Journalist demands summary judgment vs. TN city on outlaw arrest policy, aka ‘general warrants’
For decades, Tennessee cops, deputies have arrested people for cause without a warrant when constitution and T.C.A. § 40-7-103 require a warrant. NoogaRadio reporter sues to halt abuse
I am in federal court seeking at least F$75,000 in damages and also equitable compensation for false imprisonment and false arrest doing my job as radio journalist at NoogaRadio Network and 96.9 FM.
Among the parties I bring to bar is city of Franklin, in wealthy Williamson County, Tenn., and city officer William Orange, who seized me and hauled me out of the conference auditorium without probable cause and without a warrant.
I have two actions against Franklin in this case. The most important claim is for an injunction to uphold the constitutional duty to obtain an arrest warrant, especially in light of the exceptions statute that allows cops to evade the constitutional limits. This exceptions statute says that in exigent or emergency cases, a cop can make an on-spot arrest for cause without warrant. But in listing exceptions (giving an inch, if you will), the law doesn’t give a mile.
The law at T.C.A. 40-7-103 lets an officer arrest on the spot for a felony. In a car crash involving alcohol or a crash. In a suicide. In stalking. But the law does not allow a general warrants scheme.
That’s what operates, I daresay, in every city and county statewide, based on years of custom and usage. The system is illegal, unchallenged by any of the state’s 18,000-plus lawyers and hundreds of courts.
In reading the motions to dismiss from the parties, I determine the case is purely a matter of law, and that I don’t have to engage a jury of my peers to make a determination of fact on any dispositive element of my imprisonment and arrest.
A motion for summary judgment, accompanied by statement of undisputed material fact, is before federal judge Waverly Crenshaw and the magistrate Barbara Holmes.
The defenses I attack in this case are staggering. The main one made by the city is that having to obey the law is stressful to police officers and brings in many inconveniences.
The case is ripe for action by the court, which has before it motions to dismiss, petitions for injunction and motion for summary judgment. Here’s an excerpt vs. city of Franklin.
Motion for summary judgment
The dispositive undisputed material facts for summary judgment are that Franklin and its officer [William] Orange are liable for injury and harm to plaintiff for imprisoning and arresting him without probable cause. Secondarily, their actions defy constitutional constraints and statutory limits at T.C.A. § 40-7-103, intended by the Tennessee general assembly to be safeguard for officer and citizen, requiring a warrant in this case for protection of federal and state due process rights.
City representative Orange is responsible for the physical seizure of plaintiff against his will in violation of clearly established law without probable cause. He acts outside his office, against the law, in his person as a man upon plaintiff.
The facts in the pleadings are that Franklin orders Orange and other officers to operate a general warrants scheme in violation of the 4th amendment and Tenn. const. Art 1, sect. 7, with exceptions for exigency enumerated in T.C.A.§ 40-7-103.
Franklin does so by city municipal code 6-109 that requires a single “is-a-warrant-required?” test Officer Orange must make when intent on making a misdemeanor arrest for cause.
State law requires two tests. An arrest for a misdemeanor offense without a warrant is permitted if (1) the alleged offense occurs in the officer’s presence and, (2) it is a “public offense” or a threatened breach of the peace. A public offense is an actual breach of the peace, is one visible to the naked eye. A breach of the peace is a riot, disorder, affray, threat or menace to the public (other people). Maliciously, the city calls the conflict between constitutional statute and illegal ordinance a “difference without a distinction” (doc. No. 40, p. 4, PageID # 259).
The city’s citations to 6th circuit cases are off point because they focus on one test only (in the officer’s presence), and neither examines issues raised here, that of the second test of “public offense” (doc. No. 27, pp, 4, 5, PageID ## 149, 150).
Defendant Orange is on the payroll to enforce ordinances and keep the peace. The facts about his acts are straightforward. He obeys the ordinance, and disobeys 40-7-103 and both state and federal constitutions’ prohibition of general warrants. The city frivolously claims innocence by pointing to a general statement in the ordinance that “all arrests *** shall be made in accordance with the Constitution of the State of Tennessee and the Constitution of the United States” (doc. No. 40, p. 4, PageID # 259). The complaint is sufficient as to the essential grounds of Orange’s actions, citing relevant law. Had he obeyed the law, he would have fulfilled duty not in ordinance. They are in conflict.
