In Mills v. City of Covina, published April 24, 2019, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed a district court's dismissal of a plaintiff's 42 U.S.C. section 1983 lawsuit. In 2013, the plaintiff was stopped and searched. Incriminating evidence was found in his car. In the criminal prosecution against him, the plaintiff moved to suppress the evidence based on lack of probable cause to stop and search him. The motion was denied. During the trial, the plaintiff argued the evidence was planted. He was convicted. In 2016, the California Court of Appeal reversed the conviction, on the ground there was no probable cause for the stop and search, and ruled the suppression motion should have been granted. Because the ruling left no evidence to support a conviction, the appellate court remanded for reversal. The plaintiff then sued the arresting officer, the defendant city, and the police chief for Fourth Amendment violations based on the stop, search, and arrest; a malicious prosecution claim under section 1983; and a Monell claim based on malicious prosecution. The district court dismissed the Fourth Amendment claims as time-barred. The court later granted the City and arresting officer judgment on the pleadings as to the malicious prosecution and Monell claims.
The 9th Circuit agreed the Fourth Amendment claims were time-barred. The claims accrued in 2013 when the search was conducted and the plaintiff arrested. Government Code section 945.3 tolled the statute of limitations during the criminal proceedings in the trial court. The plaintiff contended that during his appeal, Code of Civil Procedure section 356 tolled the statute for suing on the Fourth Amendment claims, because those claims were barred by Heck v. Humphrey until the conviction was set aside. Section 356 tolls statutes of limitations during the time the plaintiff is legally prevented from taking action to protect his rights. But section 356 requires a definitive bar to commencing an action. The Heck bar did not prevent the plaintiff from commencing a section 1983 action for the Fourth Amendment violation. Even if the district court dismissed the action at that time based on Heck, the plaintiff would have been able to revive the action once the conviction was overturned. The two-year statute of limitations thus ran on the Fourth Amendment claims before the plaintiff filed suit.
The malicious prosecution and Monell claims were not time-barred. Further, the district court erred in ruling collateral estoppel barred the claim, because his conviction, which was eventually reversed, was not a final ruling. But the district court correctly ruled that the reversal was not a favorable termination of the criminal action. Because the state appellate court reversed on the exclusionary rule, there was never a ruling that the plaintiff did not commit the criminal offense. He therefore could not meet the favorable-termination element of malicious prosecution.
Leave a Reply