IN THE SUPERIOR COURT
FOR THE STATE OF RIDGEWAY
SEAL_LOVE,
Plaintiff(s),
v.
DPS_K, et al.,
Defendant(s).
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Case No. RSC-CV-2544
Memorandum Opinion & Order
MEMORANDUM OPINION & ORDER
Before the Court is Plaintiff SEAL_LOVE who brings this Motion for Reconsideration of
the Court’s Memorandum Opinion & Order of Defendant’s March 28 Motion to Dismiss, which
was a ruling adverse to their interests. On review of Plaintiff’s Motion for Reconsideration and
on review of briefs submitted by both parties, it is ordered that the Motion is DENIED.
BACKGROUND
Plaintiff is an individual who entered the County Hall building on Jackson Street in the
City of Palmer to view an ongoing government proceeding. In the lobby of the building are two
security checkpoints with metal detectors and armed law enforcement officers to oversee the
operation of the checkpoints. Plaintiff “jumped over the reception desk and went directly toward
the stairs” that led to the chambers where the proceedings were taking place. Plaintiff’s Civil
Complaint, ¶ 7. This was done to evade and avoid the security checkpoint and to gain immediate
access to the chambers where proceedings were taking place. Plaintiff’s route of entry took them
directly to the main entrance doors where other spectators were entering.
Defendant DPS_K is a trooper with the Ridgeway State Police who was in the chambers
within the galleries where Plaintiff had just breached entry, unbeknownst to the Defendant.
Within seconds of entering the chambers through the main entrance, Defendant detained the
Plaintiff in handcuff restraints and then forcibly searched their person. Plaintiff was discovered to
be in possession of a concealed firearm within the building and was charged with 5 R.C.C. § 12,
a statute which prohibits possession of a firearm within a restricted government building with
posted signage, which the building had. Plaintiff then filed this suit against the Defendant
seeking declaratory relief, monetary relief (both punitive and compensatory), and injunctive
relief of assorted variety.
Defendant’s answer to the suit came in the form of a Motion to Dismiss, which is
permissible under Rid. R. Civ. P. 12, in lieu of an answer. Their argument is based on three
assertions: (1) Defendant had reasonable suspicion of danger given the Plaintiff’s “abrupt and
unusual entry into a government facility and his unpredictable conduct” which justified search;
(2) Plaintiff’s claim is barred under Qualified Immunity; and (3) that “that certain social
circumstances may warrant exceptions to the warrant requirement” of the Fourth Amendment.”
Defendant’s Motion to Dismiss, 1-2.
The Court heard briefs from both parties regarding the Motion to Dismiss and gave
particular weight to the Qualified Immunity claim invoked by Plaintiff as neither party contested
the relevance of the claim in an action brought under 1 R. Stat. § 3115 for Official Misconduct.
In those briefs, both parties litigated whether Defendant’s actions were immune under the
doctrine. The Court determined that they were and that the suit must be dismissed. Plaintiff now
files for reconsideration, arguing a new assertion that claims of Qualified Immunity are barred in
suits in the official capacity and that the stare decisis of past judgments regarding Qualified
Immunity in Official Misconduct suits upholds this reading.1 On this argument, there does exist
1 Plaintiff also raises two other grounds: (1) that a motion for reconsideration is inappropriate for the arguments
raised; (2) that Defendant is not entitled to Qualified Immunity. On these two grounds, the Court rejects the need for
reconsideration and finds no need to provide an in-depth review. The grounds that are elaborated on in this opinion
were selected because of their importance to address because of their absence in the original opinion.
sufficient past precedent that Qualified Immunity has past been held to be inappropriate for a suit
brought under Official Misconduct. Today, the Court rejects that reading and returns the viability
of the immunity to these suits under the Official Misconduct cause of action.
LEGAL FINDINGS
I. Plaintiff is correct that past precedent barred the use of Qualified Immunity for the
Official Misconduct suit. Regardless, stare decisis is not an immovable force.
