Clarett v. RobertsClarett v. Roberts
Police officers went to Patricia Clarett’s home in Lansing, Illinois, early one morning to question her sons about a burglary that had occurred overnight in nearby Lynwood, Illinois. A confrontation ensued and escalated quickly. One of the officers Tasered Clarett three times, and the officers arrested her for obstruction and resisting arrest. Those charges were subsequently dropped, and Clarett sued the officers under
We affirm. Clarett waived her most plausible claim of trial error — the court’s decision to admit two of her criminal convictions — when she introduced evidence of the convictions herself, before the officers could do so. Her remaining evidentiary challenges are meritless. We also reject Clarett’s claims of instructional error. Finally, the district court properly denied Clarett’s motion for judgment as a matter of law as well as her motion for a new trial. The parties told dramatically different stories about the confrontation inside Clarett’s home, and the jury was entitled to believe the officers’ version of events.
I. Background
Early in the morning on October 11, 2005, officers with the Lynwood Police Department received a report that a suspicious vehicle was making unusual, repeated trips to and from' a garage. Officers dispatched to the neighborhood saw a vehicle in the area matching the caller’s description. The officers stopped the vehicle and in it found Clarett, her boyfriend, and her two sons Patrick and Anthony Peters. The officers also noticed an air compressor in the vehicle; none of the occupants of the vehicle claimed to own the compressor, so the officers confiscated it. Soon thereafter, Lynwood police received a call reporting a garage burglary. Among the items reported stolen was an air compressor whose model number matched the one recovered from Clarett and her sons. Lynwood officers went to Clarett’s home in Lansing to try to talk with her sons, but they first called the Lansing Police Department for backup.
At trial Clarett and the officers disagreed -about what occurred when the offi
The officers’ description of the confrontation was very different. They claimed that they entered Clarett’s home only after she consented and that none of the officers were hiding. They testified that Clarett also gave them permission to enter her sons’ bedroom. Several did so, and a dispute soon arose. Clarett ran past some of the officers who were still in the living room and blocked their entry into the bedroom. Officer Roberts testified that he told Clarett a number of times to move away from the door, but she refused. Fearing for the safety of the officers in the small bedroom, Roberts warned Clarett that he would deploy the Taser if she did not move. When she did not move, he deployed the Taser, and she fell to the ground. The Taser delivered an electrical current for five seconds. Roberts said he waited five seconds, then tried to assist Clarett in getting back on her feet, but she began to kick at him. He warned her several times to stop, and when she did not, he deployed the Taser a second time. Because she continued to resist, Roberts decided to arrest her for obstruction. When he аttempted to handcuff Clarett, however, she started to yell and flail her arms. When she would not stop, Roberts shocked Clarett a third time. The officers were then successful in placing Clarett under arrest.
Though the parties radically disagreed about important details, they agreed that Roberts deployed the Taser three times. It was also undisputed that Clarett suffered various injuries as a result of the deployments. A doctor who examined her the day after the incident noted electrical burns from the Taser barbs, as well as multiple bruises and sprains. She was prescribed Valium for stress-induced anxiety.
Clarett was charged with obstructing an officer and resisting arrest, but those charges were eventually dropped. Clarett then brought this action against four officers from Lansing and three from Lynwood alleging claims for excessive force and false arrest in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. She also brought state-law claims for malicious prosecution and failure to intervene. The case was tried to a jury, which returned a verdict for the defendants on all counts. Clarett moved for judgment as a matter of law under
II. Discussion
Clarett’s appeal focuses primarily on claimed evidentiary and instructional errors. She also argues that the jury’s verdict was against the weight of the evidence and asks us to remand for entry of judgment in her favor as a matter of law, or alternatively, a new trial.
Clarett challenges three evidentiary rulings made by the district court. First, she challenges the court’s pretrial decision to аdmit evidence of two of her criminal convictions, one for retail theft and one for obstructing a police officer. Second, she claims that the court erroneously allowed Officer Roberts, a lay witness, to offer expert testimony. Finally, she argues that the court erroneously excluded evidence that the police did not have a warrant to enter or search her home. We review the district court’s evidentiary decisions for abuse of discretion and will reverse “only where no reasonable person cоuld take the view adopted by the trial court.”
United States v. L.E. Myers Co.,
1. Admission of Clarett’s Convictions
The district court entered a ruling in limine that two of Clarett’s criminal convictions — for misdemeanor retail theft and obstructing a police officer — could be admitted at trial.
