United States District Court, D. Arizona
ORDER
HONORABLE ROSEMARY MARQUEZ UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
On
April 12, 2017, Plaintiffs Heriberto Martinez Ortiz
(“Ortiz”) and his wife Nora Morales
(“Morales”) filed a Complaint (Doc. 1), raising
constitutional claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 as well as
various state-law claims. On August 18, 2017, the Court
issued an Order staying this case pending the resolution of
underlying state criminal proceedings. (Doc. 26.) The Court
lifted the stay on December 18, 2018. (Doc. 36.) Currently
pending before the Court is a fully briefed Motion to Dismiss
filed by Defendants Jose Nohe Garcia (“Garcia”),
Jane Doe Garcia, and La Loma Grande, LLC (“La
Loma”) (collectively, “Movants”). (Doc. 18;
see also Docs. 19, 22.)[1]
I.
Legal Standard
Rule
8(a)(2) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure requires a
pleading to contain a “short and plain statement of the
claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.”
This pleading standard does not demand detailed factual
allegations, but it “requires more than labels and
conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a
cause of action will not do.” Bell Atl. Corp. v.
Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007). A complaint must
tender more than “naked assertions devoid of further
factual enhancement.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556
U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (internal quotation and alteration marks
omitted).
“To
survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain
sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state
a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'”
Id. (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570).
“A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff
pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the
reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the
misconduct alleged.” Id. While a court
evaluating a motion to dismiss must accept as true all
factual allegations of the complaint, the same does not apply
to legal conclusions couched as factual allegations.
Id. Rule 8 “does not unlock the doors of
discovery for a plaintiff armed with nothing more than
conclusions.” Id. at 678-79.
II.
Allegations of Complaint
The
factual allegations of Plaintiff's Complaint, accepted as
true for purposes of the pending Motion to Dismiss, are as
follows.
Plaintiffs,
a married couple, reside in Santa Cruz County, Arizona. (Doc.
1 at ¶¶ 4-5.) Defendants Derek Arnson
(“Arnson”), Joaquin Lopez (“Lopez”),
Amador Vasquez (“Vasquez”), and Roberto Fierros
(“Fierros”) are employees of the Nogales Police
Department (“NPD”), and at all relevant times
they were acting within the course and scope of their
employment. (Id. at ¶¶ 7-13.) Garcia is a
resident of Santa Cruz County, Arizona, and the manager of La
Loma, an Arizona limited liability company. (Id. at
¶¶ 15-17.)
On
March 9, 2016, Garcia filed a report stating that a generator
and an impact wrench had been stolen from property owned by
La Loma. (Id. at ¶¶ 25-26.) Garcia
provided non-party Officer Velasco with a surveillance-camera
photo date-stamped February 28, 2016, which showed the
partial face of an individual. (Id. At ¶¶
27-28.) Garcia also provided a surveillance-camera photo
showing a truck leaving the property with what appeared to be
a generator in the truck bed. (Id. at ¶ 27.)
The photo of the truck was time-stamped March 7, 2016, but
Garcia told Officer Velasco that the photo was taken on March
6, 2016. (Id. at ¶ 29.) Garcia stated that he
believed the individual in the photo taken on February 28,
2016-who had damaged the surveillance camera- was a possible
suspect for the theft that had occurred on March 6, 2016;
however, Garcia had no evidence to support that belief.
(Id. at ¶¶ 30-31.)
On
March 11, 2016, without further investigation, Fierros issued
a press release with the February 28, 2016 photo, indicating
that the individual in the photo was a suspect wanted for
theft and asking the public for assistance in locating him.
(Id. at ¶ 33.) The NPD also posted the
surveillance-camera photos of the individual and the truck on
their Facebook page. (Id. at ¶ 34.) Fierros
intentionally or recklessly misled the public, because the
photos were taken on different dates and the person in the
February 28, 2016 photo was never seen driving the truck in
the other photo. (Id. at ¶ 36.)
Approximately
a month after NPD issued the press release, Lopez claimed
that an anonymous male called his department-issued cell
phone with information about the theft; however, Lopez's
cell phone number was not published, there is no evidence
that an anonymous tipster called the NPD number listed in the
press release and Facebook post, and Lopez did not document
or save the number that appeared on his cell phone.
(Id. at ¶¶ 37-38, 58-68.) According to
Lopez, the anonymous caller indicated that the individual in
the February 28, 2016 surveillance-camera photo was Ortiz and
that Ortiz had spray-painted his truck a different color days
after NPS had released the surveillance-camera photos.
(Id. at ¶¶ 64-66.) Lopez had a personal
vendetta against Morales as a result of prior interactions
and familial relationships. (Id. at ¶¶
39-57.)
After
police officers interrogated Ortiz, Vasquez contacted Garcia
via telephone. (Id. at ¶ 113.) Garica informed
Vasquez that he had shown the surveillance-camera photos to
various people who had identified the individual in the
photograph as Ortiz and the truck as belonging to Ortiz.
(Id. at ¶¶ 114-117.) Vasquez drafted a
search-warrant affidavit based on the information provided to
him by Lopez and Garcia. (Id. at ¶ 118.) The
affidavit contained deliberately misrepresented and
misleading information. (Id. at ¶¶
119-125.)
After
Ortiz's arrest, Vasquez interviewed witnesses that Garcia
said had identified Ortiz and the truck. (Id. at
¶¶ 141-143.) The witnesses denied having identified
Ortiz or the truck. (Id.) On October 24, 2016, a
complaint was filed against Ortiz for theft. (Id. at
¶ 151.)[2]
Plaintiffs
raise three § 1983 claims asserting violations of their
Fourth, Fifth, and Fourteenth Amendment rights, as well as a
§ 1983 claim asserting municipal liability against the
City of Nogales pursuant to Monell v. Department of
Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978). (Id. at
¶¶ 161-196, 213-216.) Plaintiffs also raise an
inadequate training and supervision claim which is labeled as
a common-law claim but which appears to be brought pursuant
to § 1983. (See Id. at ¶ 219-228 (citing
City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378 (1989).)
Plaintiffs raise state-law claims for false arrest, false
imprisonment, assault, battery, negligence, defamation,
“false light, ” intentional infliction ...