LINDA DEVOOGHT v. CITY OF WARREN, MICHIGAN; WILLIAM DWYER - Articles

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LINDA DEVOOGHT v. CITY OF WARREN, MICHIGAN; WILLIAM DWYER

Posted by: Azya Thornton on Nov 5, 2025

Court: 6th Circuit Court (Published Opinions)

Attorneys 1: ARGUED: Raechel M. Badalamenti, KIRK, HUTH, LANGE & BADALAMENTI, PLC, Clinton Township, Michigan, for Appellants.

Attorneys 2: ARGUED: Kevin M. Carlson, PITT, MCGEHEE, PALMER, BONANNI & RIVERS, P.C., Royal Oak, Michigan, for Appellee.

Attorneys 3: ON BRIEF: Raechel M.Badalamenti, Elizabeth P. Morris, Chad L. Riddle, KIRK, HUTH, LANGE & BADALAMENTI, PLC, Clinton Township, Michigan, for Appellants.

Attorneys 4: ON BRIEF: Kevin M. Carlson, Robin B. Wagner, PITT, MCGEHEE, PALMER, BONANNI & RIVERS, P.C., Royal Oak, Michigan, for Appellee.

Judge(s): GRIFFIN, THAPAR, and MATHIS, Circuit Judges

Court Appealed: United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan at Ann Arbor

THAPAR, Circuit Judge. Police dispatcher Linda DeVooght sued her employer for gender discrimination. Just eleven days later, she became the subject of an Internal Affairs investigation, which ended in her termination. So she sued again—this time, alleging the City of Warren and its Police Commissioner unlawfully retaliated against her for suing them. The district court denied Commissioner William Dwyer qualified immunity. This interlocutory appeal followed. Federal courts can hear interlocutory appeals only in a narrow set of circumstances. Usually, that jurisdiction is limited to purely legal questions. Isolating the purely legal questions in this appeal, we affirm the district court’s denial of qualified immunity. Appellants also raise factual arguments about causation, which we dismiss for lack of appellate jurisdiction at this interlocutory stage.

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