From time to time, actions by public officials may be the subject of a lawsuit where
“action for damages may offer the only realistic avenue for vindication of constitutional
guarantees.” Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 814 (1981). It must also be recognized that
these lawsuits bring a cost “not only to the defendant officials, but to society as a whole.” Id. In a
legal environment flooded by suits against law enforcement officers, the general patrolmen on
the beat are made less attentive by fear of being subjected to a lawsuit for the slightest mistake of
fact. To combat this, Qualified Immunity was created as the “immunity of government officers
from personal liability [that] springs from the same root considerations that generated the
doctrine of sovereign immunity.” Scheuer v. Rhodes, 416 U.S. 232, 239 (1973).
In this case, Defendant is sued under 1 R. Stat. § 3114 for the Official Misconduct cause
of action which allows monetary damages awarded against “a public servant [that] commits an
act relating to his office but constitutes an unauthorized exercise of his official functions, where a
reasonable person with his training, expertise, and experiences should know that such act is
unauthorized.” This cause of action is brought “in a form of quasi-official capacity, such that the
defendants shall be named as parties in official capacity” but that “it shall be the duty of the
defendant’s individual capacity to pay such damages as ordered.” 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii). In past,
this Court has heard and sided with arguments that the “quasi-official provision” has barred the
invocation of Qualified Immunity in the Official Misconduct cause of action. Removelungs v.
ethhaqn, 2 R. Supp. 5 (2022).
It is clear that the past judgments from this Court abrogated Qualified Immunity as a
defense afforded to public servants in an Official Misconduct suit. However, “stare decisis is ‘not
an inexorable command.’” Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, 597 U.S. ___, ___
(2022) (slip op., at 39) (quoting Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 233 (2009)). Admittedly,
stare decisis is a tough doctrine to quarrel against and “reflects a policy judgment that ‘in most
matters it is more important that the applicable rule of law be settled than that it be settled
right.’” Agostini v. Felton, 521 U.S. 203, 235 (1997) (quoting Burnet v. Coronado Oil & Gas
Co., 285 U.S. 393, 406 (1932). In Dobbs, the Supreme Court of the United States outlined five
general factors that are examined when overturning a court’s established precedent: “the nature
of their error, the quality of their reasoning, the ‘workability’ of the rules they imposed on the
country, their disruptive effect on other areas of the law, and the absence of concrete reliance.”
Dobbs, 597 U.S. at ___ (slip op., at 43). This Court adopts those standards in this review, not as
an authoritative matter but out of tradition.
Nature of Error
“In situations of abuse of office, an action for damages may offer the only realistic
avenue for vindication of constitutional guarantees.” Harlow, 457 U.S. at 814. Throughout the
past precedents regarding Qualified Immunity, it cannot be stressed how important these reviews
are to balance the need to hold public officials accountable from extreme abuses of their
discretion and to avoid paralyzing societal effects from a saturated legal field against public
officials exercising day-to-day executions of their duties. Qualified Immunity remains a
constitutionally significant doctrine that can make or break this balance that must be struck by
the Court.
The nature of the error is severe in that its consequences are immense in rejecting the
purposes of Qualified Immunity in favor of a lessened version based on immunity from damages
by incorporating the elements of a Qualified Immunity inquiry into the cause of actions. This
will be explored later in this opinion.
Quality of their Reasoning
The widely-accepted view that Qualified Immunity is inappropriate for invocation in
Official Misconduct suits is nuanced in our jurisdiction and “[f]inding precedent over nuanced
common law doctrines [...] can be tough because often-times they are intertwined and knotted
with local constitutional provision or statutes of that jurisdiction.” State v. Lx1nas, 1 Rid. 501,
502 (2022) (JACKSON, J., concurring in the denial of certiorari). In our case, there are very few
written rulings of well-thought quality on this matter aside from transcript statements made
during court proceedings.
No judge has engaged in an in-depth textualist review of 1 R. Stat. § 3115 or any other
relevant statutory provision governing the process of Qualified Immunity in these claims.
Today’s ruling presents the first of its kind and immediately quashes the quality of reasoning of
past rulings holding opposite views.
