Reed v. Gardner
1993 WL 45153, 986 F.2d 1122 (1993)
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Rule of Law:
Under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, police officers may be liable for violating the Due Process Clause if their affirmative actions create a danger or render the public more vulnerable to a danger they otherwise would not have faced, even without a custodial relationship.
Facts:
- Police officers Thomas Gardner, Herman Davidson, and James Bender arrested Cathy Irby, the driver of a car.
- Larry Rice, a passenger in Irby's car, was intoxicated at the time of Irby's arrest.
- The officers left the intoxicated Rice inside the car with Irby's car keys.
- Approximately two hours after Irby's arrest, Rice was driving the same car.
- While intoxicated, Rice crossed the center line of Illinois Route 130 and collided head-on with a car driven by Richard Reed.
- The collision resulted in the death of Pamela Jo Reed and her fetus, Jason Wesley Reed, and caused severe injuries to other passengers, including Marilyn Reed and the Kuykendalls.
Procedural Posture:
- The Reed family and the Kuykendalls (plaintiffs) filed a complaint in U.S. District Court against several police officers (defendants), alleging a civil rights violation under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
- The defendants filed a motion to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.
- The district court (trial court) granted the defendants' motion to dismiss, holding that under DeShaney, the officers had no constitutional duty to protect the plaintiffs from the drunk driver.
- The plaintiffs (appellants) appealed the district court's dismissal to the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
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Issue:
Does the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment impose liability on police officers under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 when their affirmative act of arresting a driver creates a danger by leaving a known-intoxicated passenger with access to the vehicle, who subsequently causes a fatal accident?
Opinions:
Majority - Flaum, Circuit Judge.
Yes. A claim for a civil rights violation under § 1983 may exist where police officers' affirmative actions create or substantially contribute to the creation of a danger. While the Due Process Clause generally does not require the state to protect citizens from private violence, as established in DeShaney v. Winnebago County, an exception applies when the state plays a part in the creation of a danger or renders a citizen more vulnerable to it. Assuming the facts in the complaint are true—that the officers arrested a sober driver (Irby) and left behind an obviously drunk passenger (Rice) with the keys—their state action changed a safe situation into a dangerous one. This affirmative conduct is distinguishable from mere inaction, such as failing to arrest a drunk driver. However, if Irby had also been intoxicated, the officers would not be liable, as their actions would have merely exchanged one drunk driver for another, not creating a new danger or making the public worse off.
Dissenting - Posner, Circuit Judge,
The court should not reach the constitutional issue presented. The plaintiffs have effectively admitted that the arrested driver, Irby, was also intoxicated. If this fact is true, the plaintiffs' claim fails even under the majority's own reasoning, because the police did not create a new danger but merely substituted one drunk driver for another. By deciding a difficult constitutional question based on a hypothetical fact known to be false, the court is issuing an advisory opinion. The proper course would be to remand the case for a summary judgment proceeding to determine the single factual issue of Irby's intoxication, which would likely resolve the case without requiring a constitutional ruling.
Analysis:
This case significantly clarifies the 'state-created danger' exception to the general rule from DeShaney that the state has no affirmative duty to protect individuals from private harm. The decision establishes that liability under § 1983 is not confined to custodial settings but can arise from any affirmative state action that makes a person worse off. It introduces a crucial comparative standard: liability attaches only if the state's intervention created a new danger or made an existing one worse than it would have been absent the intervention. This 'worse off' test has become a central element in analyzing state-created danger claims, requiring future courts to compare the plaintiff's situation before and after the state's action.