1
The judge held that her retail-theft conviction was admissible under
These rulings may have been problematic. Admission of a criminal eonviction under
The authority to admit evidence for impeachment purposes is implicit in
The only remaining evidentiary option available to the officers was inquiry on cross-examination. Under
By introducing the convictions herself, Clarett waived the right to challenge their admission on appeal. The Supreme Court has held that criminal defendants who introduce evidence of their own prior convictions in an effort to remove the “sting” forgo the right to appeal the trial court’s decision to admit those convictions into evidence.
Ohler v. United States,
We have never addressed whether the
Ohler
principle applies in civil cases. Clarett argues against applying
Ohler
in the civil context, noting that criminal defendants have the right not to testify in their defense, while civil plaintiffs generally must do so in order to prove their claim. This distinction is immaterial in light of
Ohler
1
s reasoning. The Court noted that even after a criminal defendаnt chooses to take the stand, she “has a further choice to make.... The defendant must choose whether to introduce the conviction on direct examination and remove the sting or to take her chances with the prosecutor’s possible elicitation of the conviction on cross-examination.”
Ohler,
If the defendant testifies, [the government] must choose whether or not to impeach her by use of her prior conviction. Here the trial judge had indicated he would allow its use, but the Government still had to consider whether its use might be deemed reversible error on appeal. This choice is often based on the Government’s appraisal of the apparent effect of the defendant’s testimony. If she has offered a plausible, innocent explanation of the evidence against her, it will be inclined to use the prior conviction; if not, it may decide not to risk possible reversal on appeal from its use.
Id.
at 758,
The logic of
Ohler
applies with equal force in both criminal and civil cases. The
2. Admission of Expert Testimony by Lay Witness
Clarett next argues that the district court erred by allowing Officer Roberts, a lay witness, to offer expert testimony. Roberts was questioned about an inconsistency between the number of times he Tasered Clarett and the digital register retained in the Taser’s internal memory. The parties agreed that Roberts Tasered Clarett three times and that each shock lasted for five seconds. But the printout from the Taser’s digital memory recorded six separate deployments of the Taser, some just one second apart. When Clarett’s counsel asked Roberts about the discrepancy, he disclaimed technical knowledge about the mechanics of the Taser or the computer download that produced the printout. At one- point during this testimony, the judge instructed Clarett’s- attorney not to “ask this witness a great many technical questions. He does not purport to be an expert, and it would be unfair to put words in his mouth.”
Under questioning from his own counsel, however, Roberts testified that based on his experience and training, it would be physically impossible to discharge the Taser multiple times just one second apart. He also testified more generally about the Taser printout, which registered 585 separate deployments occurring over the span of morе than a year. He also said that “[ajfter reviewing this printout, there does appear to be many different málfunetions in the printout.” Clarett argues that this was impermissible expert testimony by a lay witness, offered without compliance with the requirements of Rule 702.
We disagree. Roberts did not give technical testimony about how the Taser’s internal memory operated or how data was uploaded from the Taser to the police department’s central computer — subjects that no doubt would have required some form of properly quаlified expert testimony under Rule 702. Rather,, his testimony was limited to his own experience in operating the Taser. He explained the steps required to fire the Taser in order to illustrate the incongruity of rapid, successive deployments only one second apart. Neither this testimony, nor his discussion of the Taser printout, was couched in terms of an expert opinion. See 29 Charles Alan Wright & Victor James Gold, Federal Practice and Procedure § 6253, at 119-20 (1997) (“[Sjeveral courts have held that, in cases involving opinions based on various types of extensive experience in a given industry or on a specific subject, the opinions properly could have been classified as either lay or expert.”).
Even if this testimony crossed the line into the domain of expert opinion, its admission was harmless.
3. Exclusion of Evidence that the Officers Did Not Have a Warrant
Clarett also challenges the district court’s decision to exclude evidenсe that the officers did not have a warrant to enter and search her home. The officers moved before trial to exclude this evidence as well as any testimony about whether Clarett consented to their entry into her home. They argued that whether they had a warrant or consent was irrelevant to the elements of Clarett’s § 1983 claims. The district court granted the motion in part, excluding all references to the absence of a warrant. The court held, however, that whether Clarett consented was potentially probаtive of what happened once the officers were inside the house.
This was not an abuse of discretion. That the officers did not have a warrant was irrelevant to whether they used excessive force or falsely arrested Clarett for obstruction after they entered the house. Stated differently, the fact that they did not have a warrant does not make it any more or less likely that they subsequently violated her federal rights by using excessive force or falsely arresting her for obstruction. Even if there was error, it was harmless. Despite thе court’s pretrial ruling, Clarett put the issue before the jury anyway. On at least two occasions, Clarett testified that the officers did not have a warrant to enter her home. Accordingly, she can hardly claim to have been harmed by the district court’s pretrial ruling.
