Patricia Spurlin v. Floyd County, Georgia

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NOT FOR PUBLICATION

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 25-11242

Non-Argument Calendar

____________________

PATRICIA SPURLIN,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

FLOYD COUNTY, GEORGIA,

AKYN BECK,

in her individual capacity,

COUNTY MANAGER, FLOYD COUNTY GEORGIA,

Defendants-Appellees.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Northern District of Georgia

D.C. Docket No. 4:24-cv-00072-WMR

____________________

Before ROSENBAUM, BRANCH, and ABUDU, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:

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2 Opinion of the Court 25-11242

Patricia Spurlin brought this lawsuit, alleging that Akyn

Beck terminated Spurlin from her job at the Floyd County

Elections Office in retaliation for an anonymous complaint about a

coworker who was related to Beck. Spurlin had not sent the

complaint, but about a week after Beck learned of the complaint,

she ended Spurlin’s employment. Spurlin’s resulting lawsuit

against Beck, county manager Jamie McCord, and Floyd County

alleged unlawful retaliation under the First Amendment and the

Georgia Whistleblower Act. The district court dismissed Spurlin’s

First Amendment claims, finding that Beck should receive qualified

immunity and that Spurlin failed to adequately allege a claim

against McCord in his official capacity. On both counts, the district

court determined that Spurlin had not shown a clearly established

constitutional violation because she had not alleged any actual

words or actions on her part that led to her termination. The court

then dismissed the Georgia law claim without prejudice.

After careful review, we vacate the dismissal of Spurlin’s

complaint and remand for further proceedings.

I. Background 1

According to the complaint, Patricia Spurlin began working

as an Election Clerk for the Floyd County Board of Elections and

Registration in May 2020. Although she was a temporary worker

1 At the motion to dismiss stage, we “accept[] the complaint’s factual

allegations as true and constru[e] them in the light most favorable to the

plaintiff[].” Otto Candies, LLC v. Citigroup Inc., 137 F.4th 1158, 1177 (11th Cir.

2025).

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placed in that position by Express Employment Services, Spurlin

worked full time for the Board of Elections for almost three years,

during which time the Board of Elections was completely

responsible for her supervision. Express Employment issued

Spurlin’s paychecks, but the Board of Elections handled everything

else: it “supervised and oversaw all of her work product; controlled

the means and manner of her work; provided her worksite,

materials, equipment, and supplies”; signed off on her timecards;

and ultimately made the decision to terminate her employment.

Akyn Beck became the Elections Supervisor for the Board of

Elections in September 2022. As such, she supervised Spurlin’s

work and reviewed and signed off on her timecards. Beck seemed

happy with Spurlin’s work; in fact, shortly after Beck entered the

role, she proposed that Spurlin consider a permanent position with

the Board of Elections and promised Spurlin “she would work on

it.”

A couple of months later, Beck—through Express

Employment—hired her fiancé’s brother, Isaiah Beck, as an

equipment technician. 2 Spurlin soon noticed that Isaiah didn’t

seem to keep to the normal office hours of 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. He

would “routinely” come in late and leave early, and some days he

did not show up at all. Spurlin and her other coworkers would

often have to “go to the front window” of the office “to address

visitors and citizens” because Isaiah was not at his post there. And

2 At the time of these events, it appears that Beck was unmarried and went by

her maiden name Akyn Bailey.

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once, he used several hours to get a new tattoo “while billing the

County for his time.”

As far as Spurlin could tell, Beck was aware of Isaiah’s

behavior. On some occasions, “Isaiah and Beck [left] the office at

the same time” and then “return[ed] to the office at the same time

hours later—and sometimes, neither one returned to the office at

all.”

Despite Isaiah’s frequent tardiness and absenteeism, he

continued to report full 45-hour weeks on his Express Employment

timecards, which Beck approved. Spurlin was in a position to

know, because both Beck and Beck’s predecessor often asked

Spurlin to deliver all the approved timecards to Express

Employment. But Spurlin’s coworkers were also aware of the

situation, and “they were all concerned that [Isaiah] was

fraudulently claiming—and getting paid by the County for—hours

that he did not work.”

