’s Title II ADA claims for disability discrimination.