B. Jury Instructions
Clarett raises three claims of instructional error. She contends that the jury instructions on excessive force and probable cause were erroneous, and also that the district court should not have rejected her request for a limiting instruction regarding the jury’s use of her prior convictions. We review de novo whether the jury instructions fairly and accurately summarized the law.
United States v. Quintero,
I. Excessive-Force Instruction
The district court’s excessive-force jury instruction was based on the Seventh Circuit pattern jury instruction and was adapted to conform to the evidence in the case. The court explained that excessive force “means more force than is reasonably necessary under the circumstances shown by the evidence,” and instructed the jury that “if [Clarett] did in fact interfere with the arrest of her sons, then the defendant Roberts also had the right to use the degree of force necessary to arrest the
Clarett argues that this approach to the excessive-force instruction improperly conflated her excessive-force claim with her false-arrest claim, making the former contingent on the latter. Not so. The district court simply explained that some degree of force may have been appropriate to arrest Clarett if the jury found she was actually obstructing the officers. The jury’s consideration of the excessive-force claim was not improperly' linked to its determination of the false-arrest claim. Put differently, the jury was free to conclude that Roberts used excessive force in subduing and arresting Clarett even if it found that the arrest itself was legal.
Clarett also argues that the excessive-force instruction improperly required her to prove that injury or harm occurred as a result of the excessive force. She cites
Briggs v. Marshall,
2. Probable Cause
On the false-arrest claim, the court gave the jury the following instruction on the meaning of probable cause: “Probable cause exists if the facts and circumstances known to the officer are sufficient to warrant a reasonable pеrson in believing that the suspect had committed or was committing an offense.” Clarett proposed that the court substitute “a reasonable police officer” for “a reasonable person” and now claims it was error for the judge to decline to do so. For support she cites
Llaguno v. Mingey,
Hеre, the district court’s probable-cause instruction was adapted from the pattern instruction, which defines “probable cause” in terms of what a “prudent person” would have believed at the time an arrest was made. 7th Cir. Pattern Civil Jury Instruction 7.06. Although some authority uses the more specific “objectively reasonable police officer” standard,
see Ornelas v. United States,
3. Limiting Instruction
Finally, Clarett challenges the district court’s failure to provide a limiting instruction regarding the jury’s use of the evidence of her criminal convictions. She preserved this issue in the district court by submitting proposed limiting instructions; the record does not reflect why the court rejected her proposal. But on appeal Clarett’s entire argument on this issue is limited to two sentences in her opening brief: “Plaintiff offered a curative instruction (153-1 p. 39) ‘you may not consider this evidence for any other purpose’ which was rejected. (Tr. 873) These errors prejudiced Plaintiff and were not harmless error.” She neither cited legal authority nor made any meaningful argument in support of this claim of errоr.
We have repeatedly held that undeveloped arguments are considered waived.
See Gross v. Town of Cicero,
C.
Finally, Clarett contends that the undisputed evidence that Roberts deployed the Taser three times constitutes “overwhelming evidence” of excessive force аnd required the district court to enter judgment in her favor as a matter of law under
On the other hand, we review the denial of Clarett’s motion for a new trial for abuse of discretion.
Id.
at 979. “A new trial may be granted if the verdict is against the clear weight of the evidence or the trial was unfair to the moving party.”
David v. Caterpillar, Inc.,
The jury’s verdict finds ample supрort in the record. Clarett’s telling of events differed sharply from that of the officers, and it was entirely the jury’s province to choose which version to believe. Roberts testified at length regarding his reasons for deploying the Taser. He testified that Clarett was blocking the doorway to her sons’ bedroom after some officers had al
The jurors wеre entitled to believe the officers’ version of events, and we will not disturb their credibility determination. On this record a reasonable juror could easily find for the defendants; the verdict does not “cry out to be overturned” or “shock the conscience.” Clarett’s
Affirmed.
Notes
. The judge excluded Clarett's third conviction — for forgery — because it was too old.
. Under
. The pattern jury instruction leaves the harm element of the excessive-force claim to the discretion of the trial judge because the law on this point is not settled.
See
7th Cir. Pattern Civil Jury Instruction 7.08.
Briggs
says only that there is no per se rule preventing a party from seeking nominal damages in an excessive-force claim without a provable injury.
Briggs v. Marshall,