Deputies and (Tangentially) Doughnuts

Price-Cornelison v. Brooks, No. 05-6140 is a factually and legally fascinating equal protection case. The plaintiff obtained an emergency protective order against her lesbian partner.  This order required the partner to leave the Plaintiff’s farm on or before the following day.  Upon receiving the order, the partner, family, and friends began removing property belonging to the Plaintiff from the farm.  Learning about this situation from her farmhands while at work out of the state, the Plaintiff called the defendant deputy sheriff.  The deputy told the Plaintiff, among other things, that were she to return to the farm and try to stop the removal of the property, she would be arrested.  Plaintiff then called a lawyer.  The lawyer, (allegedly) called the sheriff’s office and told the deputy to get “off his doughnut eating ass and do something” to prevent the theft. 

Plaintiff subsequently obtained a permanent order of protection.  After Plaintiff obtained this order, her partner (who had previously threatened to kill the Plaintiff) attempted to reenter the farm.  The Plaintiff again called the sheriff’s office.  This time she was told that the sheriff’s office was “too busy” to send someone to respond. The deputy later told her that her situation “was all over the courthouse in town . . . and that everybody was laughing, it was a big joke” and that her attorney had upset the sheriff’s office and “she needed to get someone local to represent her if she was going to have . . . anything go on here in town at the courthouse.”

Plaintiff asserted two constitutional claims:  She alleged that the failure to enforce the two protective orders violated the equal protection clause because the Plaintiff was a lesbian victim of domestic violence and was treated differently than other domestic violence victims.  She also alleged that in assisting the partner to unlawfully seize her property, the deputy had violated the Fourth Amendment.  The court held that the Plaintiff was able to overcome qualified immunity on all counts except for the enforcement of the emergency protective order. The court held that Plaintiff was able to show that the deputy had handled the permanent protective orders of non-lesbians differently, but could not make such a showing with regard to the emergency protective order.  The court also held that the threat to arrest the plaintiff were she to return to her home enabled the partner to unlawfully seize the plaintiff’s property.  The court noted its prior precedent that while officers can defuse confrontations regarding possession of property, they cannot adjudicate them in a “curbside courtroom” by deciding who is entitled to possession.