The opinion
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA
CHERIE A. BADEAUX CIVIL ACTION
v. NO. 20-3197
ST. CHARLES PARISH SHERIFF’S SECTION “F”
OFFICE, ET AL.
ORDER AND REASONS
Before the Court is the defendants’ Rule 12(b)(6) motion to
dismiss. For the reasons that follow, the motion is GRANTED.
Background
On Sunday, November 24, 2019 around 8:30 AM, the plaintiff
Cherie Badeaux “rest[ed] peacefully” in her bed in her house. See
Compl., ¶ 10. A short time later, Badeaux was awakened by the
presence of St. Charles Parish Sheriff’s Deputy Jeffrey Mahan in
her bedroom doorway. Id. Badeaux “opened her eyes, sat up, took
a closer look, and [Mahan] questioned her on the whereabouts of
[her visiting brother] Beau Badeaux.” Id. ¶¶ 10–11. “Filled with
fear, embarrassment, [and] emotional and mental distress,” Badeaux
“immediately followed defendant Mahan to her back porch,” where
“Beau Badeaux had his arms raised up as defendant Mahan began to
tell him he was under arrest.” Id. ¶ 11. “Seconds later,” Badeaux
“witness another St. Charles Parish Deputy, defendant Frank
Fricano, enter the back door of her home without consent.
Defendant Fricano approached [Beau Badeaux] and assisted defendant
Mahan with the arrest.” Id.
As Mahan and Fricano took her brother away, Badeaux
“immediately spoke with her visiting sister-in-law, Ann Badeaux,”
who “advised that as she slept, she heard repeated loud and
uninterrupted banging at the front door.” Id. ¶¶ 12–13. “In
response, Ann Badeaux not knowing who was at the door asked, ‘who
is it.’ Defendant Mahan yelled ‘we know Beau Badeaux is in there
and if you do not open the door you will be arrested and imprisoned
for impeding this investigation.’” Id. ¶ 14. “Terrified, Ann
Badeaux opened the door. However, after opening the door defendant
Mahan did not ask for permission to enter the residence, [but
rather] forced his way into the residence.” Id. ¶ 15. “At no
point during this encounter did defendant Badeaux [ask] Ann Badeaux
for consent to enter the residence. In fact, defendant Mahan never
ascertained whether or not Ann Badeaux had the authority to give
permission to enter the residence.” Id. ¶ 16.
Despite never obtaining consent to enter Badeaux’s residence,
defendants Mahan and Fricano went ahead and entered anyway. Their
reason for doing so? Their possession of a warrant for Beau
Badeaux’s arrest, who they reasonably believed to share an address
with the plaintiff. See id. ¶ 18; see also Opp’n, Exs. A-1, A-2
(attachments and bench warrant for Beau Badeaux’s arrest).1
Because the Fourth Amendment does not preclude officers in Mahan
and Fricano’s position from acting in precisely such a fashion,
Badeaux’s complaint does not state a claim upon which relief can
be granted.
I.
Rule 12(b)(6) allows a party to move for dismissal of a
complaint that fails to state a claim upon which relief can be
granted. “To survive a motion to dismiss” under Rule 12(b)(6), “a
complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as
true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’”
Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl.
Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). To demonstrate a
facially plausible basis for relief, a plaintiff must plead facts
which allow “the court to draw the reasonable inference that the
defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. In
determining whether a plaintiff has met this burden, a court must
“accept all well-pleaded facts as true and view all facts in the
light most favorable to the plaintiff,” but must not accord an
assumption of truth to conclusory allegations and threadbare
1 Because they are integral to the plaintiff’s complaint and
incorporated by reference, these documents are appropriately
reviewable at the motion-to-dismiss stage. See, e.g., Causey v.
Sewell Cadillac-Chevrolet, Inc., 394 F.3d 285, 288 (5th Cir. 2004).
assertions. Thompson v. City of Waco, 764 F.3d 500, 502 (5th Cir.
2014).
The foregoing presumptions are not to be applied mindlessly,
however. Thus, in considering a motion to dismiss, the Court may
review any documents attached to or incorporated into the
plaintiff’s complaint by reference. Causey v. Sewell Cadillac-
Chevrolet, Inc., 394 F.3d 285, 288 (5th Cir. 2004). In addition,
the Court may judicially notice matters of public record and other
facts not subject to reasonable dispute. See United States ex
rel. Willard v. Humana Health Plan of Tex. Inc., 336 F.3d 375, 379
(5th Cir. 2003).
