Monteiro v. City of Elizabeth, 436 F.3d 397 (3d Cir. 2006), cert. denied sub nom., Perkins-Auguste v. Monteiro, 549 U.S. 820. We represented Plaintiff Tony Monteiro, a dissident Elizabeth City Councilman. We prevailed at trial with the jury finding that Councilman Monteiro was removed from a City Council meeting in retaliation for exercising his first amendment rights. The Third Circuit, in a 2-1 decision, affirmed the decision by the district court, which had denied the City’s motion for summary judgment and judgment as a matter of law after a jury had found in favor of Monteiro on his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim. In affirming that decision, the Third Circuit held that: (1) the City Council President was not entitled to qualified immunity, even though she could have constitutionally ejected the member if he had disrupted the meeting; (2) the district court did not err by admitting evidence of the member’s acquittal of criminal charges in municipal court; (3) a memorandum regarding ejecting a person from a meeting was admitted as probative circumstantial evidence that the ejection was not based on valid non-discriminatory reasons; and (4) punitive damages were properly awarded since the City Council president acted recklessly and with callous indifference to Monteiro’s rights. The dissenting judge would have reversed the verdict on the grounds of qualified immunity.