Sometime around March 14, 2023, another county

employee warned Spurlin to “watch [her] back[] because Beck was

livid about an anonymous complaint sent to the County.” Spurlin

had not sent the complaint, although she was aware that someone

was considering making an anonymous complaint about Isaiah to

the county’s human resources director. But on March 17, Beck

called Spurlin to a meeting with Beck and the assistant to the

county manager. Beck told Spurlin “she had been doing a great job

and appreciated all her hard work but . . . they did not need her

anymore and they were letting her go.”

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Spurlin called the owner of Express Employment that same

day, who was “shocked that she was fired.” A short time later, after

speaking to the county’s human resources director, the Express

Employment owner asked Spurlin “if she wrote the anonymous

complaint and told her that Beck was livid about it.” He also let

Spurlin know that the anonymous complaint had been handed up

the chain to the county manager, Jamie McCord.

Spurlin sued Beck in her individual capacity, McCord in his

official capacity, and Floyd County, Georgia, bringing three claims:

(1) First Amendment retaliation pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 as to

Beck, (2) First Amendment retaliation pursuant to § 1983 as to

McCord, and (3) retaliation under the Georgia Whistleblower Act

as to Floyd County. Defendants moved to dismiss the complaint

for failure to state a claim, and the district court granted their

motion.

On the First Amendment claim against Beck, the district

court concluded that qualified immunity was appropriate because

Spurlin had not alleged a clearly established constitutional

violation. The court determined existing law clearly established

that an employer’s retaliation based on a mistaken belief her

employee had engaged in protected activity was a constitutional

violation only when the employee had engaged in some affirmative

conduct leading to the mistake. Since Spurlin had not said or done

anything to give rise to Beck’s alleged mistake, the court concluded

she did not have a clearly established right against retaliation.

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The court similarly concluded that because Spurlin had not

demonstrated a violation of a “clearly established constitutional

right,” the First Amendment claim against McCord failed. The

court then dismissed the remaining state law claim without

prejudice because there was no remaining basis for federal subject

matter jurisdiction. Spurlin timely appealed.

II. Standard of Review

“We review a dismissal for failure to state a claim de novo,

accepting the complaint’s factual allegations as true and construing

them in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs.” Otto Candies,

LLC v. Citigroup Inc., 137 F.4th 1158, 1177 (11th Cir. 2025). “To

prevent dismissal under [Federal Rule of Civil Procedure] 12(b)(6),

the plaintiff must allege sufficient facts to state a claim for relief that

is ‘plausible on its face.’” Moore v. Cecil, 109 F.4th 1352, 1365 (11th

Cir. 2024) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570

(2007)).

III. Discussion

Spurlin challenges each of the district court’s conclusions.

First, she argues that her allegations against Beck, if true, would

constitute a clearly established First Amendment violation, so

qualified immunity is not appropriate. Second, Spurlin argues that

because she alleged a constitutional violation along with the other

elements needed prove a claim against a county official in his

official capacity, the district court erred in dismissing her claim

against McCord.

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Defendants respond that the court was correct to dismiss

Spurlin’s claim against Beck because any possible constitutional

violation was not clearly established. They further contend that

Beck’s alleged actions did not, in any event, violate the First

Amendment. As to McCord, Defendants argue that Spurlin’s claim

fails because there was no constitutional violation and because

Spurlin’s other allegations would fail to plausibly make McCord

liable in his official capacity.

The threshold question in both claims is whether a

government official violates the First Amendment when she

retaliates against an employee based on a mistaken belief that the

employee engaged in protected speech, even when the employee

took no affirmative action to cause the mistaken belief. We

conclude the answer is yes, and that principle has been clearly

established. We thus refrain from reaching the remaining

questions and instead remand for the district court to consider

them in the first instance.

