Leonorilda Ochoa v. City of Mesa, 26 F.4th 1050

On March 3, 2016, after two related 911 calls reporting (1) a domestic dispute involving a gun and drug use and (2) an intruder claiming to have knives, police located Sergio Ochoa’s vehicle and followed it by helicopter after it fled a traffic stop.
Officers tracked Ochoa to a residence where occupants evacuated children from a locked bedroom; officers saw Ochoa inside the house, agitated and appearing to hold knives.
Officers entered the home; Ochoa ran into the backyard still armed with two knives, ignored repeated commands to drop them, and took a large step while officers deployed a beanbag round and a police dog.
Officers then fired about 30 shots, killing Ochoa. Bodycam video shows roughly 16 seconds elapsed from entry to the shooting; postmortem toxicology showed methamphetamine.
Ochoa’s children (through their mothers) and his mother sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging a Fourteenth Amendment due-process deprivation of familial companionship; they also asserted a state wrongful-death claim. The district court granted summary judgment to the officers on the Fourteenth Amendment claim; plaintiffs appealed.

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Whether officers’ conduct violated relatives’ Fourteenth Amendment right to companionship by “shocking the conscience.”	Ochoa’s relatives argued the shooting (including alleged continued firing when he was down and officers’ post-shooting conduct) was conscience-shocking and deprived them of companionship.	Officers asserted they faced an emergent threat from an armed, noncompliant suspect; their split-second response served legitimate law-enforcement objectives and is protected by qualified immunity.	Court applied purpose-to-harm test (snap-judgment context) and held officers’ actions did not shock the conscience; summary judgment for defendants affirmed.
Whether disputed assertions about continued firing and officers’ laughter/cheering created a genuine factual dispute defeating summary judgment.	Plaintiffs relied on an expert’s statement and circumstantial claims to show excessive/culpable conduct.	Defendants pointed to sworn denials, contemporaneous video, and testimony showing officers believed Ochoa still had access to knives; unsupported assertions cannot defeat summary judgment.	Court found those assertions lacked evidentiary support and, even if credited, did not establish an improper purpose to harm unrelated to legitimate objectives.

Porter v. Osborn, 546 F.3d 1131 (9th Cir. 2008) (distinguishes deliberate-indifference and purpose-to-harm tests for conscience-shocking conduct)
Wilkinson v. Torres, 610 F.3d 546 (9th Cir. 2010) (deliberation defined beyond narrow technical meaning)
Foster v. City of Indio, 908 F.3d 1204 (9th Cir. 2018) (illegitimate use of force includes harm against a clearly harmless or subdued suspect)
Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989) (Fourth Amendment objective-reasonableness standard for excessive force)
Byrd v. Guess, 137 F.3d 1126 (9th Cir. 1998) (relatives cannot assert decedent’s Fourth Amendment rights vicariously via Fourteenth Amendment claim)
Moreland v. Las Vegas Metro. Police Dep’t, 159 F.3d 365 (9th Cir. 1998) (Fourteenth Amendment substantive-due-process claim requires more than Fourth Amendment showing)
Curnow ex rel. Curnow v. Ridgecrest Police, 952 F.2d 321 (9th Cir. 1991) (parental liberty interest in companionship of child)
Plumhoff v. Rickard, 572 U.S. 765 (2014) (Fourth Amendment rights are personal and not vicariously asserted)
County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833 (1998) (qualified-immunity approach: first ask whether constitutional violation occurred)
Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194 (2001) (qualified-immunity two-step framework)
Galen v. County of Los Angeles, 477 F.3d 652 (9th Cir. 2007) (expert testimony cannot create genuine issue if unsupported by evidence)
Stephens v. Union Pac. R.R. Co., 935 F.3d 852 (9th Cir. 2019) (same point on expert evidence)