Caldwell v. Officer German Geronimo
- Sarah Cave
- 1:19-cv-08253
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 3
In Caldwell v. Geronimo, Judge Failla denied Caldwell’s request for ten years of citywide police-use-of-force records as overbroad and unrelated to his remaining claims.
Boisy Caldwell’s request for citywide New York Police Department use-of-force, stop-and-frisk, and settlement records was denied; discovery of Officer Geronimo’s disciplinary records remained ordered.
What happened
In Caldwell v. Officer German Geronimo, Boisy Caldwell asked the court to require the defendant to produce New York City police records from 2010 through 2020, including records about alleged excessive force, stops and frisks, and settlements. The defendant was represented by the New York City Law Department.
The court said the requested records concerned many unrelated incidents, officers, and claims. It had already dismissed Caldwell’s claims against New York City because he had not alleged facts showing that a city policy or practice caused a violation of his rights. The court found that the records would not help decide whether Officer Geronimo’s use of force against Caldwell during one incident in Morningside Park was reasonable.
The court denied Caldwell’s request for the city’s use-of-force records from 2010 through 2020 and said the relevant discovery was limited to disciplinary records about Geronimo, which the court had already ordered produced. Judge Katherine Polk Failla issued the order.
The detailed version
- Caldwell v. Officer German Geronimo · No. 1:19-cv-08253
- Sarah Cave
- Oct. 16, 2020
Background
Boisy Caldwell sought an order requiring Officer German Geronimo to produce the City’s complete “use of force records from 2010-2020.” Caldwell’s request, as understood by the court, covered records concerning all New York City Police Department complaints involving excessive force or unlawful stops and frisks during that period, as well as settlement records. Caldwell repeated the request in several later letters.
At a discovery conference on October 1, 2020, the court ordered Geronimo to produce certain disciplinary-history records concerning Geronimo but did not then decide Caldwell’s broader request. Geronimo later objected to that request.
Court’s Analysis
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(b)(1) permits discovery of information relevant to a claim or defense and proportionate to the needs of the case. The court viewed Caldwell’s request for citywide records over ten years as essentially seeking information for a claim that New York City was liable because of a municipal policy, custom, or practice. This type of municipal-liability claim is commonly called a Monell claim.
The court had already dismissed Caldwell’s claims against New York City because he had not alleged facts suggesting that a city policy, custom, or practice caused the violation of his rights. As a result, Geronimo was the only remaining defendant in the matter. The court noted that Caldwell had not sought permission to amend his complaint, although his later filings suggested that he wanted to pursue municipal-liability theories.
The court found that ten years of records about unrelated incidents, officers, and claims would not resolve whether the force Geronimo used against Caldwell was reasonable. It also found that producing citywide records concerning excessive-force and unlawful-stop allegations over ten years would involve hundreds of thousands of pages. In the court’s view, the relevant and proportionate discovery was limited to Geronimo’s disciplinary records, which the court had already ordered produced.
Disposition
Judge Katherine Polk Failla denied Caldwell’s request for production of the City’s use-of-force records from 2010 to 2020. The Clerk of Court was ordered to mail Caldwell a copy of the order at his address of record.
Read the full 3-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.