A. The retaliation claim against Beck

Spurlin argues that Beck is not entitled to qualified

immunity because it is clearly established that a government

employer may not retaliate against an employee for protected

speech. Spurlin contends that although she did not in fact engage

in protected speech here, it is enough that Beck believed she had

and that belief motivated Beck’s decision to terminate her. Spurlin

further argues that the speech Beck believed Spurlin engaged in

was protected speech under the Pickering framework, which allows

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the government leeway to regulate employee speech in some

instances. See Pickering v. Bd. of Educ., 391 U.S. 563, 568 (1968). Beck

responds that there was no clearly established law sufficiently

particularized to the facts of this case to put Beck on notice that her

alleged actions violated the First Amendment. We agree with

Spurlin that she can bring a First Amendment retaliation claim

even if she did not actually send the anonymous complaint that

allegedly led to her termination and took no action that caused

Beck to think she did. We remand for consideration of whether

that complaint was protected speech.

“Qualified immunity shields public officials from liability for

civil damages when their conduct does not violate a constitutional

right that was clearly established at the time of the challenged

action.” Jarrard v. Sheriff of Polk Cnty., 115 F.4th 1306, 1323 (11th

Cir. 2024) (quotation omitted). If a government official was acting

in the scope of her discretionary authority when the alleged

conduct occurred, the plaintiff must show “(1) that the official

violated a statutory or constitutional right, and (2) that the right

was clearly established at the time of the challenged conduct.” Id.

(quotation omitted). A plaintiff may prove that a law was “clearly

established” by (1) offering a “materially similar case [that] has

already been decided,” (2) “point[ing] to a broader, clearly

established principle that should control the novel facts of the

situation,” or (3) demonstrating that “the conduct involved in the

case . . . so obviously violate[s] the constitution that prior case law

is unnecessary.” Gaines v. Wardynski, 871 F.3d 1203, 1209 (11th Cir.

2017) (quotation omitted).

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The parties do not dispute that Beck acted within her

discretionary authority when she fired Spurlin. They disagree,

however, whether Beck’s alleged conduct clearly constituted

unlawful retaliation under the First Amendment.

A First Amendment retaliation claim requires a plaintiff to

show that “(1) her speech was constitutionally protected; (2) she

suffered adverse conduct that would likely deter a person of

ordinary firmness from engaging in such speech; and (3) there was

a causal relationship between the adverse conduct and the

protected speech.” Brannon v. Finkelstein, 754 F.3d 1269, 1274 (11th

Cir. 2014).

In the past, courts disputed whether a plaintiff could bring a

claim based on her “perceived” rather than “actual” exercise of

constitutional rights. Heffernan v. City of Paterson, 578 U.S. 266, 270

(2016) (emphasis in original) (quotation omitted). But in Heffernan

v. City of Paterson, the Supreme Court resolved that question,

concluding that

[w]hen an employer demotes an employee out of a

desire to prevent the employee from engaging in

political activity that the First Amendment protects,

the employee is entitled to challenge that unlawful

action under the First Amendment and 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983—even if . . . the employer makes a factual

mistake about the employee’s behavior.

Id. at 273.

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In Heffernan, the Supreme Court considered a police officer’s

claim that he had been demoted for engaging in protected political

activity. Id. at 268. During a mayoral election season, members of

the police force saw Heffernan picking up a campaign sign and

interacting with campaign staff for a candidate whom his

supervisors opposed. Id. at 269. Unbeknownst to the supervisors,

Heffernan was not actually involved in the campaign and had been

picking up the sign at his mother’s request. Id. But based on the

supervisors’ mistaken belief that Heffernan was “overt[ly]

involve[d]” in the campaign, they demoted him from detective to

a “walking post.” Id. Heffernan sued them, claiming his

supervisors “demoted him because he had engaged in conduct that

(on their mistaken view of the facts) constituted protected speech.”

Id.

