The Supreme Court on Thursday A legal theory rejected This set strong boundaries to lawsuits that police officers are responsible for the use of fatal violence.
The case was created, A judge of a court of appeal wroteFrom an everyday event. “A routine traffic stop,” the judge wrote, “has again ended in the death of an unarmed black man.”
The question for the judges was how closely the courts should limit their consideration whether fatal violence was justified to “the moment of threat” – the seconds prior to a shooting at the police – instead of the greater context of the meeting.
Justice Elena Kagan, who wrote before a unanimous court, said it was too limited that only the moment of threat was too limited. “To assess whether an officer acted reasonably well when using violence,” she wrote, “a court must take into account all relevant circumstances, including facts and events that are prior to the climatic moment.”
The case started one afternoon in April in 2016, when Ashtian Barnes, 24, rode a highway outside Houston in a car that had rented his girlfriend. He was on his way to pick up her daughter from childcare.
Although Mr Barnes did not know, the car license plate of the car was linked to unpaid tolls made by another driver. Officer Roberto Felix Jr. From the office of the Harris County Constable, the car moved on the basis of that unpaid toll.
When Mr. Barnes could not immediately find his driver’s license and the registration of the car, the officer asked him to get out of the car. Instead, Mr. To pull barnes away, still open with the car door. Officer Felix pulled his gun, jumped on the sill of the moving car and shot Mr. Barnes down twice, as recorded on dashboard images.
Mr. Barnes’s mother, Janice Hughes Barnes, complained and said that the use of violence by the officer was unreasonable and violated the fourth amendment.
A unanimous panel with three judges of the American Court of Appeal for the fifth circuit ruled last year There was a scary question for the officer about what was there. “We can only ask if officer Felix was in danger” at the time of the threat “that used deadly violence against Barnes,” wrote Judge E. Higginbotham.
Judge Higginbotham added a simultaneous opinion and only wrote to himself. Had he seen all the circumstances around the stop, he wrote, he could have rule the other way.
“Given the rapid order of events and the role of officer Felix in drawing his weapon and jumping on the running board,” wrote the judge, “the totality of the circumstances deserves to find that officer Felix violated the fourth amendment of Barnes to be free of excessive violence.”
The Supreme Court has returned the case, Barnes v. Felix, No. 23-1239, to the lower courts for a fresh look under the right standard.
In a competitive opinion, Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh suggested that officer Felix could still prevail under that wider norm. Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel A. Alito Jr. And Amy Coney Barrett joined the opinion of Justice Kavanaugh.
“The most important point is a common sense,” wrote Justice Kavanaugh. “A driver who is away from a traffic stop can be significant dangers for both the officer and the surrounding community.”
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