MEMORANDUM & ORDER
Plaintiff Stanley Dudek’s Complaint
Defendants now move to dismiss the Complaint (the “Motion”), mainly on the basis of its failure to state a claim and the individual officers’ absolute or qualified immunity. Defendants’ Motion also argues that the Complaint is untimely. This Court GRANTS in part and DENIES in part Defendants’ Motion, for the reasons set forth below.
I. Background
A. The Law
Under New York’s Family Court Act, a person may commence a “family offense
In furtherance of this proceeding, the Family Court “for good cause shown may issue a temporary order of protection,” prior to making a final decision. Id. § 828. Section 842-a of the Family Court Act (“Section 842-a”) provides that such an order may (i) suspend the spouse’s firearm license and (ii) confiscate
B. The Facts
On November 17, 2008, Dudek’s wife, Claudia Dudek (“Claudia”), commenced a family offense proceeding in the Family Court against Dudek. (Compl. ¶ 14; Dkt. No. 41-2^1-6 (“Defs. Exs.”), Ex. A, at 1.) The proceeding stemmed from an “alleged
[s]urrender any and all handguns, pistols, revolvers, rifles, shotguns and any other firearms owned or possessed. Such surrender shall take place immediately, but in no event later than service of this order, [sic] at the appropriate law enforcement agency. Inсluding all hunting weapons that maybe [sic] in basement[.]
(Defs. Ex. A, at 2.) On the same day, the Sheriffs Department served Dudek with the Order at his residence and simultaneously confiscated his handgun
On January 6, 2009, the Family Court, citing the fact that Claudia withdrew her petition, terminated the family offense proceeding and vacated the Order. (Compl. ¶ 16; Defs. Ex. B, at 1.) At that point, the Sheriffs Department did not return any of the firearms that it seized from Dudek, nor did the NCPD reinstate Dudek’s pistol license.
On November 80, 2010, Dudek petitioned the Supreme Court of New York, Nassau County (“New York Supreme Court”), pursuant to Article 78 of the New York Civil Practice Law and Rules, for the reinstatement of his pistol license by the NCPD. (Compl. ¶ 17; Defs. Ex. C ¶ 16.) On September 19, 2011, the NCPD agreed, by written stipulation, to reinstate Dudek’s pistol license and return his handgun. (Compl. ¶ 18; PL Ex. 6, at 1.)
Throughout this time, the Sherriffs Department has “refused tо return Dudek’s two longarms ... without a Court Order, despite being asked by Dudek.”
C. Procedural History
On March 12, 2012, Dudek commenced this action by filing the first of three complaints. (Dkt. No. 1.) The original complaint named, as Defendants, the Sheriffs Department, Sheriff Sposato, and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri, but not the County or any of the other individual officers. (Id. ¶¶ 6-8.)
Defendants named in the original complaint initially moved to dismiss it. (Dkt No. 7.) At a conference on November 29, 2012, Judge Leonard D. Wexler, who was previously assigned to this action, orally denied the initial motion from the bench. (Order, dated Nov. 29, 2012.) There appears to be no written record of Judge Wexler’s reasons for the denial.
On December 3, 2012, Dudek filed the amended complaint. (Dkt. No. 13.) The amended complaint was the same as the original complaint, except that it also named the County as a Dеfendant. (Id. ¶¶ 6-9.)
On March 11, 2013, Dudek filed the second amended, and operative, Complaint. (Compl., at 1.) The only difference between the second amended Complaint and the prior two complaints is that it also names, the other individual officers. (Id. ¶¶ 6-13.) As with the prior two complaints, the second amended Complaint asserts the following claims against Defendants:
A claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (“Section 1983 claim”) that Defendants allegedly violated Dudek’s Fourteenth Amendment right of procedural due process by enacting and enforcing the “policy ... requiring a Court Order for the return of confiscated longarms” after the Family Court vacated the Order, and thus “failing] [to] provide a procedure or mechanism” for their return, but rather “placing the burden on” Dudek to take his own “affirmative steps” (id. ¶¶ 30-35; see id. ¶ 1); and
Supplemental state law claims of conversion and replevin, alleging that Defendants unlawfully retained Dudek’s longarms “without cause or legal authority,” when the Family Court’s Order was lifted (id. ¶¶ 47-57).
Specifically, with respect to the Section 1983 claim, Dudek requests monetary relief, as well as declaratory and injunctive relief. (Id. at 8-9.) The monetary relief requested consists of compensatory damages, as well as punitive damages against Sheriff Sposato and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri and attorneys’ fees.
