Whitson v. Board of County Commissioners.
No. 23-1084. 7/5/2024. D.Colo. Judge Ebel. Claims Against an Official in Their Official Capacity—Municipal Liability—Final Policy-Making Authority.
July 5, 2024
Hanna was the sheriff of Sedgwick County. He told his Deputy Sheriff Neugebauer that he was going to transfer Biggs, an intellectually disabled prisoner, to the Logan County Jail in his personal vehicle. Instead of transporting Biggs to the Logan County Jail, Sheriff Hanna brought Biggs into his home, where he sexually assaulted her. While the assault was occurring, Deputy Neugebauer took a lunch break. He drove past Hanna’s house on his way to and from his lunch break and saw Hanna’s empty vehicle parked outside his home on both occasions. Deputy Neugebauer reported the incident to the Logan County District Attorney’s Office, which opened an investigation and, two days later, criminally charged Hanna with sexual assault on an at-risk adult, sexual conduct in a correctional institute, soliciting prostitution, and first degree official misconduct. Hanna was later removed from office. Biggs filed suit under 42 USC § 1983 by and through her guardian ad litem, Whitson, against Sedgwick County (county), the Sedgwick County Sheriff’s Department (sheriff’s department), and Sheriff Hanna in his individual and official capacities. The county and the sheriff’s department (the municipal defendants) moved to dismiss the complaint, and the district court granted the motion on the ground that the complaint failed to state a claim against them. A jury then found Hanna liable in his individual capacity. Because the municipal defendants had not moved to dismiss the claim against Sheriff Hanna in his official capacity, the original judgment was entered against Sheriff Hanna in his personal and official capacities. Whitson moved to amend the final judgment to explicitly bind the municipal defendants because the judgment against Sheriff Hanna in his official capacity is a judgment against the municipal defendants. The municipal defendants moved to clarify the judgment to say that the official-capacity claims did not survive the motions to dismiss. The district court granted the municipal defendants’ motion, concluding that Hanna’s conduct could not be imputed to the municipality because the assault was unrelated to his grant of authority with respect to transportation of prisoners and he was “advancing a purely personal agenda.”
On appeal, Whitson argued that the district court erred by dismissing the claims against the municipal defendants because they are legally equivalent to claims against Hanna in his official capacity. A municipality is responsible only for (1) actions taken by its subordinate employees that conform with preexisting official policies or customs and (2) actions taken by a municipality’s final policymakers that are fairly attributable to the municipality. When an official has final policymaking authority with respect to the actions taken, they are the alter ego of the municipality, so it is fair to impose liability on that entity for that action, regardless of the miscreant’s motives or whether the conduct was within the scope of employment. Here, Sheriff Hanna was the final policymaker for the municipal defendants with respect to the care of county prisoners, including their transportation, and neither the county nor the sheriff’s department had any policy to oversee and monitor Sheriff Hanna’s action. Therefore, Sheriff Hanna’s actions were within the scope of his policymaking authority regarding the custody and care of prisoners and subjected the municipal defendants to liability.
The Tenth Circuit left it to the district court to determine in the first instance whether and, if so, to what extent the municipal defendants are bound by the existing judgment.
The order was reversed and the case was remanded for further proceedings.
The full opinion is available at https://www.ca10.uscourts.gov/sites/ca10/files/opinions/010111075551.pdf.