John Partee v. Tommy CallahanJohn Partee v. Tommy Callahan
RONALD LEE GILMAN, Circuit Judge.
John Partee was arrested by Tommy L. Callahan, an off-duty City of Memphis police officer, after the vehicle that Partee was driving allegedly came into contact with a trailer that Callahan was towing. Partee and his wife Fannie sued Callahan and the City of Memphis for violating
The district court granted the City‘s pretrial motion to dismiss all of the Partees’ state-law tort claims against the municipality, holding that the City retained immunity from such claims under Tennessee‘s Governmental Tort Liability Act (GTLA). But the district court allowed the Partees’
The Partees have limited their appeal to the issue of whether the district court erred in dismissing the Partees’ GTLA claims against the City under
I. BACKGROUND
On April 5, 2007, Partee and Callahan were both traveling southbound on Plough Road in Memphis, Tennessee when Partee‘s vehicle allegedly came into contact with the trailer that Callahan was towing. Partee continued driving. Callahan believed that Partee had committed a misdemeanor offense by failing to stop. As part of his training with the City of Memphis Police Department, Callahan began following Partee‘s vehicle with his own and contacted the police department‘s dispatcher to report the alleged crime. Callahan identified himself to the dispatcher as an off-duty officer and provided his badge number.
In addition to recounting the details of the misdemeanor, Callahan informed the dispatcher that Partee appeared to be driving under the influence of alcohol. Callahan said that he would continue to follow Partee. The dispatcher broadcast this information to local law-enforcement officers. Callahan followed Partee for several miles, providing periodic updates on Partee‘s location and driving behavior.
Partee ultimately arrived at his home on Aquarius Avenue in southeast Memphis. When Partee pulled into the driveway, Callahan stopped his own vehicle in front of the residence and exited. Callahan‘s Memphis Police Department badge was clipped conspicuously onto his belt. The Partees’ complaint alleges that Callahan drew his official service weapon as he approached Partee‘s car, identified himself as an officer with the Memphis Police Department, and ordered Partee to step out of the car. Without waiting for Partee to comply, Callahan allegedly opened the driver‘s side door, unbuckled Partee‘s seatbelt, struck Partee in the face with the handgun, and threw Partee to the ground. Callahan, according to the complaint, then lifted Partee‘s head and slammed his face onto the driveway. He allegedly held Par-
Some time thereafter, the Memphis Police Department‘s Inspectional Services Bureau commenced an investigation into the events surrounding Partee‘s arrest. It determined that Callahan had violated departmental disciplinary policies concerning compliance with regulations, truthfulness, and excessive force/abuse. The City of Memphis later held a disciplinary hearing on the same topic, finding that Callahan violated only the excessive force/abuse regulation. According to the Partees, the City failed to consider Callahan‘s full disciplinary record when it imposed a punishment limited to three months of suspended insurance benefits and three extra service days per month for three months.
The Partees’ complaint was originally filed in state court, but it was removed to federal court by the City. As amended, it sets forth claims against Callahan and the City under
The City filed a motion to dismiss the Partees’ complaint. In partially granting the motion, the district court concluded that the state-law tort claims did not fall within the City‘s waiver of immunity as set forth in the GTLA. The GTLA, the court noted, explicitly excludes civil rights violations from the statute‘s otherwise blanket waiver of immunity for suits arising out of negligent conduct by government employees. Describing the Partees’ suit as “fundamentally a civil rights suit” that fell within the GTLA‘s express reservation of immunity, the court dismissed all of the state-law claims against the City.
Trial commenced in November 2009 on the Partees’
The Partees now appeal from the district court‘s pretrial order dismissing their state-law tort claims against the City. They do not appeal from the jury‘s verdict in favor of both defendants on the
A. Standard of review
We review de novo the district court‘s decision to grant a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim under
B. Governmental Tort Liability Act
The GTLA waives the immunity of state entities from suit and permits litigants to sue “for injury proximately caused by a negligent act or omission of any employee within the scope of his employment.”
The GTLA permits the Partees to bring suit directly against the City “for injury proximately caused by . . . negligent act[s] or omission[s]” that might have been committed by Officer Callahan while arresting Partee, provided that the Partees’ claim avoids any of the statutory exceptions under which the City retains immunity. See
There is no cause of action set forth in the GTLA to hold the City directly liable for Callahan‘s alleged intentional conduct during Partee‘s arrest. See
The exception relevant to the present case—colloquially referred to as the “intentional tort exception,” see Limbaugh, 59 S.W.3d at 79—functions to preserve governmental immunity “if the injury arises out of . . . civil rights.”
