Rosado v. Soriano
- Ronnie Abrams
- 1:16-cv-03310
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 4
In Rosado v. Soriano, Judge Abrams denied Rosado’s motion to reconsider the court’s summary-judgment ruling on his false-arrest claim.
Edward Rosado’s false-arrest claim was not reconsidered. The three police-officer defendants and the City of New York prevailed on the reconsideration motion; the excessive-force claim had previously remained unresolved after summary judgment was denied on that claim.
What happened
In Rosado v. Soriano, Edward Rosado sued three New York City police officers and the City of New York after an altercation at a shoe store led to his arrest. He alleged false arrest, excessive force, and failure to train.
Rosado asked the court to reconsider its earlier decision granting summary judgment to the defendants on his false-arrest and municipal-liability claims. He argued that the officers could not reasonably have believed they had probable cause to arrest him under New York law.
Judge Ronnie Abrams denied the motion. She ruled that Rosado had not shown a clear error, a change in controlling law, or new evidence, and that the cases he cited were not sufficiently similar to show that the officers lacked arguable probable cause.
The detailed version
- Rosado v. Soriano · No. 1:16-cv-03310
- Ronnie Abrams
- Sept. 15, 2020
Background
After an altercation at a shoe store resulted in his arrest, Edward Rosado sued three New York City police officers and the City of New York. He alleged false arrest, excessive force, and failure to train. In a June 26, 2020 bench ruling, the Court granted summary judgment for the defendants on the false-arrest and municipal-liability claims, while denying summary judgment on the excessive-force claim. Rosado then sought reconsideration of the ruling on false arrest.
Legal standard
The Court explained that reconsideration under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) and Local Civil Rule 6.3 is available only when the court overlooked controlling law or facts that could reasonably have changed the result. The relevant grounds include an intervening change in controlling law, newly available evidence, or a need to correct a clear error or prevent serious unfairness. Reconsideration is not a chance to repeat arguments already considered.
Analysis
Rosado did not claim that the Court had made a clear error or caused serious unfairness, and he did not identify a change in controlling law or new evidence. Instead, he argued that controlling decisions showed the individual defendants could not have had “arguable probable cause” to arrest him.
The Court explained that qualified immunity protects government officials from civil liability unless the plaintiff shows both a constitutional violation and that the violated right was clearly established at the time. In an unlawful-arrest case, an officer is entitled to qualified immunity if the officer had arguable probable cause—that is, if it was reasonable for the officer to believe probable cause existed.
The Court rejected Rosado’s comparison to several New York cases in which officers lacked probable cause for disorderly-conduct arrests. It found that those cases did not involve facts sufficiently similar to Rosado’s case. In particular, the cited cases did not involve an arrestee physically engaging with an officer or obstructing access to a public space that an officer was assigned to monitor. The Court also noted that Rosado was repeating the argument he had made in opposition to summary judgment. It separately stated that his arguments about the sufficiency of charging documents under New York law were irrelevant because he had not brought a wrongful-prosecution claim and was not prosecuted after his arrest.
Disposition
Judge Ronnie Abrams denied Rosado’s motion for reconsideration and directed the Clerk of Court to terminate the motion at docket entry 105. The opinion does not change the earlier ruling that granted summary judgment to the defendants on the false-arrest and municipal-liability claims or the earlier ruling denying summary judgment on the excessive-force claim.
Read the full 4-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.