On July 29, 2013, the parties briefed the Motion presently before this Court, pertaining to the dismissal of the second amended Complaint. (Dkt. Nos. 41-43.)
II. Discussion
A. Standard of Review
In deciding the Motion, this Court considers whether Dudek’s Complaint meets the proper pleading standard under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), as illuminated by the Supreme Court’s decisions in Ashcroft v. Iqbal (“Iqbal”),
The above principles reinforce a “two-pronged” analysis: this Court should consider (i) whether the Complaint alleges “no more than [legal] conclusions,” without the factual allegations to support them; and (ii) whether the “well-pleaded factual allegations ... plausibly give rise to an enti
B. Section 1988 Claim
1. Failure to State a Claim
i. Against the Sheriffs Department
Regardless of whether the factual allegations supporting the Section 1983 claim against the Sheriffs Department are otherwise sufficient, Defendants argue that the department does not have the capacity to be sued. (Defs. Br., at 16-17.) Dudek does not address Defendants’ argument in his opposition brief and has therеfore abandoned all objections to it. See, e.g., Bonilla v. Smithfield Assocs. LLC, No. 09-CV-1549,
Even if Dudek has not abandoned all objections to the argument, this Court still dismisses this claim. New York law specifies the capacity of the Sheriffs Department to be sued. Fed.R.Civ.P. 17(b). Under New York law, “departments that are merely administrative arms of a municipality do not have a legal identity separate and apart from the municipality and, therefore, cannot sue or be sued.” Davis v. Lynbrook Police Dep’t,
Indeed, the Complaint concedes that the Sheriffs Department is an “administrative arm” of the County (Compl. ¶ 6), and, as such, the department cannot be sued separately. See Melendez v. Nassau Cnty., No. 10-CV-2516,
Accordingly, this Court dismisses with prejudice the Section 1983 claim agаinst the Sheriffs Department.
ii. Against the County
With respect to the Section 1983 claim against the County (the “Monell claim”), Defendants argue that the Sheriffs Department, as the County’s administrative arm, was “merely carrying out the mandates of state law” in refusing to return Dudek’s longarms. (Defs. Br., at 15; see Dkt. No. 43 (“Defs. Reply”), at 3.) According to Defendants, the department was required to retain the longarms until a different court, i.e., the New York Supreme Court, separately ordered their return, as the Family Court lacked the authority to do so upon vacating the Order. (Defs. Br., at 15-16; see id. at 6-8; Defs. Reply, at 2-4.) The department’s refusal therefore was “not because of any policy, practice or custom promulgated by Nassau County,” but rather a “deficiency” in state law. (Defs. Br., at 16; see Defs. Reply, at 3.) Dudek responds in part, stating that Defendants “place the blame on” state law when the department was authorized to, and did not as a matter of the County’s “policy,” return the longarms without an order from another court. (PI. Br., at 22 & n. 8.)
For Vives to apply as a limit on a municipality’s liability under Monell, the threshold question is, does the municipality merely carry out a state law? The answer here is no. The Sheriffs Department refused to return Dudek’s longarms, but not because Section 842-a required it to. Section 842-a only authorizes the Family Court to order that a person’s firearms be confiscated. See supra at Section I.A (collecting cases). Even though Defendants focus on the “legislative glitch” in this provision (Defs. Br., at 6 (quoting Aloi II,
Defendants therefore may not rely on Vives, as a reason to dismiss the Monell claim. (Defs. Br., at 16; Defs. Reply, at 3.) The Sheriffs Department was not applying Section 842-a when it refused to
Even if the Sheriffs Department was not merely carrying out a state law, this does not automatically mean that it was acting according to a policy that the County had created, for purposes of the Monell claim. Defendants argue, along those lines, that the County “has not promulgated” such a policy for the department. (Defs. Reply, at 3.) Dudek responds in part to this argument, stating that Sheriff Sposato’s actions reflect such a policy. (PI. Br., at 22.)
