Supreme Court is faulted for shielding police officers from excessive-force lawsuits
WASHINGTON — Amid nationwide protests over police killings, the Supreme Court is facing pressure to reconsider the legal immunity that often shields officers from being sued for using excessive force, including brutal arrests and the shooting of innocent people in their homes.
The high court has been sharply criticized from the left and the right for rulings in the last decade that have made it nearly impossible for many victims of police brutality or wrongful shootings to sue the officers for violating their rights. Since police officers are rarely charged with a crime, the court-created doctrine of “qualified immunity” from civil lawsuits has meant no redress for victims and little accountability for those who abuse their authority, according to the critics.
In recent weeks, justices have been considering several appeals from victims urging the court to reverse course and allow these claims to go before a jury.
Lawyers behind the appeals say the images of a Minneapolis police officer pressing his knee onto the neck of unarmed black man who is handcuffed and gasping for breath should weigh on the justices.
“It makes for grim coincidence,” said Jay Schweikert, a lawyer for the Cato Institute, which has waged a campaign against police immunity. “The senseless violence committed by (police officer) Derek Chauvin — and the stunning indifference of the officers standing by as George Floyd begged for his life — is the product of our culture of near-zero accountability for law enforcement. I expect the events of the past week will increase their sense of urgency, because the justices are culpable for this doctrine that they have expounded.”
He noted that the issue has been taken up by protesters who carried signs that say, “Abolish Qualified Immunity.”
He and others are encouraged because legal scholars have strongly disputed the doctrine of qualified immunity, and justices on the right and left have voiced doubts. Justices Clarence Thomas and Neil M. Gorsuch have questioned the doctrine because it was invented by judges, while Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg warned about its practical impact.
The court’s stance has “sent an alarming signal to law enforcement officers and the public. It tells officers that they can shoot first and think later,” Sotomayor said, dissenting in Kisela vs. Hughes in 2018. Without bothering to hear arguments in the case, the justices overturned a lower court and tossed out an excessive-force claim brought by a Tucson woman who was shot four times while standing in her front yard by an officer who had just arrived on the scene.
The Tucson officer had no cause to make an arrest, and he faced no danger. Nonetheless, the justices ruled the shooting victim could not sue the officer because there was no specific past ruling that “clearly established” it was unreasonable for a police officer to shoot someone in this particular circumstance.