“Workability” of the Rules Imposed
The traditional holding on the applicability of Qualified Immunity to 1 R. Stat. § 3115
cause of action has workability in our courts but comes at immense waste to the judicial
economy. Qualified Immunity is “an immunity from suit rather than a mere defense to liability,”
Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231 (2009), while 1 R. Stat. § 3114 is the incorporation of
the elements of Qualified Immunity which must be demonstrated at trial. The workability of
Qualified Immunity “is effectively lost if a case is erroneously permitted to go to trial.” Id. We
have lost this workability with the traditional reading and now are encumbered with immense
lawsuits on an already-superfluous docket. Unequivocally, the traditional reading of 1 R. Stat. §
3115(iii) has brought immense consequences that have undermined and confused the
applicability of Pearson in our jurisdiction and has further caused an immense waste of resources
within our judicial economy.
Disruptive Effect on Other Areas of the Law
As previously mentioned, the birth of Qualified Immunity came from the doctrine that
“the king can do no wrong” and that “whatever may be amiss in the conduct of public affairs is
not chargeable personally on the king.” 3 William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of
England 254. It may be the libertarian tendencies of the judge presiding but the complete
abrogation of other aspects of law by an immunity given to a special person holding fake powers
is utterly repulsive and disruptive to the law. Qualified Immunity is a socially divisive topic that
has proponents arguing that it is necessary to maintain a well-lubricated police department while
opponents argue that it allows misconduct to fester without restitution given to those that have
been wronged by law enforcement.
It was previously mentioned that the Supreme Court of the United States explicitly
devised the modern Qualified Immunity plan to be an immunity from suit, not damages. The
traditional reading of 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii) has obstructed this view by requiring public officials
to litigate their immunity at trial as a defense to damages instead of at pretrial where it was
intentionally intended to be. The field of United States law on Qualified Immunity has been
unnecessarily disrupted by the traditional reading of our statute so as to effectively rescind
Qualified Immunity while also failing to follow the purposes of it, despite it being
well-established common law. The difficulty of reconciling Pearson and the traditional view of
Ridgeway Qualified Immunity is unworkable — we have been forced to abandon common law
for a subpar variant. Yet, the traditional reading has been held up on subpar rulings and
examinations by judges.
Reliability of Precedent
Though courts have past been reliant on the traditional reading of 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii),
its reliance is not sufficient enough to leave the issue alone. Overturning any precedent,
especially one as nuanced as this one, will come at a cost to the reliance it had in past decisions
and future ones. It will be rare to find a precedent ripe to overcome the barrier that stare decisis
presents while also being overly cautious of avoiding the destruction of a reliant precedent.
When examining this factor, a judge must ask whether overturning a well-established erroneous
decision would be “a small price to pay for the uprooting of this weed.” Hubbard v. United
States, 514 U.S. 695, 717 (1995) (Scalia, J., concurring in part and concurring in the judgment).
In this review, civil litigants may have to prepare well in advance to address Qualified
Immunity concerns well before they enter trial, but they had to prepare for that anyways even
with the traditional reading. The elements of Qualified Immunity are incorporated in the cause of
action for Official Misconduct, so there is little reliance that this decision will interfere with.
Stare decisis is made to “promote[] the evenhanded, predictable, and consistent development of
legal principles, fosters reliance on judicial decisions, and contributes to the actual and perceived
integrity of the judicial process.’” Hohn v. United States, 524 U.S. 236, 251 (1998) (quoting
Payne v. Tennessee, 501 U.S. 808, 827 (1991)). In this case, there is little disruption to that
reliance on our past decisions given that a litigant already had to prove that the officer violated a
clearly established right. The only interference is that litigants must prepare earlier into a case’s
lifespan, which is the smallest price to pay for the unrootance of our weed.
Conclusion
The traditional reading “was egregiously wrong from the state. Its reasoning was
exceptionally weak, and the decision has had damaging consequences.” Dobbs, 597 U.S. at ___
(slip op., at 6).2 The examination of stare decisis in terms of the traditional reading of 1 R. Stat. §
3114(iii) is weak and requires review to correct an incorrect reading that has caused burden to
the quick administration of justice in dockets by compelling law enforcement to be sequestered
constantly by the courts of this state instead of allowing claims of Qualified Immunity to dispose
of the “insubstantial claims [that] should not proceed to trial.” Harlow, 457 U.S. at 816.