To survive a motion to dismiss the Monell claim, a policy must be alleged by the Complaint in “sufficient factual detail]” and not mere “boilerplate allegations.” Plair v. City of N.Y.,
The Complaint alleges that the Sheriffs Department refused to return Dudek’s longarms, and that the department based its refusal on a policy of requiring an ordеr from another court before returning a person’s firearms, where those firearms were previously ordered to be confiscated by the Family Court. (Compl. ¶¶ 19, 34.) To support this otherwise “boilerplate” allegation of a no-return policy, the Complaint also alleges that Dudek directed a request for the return of the longarms to Sheriff Sposato and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri, who declined to address it. (Id. ¶¶ 19-26.) The fact that Sheriff Sposato, as an “official policymaker” for the County in the area of “law enforcement practices,” failed to consider Dudek’s request raises a plausible inference that a no-return policy existed. Pembaur,
In addition to the above factual allegation, the inference of a no-return policy is reinforced by Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri’s admission in a state court case that “the Sheriffs Department’s general rule in returning firearms is that the return is made when an order from the court is provided to the Sheriffs Department.” Aloi II,
Accordingly, this Court declines to dismiss, and allows discovery on, the Monell claim against the County.
iii. Against the Individual Officers
Dudek also asserts the Section 1983 claim against the individual officers in their official and personal capacities. At the outset, this Court dismisses with prejudice the claim against the individual officers in their official capacities (the “official-capacity claim”), because it is duplicative of the surviving Monell claim against the County. See, e.g., Orange v. Cnty. of Suffolk,
The fact that Dudek has pleaded the Monell claim premised on a policy — which is, as discussed above, functionally the same as the official-capacity claim — does not otherwise preclude him from pleading the claim against the individual officers in their personal capacities (the “personal-capacity claim”). See Hafer v. Melo,
An individual officer’s personal involvement in the “constitutional deprivation[]” is a “prerequisite” to a Section 1983 claim against them. McKinnon v. Patterson,
The Complaint in this action fails to contain a single factual allegation that several of Sheriff Sposato’s subordinate officers—Deputy Sheriffs Goropeuschek, Lee, Gorey, and Linn—were personally involved in the purported violation. Those subordinate officers’ names appear nowhere in the section of the Complaint that recites the “Factual Allegations.” (Compl. ¶¶ 14-29.) The fact that “discovery has not been commenced” (PI. Br., at 20) is no excuse for this deficiency. Due to this deficiency, the personal involvement of those subordinate officers appears not only tenuous, but also illusory.
To conclude otherwise would be to countenance plaintiffs in Section 1983 actions to blindly name subordinate officers as defendants and then use discovery to ascertain whether they had any involvement in the disputed conduct. Permitting plaintiffs to use discovery as a fishing expedition undermines the principle that only portions of a complaint which satisfy a plausibility standard, i.e., more than possible and less than probable, should “unlock the doors of discovery.” Iqbal,
Accordingly, this Court dismisses without prejudice the personal-capacity claim with respect to Deputy Sheriffs Goropeuschek, Lee, Gorey, and Linn. Should discovery reveal that those subordinate officers were personally involved, Dudek may seek to amend the Complaint to rename them as Defendants. See Satchell v. Dilworth,
2. Immunity from the Monetary Relief Portion of the Personal-Capacity Claim Against the Individual Officers
i. Absolute Immunity
Additionally, for the monetary relief portion of the personal-capacity claim, Defendants first argue for dismissal based on absolute immunity, because the individual officers “cannot be held liable for any proper act done in executing a valid court order” by the Family Court to confiscate
Absolute immunity protects from liability judges, along with any officers who, in performing “functions” which are an “integral part of the judicial process” and “comparable] ... to those of the judge,” are allowed the same protection “derivative of the immunity of judges.” Imbler v. Pachtman,
Courts have held that an officer with the sheriffs department does perform such a function tо which absolute immunity attaches, when “acting pursuant to a court order” that he is “required to execute.” Maldonado v. N.Y. Cnty. Sheriff, No. 05-CV-8377,
Although the individual officers were acting in accordance with the Family Court’s Order when they initially seized Dudek’s longarms, the- officers were operating in complete judicial silence, without a directive from any court, once the Order was vacated. At that point, the officers stopped performing a judicial function within the scope of the Order, for which they would be absolutely immune, and any decision thereafter to retain the longarms remained in the sound discretion of the Sheriffs Department. Cf. Levine v. Lawrence, No. 03-CV-1694,
Defendants, however, dispute the fact that the Sheriffs Department had such discretion, when the Order was finally vacated. They argue that, because the Family Court did not have the authority to direct the return of Dudek’s longarms after vacating the Order, the individual officers remained bound by the Order, requiring them to retain, but not return, the longarms. (Defs. Br., at 9-10.) Defendants’ argument is inapposite, and again conflates the absence of the Family Court’s authority to direct the return of a person’s firearms with the department’s authority to do so, see supra at Section II.B.l.ii. Although the Order, when vacated, did not amount to a directive from the Family Court that the officers return the longarms, as the court did not have the authority, it also did not amount to a directive that the officers continue to carry out the Order and retain the longarms. The lifting of the Order left the officers free to return the longarms.
