YOLANDA MADRY, an individual v. KING COUNTY, a political subdivision for the State of Washington

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

YOLANDA MADRY, an individual,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
KING COUNTY, a political subdivision
for the State of Washington,
Defendant-Appellee,
and
KING COUNTY DEPARTMENT OF
TRANSPORTATION,
Defendant.
No. 19-35578
D.C. No. 2:18-cv-00402-TSZ
MEMORANDUM
*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Washington
Thomas S. Zilly, District Judge, Presiding
Submitted March 30, 2020
**
Seattle, Washington
FILED
APR 1 2020
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
* *
The panel unanimously concludes this case is suitable for decision
without oral argument. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2).

Before: McKEOWN, N.R. SMITH, and NGUYEN, Circuit Judges.
Yolanda Madry appeals the district court’s order granting summary
judgment in favor of the King County Department of Transportation (“King
County”) on her due-process claim brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. We have
jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.
Madry alleges that King County deprived her of due process by failing to
provide her a hearing in which she could refute stigmatizing information contained
in her publicly accessible termination letter. She seeks to hold King County liable
under § 1983 for the purported constitutional violation by alleging that the
county’s failure to adequately train her supervisor to understand when an employee
is entitled to a “‘name-clearing’ hearing” was the reason she was denied this right
of due process. See Cox v. Roskelley, 359 F.3d 1105, 1110 (9th Cir. 2004).
In order to hold King County liable for the alleged constitutional violation,
Madry must show that King County’s training policies amounted to “deliberate
indifference to the rights of persons with whom the untrained employees come into
contact.” Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51, 61 (2011) (cleaned up) (quoting City
of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 388–89 (1989)). To establish a municipality’s
deliberate indifference where a claim alleges a failure to train, “it is ‘ordinarily
necessary’ for a plaintiff to demonstrate a ‘pattern of similar constitutional
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violations by untrained employees.’” Kirkpatrick v. Cty. of Washoe, 843 F.3d 784,
794 (9th Cir. 2016) (quoting Connick, 563 U.S. at 62). However, in a “rare” and
“narrow range of circumstances,” Connick, 563 U.S. at 63–64, a plaintiff may also
demonstrate a municipality’s deliberate indifference by showing that “‘the
unconstitutional consequences of failing to train’ [were] ‘[so] patently obvious’
and the violation of a protected right [was] a ‘highly predictable consequence’ of
the decision not to train,” Kirkpatrick, 843 F.3d at 794 (quoting Connick, 563 U.S.
at 64).
Madry failed to demonstrate that King County was deliberately indifferent.
She rests her argument on a misperceived deficiency in King County’s Employee
Rights and Due Process Manual (“Manual”). She argues that the Manual’s “overly
broad” description of non-stigmatizing information “could be considered” by a
supervisor to encompass issues regarding an employee’s honesty and
ethics—categories of information this Court has previously determined to be
stigmatizing. See Tibbetts v. Kulongoski, 567 F.3d 529, 536 (9th Cir. 2009).
However, the Manual explicitly states that “[s]tigmatizing information is that
which impairs the employee’s reputation for honesty or morality.” Thus, this
evidence does not support Madry’s argument that King County’s training policies
reflected deliberate indifference.
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Because Madry points to no other evidence in the record tending to show
that King County’s training policies reflected a deliberate indifference towards the
due-process rights of its employees, her due-process claim fails as a matter of law.
AFFIRMED.
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