Ridgeway’s jurisprudence on 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii) is malformed and stuck based on incomplete
precedent done by superficial review without challenge. Today, the challenge must be heard and
the Court gives weight to the claim.
II. The quasi-official capacity provision is a wolf in sheep’s clothing that textually leans
more to an individual capacity suit.
“When interpreting a statute, we look first to the language.” Richardson v. United States,
526 U.S. 813, 818 (1999). The controlling statute in this matter is 1 R. Stat. § 3114 and
surrounding provisions that dictate how suits in the quasi-official capacity are to proceed. § 3114
outlines the elements necessary for a claim of Official Misconduct to be successful, and it
includes the same elements that are necessary for an invocation of Qualified Immunity. The
traditional reading of § 3114 has been that, because the elements of Qualified Immunity are
2 This quote is to be read in comical effect to emulate the harsh rebuke given by Justice Alito in Dobbs and does not
reflect the sincere phrasing of the Court. The traditional reading of 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii), while inappropriate, was
neither egregiously wrong nor had severe damaging consequences aside from the judicial economy argument made
in the “Workability” of the Rules Imposed section of Part I of this memorandum opinion. The remainder of the
section is to be read as is.
incorporated into the cause of action, the immunity is duplicated and the statutory text would be
ineffective if a claim had to undergo an examination of these elements at pretrial and trial. The
escape to this issue, according to the traditional reading, is in 1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii) which allows
the suit to proceed in “quasi-official capacity” with the case naming scheme being against the
public official in the official capacity and in 1 R. Stat. § 3205 where “[c]ases against an
individual in official capacity [...] shall be construed as cases against the government.”
Surplusage Canon
The traditional reading was born out of the surplusage canon that “every word and every
provision is to be given effect” and that it should not “needlessly be given an interpretation that
causes it to duplicate another provision or to have no consequence.” A. Scalia & B. Garner,
Reading Law: The Interpretation of Legal Texts 172 (2012). With this canon, § 3114(iii)
(hereinafter the “quasi-official provision”) was read so that suits in this cause of action were
treated as mostly in the official capacity but not entirely so as to allow personal liability to
monetary judgments on the officer responsible. The statute itself is vague in that it does not
explicitly outline which parts of the suit are to be treated in the official capacity, which parts are
to be treated in the individual capacity — it just allows for the suit to be treated in a mixed
capacity.
Today, the Court takes an exploratory venture as to whether the quasi-official provision
was meant to be read so that the case was done in the official capacity in all aspects except for
liability of monetary judgments, which is on the individual capacity. In this exploration, the
Court finds plenty more cause to find that the traditional reading was erroneous in relying only
on the surplusage canon to craft a circumvention around the Qualified Immunity invocation
while also maintaining the remainder of the statute. Our review of the surplusage canon begins
first with the arguments both parties assert and reconciliation with other statutory construction
canons.
Plaintiff argues that the legislature “would not have wanted the courts to litigate the same
fundamental issues twice (once during pretrial and once at trial)” and so the inclusion of the
Qualified Immunity elements into the cause of action would be made without consequence,
which the surplusage canon prohibits. Plaintiff’s Mot. for Reconsideration 3. Defendant contests
the invocation of this canon, saying that “a latter provision must be inherently redundant of the
former provision” for surplusage to bar an interpretation. Defendant’s Response to Mot. for
Reconsideration 4. The Court disagrees — surplusage is meant to avoid interpretations that
subtract from a statute and make it without effectiveness. Plaintiff is correct that the inclusion of
the elements of Qualified Immunity in the statute requires some form of action, enforcement, or
guidance to our handling of Official Misconduct cases, otherwise it wouldn’t have been included
in the statute in the first place.
However, the traditional reading is not the only reading that can maintain good-standing
with the surplusage canon.
Harmonious Reading Canon
In this case, we have a conflict between whether to read the quasi-official provision so as
to treat cases of this cause of action in the official capacity in all but liability. “[T]here can be no
justification for needlessly rendering provisions in conflict if they can be interpreted
harmoniously.” Scalia & Garner, supra at § 27. The “task is to fit, if possible, all parts into an
harmonious whole.” Roberts v. Sea-Land Services, Inc., 556 U.S. 93, 100 (2012) (quoting FTC v.
