New Jersey Public Safety Employee Lawyer & Attorney : Pellettieri, Rabstein & Altman Law Firm : Workers Compensation, Discipline Representation for Police & Firefighters : New Jersey

On February 3, 2009, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit decided the case of LaPosta v. Borough of Roseland. In the case, plaintiff, Joseph LaPosta, a police officer, alleges Defendants, the Borough of Roseland and its Police Chief, retaliated against him after he attempted to join a police organization of which the Police Chief did not approve. Plaintiff’s claims were brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §1983 and state tort law. 

Plaintiff was employed as a police officer with the Borough of Roseland. After completing his police academy training, Plaintiff was forced to join the Fraternal Order of Police (“FOP”) union. When Plaintiff expressed an interest in joining an alternative union, the Policemen’s Benevolent Association (“PBA”), the Police Chief advised Plaintiff that neither he nor any other officers were to have any influence from the PBA. Nevertheless, Plaintiff joined the PBA. Thereafter, the Police Chief allegedly retaliated against Plaintiff, specifically by subjecting Plaintiff to smoke from cigarettes, cigars, and scented candles, charging him with insubordination, denying him an earned stipend, belittling him in front of other officers, filing frivolous internal affairs claims against him, and denying him the opportunity to attend career-advancing classes and seminars.

Plaintiff’s complaint asserted six claims: (1) violation of 42 U.S.C. §1983; (2) intentional infliction of emotional distress against the Police Chief; (3) hostile work environment; (4) negligence; (5) intentional interference with prospective economic advantage against the Police Chief; and (6) conspiracy. Both the Borough and Police Chief filed motions to dismiss the complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Thereafter, the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey entered an opinion and order granting the motions. This appeal followed.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit affirmed the District Court’s ruling in part, reversed in part, and remanded the case for further consideration. Specifically, the Third Circuit affirmed the dismissal of all but one of Plaintiff’s claims for failing to file a notice of claim under the New Jersey Tort Claims Act. However, the Third Circuit determined the District Court erred in dismissing Plaintiff’s §1983 claim. The Third Circuit held the retaliation claim was not barred by the statute of limitations and should be remanded to the District Court to be adequately analyzed as a claim based on freedom of association.

This case illustrates the importance of obtaining an experienced, qualified attorney prior to initiating an action similar to the one recounted above. There are many procedural hurdles one must follow, to include filing certain notices, to perfect the filing of such a claim. Consequently, it is imperative one obtains a qualified, experienced attorney to ensure their rights are protected. Moreover, this case shows that viable retaliation claims can be pursued against public employers. With the right set of facts, many courts are willing to explore such a claim and, potentially, hold the employer liable for infringing on one's right to join a certain collective bargaining unit.

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In Frohner v. City of Wildwood, the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey addressed a very unusual and interesting factual scenario. The lawsuit asserted numerous claims arising out of the arrest and handcuffing of plaintiff, an undercover FBI agent, by defendants, local police officers. Defendants suspected plaintiff was a motorcyclist impersonating an FBI agent.

Defendants moved for summary judgment on a variety of plaintiff’s claims. First, the Court denied defendants’ motions as to the false-arrest claims because defendants failed to show as a matter of law that they had probable cause or arguable probable cause to believe plaintiff was impersonating an FBI agent. Next, the Court denied defendants’ motion as to the claim that defendants’ conducted an unlawful search and seizure of plaintiff’s car. The Court indicated that it could not be concluded that the search was incident to a lawful arrest.

The Court also denied defendants’ motion as to plaintiff’s excessive-force and punitive damages claims. The Court held that such a claim will lie for the use of excessively tight handcuffs and that expert testimony is not required. With regard to plaintiff’s punitive damages claim, the Court noted that the issue as to whether any defendant was recklessly indifferent to plaintiff’s rights was a jury question. 

Although the vast majority of plaintiff’s claims were upheld, the Court did grant defendants summary judgment on one of the claims. The Court determined that since plaintiff has not shown a pattern of constitutional violations indicating defendants were deliberately indifferent to the likelihood that constitutional violations such as those alleged in this case would occur, defendants were entitled to summary judgment on that claim.

