Do you know what “qualified immunity” is? It just means that a government official (not just police), doing his job as proscribed, can not be sued individually. You have to sue the Department. Police officers are in no way protected from criminal violations.
Now, do you know what are the qualifications for a lawsuit> The filing fee, which is usually quite small. Every IRS agent would be sued on a regular basis, hell the GOP would have a fund just for that. Gangs would quickly figure out that all they need to do is sue any good cop constantly, keeping him from enforcing the law, and bankrupting him just for the legal fees. Meter maid would be chased by process servers, which they did their jobs. Any unpopular commission or city council decision would be met by a slew of lawsuits to the individual lawmakers. Don’t like that planning commissions decision? Sue them each, over and over.
i think they use it after the fact when they get sued and need a defense. I doubt many know enough to rely on it when they’re in the field doing stupid (or worse) things.
…just to be clear here: Crafter_Man never argued that qualified immunity protected cops from criminal violations. Just that many cops think that it does.
And prosecution is problematic since the DA is going to side with the police in all but the most egregious of cases.
These cops messed up. Not by beating Tyre Nichols, but for doing so in a way that couldn’t be covered up and papered over. They’ll probably face some level of criminal punishment, but that won’t change the police culture, it’ll just make them a bit more careful not to get caught.
Cite? Cops are not that stupid. Now sure cops think that their badge gives them some sort of immunity, but they don’t think about lawsuits.
Cities and states are constantly being sued- and paying out, due to Police excesses and errors.
Police misconduct is costing WA taxpayers millions. The trend shows no sign of slowing down
Lawsuits filed over their violent deaths resulted in more than a dozen multimillion-dollar settlements in 2021 as cities and counties increasingly decide to forgo civil trials and offer grieving families a kind of financial accountability. While settling police misconduct cases before they reach a courtroom is hardly a new tactic for risk managers, the steadily rising numbers and amounts are.
Last year saw Washington cities and counties settle 15 misconduct and wrongful death cases for a total of at least $34.3 million, a 146% increase over what was paid out in 2020 — and a 363.5% increase over the 2019 amount, according to data compiled by The Seattle Times through public disclosure, court dockets and news accounts.
That is just one state. So, yeah, you are totally wrong, they can be sued. Sure sovereign immunity is a thing, but it doesnt work like you think it does.
They don’t think about a lot of things, apparently. They don’t think about lawsuits, they don’t think about the wellbeing of the people they are beating up, they don’t think about the consequences of what happens when the person they are beating up inconveniently happens to die.
Isn’t it nice that the five police officers on the force that were bad just happened to be at the same place, at the same time, making it easy to get rid of all the corruption at once? Now that they have been exposed, everything is hunky dory!
I suspect these kinds of lawsuits are filed in U.S. District Courts against persons, whose qualified immunity is abrogated by 42 U.S.C. § 1983.
ETA: I guess one could go for wrongful death in state court rather than federal court, but that’s probably much less common. And also it would be against the individual.
Doesn’t this give you reason to pause here? It apparently isn’t having an effect on getting the police to stop terrorizing and brutalizing those they are being paid to protect.
It’s all well and good to win a lawsuit, but most people would probably rather have their family member still alive. Most people would rather have not been tortured and maimed than to receive a settlement for having been.
Sure, and what does that have to do with Qualified Immunity? Getting rid of Qualified Immunity won’t do anything. I mean, how many meter maids, planning commissioner clerks or tax auditors go on violent rampages like this?
What is your solution? As long as we hire humans for cops, things like this will happen. It doesnt only happen here. Now yes, there are possible ways to reduce the problem- training, better hiring etc, but what is your solution?
It is entirely a strawman of your creation that it should be entirely gotten rid of. Change it a bit, so that when a cop finds a new and inventive way of violating your constitutional rights, they are not protected by the fact that no cop has ever been sued for violating constitutional rights in that way.
But the binary dilemma that you present is false, and one of your own making.
I mean, do you expect me to write out an entire multi thousand page thesis on the problems and solutions facing the 17,000+ different police departments, address each and everyone specifically, and give the solution for each one? That’s a pretty ridiculous demand on your part.
But yes, as you said, better training and hiring would certainly help. But holding them accountable for their actions would as well. Taking complaints of police misconduct seriously, as well as protecting the complainants against retaliation by those police. Holding not only the bad actors responsible, but also any other cops who have knowledge of those bad actions and didn’t report them.
Demilitarize the police, and replace a significant portion of them with people who are trained to help people, especially people who are having a bad day of some sort, rather than someone who is only able to demand compliance with the threat of violence.
Cops are protected, individually, by qualified immunity. If a cop shoves a screwdriver into your anus, you can’t sue them. You may be able to sue the department, if they feel like letting you. It’s doubtful that the DA will bother to bring charges unless they are afraid the city will burn down in riots.
For starters, we could hire better humans for cops. It can be done. Nearly every other profession manages to do it. How often do you hear about teachers killing our students, for instance?
Again qualified immunity has nothing whatsoever to do with the problem of police violent misconduct. It just sounds like they can’t be held legally responsible by people who do not understand it.
Our dear Sheriff Joe has cost Maricopa county taxpayers well over $100 million in settlements and associated legal fees. That does not include something like $175 million related to his racial profiling program and willful ignoring court orders to cut it out. Still financial fallout years after he was finally voted out of office. I don’t know how the suits were targeted, but the county ends up paying.
This makes me wonder if the audio before the stop might have something on it that makes things even worse. Like “Hey, I don’t like that make of car. Let’s pull this guy over and beat the shit out of him.” “OK, I’m bored, sounds good to me.”