Mandel Brothers, Inc., 359 U.S. 385, 389 (1959)). Whether the scheme is complex or made
difficult, what matters most is an ability to maintain the structure of the statute in practice while
also not deleting or amending any part of it. Defendant agrees and asserts this point, that the
“embedded elements of qualified immunity in official misconduct claims should be universally
accepted, and deference to qualified immunity must exist because of the nature and
characteristics of relief that are guaranteed in official misconduct lawsuits.” Defendant’s
Response to Mot. for Reconsideration 5.
The Court agrees — the statutory scheme that can bring harmony of the provision and a
reconciliation of American common law is that the legislature’s inclusion of the elements of
Qualified Immunity in the cause of action was not to bar the invocation of defense, but to
recognize it by statute as one that a court is to consider in light of the quasi-official provision.
Once the Court has heard the claim, the elements are unimpeachable at trial. The quasi-official
provision is to be read as treating the case in the individual capacity in all manner except in
naming scheme, where both the public official and their office (or in our case, the law
enforcement agency they are employed with) are both named in the lawsuit.
In the history of our jurisprudence, it has always been the duty of the Government to
provide defense to its officers in lawsuits. See 1 R. Stat. § 3205-6. It is important to note that 1 R.
Stat. § 3205 only requires the Government to afford legal defense in cases in the official capacity.
With respect to the Official Misconduct cause of action, there exists no other statutory provision
that provides legal representation by the Government except through the quasi-official provision
which names the case in the official capacity and does nothing else. No evidence from
accompanying provisions or any statutory construction review, aside from the weak surplusage
canon argument, can strengthen the view that the quasi-official provision is meant to do anything
other than simply name the case in the official capacity so as to require the Government to
defend its officers.
Ordinary Meaning
“In the absence of an indication to the contrary, words in a statute are assumed to bear
their ‘ordinary, contemporary, common meaning.’” Walters v. Metropolitan Ed. Enterprises, Inc.,
519 U.S. 202, 207 (1997) (quoting Pioneer Investment Services Co. v. Brunswick Associates Ltd.
Partnership, 507 U. S. 380, 388 (1993) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted)). The
quasi-official provision states that “the defendants shall be named as parties in official capacity.”
1 R. Stat. § 3114(iii). When something is named, it does not change much of the substance of the
item — especially when the item acts with different characteristics. If you name your pet duck
with the name “dog,” but it still walks and quacks like a duck, it is a duck and not a dog. Unless
otherwise stated, such as in 1 R. Stat. § 3205 where the naming scheme does matter, the naming
convention of the case is irrelevant.
A case of Official Misconduct is against the public official, who bears all financial
liability, and is in the same subsection of the Ridgeway Revised Statutes as individual capacity
claims. For all intents and purposes, it is an individual capacity case with the naming convention
of an official capacity case. The traditional reading is an expansion from the naming convention
to infect other parts of the handling of these cases.
III. Reconciliation of Pearson in past and future readings of Qualified Immunity
invocations in Official Misconduct cases.
As previously mentioned, Pearson held that Qualified Immunity is an immunity from
suit, not damages. The purpose of the immunity is irrecoverably lost with the traditional reading
and thus incompatible with the American common law reading of Qualified Immunity. The past
reading was inappropriate and could not meet the goals that the U.S. Supreme Court sought to
uphold when they decided Pearson. The future reading promulgated from this opinion — that
the inclusion of the elements of Qualified Immunity is nothing more than a recognition of the
immunity and that once the claim is heard either in pretrial or trial, the ruling is unimpeachable
— can reconcile with Pearson. In this reading, immunity from suit can be invoked early so as to
remain compliant with Pearson and also with 1 R. Stat. § 3114.
CONCLUSION
SO ORDERED, ADJUDGED, AND DECREED in chambers in Palmer, Ridgeway
County, this 18th day of April 2024 that, for the foregoing reasons, the Plaintiff’s Motion for
Reconsideration of the Court’s Memorandum Opinion & Order of Defendant’s March 28 Motion
to Dismiss is DENIED.
/s/ TaxesArentAwesome
TaxesArentAwesome
Superior Court Judge