The Supreme Court determined that “the government’s

reason for demoting Heffernan is what counts.” Id. at 273. The

First Amendment prohibits any law “abridging the freedom of

speech,” id. (quoting U.S. Const. amend. I), and retaliatory action

such as this would “discourag[e] employees—both the employee

discharged . . . and his or her colleagues—from engaging in

protected activities,” id. Consequently, “a discharge or demotion

based upon an employer’s belief that the employee has engaged in

protected activity can cause the same kind, and degree, of

constitutional harm whether that belief does or does not rest upon

a factual mistake.” Id. at 274.

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Heffernan controls our decision here. In 2016, before the

events Spurlin recounts, the Supreme Court clearly established that

an employee can bring a First Amendment retaliation claim even if

the employer was mistaken about whether the employee actually

engaged in protected activity: the employer’s motive is what

matters. Thus, Beck’s alleged decision to fire Spurlin because of

Spurlin’s perceived speech violates the First Amendment (if that

speech is protected speech)—even if Beck was mistaken and

Spurlin never spoke at all.

Beck argues that there are factors distinguishing this case

from Heffernan such that Heffernan does not control this set of facts

or, at a minimum, does not clearly establish that Beck’s alleged

actions violated the Constitution. Beck contends that “the law

announced in Heffernan is not sufficiently particularized to the facts

of this case to clearly establish the law.”

First, Beck highlights that “the employee in Heffernan

actually engaged in conduct which was misperceived as protected

activity, whereas Spurlin engaged in no protected conduct

whatsoever.” This was the argument the district court relied on,

reasoning that “it appears [from Heffernan] that the employee must

actually do something that the employer misperceives as a

protected activity.” The court relied on the following statement

from Heffernan: “In a case like this one, the employee . . . will have

to point to more than his own conduct to show an employer’s intent

to discharge or to demote him for engaging in what the employer

(mistakenly) believes to have been different (and protected)

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activities.” 3 Heffernan, 578 U.S. at 274 (emphasis added by the

district court). On the district court’s reading, the Heffernan Court

“held that it was the employer’s motive that mattered, but the

motive in that case was based on the employer’s misperception of

the employee’s actual conduct, thereby implicating the employee’s

own First Amendment rights.” So, the district court concluded,

because Spurlin “made no statements at all,” Heffernan’s “factual

scenario is not present in this case.”

To the contrary, the Heffernan Court’s holding did not turn

on whether the employee had engaged in actual conduct but on

“improper employer motive.” Id. The language the district court

relies on did not limit or qualify Heffernan’s holding. Instead, it

comes from the Court’s explanation that employees might

sometimes find it more difficult to prove unlawful retaliation in

cases involving an employer’s mistake. See id. In a normal case, a

plaintiff can rely on evidence of her own actions to show protected

First Amendment activities, but in a case involving mistake, she

will have to offer “more than [her] own conduct” to prove

improper motive. Id.

Neither Beck nor the district court has identified a single

court that has understood Heffernan the way they propose. A

survey of the various federal appellate court decisions discussing

3 The district court’s opinion purports to continue the Heffernan quote as

follows: “. . . based on an employer’s misperception of the employee’s conduct.”

Heffernan, however, does not contain this language, nor did it originate in the

parties’ briefing below.

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and applying Heffernan demonstrates that there is no confusion:

Heffernan applies to facts like these. Two of our sister circuits have

squarely addressed cases with parallel facts and have

unquestioningly applied Heffernan. 4 And other courts have cited

Heffernan’s rule in passing without raising any similar caveats. See,

e.g., Molina v. City of St. Louis, 59 F.4th 334, 342–43 (8th Cir. 2023)

