Lansing, Mich. cop sees man passed out at the wheel of a running car early in the morning after a blizzard. Without knocking opens the driver's door to check. Man wakes up. Cop asks for ID. Things escalate quickly and cop finds a whole lot of bags of drugs and a gun. Man: Unreasonable search and the community caretaker exception does not apply. District court. Not unreasonable. Motion to dismiss denied. Here's a 204-month sentence.
Seventeen-year-old student is required to participate in police ride-along for a class, and Hammond, Ind. officer Jamie Garcia she shadows spends the day groping her, making lewd remarks, and even taking her to a remote location where he offers her to another officer for sex. Officer: This mere "boorish flirtation" was just "making for an exciting ride along." District court: Qualified immunity.
Allegation: After Montgomery County, Ky. officials are ordered to obtain exculpatory evidence from a witness and turn it over to the defense, a prosecutor instead tells the witness to destroy the evidence. (She does.) Man, age 56, spent two years in jail facing a potential death sentence for a crime he didn’t commit — all while fighting cancer. Sixth Circuit: That is "seemingly unbecoming" but nevertheless within the prosecutor's traditional role as an advocate. Absolute immunity.
Oregon law makes it a crime to surreptitiously record conversations with another person without their knowledge . . . unless you're a cop performing official duties, in which case, record away! Project Veritas—which has something of a history of secretly recording conversations—challenges the recording ban as a violation of the First Amendment. Ninth Circuit: And they're right. The ban is unconstitutional. Dissent: We should just sever the exceptions for law enforcement and then the ban is fine.
It is obviously unreasonable for an off-duty, out-of-uniform police officer to lose his temper on the road, follow another motorist home, box him in his driveway, scream profanities, all before identifying himself as law enforcement, and point a gun at the nonthreatening motorist. At least so says the Tenth Circuit, reversing a grant of qualified immunity to a (now-former) Chaves County, N.M. sheriff's deputy David Bradshaw.
In en banc news, the Ninth Circuit will not reconsider its decision that the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause prevents Grants Pass, Oregon officials from ticketing people experiencing homelessness for, among other things, sleeping in public parks or in their cars.
Grants Pass, Ore. has more homeless residents than shelter beds, forcing some homeless to sleep in public spaces. Easy fix, says the town, we'll just make that illegal. Ninth Circuit: You can't ticket the involuntarily homeless just for being homeless.
Connecticut prisoner has an "intolerable" scalp condition consisting of painful scabs and oozing sores. Prison officials allegedly deny treatment for years. District court: there are no binding cases holding that a scalp condition is a serious medical need requiring treatment. Second Circuit: Qualified immunity is specific, but it's not that specific. The guy said his head felt like it was on fire. Reversed and remanded.
The case is Collymore v. Myers, Collymore v. Comm’r of D.O.C., No. 21-02292 (2d Cir. July 14, 2023).
If prosecutors don't turn over potentially exculpatory evidence and a person on death row finds out about it (by accident) years later, does that mean he gets a new trial? Well, explains the Fourth Circuit over the course of 102 pages, it depends.
The case is Juniper v. Davis, No. 21-00009 (4th Cir. July 19, 2023).
Kannapolis, N.C. police officer Jeremy Page catches drug dealer/informant selling crack but says he won't arrest drug dealer if he hands over any other drugs he has and does more to help the police. He agrees, hands over more drugs, and helps police find a fugitive. Officer then decides that's not enough, swears out arrest warrants, and more drugs are found during arrest. Is cop's non-arrest-for-cooperation deal enforceable?