Greisen v. Hanken

Plaintiff, the former police chief, filed suit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging that defendant, the former city manager, violated the First Amendment by subjecting plaintiff to adverse employment actions in retaliation for his protected speech. Plaintiff was suspicious of the city's accounting and budgeting practices and voiced his concerns to various city council members and others.The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court's judgment following a jury verdict in favor of plaintiff. The panel held that plaintiff provided sufficient detail about his speech to establish that it substantially involved a matter of public concern; plaintiff spoke as a private citizen rather than a public employee; the district court properly concluded that plaintiff's retaliation claim could be based in part on defendant's own speech acts, in the form of defamatory communications to the media; defendant waived his argument that his actions were supported by an adequate justification; and sufficient evidence supported the conclusion that defendant's retaliatory actions proximately caused plaintiff's termination, and any error in instructing the jury on proximate cause was harmless. Finally, the panel held that defendant was not entitled to qualified immunity. View "Greisen v. Hanken" on Justia Law