(recognizing the Heffernan rule but noting it could not defeat

qualified immunity because it was decided after the challenged

conduct took place); Stilwell v. City of Williams, 831 F.3d 1234, 1240

(9th Cir. 2016) (describing Heffernan as “holding that whether the

protected speech was actually engaged in by the employee is not

determinative because it is the perception of the employer as to

4 The Sixth Circuit considered a qualified immunity case where a plaintiff

alleged he had faced negative employment outcomes because his supervisors

believed he had leaked certain information to the media, although he was not

actually the leaker. DeCrane v. Eckart, 12 F.4th 586, 591–92 (6th Cir. 2021). The

court recognized that the Supreme Court had answered “yes” to the question

of whether “public employees have a right not to be disciplined for perceived

speech that they do not engage in.” Id. at 594 (emphasis in original). Similarly,

in Bird v. West Valley City, the Tenth Circuit asserted, “Heffernan clearly

governs Plaintiff’s First Amendment retaliation claim, for Plaintiff was a public

employee who claims her municipal employer discharged her based on its

belief that she engaged in constitutionally protected activity.” 832 F.3d 1188,

1212 (10th Cir. 2016). The court noted that the plaintiff’s superiors “actually

believed [she] leaked statements to the press,” so “as long as [they] fired [her]

based on this belief, then [her] denial that she was the source of these leaks is

not fatal to her claim.” Id.

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whether that protected activity occurred that matters to a First

Amendment retaliation claim”).5

Second, Beck argues that “Heffernan was decided in the

context of the First Amendment’s protection of the right to political

affiliation,” while this case deals with protected speech. Again,

though, the Court’s decision was clearly not cabined to the political

association context. While political campaigning was the

potentially protected activity at issue in Heffernan, Heffernan

brought a “free-speech retaliation claim,” Heffernan, 578 U.S. at 270

(quotation omitted), and the Court’s discussion centered on cases

dealing with “protected speech,” id. at 271–72. 6 In reaching its

ultimate conclusion, the Court invoked the “freedom of speech.”

Heffernan, 578 U.S. at 273. 7

5 The district court cites a string of cases for the proposition that “a plaintiff

cannot maintain a First Amendment retaliation claim based on misperception

if the plaintiff did not make the misperceived speech at issue.” But, as the

district court notes, all were decided before Heffernan.

6 Beck’s suggestion that the Heffernan Court disclaimed application of its rule

to public-employee speech cases is misguided. The Heffernan Court “set aside”

Pickering and its progeny in its analysis only in that it determined they did not

directly speak to the factual mistake issue. See Heffernan, 578 U.S. at 271.

7 The Supreme Court’s discussion of speech and political association together

tracks the Court’s fundamental understanding of the “freedom of [expressive]

association . . . as an indispensable means of preserving other individual

liberties,” namely, “those activities protected by the First Amendment,”

including “speech.” Roberts v. U.S. Jaycees, 468 U.S. 609, 618 (1984); see

O’Laughlin v. Palm Beach County, 30 F.4th 1045, 1053 (11th Cir. 2022) (discussing

this understanding of freedom of association).

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Spurlin has “point[ed] to a broad[], clearly established

principle that . . . control[s] the novel facts of [this] situation.”

Gaines, 871 F.3d at 1208 (quotation omitted). “[I]dentical facts [are]

not essential for the law to be clearly established”; “[a]uthoritative

judicial decisions may establish broad principles of law that are

clearly applicable to the conduct at issue.” Gates v. Khokar, 884 F.3d

1290, 1298 (11th Cir. 2018) (quotations omitted). The Heffernan

Court clearly decided that the constitutional concerns related to

First Amendment retaliation were the same “whether [the plaintiff]

did or did not in fact engage in [protected] activity.” 578 U.S. at

Beck points to a statement from an unpublished Third Circuit

decision, Falco v. Zimmer, 767 F. App’x 288, 314 (3d Cir. 2019), for the

proposition that Heffernan does not apply to free speech cases. But that

interpretation misreads the Third Circuit’s analysis. Falco did not raise any

issue related to perceived versus actual speech. See generally id. Instead, the

plaintiff “attempt[ed] to undermine the ordinary firmness standard used in

determining whether a public employee’s protected activity was a substantial

or motivating factor in the employer’s retaliation” by pointing to language

from Heffernan that unlawful retaliatory actions need not actually coerce the

employee into changing his political affiliation. Id. at 314 (citing Heffernan, 578

U.S. at 273). The Third Circuit declined to relax the “ordinary firmness”

standard based on language pulled from “a factually similar case” (in that both

Falco and Heffernan dealt with First Amendment retaliation) “that turns on an

entirely separate legal question.” Id. at 315.

