Keates v. Koile, No. 16-16568 (9th Cir. 2018)
Annotate this CasePlaintiff and her minor child filed suit against officers and employees of the Child Protective Services (CPS) division of the Arizona Department of Economic Security (ADES), alleging violations of plaintiff's constitutuional rights to familial association. In this case, CPS removed the child from plaintiff's custody following the child's hospitalization for depression and suicidal ideation. The panel held that the allegations in the complaint were sufficient to state a claim to relief that was plausible on its face. In this case, a reasonable official in defendant's position would know that the available information did not establish reasonable cause to believe that the child was in imminent danger of attempting to commit suicide, or that it was necessary to separate her from her mother, transfer her to another hospital and continue to detain her after medical professionals at the hospital concluded she was a low suicide risk. Therefore, the district court erred in dismissing the familial association claim against defendants Koile and Pender on the basis of qualified immunity. However, the district court did not err in granting the motion to dismiss plaintiff's claim that defendants violated plaintiff and her child's due process right to be free from deliberately false statements during juvenile court proceedings. Finally, the district court did not err in dismissing claims against the remaining defendants.
Court Description: Civil Rights. The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court’s dismissal of an action against Child Protective Services officers and employees alleging constitutional violations arising from defendants’ actions in removing a minor child A.K. from her mother’s custody following A.K.’s hospitalization for depression and suicidal ideation, and remanded. The panel held that this Circuit’s case law clearly establishes that the rights of parents and children to familial association under the Fourteenth, First, and Fourth Amendments are violated if a state official removes children KEATES V. KOILE 3 from their parents without their consent, and without a court order, unless information at the time of the seizure, after reasonable investigation, establishes reasonable cause to believe that the child is in imminent danger of serious bodily injury, and the scope, degree, and duration of the intrusion is reasonably necessary to avert the specific injury at issue. The panel held that the district court erred in dismissing the familial association claim against defendants Koile and Pender on the basis of qualified immunity. The panel held that the operative complaint alleged sufficient facts to establish that defendants violated plaintiffs’ constitutional rights to familial association. The panel further determined that a reasonable official in defendants’ position would have known that the available information did not establish reasonable cause to believe that A.K. was in imminent danger of attempting to commit suicide, or that it was necessary to separate her from her mother, transfer her to a treatment center, and continue to detain her after medical professionals concluded she was a low suicide risk. The panel held that the district court did not err by dismissing plaintiffs’ judicial deception claim. The panel determined that it could not say that defendant’s statement in the dependency petition was a deliberate falsehood or constituted judicial deception in light of the specific context of the case. The panel held that there was sufficient evidence to make a plausible allegation that defendants Lensche and Rountree were integral participants in violating plaintiffs’ constitutional rights. As to the claims against four other defendants, the panel held that the complaint did not offer any plausible allegation that the defendants participated in the 4 KEATES V. KOILE decision to interfere with plaintiffs’ constitutional rights, and therefore the district court did not err in dismissing those claims. Finally, the panel held that the complaint did not allege that the Director of the Arizona Department of Economic Security was directly involved in the allegedly unconstitutional conduct or that he had knowledge of the constitutional deprivations and acquiesced in them. The panel held that plaintiffs’ conclusory allegations that the unconstitutional policies and procedures caused the unconstitutional conduct did not suffice to state a claim of supervisory liability.
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.