II.
With this standard in view, the Court proceeds to evaluate
whether Badeaux’s complaint states a plausible claim for relief.
A. Badeaux’s Constitutional Claims
The fulcrum of Badeaux’s case is a claim that Mahan and
Fricano’s failure to obtain consent or a search warrant before
entering her home violated her Fourth Amendment right to be free
of unreasonable searches and seizures. Contrary to the defendants’
mistaken assertions otherwise,2 this central allegation could
2 While counsel’s duty of zealous advocacy is strong, its
companion duty of faithfulness to the tribunal is equally
important. Here, defense counsel either failed to observe its
latter duty or missed the mark significantly. Whatever the reason
for counsel’s mishap, by citing the Fifth Circuit’s blanket
statement in United States v. Cravero but neglecting to mention a
clearly be read to state a baseline constitutional violation. In
Steagald v. United States, the Supreme Court held that in the
absence of consent or exigent circumstances, officers cannot
search for the subject of an arrest warrant in a third party’s
home without first obtaining a search warrant. See 451 U.S. 204,
211–16 (1981). The core rationale for the Court’s holding was
simple: because as between the Government and the petitioner whose
home was searched without consent or a search warrant, the
Government’s search “was no more reasonable . . . than it would
have been if conducted in the absence of any warrant.” Id. at 216
(emphasis added). As the Court reasoned,
whether the arrest warrant [at issue] adequately
safeguarded the interests protected by the Fourth
Amendment depends upon what the warrant authorized the
agents to do. To be sure, the warrant embodied a
judicial finding that there was probable cause to
believe [that the subject of the arrest warrant] had
committed a felony, and the warrant therefore authorized
the officers to seize [the subject]. However, the agents
sought to do more than use the warrant to arrest [the
subject] in a public place or in his home; instead, they
relied on the warrant as legal authority to enter the
home of a third person based on their belief that [the
subject] might be a guest there. Regardless of how
reasonable this belief might have been, it was never
subjected to the detached scrutiny of a judicial
Supreme Court decision that both referenced Cravero by name and
reversed a Fifth Circuit case relying on Cravero’s rule and
reasoning, counsel ran a grave risk of misleading the Court. A
cursory glance at Cravero’s citing references – which is plainly
necessary for a case decided 45 years ago – would have revealed
both the Supreme Court’s decision in Steagald and subsequent Fifth
Circuit decisions referencing it. (Plaintiff’s counsel - whose
opposition was three days late - also failed to find the Steagald
case.)
officer. Thus, while the [arrest] warrant [at issue]
may have protected [the subject] from an unreasonable
seizure, it did absolutely nothing to protect
petitioner’s privacy interest in being free from an
unreasonable invasion and search of his home. . . .
A contrary conclusion – that the police, acting
alone and in the absence of exigent circumstances, may
decide when there is sufficient justification for
searching the home of a third party for the subject of
an arrest warrant – would create a significant potential
for abuse.
Id. at 214–15 (footnote omitted) (citations omitted). Therefore,
as framed by Badeaux, the allegations in Badeaux’s complaint supply
a plausible basis for finding a threshold constitutional
violation.
As is often true, however, there is more to this case than
meets the eye on review of Badeaux’s complaint alone. Indeed, as
the exhibits to the defendants’ motion indicate, Badeaux’s central
assertion – namely, that Mahan and Fricano entered her residence,
in which Beau Badeaux was merely a visitor – is belied by
judicially noticeable facts that must be considered in the
interests of fairness and judicial economy. See, e.g., Martinez
v. Greater New Orleans Expressway Comm’n, 2021 WL 1023054, at *1
n.1 (E.D. La. Mar. 17, 2021) (considering police report that was
extraneous to plaintiff’s complaint because, “while courts must
ordinarily hew to a plaintiff’s version of events in considering
a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss . . . a court need not turn a
blind eye to harmful facts” in documents referenced by the
plaintiff).
Here, Badeaux states in her complaint that when she “attempted
to get clarification from defendant Mahan about his actions,” Mahan
“advised [her] that Beau Badeaux had a warrant for his arrest.”
See Compl., ¶ 18. That allegation incorporates the warrant by
reference, so insofar as either party is able to produce the
warrant, the Court ought to consider its actual terms in assessing
Badeaux’s ability to state a plausible claim for relief. See,
e.g., Martinez, 2021 WL 1023054, at *1 n.1. The defendants have
done just that here, attaching the warrant as Exhibit A-2 to their
present motion.