Accordingly, this Court declines to dismiss the monetary relief portion of the personal-capacity claim, based on absolute immunity.
ii. Qualified Immunity
Defendants second argument for dismissing the monetary relief portion of the personal-capacity claim is that the individual officers are entitled to qualified immunity, as Dudek did not possess, and the officers could not have violated, a “clearly established constitutional right to the return of his longarms after the expiration of a Temporary Order of Protection.” (Defs. Br., at 11-18.) In response, Dudek insists that such a right was “clearly established,” based on a district court decision and a “trio of Second Circuit eases” cited therein. (PI. Br., at 15-18 (emphasis omitted).)
Qualified immunity protects from liability any officer “insofar as their conduct does not violate dearly established stаtutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.” Harlow v. Fitzgerald,
To determine whether a right was “clearly established” by law at the time, the “relevant, dispositive inquiry” is “whether it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted.” Saucier v. Katz,
The only law of this Circuit to which Dudek cites (PI. Br., at 17) — a decision from this district and three Second Circuit decisions — is “distinguishable in a fair way” from this action. Saucier,
In Razzano v. Cnty. of Nassau,
The three Second Circuit decisions that Dudek contends “clearly established” a constitutional right are discussed in Razzano: McClendon v. Rosetti,
As a follow-up to McClendon, the Butler and Alexandre courts held that, although the post-McClendon procedures to secure the return of the property were adequate, notice of those procedures arguably was not. See Alexandre,
None of the above decisions, however, recognized the “contours” of a right relating to the return of property, where a law enforcement agency’s officers had confis
This distinction is important, as it informs the conclusion that a “reasonable officer” in this action would not have believed, based on those decisions, that his refusal to return Dudek’s longarms without a court order departed from “clearly established” law. On the contrary, an officer could have reasonably believed that, because the Family Court had ordered that the longarms be confiscated, he was not allowed to return the longarms, until a different court with actual authority ordered that they be returned. It was incorrect, but not unreasonable, for an officer to have believed, as Defendants do, that an “independent determination that [Dudek] was entitled to the return of his longarms” would amount to an “impermissiblfe] review[ ]” of the Order by a law enforcement agency, rather than another court. (Defs. Br., at 10.) Even assuming an officer should have believed that he was allowed to reverse, without direction from another court, what the Family Court hаd already directed as far as retaining the longarms, he had no reason to believe that his refusal to do so would run afoul of the Constitution. See, e.g., 10 N.Y. Prac., N.Y. Family Ct. Prac. § 12:17 (2012) (“[The] Family Court [in Aloi II] had initially issued a temporary order of protection and a § 842-a order, but both had been withdrawn as part of a negotiated settlement. In the absence of Family Court jurisdiction, the respondent’s only recourse was a new petition in Supreme Court (the Sheriff understandably refused to return the firearms in the absence of a court order) [.]”) (emphasis added).
This Circuit’s “pre-existing law” therefore did not suffice to alert a “reasonable officer” that, in conditionally refusing to return Dudek’s longarms, he had deprived Dudek of procedural due process. Anderson,
3. Timeliness
As an alternative basis for dismissing the Section 1983 claim against the County and the individual officers, Defendants argue that the applicable three-year statute of limitations for this claim started to accrue on January 6, 2009, when the Family Court vacated the Order; and therefore this claim, which Dudek did not assert until March 12, 2012, is untimely. (Defs. Br., at 17-18.) Dudek argues that this claim is timely, because the statute of limitations had only been accruing since January 20, 2012, when he made the request to Sheriff Sposato and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri for the return of his long-arms. (PI. Br., at 24.)
