Capp v. County of San Diego, No. 18-55119 (9th Cir. 2019)
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Plaintiff and his children filed suit against the County, the Agency, and others, alleging 42 U.S.C. 1983 and Monell claims stemming from a child welfare investigation undertaken by defendants that allegedly violated plaintiff and his children's First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The district court dismissed the claims as insufficiently pleaded or barred by qualified immunity.
The Ninth Circuit held that plaintiff's first amended complaint (FAC) failed to plausibly allege Fourth Amendment, Fourteenth Amendment, and Monell claims. However, the panel held that plaintiff pleaded a plausible First Amendment claim where he alleged that he engaged in protected activity, that the alleged retaliation would objectively have had a chilling effect and that retaliation was the but-for motive for the social worker's actions. Furthermore, the social worker was not entitled to qualified immunity because a reasonable official would know that taking the serious step of threatening to terminate a parent’s custody of his children, when the official would not have taken this step absent her retaliatory intent, violates the First Amendment. Therefore, defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity on the First Amendment claim. The panel affirmed in part, reversed in part, and remanded for further proceedings.
Court Description: Civil Rights. The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district court’s dismissal of plaintiffs’ claims as insufficiently pled in an action brought by Jonathan Capp and his two minor children arising from a child welfare investigation undertaken by County of San Diego social workers that allegedly violated plaintiffs’ First, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Plaintiffs asserted, in part, that social workers retaliated against Capp in violation of the First Amendment after he questioned abuse allegations against him and criticized the County. Plaintiffs asserted that defendants placed Capp on the Child Abuse Central Index and coerced his ex-wife to file an ex parte custody application. The panel first rejected the retaliation claim premised on the Child Abuse Central Index listing. The panel held that * The Honorable Stanley A. Bastian, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Washington, sitting by designation. CAPP V. COUNTY OF SAN DIEGO 3 taking the allegations as a whole, the first amended complaint did not plausibly allege that Capp was placed on the Index as intentional retaliation. Focusing on plaintiffs’ allegation that defendant social worker coerced Capp’s former wife to file the ex parte custody application, the panel found that pursuant to the liberal pleading standard afforded pro se litigants, plaintiffs plausibly alleged that Capp engaged in protected activity, that the alleged retaliation would objectively have had a chilling effect and that retaliation was the but-for motive for the social worker’s actions. Plaintiffs therefore pleaded a plausible First Amendment retaliation claim. The panel further concluded that the accused defendant social worker was not entitled to qualified immunity. The panel held that a reasonable official would know that taking the serious step of threatening to terminate a parent’s custody of his children, when the official would not have taken this step absent her retaliatory intent, violates the First Amendment. The panel held that the district court properly dismissed plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment claims, and claims brought pursuant to Monell v. Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978), which alleged that defendants interviewed the minor children while they were at school without Capp’s consent. The panel held that the first amended complaint contained no facts as to whether the interviews were conducted without either parent’s permission, the length of the interviews, or the specific circumstances of the interviews. Moreover, the panel held that even if plaintiffs had pleaded a plausible Fourth Amendment claim, defendants would be entitled to qualified immunity because the right of minor children to be free from unconstitutional seizures and interrogations by social workers had not been clearly established. 4 CAPP V. COUNTY OF SAN DIEGO Rejecting the Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process claim, the panel held that although Capp might have been subjected to an investigation by the County’s Health and Human Services Agency, that alone was not cognizable as a violation of the liberty interest in familial relations. The panel rejected the Monell claim, concluding that plaintiffs failed to plead a plausible constitutional violation stemming from defendants’ interviews with the children. Moreover, even if plaintiffs had pleaded a plausible Fourth Amendment claim, the first amended complaint ascribed defendants’ alleged misconduct to official policy in a conclusory fashion that was insufficient to state a viable claim.
The court issued a subsequent related opinion or order on October 4, 2019.
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