WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., joined by Justice Clarence Thomas offered a rare, direct rebuke to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in his dissent to the court’s decision not to take up Pina v. Estate of Jacob Dominguez. Justice Alito wrote that the lower court’s decision to award damages to the widow and children of a man killed in an officer-involved shooting was “a flagrant error.”
In the dissent published on Feb. 24th Alito wrote in part, “The courts below badly fumbled this basic tenet of our qualified immunity doctrine,” when it ruled that San Jose Police Officer Michael Pina was not protected from civil liability by the doctrine of qualified immunity in the 2017 shooting death of Jacob Dominguez.
As explained by Alito, “In 2017, officers of the San Jose Police Department procured an arrest warrant for Jacob Dominguez, a suspect in an armed robbery of a gas station. Based on information from a confidential informant, officers believed Dominguez was armed with a revolver. Once the officers had found Dominguez in his vehicle, Officer Michael Pina ordered him to put his hands up. Dominguez complied, but he then “‘quickly dropped his hands’” out of sight and “‘moved forward.’”
Officer Pina, who told the court he believed Dominguez was reaching for a weapon shot and killed the man. The Dominquez estate sued Pina and a California jury found him liable for excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Officer Pina moved for judgment as a matter of law on qualified immunity grounds, but the District Court denied his motion. This denial was appealed to the 9th Circuit Court which upheld the denial in an unpublished decision.
As reported by LA Times, Dominguez’s widow sued both Officer Pina and the San Jose Police Department, winning $1 million in damages.
Justice Alito noted that in its unpublished ruling essentially disregarded two prior precedents and “made a serious misstep in their analysis.”
Through a footnote the court stated without reasoning or consideration that one qualified immunity precedent Peck v. Montoya “merely identified” the law that a 2014 ruling Cruz v. City of Anaheim “clearly established.’”
Alito then scolded the appellate court, saying, “Those ham-fisted rescue efforts rest on a misreading of Cruz. If Cruz itself could serve as the basis for clearly established law, then the Ninth Circuit presumably could have cited it directly instead of shunting it to a footnote.”
“To overcome qualified immunity, a party must show that an official violated a federal right that ‘was “clearly established” at the time of [the] alleged misconduct,’” Alito explained. “This requirement ensures that officials are not subject to the burdens of litigation or held liable for conduct without notice that such conduct is unlawful.”
He added, “The decisions below made more than a trifling mistake. In the Fourth Amendment context, the clearly-established law requirement provides essential notice at the “‘hazy border between excessive and acceptable force.’”
“But by holding an officer liable based on a judicial precedent issued after the events in question, the courts below ran roughshod over this key notice-bearing feature of our qualified-immunity jurisprudence.”
In the dissent published on Feb. 24th Alito wrote in part, “The courts below badly fumbled this basic tenet of our qualified immunity doctrine,” when it ruled that San Jose Police Officer Michael Pina was not protected from civil liability by the doctrine of qualified immunity in the 2017 shooting death of Jacob Dominguez.
As explained by Alito, “In 2017, officers of the San Jose Police Department procured an arrest warrant for Jacob Dominguez, a suspect in an armed robbery of a gas station. Based on information from a confidential informant, officers believed Dominguez was armed with a revolver. Once the officers had found Dominguez in his vehicle, Officer Michael Pina ordered him to put his hands up. Dominguez complied, but he then “‘quickly dropped his hands’” out of sight and “‘moved forward.’”
Officer Pina, who told the court he believed Dominguez was reaching for a weapon shot and killed the man. The Dominquez estate sued Pina and a California jury found him liable for excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Officer Pina moved for judgment as a matter of law on qualified immunity grounds, but the District Court denied his motion. This denial was appealed to the 9th Circuit Court which upheld the denial in an unpublished decision.
As reported by LA Times, Dominguez’s widow sued both Officer Pina and the San Jose Police Department, winning $1 million in damages.
Justice Alito noted that in its unpublished ruling essentially disregarded two prior precedents and “made a serious misstep in their analysis.”
Through a footnote the court stated without reasoning or consideration that one qualified immunity precedent Peck v. Montoya “merely identified” the law that a 2014 ruling Cruz v. City of Anaheim “clearly established.’”
Alito then scolded the appellate court, saying, “Those ham-fisted rescue efforts rest on a misreading of Cruz. If Cruz itself could serve as the basis for clearly established law, then the Ninth Circuit presumably could have cited it directly instead of shunting it to a footnote.”
“To overcome qualified immunity, a party must show that an official violated a federal right that ‘was “clearly established” at the time of [the] alleged misconduct,’” Alito explained. “This requirement ensures that officials are not subject to the burdens of litigation or held liable for conduct without notice that such conduct is unlawful.”
He added, “The decisions below made more than a trifling mistake. In the Fourth Amendment context, the clearly-established law requirement provides essential notice at the “‘hazy border between excessive and acceptable force.’”
“But by holding an officer liable based on a judicial precedent issued after the events in question, the courts below ran roughshod over this key notice-bearing feature of our qualified-immunity jurisprudence.”
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