MIDLAND, Texas — The City of Midland has once again filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by the five former Midland Christian employees who were accused of failing to report an assault on a student.
Near the end of October, the city and the three police officers named in the lawsuit filed a motion to dismiss.
The "Midland Christian Five" then submitted an amended complaint at the beginning of December, and three days later a judge denied the motion to dismiss.
In the new request to dismiss, the city reiterates its belief that none of the former employees' claims "overcomes the officers' qualified immunity" because they have not properly proven they violated any constitutional rights.
Lawyers also claim that regardless of the five's investigation and findings on the child who was assaulted, a potential assault still occurred and that still falls under the requirements to report.
Additionally, while the MCS employees allege their Fourth Amendment rights were violated, the city argues that the bar for probable cause is not very high.
"The propriety of Plaintiffs’ arrest is not judged by the charge Officer Alonzo filed but, instead, on any charge supported by probable cause that a reasonable officer could have filed based on the facts," the motion reads.
Lawyers are also pointing to other cases to show officers are "allowed to make 'common-sense conclusions about human behavior'" when making an arrest.
Another claim the five has made against the city is that the warrants obtained by the arresting officers contained false information. The city refutes this, saying the warrants simply reflect information Officer Alonzo had available to her when submitting for the arrest warrants.
The MCS employees also directed accusations against Sergeant Sharp, both as a bystander and a supervisor.
According to the motion to dismiss, lawyers are arguing that the employees have not proven that Sharp had enough bystander liability or that Sharp failed to supervise or train the officers in regards to people's constitutional rights.
Arguments in the motion to dismiss regularly go back to the city's beliefs that its employees did not commit any constitutional violations.
The MCS team has allegedly not presented any proof to show that Sharp or Officer Fonseca assisted with the warrants as well.
Now that the city has filed the motion to dismiss, a judge will take a look and either grant or deny the motion to dismiss. At this time there is no set deadline for the judge to hand down a decision.
NewsWest 9 will continue to follow this story and provide updates as they become available.
You can read the full motion to dismiss down below.