Indeed, the applicable statute of limitations for a Section 1983 claim is the particular state’s “general or residual statute of limitations governing personal injury actions,” which, in New York, is three years. Owens v. Okure,
However, “[w]here no single act is sufficiently decisive to enable a person to realize that he has suffered a compensable injury, the cause of action may not accrue until the wrong becomes apparent.” Id. at 192-93. Along those lines, the accrual of the claim may be delayed by the fact that it involves an injury that not-so-clearly stems from a continuing violation, founded on (i) a municipality’s “policy or custom,” see Pinaud v. Cnty. of Suffolk,
In this action, Dudek satisfies either basis for delaying the accrual of this claim. First, Dudek’s claim against the County, the sole remaining Defendant from whom Dudek may collect any money, alleges an injury arising from a policy, pursuant to which the Sheriffs Department and its officers refused to return firearms confiscated by court order, without another court order directing their return. As discussed supra at Section II.B.1.Ü, the sufficiency of this claim is based on the allega
Second, Dudek could not have known, at the time the Order was vacated, that he was suffering a “continuous injury that was not simply a consequence of the initial seizure” based on the Order, but rather the “ill effects” of the “daily failure” by the Sheriffs Department to afford him with adequate process to secure the return of his longarms. Remigio,
Accordingly, this Court declines to dismiss the Section 1983 claim, based on the applicable three-year statute of limitations.
C. Supplemental State Law Claims
With respect to Dudek’s state law claims of conversion and replevin, Defendants argue that those claims are untimely, because the applicable three-year statute of limitations for those claims also began running as of January 6, 2009,
Dudek’s failure to address the timeliness argument regarding those claims is reason alone to deem all objections thereto abandonеd. See supra discussion at Section II.B.1.Í (collecting cases). In his brief opposing Defendants’ initial motion to dismiss back in 2012, however, Dudek did address the same argument regarding those claims, as they appeared in the original complaint. (Dkt. No. 8, at 9-10.) As such, this Court declines to resolve the issue of timeliness based solely on Dudek’s abandonment of all objections in his current opposition brief. See Indep. Asset
Under New York law, the applicable statute of limitations for a conversion or replevin claim is three years. N.Y. C.P.L.R. § 214(3). Where the claim involves a plaintiffs property, whose possession by a defendant is “originally lawful” but later becomes a “wrongful withholding,” a demand that the property be returned is a procedural “condition precedent” to asserting the claim. Berman v. Goldsmith,
In Smith v. Scott,
Similarly, in this action, the Sheriffs Department and its officers lawfully seized and retаined Dudek’s longarms between November 17, 2008 and January 6, 2009, based on the Order. On January 6, 2009, the Family Court vacated the Order; but the department continued to retain, and refused to subsequently return, the longarms, even though it no longer had a legal basis for doing so. The fact that Dudek had the “right to demand” that the longarms be returned to him also meant that he had the right to bring the conversion and replevin claims beginning on January 6, 2009. Indeed, those claims turn on the department’s retention of, and refusal to return, the longarms as of that date. Dudek should have, but did not, assert those claims before January 6, 2012. Those claims are now time-barred.
Accordingly, this Court dismisses with prejudice the conversion and replevin claims, based on the applicable three-year
III. Conclusion
This Court (i) declines to dismiss, and allows discovery on, the Monell claim against the County and the declaratory and injunctive relief portions of the personal-capacity claim against Sheriff Sposato and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri; and (ii) dismisses with prejudice all other claims, except for the declaratory and injunctive reliеf portions of the personal-capacity claim against Deputy Sheriffs Goropeuschek, Lee, Gorey, and Linn, which is dismissed without prejudice. The Clerk of the Court is directed to terminate, as parties to this action, the Sheriffs Department and Deputy Sheriffs Goropeuschek, Lee, Gorey, and Linn.
SO ORDERED.
Notes
. The "Complaint” refers to Dudek's Second Amended Complaint, filed on March 11, 2013.
. Defendants in this action are (i) Nassau County (the “County”); (ii) the Sheriff’s Department, an "administrative arm” of the County; and (iii) Sheriff Michael J. Sposato and his Deputy Sheriffs Robert Mastropieri, Michael Goropeuschek, Christopher Lee, Francis Gorey, and Michael Linn (collectively, the "individual officers”). (Compl. ¶¶ 6-13.) With respect to the individual officers, this Court construes the Complaint as asserting a claim against them in their official and personal capacities.
. New York established a "state-wide” Family Court in 1962, when enacting Article VI of the New York State Constitution. People v. Johnson,
. Despite what Dudek argues in his opposition brief (Dkt. No. 42-1 ("PL Br.”), at 8), this Court perceives no difference between a temporary order of protection that confiscates firearms and one that directs their surrender. To direct the surrender of property is to confiscate, or "seize (property) by authority of law.” Black’s Law Dictionary 340 (9th ed.2009).