Exhibit A-2’s terms are clear. Styled as a “BENCH WARRANT,”
the document commands the Sheriff of St. Charles Parish to seize
“the body” of one
BEAU BADEAUX
17944 RIVER RD
MONTZ, LA 70068.
Any officer in receipt of such a document would have
objectively good reason to believe that the subject of the arrest
warrant, Beau Badeaux, resided at 17944 River Road, Montz, LA
70068. And that address is where the allegedly unconstitutional
entry at issue – as well as the arrest of Beau Badeaux – occurred
in this case.3
That fact transforms this case from one about a warrantless
and unconsented entry of a third party’s residence into one about
the objectively reasonable entry of the apparent residence of the
subject of a valid arrest warrant. As one might imagine, the legal
consequences of that transformation are significant. Indeed, the
Supreme Court has held that “for Fourth Amendment purposes, an
arrest warrant founded on probable cause implicitly carries with
it the limited authority to enter a dwelling in which the suspect
lives when there is reason to believe the suspect is within.” See
Payton v. New York, 445 U.S. 573, 603 (1980).
The arrest warrant attached as Exhibit A-2 to the defendants’
motion speaks for itself. By that document’s plain terms, 17944
3 Badeaux’s complaint makes no mention of this address, so the
pleadings alone do not establish that 17944 River Road was the
site of the events at issue. However, here as well, judicially
noticeable facts beyond the pleadings confirm that this was indeed
the plaintiff Cherie Badeaux’s address (which, according to the
complaint, was the site of the allegedly unconstitutional actions
at issue). As stated above, the Court may judicially notice
matters of public record and other facts not subject to reasonable
dispute. See United States ex rel. Willard v. Humana Health Plan
of Tex. Inc., 336 F.3d 375, 379 (5th Cir. 2003). The April 25 and
26, 2010 police reports published by Houma Today fit this billing.
See POLICE REPORT: APRIL 25 – APRIL 26, 2010,
https://www.houmatoday.com/news/20100427/police-report-april-25-
--april-26-2010. That document, discovered in a simple Google
search, references the April 25, 2010 arrest of one “Cherie
Antionette Badeaux, 20, 17944 River Road, Montz” for “careless
operation, underage DWI.”
River Road was as much Beau Badeaux’s address as it was the
plaintiff’s, and Mahan and Fricano’s decision to enter that
dwelling in execution of a valid arrest warrant accordingly passed
Fourth Amendment muster and met the Fifth Circuit’s “reason to
believe” standard. See, e.g., United States v. Barrera, 464 F.3d
496, 504–05 (5th Cir. 2006).
B. Badeaux’s Remaining Claims
From the unavailing starting point discussed above, Badeaux
tacks on general negligence claims and a § 1983 standard litany of
pattern-of-misconduct allegations. In Badeaux’s case, however, all
such allegations are textbook examples of conclusory assertions
that cannot get a complaint past a well-crafted motion to dismiss
like the one before the Court. Consequently, Badeaux’s conclusory
assertions of negligence, patterns of misconduct, and deliberate
indifference do not supply plausible bases for relief.4
* * *
Moreover, although 42 U.S.C. § 1983 provides a cause of action
to parties subjected to a “deprivation of any rights, privileges,
or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws” of the United
States. Here, the plaintiff alleges no such deprivation.
4 This is to say nothing of the individual defendants’ qualified
immunity, or the fact that the Sheriff’s Office is not a suable
legal entity. The Court does not reach either such issue because
it need not do so in resolving the defendants’ motion.
Accordingly, IT IS ORDERED: that the defendants’ motion to
dismiss is GRANTED. The plaintiff’s claims are DISMISSED WITH
PREJUDICE. ® The defendants’ alternative motion for summary
judgment is DISMISSED AS MOOT.
New Orleans, Louisiana, May 12, 2021
MARTIN . C. ELDMAN
UNITED STATHS DISTRICT JUDGE
° Dismissal with prejudice is appropriate because Badeaux is
represented by counsel, because she did not request leave to amend
in the alternative to dismissal, and because “it is clear that the
defects [in her complaint] are incurable.” See Great Plains Tr.
Co. v. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co., 313 F.3d 305, 349 (5th
Cir. 2002).
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