holding that to determining whether force used was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment “requires a careful balancing of the nature and quality of the intrusion on the individual’s Fourth Amendment interests against the countervailing governmental interests at stake. . . . [T]he test of reasonableness under the Fourth Amendment is not capable of precise definition or mechanical application, however, its proper application requires careful attention to the facts and circumstances of each particular case . . . .”
How later courts described this case
- holding that to determining whether force used was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment “requires a careful balancing of the nature and quality of the intrusion on the individual’s Fourth Amendment interests against the countervailing governmental interests at stake. . . . [T]he test of reasonableness under the Fourth Amendment is not capable of precise definition or mechanical application, however, its proper application requires careful attention to the facts and circumstances of each particular case . . . .”
- stating that “the ‘reasonableness’ inquiry in an excessive force case is an objective one: the question is whether the officers’ actions are ‘objectively reasonable’ in light of the facts and circumstances confronting them, without regard to their underlying intent or motivation” and “[a]n officer’s evil intentions will not make a Fourth Amendment violation out of an objectively reasonable use of force; nor will an officer’s good intentions make an objectively unreasonable use of force constitutional.”
- finding that, although the Eighth Circuit had not yet determined whether an officer’s use of a taser on a nonviolent, nonfleeing misde-meanant was an excessive use of force, “the general constitutional principles against excessive use of force that were clearly established at the time of the incident ... were such as to put a reasonable officer on notice that tasering [plaintiff] under the circumstances as presented by [plaintiff] was excessive force in violation of clearly established law”
- stating that the reasonableness of an officer’s use of force depends on, among other things, “the severity of the crime at issue, whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others, and whether he is actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by flight” and stating, “[T]he right to make an arrest or investigatory stop necessarily carries with it the right to use some degree of physical coercion or threat thereof to effect it.”
Written by the judges who cited it.
Later courts went against this
Questioned by Jackson v. Johnson, 118 F. Supp. 2d 278 (2000)
490 U.S. 386, 109 S.Ct. 1865, 104 L.Ed.2d 443 (1989), called into question the viability of a Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process claim for excessive force.
Questioned by Norman Braley v. City of Pontiac, Stanley Helgemo, Sergeant Arthur Rouse and Roland Garcia, Officers, 906 F.2d 220 (1990)
Note that the holding in Graham v. Connor, - U.S.-, 109 S.Ct. 1865, 104 L.Ed.2d 443 (1989) calls into question the continued existence of this "species" of substantive due process, at least insofar as it exists apart from any specific of the Bill of Rights.
Declined to follow by Mattos v. Agarano, 661 F.3d 433 (2011)
We decline to adopt such an approach, which would be contrary to the firmly established Graham analysis.
Distinguished
Distinguished by David Hosea v. City of St. Paul, 867 F.3d 949 (2017)
Thus, the holding in Atkinson, which hinged on the absence of these Graham factors, is inapplicable.7
Distinguished by Ganek v. Leibowitz, 167 F. Supp. 3d 623 (2016)
Ganek argues that Graham and its progeny are inapposite because “the entirety of Defendants’ misconduct ... exceeds what is cognizable under the Fourth or Fifth Amendments alone.
Distinguished by Jesus Hernandez v. Unknown Named Agents, et, 785 F.3d 117 (2015)
The plaintiffs argue that Graham is inapplicable here because its rule only applies to “free citizens.
Distinguished by Lucille A. McKenzie Cecil McKenzie Jr. v. The City of Milpitas Frank Acosta, Individually and in His Capacity of the City of Milpitas, 953 F.2d 1387 (1992)
Because the evidence was introduced to resolve the factual dispute over what had happened, and not to determine the reasonableness of the officers' actions, Graham, 490 U.S. at 386, upon which Milpitas relies, is inapposite.
The opinion
Justice Blackmun,
with whom Justice Brennan and Justice Marshall join,
concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
I join the Court’s opinion insofar as it rules that the Fourth Amendment is the primary tool for analyzing claims of excessive force in the prearrest context, and I concur in the judgment remanding the case to the Court of Appeals for reconsideration of the evidence under a reasonableness standard. In light of respondents’ concession, however, that the pleadings in this case properly may be construed as raising a Fourth Amendment claim, see Brief for Respondents 3,1 see no reason for the Court to find it necessary further to reach out to decide that prearrest excessive force claims are to be analyzed under the Fourth Amendment rather than under a *400 substantive due process standard. I also see no basis for the Court’s suggestion, ante, at 395, that our decision in Tennessee v. Garner, 471 U. S. 1 (1985), implicitly so held. Nowhere in Garner is a substantive due process standard for evaluating the use of excessive force in a particular case discussed; there is no suggestion that such a standard was offered as an alternative and rejected.
In this case, petitioner apparently decided that it was in his best interest to disavow the continued applicability of substantive due process analysis as an alternative basis for recovery in prearrest excessive force cases. See Brief for Petitioner 20. His choice was certainly wise as a matter of litigation strategy in his own case, but does not (indeed, cannot be expected to) serve other potential plaintiffs equally well. It is for that reason that the Court would have done better to leave that question for another day. I expect that the use of force that is not demonstrably unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment only rarely will raise substantive due process concerns. But until I am faced with a case in which that question is squarely raised, and its merits are subjected to adversary presentation, I do not join in foreclosing the use of substantive due process analysis in prearrest cases.