.This Court draws the following facts from (i) the allegations in Dudek’s Complaint, which are assumed to be true in deciding the Motion; and (ii) certain exhibits that accompany the parties’ briefs and are appropriately considered without converting the Motion into one for summary judgment. See Brass v. Am. Film Techs., Inc.,
. Handguns are sometimes seen as synonymous with pistols. See Dist. of Columbia v. Heller,
. As compared to handguns, longarms, also referred to as long guns, are a category of firearms with "longer barrels” which are "generally more effective at distances where the handgun is nearly irrelevant.” Nicholas J. Johnson, Supply Restrictions at the Margins of Heller & the Abortion Analogue: Stenberg Principles, Assault Weapons, & the Attitudinalist Critique, 60 Hastings L.J. 1285, 1297 n. 87 (2009); see also Razzano v. Cnty. of Nassau,
.Neither party explains how or why the NCPD took possession of the handgun that the Sheriff’s Department seized from Dudek. The NCPD, however, is the County’s licensing authority for handguns. See N.Y. Penal Law § 265.00(10) (defining "licensing officer,” for
. Insofar as the initial motion propounded similar bases for dismissal, such as timeliness, its summary denial by Judge Wexler does not otherwise preclude this Court’s consideration of those bases in the Motion before it. See Dictograph Prods. Co., Inc. v. Sonotone Corp.,
. Although Dudek attempts to assert claims for punitive damages and attorneys’ fees (Compl. ¶¶ 36-46), this Court construes them as requests for relief and not as claims separate from the Section 1983 clаim. See, e.g., Williams v. Walsh,
. Defendants cite two other state laws, New York Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f) and New York County Law § 650(1) (Defs. Br., at 15-16), to support the argument that the Sheriff’s Department lacks such authority in light of Section 842-a. Neither provision supports this argument.
The first provision specifies that, once the Family Court orders the seizure of a person’s firearms pursuant to Section 842-a, those firearms may be surrendered to the “sheriff of the county in which such person resides,” N.Y. Penal Law § 265.20(a)(1)(f). It does not specify that, after such an order has been lifted, the Sheriff's Department may not legally return those firearms.
The second provision defines the "[g]eneral duties of [the] sheriff,” among which are the "duties prescribed by law as an officer of the court,” N.Y. County Law § 650(1). The fact that the Sheriff's Department serves as an “officer” of the Family Court, when directed under Section- 842-a to confiscate a person's firearms, does not prevent the department from returning those firearms, when it is no longer being directed by the Family Court to retain them.
. "While the ... Family Court ... ha[s] the statutory authority to order the surrender of firearms, the[ ] court[ ] do[es] not have jurisdiction to order the return of such firearms .... Rather the applicant must exhaust administrative remedies, requiring the license holder to demand the return of the firearms from the law enforcement agency which seized them pursuant to the court’s directive. Thereafter, the licensee may seek judicial review of the administrative decision in the Supreme Court.” 2 N.Y. L. of Dom. Violence § 6:36 (2012).
. "[I]mmunity from damages does not ordinarily bar equitable relief as well.” Wood v. Strickland,
. Dudek's allegation that "a copy of the Razzano decision was include [sic] with the demand for the return of the longarms” (PL Br., at 16), thus alerting Sheriff Sposato and Deputy Sheriff Mastropieri that their refusal to do so was unlawful, is irrelevant. The standard for qualified immunity is "objective,” and not "subjective,” reasonableness, "as measured by referеnce to clearly established law” about which a "reasonably competent public official should know.” Harlow,
. Potentially, after discovery, the record will reflect that Dudek "realize[d],” far sooner than January 20, 2012, that (i) the County had promulgated a no-return policy for the Sheriff’s Department; or (ii) the department's inaction in returning his longarms, once the Order had been lifted, amounted to a persistent failurе to provide adequate process. Singleton,
. Defendants’ initial brief says "January 5, 2009,” but this Court assumes that they intended to say January 6, 2009, which is when the Family Court vacated the Order.
. The above rule about accrual is distinguishable from the rule that applies to a conversion or replevin claim against a "good faith purchaser.” Where a purchaser acting in good faith has obtained a plaintiff’s property, already wrongfully withheld by a third-party through theft, a demand for the return of the property is a "substantive element of the cause of action” against the purchaser, and not a "procedural condition precedent.” As a result, the "right to make the demand” is irrelevant to the accrual of the claim against the purchaser. Solomon R. Guggenheim Found. v. Lubell,
. Because this Court dismisses the conversion and replevin claims as time-barred, it does not address Defendants’ alternative arguments for dismissal, based on the failure to serve a timely notice of claim and the laches defense. (Defs. Br., at 19-21.)