This case shows that arrests of undercover agents by local police departments, much like arrests of everyday citizens, can give rise to various claims being brought against the departments. Even with the unusual nature of the facts of this case, this case also illustrates that Courts are typically reluctant to dismiss certain claims as long as some evidence in support thereof has been offered.    

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In the matter of Paul Weber v. Borough of Glen Rock, A-1079-07T3, Plaintiff, Paul Weber, appealed from two trial court orders: (1) an order dated May 3, 2006 dismissing some of his claims; and (2) an order dated September 5, 2007 granting summary judgment to defendants on the balance of the claims. After reviewing the contentions raised on appeal, the Appellate Division affirmed the trial court’s determinations. 

Weber is a member of the Glen Rock Police Department. After joining the Department as a patrolman in 1978, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant in 1985. Since 1985, there have been four occasions when there was an opening within the Department for a member to be promoted to the rank of lieutenant. Weber applied for this promotion on each occasion and was unsuccessful. 

In 2004, the successful applicant was Garret Merselis, who was promoted from sergeant to lieutenant. In 2005, a vacancy developed for the position of captain. Thereafter, Merselis, the only lieutenant on the Glen Rock force at that time, was promoted to the rank of captain. The promotion of Merselis to captain created a vacancy for the position of lieutenant. Plaintiff applied, as did three other members of the Department. On this occasion, Frederick Stahman was selected for promotion to the rank of lieutenant.

Plaintiff, who had more seniority than did either Merselis or Stahman at the time of their respective promotions, filed suit contending that the promotional process was flawed. Specifically, he sought to reopen the process relating to the most recent promotional opening. In support, Weber contended: (1) the Borough was required to administer examinations to those applying for promotion and not rely exclusively on interviews; and (2) the Borough, in passing him over for promotion, did not comply with N.J.S.A. 40A:14-129. 

The Court rejected both of Weber’s assertions. The Borough is not a civil service municipality and followed its own two-step promotional process, a written test followed by interviews, until 1992 when, under the new police chief, only interviews were used to select a candidate for promotion to lieutenant. The Court found that where all members of the committee participated in the interviews of all the candidates, the process employed by Glen Rock does not suffer from the same deficiencies criticized in Rox v. Dep’t of Civil Service, 141 N.J. Super. 463, 467 (App. Div. 1976). In Rox, different panels interviewed the various candidates and used different criteria in making promotional decisions. This was not the situation in this case.

Moreover, the Court held that seniority, in and of itself, is not determinative of promotion. The Court indicated seniority is merely an additional factor to be considered on the merits of the evaluation of individuals for promotion and not a mechanical rule which guarantees promotion to a senior employee. In this case, it was established Weber’s seniority was considered. That is all he was entitled to; he was not entitled to have it treated as controlling.          

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In the case Reilly v. City of Atlantic City, 06-2591, the United States Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit held that a police officer’s testimony in a police corruption case is protected speech and his superiors are not entitled to qualified immunity regarding his retaliation claim. 

Appellee, Robert Reilly, a former Atlantic City police officer, filed suit against Robert Flipping, the Director of Public Safety, and Arthur Snellbaker, the Chief of Police, claiming that they retaliated against him for his participation, including trial testimony, in an investigation into police corruption a decade earlier. The alleged retaliation involved defendants formally recommending Reilly be demoted and suspended for 90 days, despite, after an extensive investigation, an independent hearing officer’s recommendation that Reilly serve a four day suspension for violating police department regulations.

Reilly accepted Flipping’s offer that he retire instead of being disciplined. Thereafter, Reilly filed this action alleging defendants’ actions violated his First Amendment free speech rights and Fourteenth Amendment right to procedural due process. The District Court denied defendants’ motion for summary judgment on the procedural due process claim, thereby declining to grant them qualified immunity. The Court also denied their motion for summary judgment on the First Amendment retaliation claim. This appeal followed.