In defending this case, the city makes an implied threat upon public peace and safety in asking the court to reject plaintiff and to be allowed continuation of despotic policing customs in violating T.C.A. § 40-7-103 and the Tennessee bill of rights. Obeying the law would “dramatically disrupt” the status quo, “[hamper]” the “ability to respond to and investigate illegal activity,” causing officers “tremendous hardship” and “endangering civilians” (doc. No. 40, p. 6, PageID # 261). No better defense of general warrants could be made than these high-handed claims. Plaintiff asks the court to inform the municipality and its agent that constitutions and law harm no one, and are meant to protect property rights and God-given liberty and immunities in limits they place on police power. Constitutional limits also protect employees such as defendant Orange.
The city claims that plaintiff’s arrest was a one-off oddity, undeserving of future protection by injunction because there is no certainty of its being repeated (doc. No. 40, p. 5, PageID #260). The reaction to plaintiff’s arrest of city court judges from around the state belie this claim. Each city court judge in the conference auditorium Nov. 6, 2021, is a magistrate under T.C.A. § 40-5-102. He or she is able to hear a criminal complaint and sign an arrest warrant.
Obeying the law would “dramatically disrupt” the status quo, “[hamper]” the “ability to respond to and investigate illegal activity,” causing officers “tremendous hardship” and “endangering civilians” (doc. No. 40, p. 6, PageID # 261). No better defense of general warrants could be made than these high-handed claims.
But Orange does not approach a magistrate for a warrant. And no judge at a mass judicial function of magistrates insists sua sponte on due process in the false imprisonment and false arrest of a press member at the event, done in ubiquitous acceptance statewide of the general warrants scheme complained of in this lawsuit and its petition for injunction upon Franklin and all other parties in like station.
Dispositive facts for a summary judgment are not disputed. Orange imprisons plaintiff. Orange arrests plaintiff. He obeys city policy. The city is his principle, and he is its agent. (See complaint, doc. No. 1, ¶¶ 15-27). The dates of the city’s and Orange’s oppression are from Nov. 6, 2021, to Dec. 14, 2021, by the parties, the imprisonment ending the hour plaintiff returns home from his second trip by car to Franklin, Tenn., for the Williamson County general sessions court hearing.
Orange likely has intervening authorities between him and the city ordinance (manuals, directives, rules, policies, training). Plaintiff believes he has no need to discover these authorities, as lesser rules are implied in citation to the greater.
Orange obeys the city ordinance. The ordinance denies plaintiff rights to probable cause secured ahead of time and to arrest under a warrant. It amplifies and magnifies Orange’s police powers beyond the law, so that he acts in his person upon press member plaintiff. Orange is presumed to be trained pursuant to the ordinance, as he brings it to life in this case, to plaintiff’s injury.
City of Franklin and defendant Orange, without there being outlying controversial facts, are subject to a summary judgment as to the law that they violated plaintiff’s rights to be free from coercion of his constitutional, statutory and civil rights invoked under 42 U.S.C. 1983 and 1985.
Conclusion
The filings in this case show undisputed facts sufficient for the court to make a determination as a matter of law that defendants violate plaintiff’s protected and guaranteed rights by falsely imprisoning him and falsely arresting him starting Nov. 6, 2021.
He has right to attend the conference, and Orange, city of Franklin, Page, Crawford and Atrium have no right to organize themselves to drag him out of his conference chair apart from law.
Relief requested
This case is a clearcut false imprisonment and false arrest that violate plaintiff’s federally protected free speech and free press rights through 42 U.S.C. 1983 and 1985. The fact of his right to be at the conference is not disputed. The fact that he is imprisoned and arrested physically against his will is not disputed.
He demands a summary judgment against the five defendants.
Weisman book gives stringent analysis of false imprisonment, false arrest