Beck also relies on Avant v. Doke, an unpublished Tenth Circuit

decision, reading it to mean that without that circuit’s previously decided Bird

decision (discussed above), Heffernan’s application to free speech cases would

be unclear. No. 21-7031, 2022 WL 2255699, at *6–7 (10th Cir. June 23, 2022).

To the contrary, the Tenth Circuit discussed Heffernan fully and concluded that

“Heffernan recognized a public employee’s First Amendment protection from

retaliation for perceived speech,” all before it ever addressed Bird. Id. at *7.

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273. We thus conclude that the fact that Spurlin did not engage in

the expressive activity for which she alleges she was fired does not

defeat her First Amendment claim.

This conclusion does not end the qualified immunity

analysis. Under the Pickering framework, government employers

have some leeway in regulating the speech of their employees

because “the State has interests as an employer in regulating the

speech of its employees that differ significantly from those it

possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the

citizenry in general.” Jarrard, 115 F.4th at 1316 (quoting Pickering,

391 U.S. at 568). Spurlin must demonstrate that the perceived

speech—the anonymous complaint—was protected speech. We

remand to the district court to determine whether, under the

Pickering framework, Spurlin’s speech would have been

constitutionally protected if she had sent the anonymous

complaint.

B. The retaliation claim against McCord

Spurlin argues that because Beck’s alleged actions

constituted unlawful First Amendment retaliation, the claim

against McCord should survive as well. McCord responds that

even if Spurlin establishes a constitutional violation, her claim

against McCord fails because she has not sufficiently alleged

municipal liability for Beck’s actions.

“Claims against individuals in their official capacities” are “to

be treated as a suit against the entity” of which the “officer is an

agent.” Rodemaker v. City of Valdosta Bd. of Educ., 110 F.4th 1318,

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1328 (11th Cir. 2024) (quotations omitted). “[T]o impose § 1983

liability on a municipality, a plaintiff must show: (1) that [her]

constitutional rights were violated; (2) that the municipality had a

custom or policy that constituted deliberate indifference to that

constitutional right; and (3) that the policy or custom caused the

violation.” McDowell v. Brown, 392 F.3d 1283, 1289 (11th Cir. 2004).

The district court determined that Spurlin failed the first prong and

thus did not reach the second two prongs of the analysis. 8 Because

we find that Spurlin has alleged that Beck violated her

constitutional rights, the first prong is met. We remand to the

district court to assess whether Spurlin plausibly alleged the

remaining two prongs.

IV. Conclusion

For these reasons, we vacate the district court’s dismissal of

Spurlin’s claims and remand for further proceedings consistent

with this opinion.9

8 The district court concluded that the claim against McCord failed because

“Spurlin has failed to show a violation of a clearly established right under the

First Amendment.” “[A] municipality is not entitled to the shield of qualified

immunity from liability under § 1983,” Brandon v. Holt, 469 U.S. 464, 473

(1985), so the question here is whether Spurlin has alleged a constitutional

violation, not whether that violation has been clearly established. See also

Kimberly Regenesis, LLC v. Lee County, 64 F.4th 1253, 1259 (11th Cir. 2023)

(noting that the qualified immunity defense “do[es] not belong to the

governmental entity” (quotation omitted)).

9 The district court should also reconsider jurisdiction over the state law

whistleblower claim in light of its resulting conclusions.

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18 Opinion of the Court 25-11242

VACATED AND REMANDED.