C. District court‘s disposition of the GTLA claims against the City
As an initial matter, the Partees argue that the City waived its immunity from suit when it removed this matter to federal court. They support their argument with an analogy to a state‘s waiver of Eleventh Amendment immunity when it voluntarily removes a state-court case to a federal forum. See Lapides v. Bd. of Regents of Univ. Sys. of Ga., 535 U.S. 613, 623, 122 S.Ct. 1640, 152 L.Ed.2d 806 (2002) (holding that a state‘s removal of a state-court lawsuit to federal court constitutes a waiver of the state‘s Eleventh Amendment immunity). But cities do not receive protection under the Eleventh Amendment as do states, and the Partees have failed to explain how the constitutional principles animating sovereign immunity might apply to a city‘s assertion of state-law statutory immunity. We therefore reject the Partees’ waiver-by-removal argument.
With respect to the merits of the appeal, we affirm the district court‘s decision to dismiss the negligence claims against the City that were based directly on Callahan‘s conduct while arresting Partee. The district court correctly concluded that these claims arise out of exactly the same circumstances as the Partees’ civil rights claims, thus falling within the exception to the waiver of immunity set forth in the GTLA. See Johnson, 617 F.3d at 872;
We also affirm the district court‘s dismissal of the Partees’ claim against the City for negligent hiring, supervision, and discipline (the negligent-hiring claim), albeit on a different ground than that articulated by the court below. The basis for the district court‘s decision on this issue was that the Partees’ action was “fundamentally a civil rights suit” that fell within the GTLA‘s express reservation of immunity for the City. See
The district court, however, did not parse the GTLA issue on a claim-by-claim basis, and therefore did not consider the distinction between a cause of action based on Callahan‘s conduct in arresting Partee and one based on allegations of the City‘s independently negligent acts in hiring, supervising, or disciplining the officer. A claim of the former type is analytically different from a claim that the City‘s own negligence proximately caused the Partees’ harm, which ultimately occurred through Callahan‘s allegedly foreseeable acts. Some of the circumstances precipitating the negligent-hiring and civil rights claims—specifically Partee‘s arrest by Callahan—are clearly identical. But the Partees’ negligent-hiring claim necessarily includes other circumstances that preceded the arrest and are temporally and factually distinct, including Callahan‘s hiring, the training he received, and any previous disciplinary problems he presented.
The Tennessee state courts have not explicitly determined whether the limited factual overlap between these claims would be sufficient to render the City immune from the negligent-hiring claim under the GTLA. Generally, in such a situation, the court should “predict how the state‘s highest court would interpret the statute.” Fed. Deposit Ins. Co. v. Stables, 573 F.3d 289, 298 (6th Cir.2009). But where interpretation of the state-law issue is not necessary in order to properly resolve the appeal, we find it advisable not to do so. See Brown v. The Raymond Corp., 432 F.3d 640, 650 (6th Cir.2005) (Ryan, J., concurring) (“[I]f a federal court exercising its diversity jurisdiction can properly decide the case before it without declaring a new rule of state law—for example, interpreting a provision of a state statute not previously interpreted by the state‘s highest court—it should do so” in order to abide by “settled and familiar principles of state/federal judicial deference” and avoid issuing an “opinion that is entirely dicta.“); see also White v. Olig, 56 F.3d 817, 821 (7th Cir.1995) (declining to reach the state-law issue because it was “superfluous,” given the court‘s dismissal of other predicate issues).
Here, we have no need to decide the reach of the GTLA‘s “intentional tort exception” to the facts of this case because the Partees have not disputed on appeal the directed verdict in favor of Callahan on the negligence claims or the jury‘s verdict in favor of him on the intentional claims. The Partees’ inability to prove that Callahan‘s conduct, whether negligent or intentional, was actionable is thus the law of the case. See Moses v. Bus. Card Exp., Inc., 929 F.2d 1131, 1137 (6th Cir.1991) (explaining that, under the law-of-the-case doctrine, “when a court decides upon a rule of law, that decision should continue to govern the same issues in subsequent stages in the same case.” (internal quotation marks omitted)). Without actionable harm committed by Callahan, the Partees cannot support a claim for negligence against the City. See Williams v. City of Grosse Pointe Park, 496 F.3d 482, 488 (6th Cir.2007) (declining to hold the city liable for the officer‘s conduct after determining that the conduct was reasonable).
In sum, we decline to determine whether the additional circumstances required for a
III. CONCLUSION
For all the reasons set forth above, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court.
* The Honorable Thomas L. Ludington, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan, sitting by designation.