The Third Circuit indicated that determining whether a public official is entitled to qualified immunity involves a two-step analysis. First, the court must decide whether a constitutional right would have been violated on the facts alleged and, if so, whether the right was clearly established. If the answer to the latter is “yes,” the defendant is not entitled to qualified immunity.

In analyzing whether Reilly had the claimed First Amendment right, the Third Circuit cited Garcetti v. Ceballos, 547 U.S. 410 (2006), which distinguished between employee speech and citizen speech and held that the First Amendment does not prohibit managerial discipline based on an employee’s expressions made pursuant to official responsibilities. Defendants argued under Garcetti they are entitled to qualified immunity on Reilly’s First Amendment claim because his testimony was made pursuant to his official duties and, thus, not protected by the First Amendment. 

In rejecting this argument, the Third Circuit noted: (1) every citizen owes the duty of giving testimony to aid in the enforcement of the law; (2) the overwhelming weight of authority concludes that an employee’s truthful testimony is protected by the First Amendment; and (3) there is a need to protect the integrity of the judicial process. Therefore, the Court concluded that the fact that Reilly’s official duties provided the impetus to appear in court is immaterial to his independent obligation as a citizen to testify truthfully. Reilly’s testimony constituted citizen speech and his claim is not foreclosed by the “official duties” doctrine announced in Garcetti and, as a result, defendants are not entitled to qualified immunity. 

This case has significance for any public safety officer who is called to testimony in a matter related to his official duties. Public safety officers, as with other citizens, have an obligation to testify truthfully in a court proceeding not only to preserve the integrity of the judicial process, but to ensure just enforcement the law. More importantly, however, this case illustrates that an officer’s superiors who retaliate against him/her will not be entitled to qualified immunity in a subsequent civil suit.      

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 After much concern regarding the new Treasury Regulations promulgated by the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”) and their potential impact on members of government pension plans, the IRS and the Treasury intend to extend the date by which a governmental plan must comply with final regulations on distributions from a pension plan upon attainment of normal retirement age. Under the extension, the new Treasury Regulations will be effective for a governmental plan for plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2011.     

As described in two previous blog entries, the IRS modified Treasury Regulation §1.401(a)-1 to provide an exception to the rule that pension benefits be paid only after retirement by permitting a pension plan to commence payment of retirement benefits to a participant after the participant has attained normal retirement age even if the participant has not yet had a severance from employment with the employer maintaining the plan. 

The new regulations also require a pension plan’s normal retirement age to be an age that is not earlier than the earliest age that is reasonably representative of the typical retirement age for the industry in which the covered workforce is employed.  In the case of a retirement plan where substantially all of the participants are qualified public safety officers, a normal retirement age of age 50 or later is deemed not be earlier than the earliest age that is reasonably representative of the typical retirement age for the industry in which the covered workforce is employed. 

Notice 2007-69, which provided temporary relief for certain plans that may have to change their definitions of normal retirement age to satisfy the new regulations, indicated that the new regulations do not contain a safe harbor or other guidance with respect to a normal retirement age conditioned on the completion of a stated number of years of service.  The notice requested comments on whether and how a pension plan with a normal retirement age conditioned on the completion of a stated number of years of service satisfies the requirement in §1.401(a)-1 that a pension plan be maintained primarily to provide for the payment of definitely determinable benefits after retirement or attainment of normal retirement age and how such a plan satisfies the pre-ERISA vesting rules. 

Based upon this, in Notice 2008-98, the IRS indicated its intention to amend the new regulations to change the effective date for governmental plan to plan years beginning on or after January 1, 2011.  Moreover, the notice provided that government plan sponsors may rely on this notice with respect to extension until such time as the new regulations are so amended. 

Although the implementation of the new regulations has been delayed, it is critical to keep apprised of the comments regarding whether a pension plan with a normal retirement age conditioned on the completion of a stated number of years of service satisfies the new regulations. Clearly, the resolution of this issue could drastically impact many public safety officers not only in New Jersey, but across the country. Periodic updates to this website regarding these regulations will be posted as more information becomes available.    

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