Case law

Barbara Marks v. Wanda Hudson

933 F.3d 481 · Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · Aug 8, 2019

They also argue they are entitled to qualified immunity because the “nebulous” rights on which the plaintiffs rely are not clearly established, nor were their actions objectively unreasonable. … Ashcroft-Smith, 922 F.3d 320, 322 n.1 (5th Cir. 2019), they cannot be the source of clearly established law for qualified immunity analysis.

Wernecke v. Garcia

591 F.3d 386 · Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · Dec 15, 2009

“The ‘clearly established’ standard does not mean that officials’ conduct is protected by qualified immunity unless ‘the very action in question has previously been held unlawful.’ ” Id. at 350 (quoting Anderson, 483 U.S. … “[A]n official does not lose qualified immunity merely because a certain right is clearly established in the abstract.” Kinney, 367 F.3d at 350 .

Langley v. Adams County

987 F.2d 1473 · Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · Mar 3, 1993

Once a defendant asserts the affirmative defense of qualified immunity, “[t]he plaintiff carries the burden of convincing the court that the law was clearly established.” [Pueblo Neighborhood Health Ctrs., Inc. v.] … Plaintiff has thus met her burden of showing clearly established law governing her First Amendment claim. Defendants assert two factual bases for their qualified immunity defense.

Stonecipher v. Valles

759 F.3d 1134 · Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · Jul 1, 2014

When a defendant raises qualified immunity as a defense, “a plaintiff must properly allege a deprivation of a constitutional right and must further show that the constitutional right was clearly established at the time … the legal rules that were ‘clearly established’ at the time it was taken.”

Galvez v. Bruce

552 F.3d 1238 · Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit · Dec 18, 2008

DISCUSSION Qualified immunity shields government officials from liability when they are performing discretionary functions and their actions “‘[do] not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights … The Supreme Court has instructed that courts should not proceed to the third step of the qualified immunity inquiry – whether the law at the time of the events clearly established such a violation – unless they find that

Jones v. Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department

873 F.3d 1123 · Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit · Oct 20, 2017

Clearly Established Law - Because defendants may have committed constitutional violations, we turn to the second element of' qualified immunity: whether there was clearly established law. Defendants rely on Brooks v. … qualified immunity).

Frederick A. Siegert, ph.d. v. H. Melvyn Gilley, ph.d.

895 F.2d 797 · Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit · Apr 16, 1990

The court concluded that “[Gil-ley’s] qualified immunity defense therefore fails,” id., and that Siegert had established a proper basis for a Bivens claim. Id. at 1419. Defendant then filed this appeal. … Instead, to overcome the qualified immunity that ordinarily attaches to government officials performing discretionary functions, a plaintiff must show that the defendant violated “clearly established statutory or constitutional

Oliver v. Woods

209 F.3d 1179 · Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · Apr 17, 2000

Oliver’s clearly established Fourth Amendment rights and were therefore not entitled to qualified immunity. The court determined Mr. … Oliver’s clearly established rights. C. Officer Woods’ Entitlement to Qualified Immunity Mr. Oliver failed to show Officer Woods violated his clearly established constitutional or statutory rights.

Jerome Polenz and Donna Polenz v. Thomas Parrott and Russell Borland

883 F.2d 551 · Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit · Aug 22, 1989

For purposes of qualified immunity, it is not enough to assert that a broad or abstract right, such as the right to due process or the right to exclusive use and enjoyment of one’s land, is clearly established. … For example, the qualified immunity question might be whether at the time in question it was clearly established that the alleged constitutional violation could arise from "reckless" rather than "intentional” conduct.

Donovan v. City Of Milwaukee

17 F.3d 944 · Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit · Feb 18, 1994

II. 5 Under the doctrine of qualified immunity, "governmental officials performing discretionary functions generally are shielded from liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established … are entitled to qualified immunity.

George E. Apostol v. Eliot Landau, Mark Gallion, and Chris Haloulos

957 F.2d 339 · Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit · Jun 8, 1992

precluded from asserting the qualified immunity defense. … We first examine whether as a matter of law officers Gallion and Haloulos are entitled to qualified immunity because their conduct during the search of Apostol’s office violated clearly established rights.

Palmer v. Johnson

193 F.3d 346 · Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · Oct 19, 1999

The bifurcated test for qualified immunity asks whether the plaintiff has alleged a violation of a clearly established right and, if so, whether the defendant’s conduct was objectively unreasonable. … Thus, for purposes of the qualified immunity analysis, Palmer has demonstrated a violation of his clearly established rights under the Eighth Amendment.

Courtney Adams v. Blount Cty., Tenn.

946 F.3d 940 · Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit · Jan 8, 2020

standard and violated Edwards’s clearly established rights. … Defendant Burns asserts “the defense of qualified immunity, which shields government officials from ‘liability for civil damages insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights

Edward Shaw v. City of Selma

884 F.3d 1093 · Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit · Mar 7, 2018

“Qualified immunity protects government officials performing discretionary functions from suits in their individual capacities unless their conduct violates clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which … Instead of clearly establishing the law against Williams, binding precedent clearly establishes it in his favor. See Singletary v.

Dwight L. McKee Allen L. Jones v. Henry Hart Wesley Rish Albert Masland James Sheehan Daniel P. Sattelle, Daniel P. Sattele

436 F.3d 165 · Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit · Jan 6, 2006

is entitled to qualified immunity. … right was clearly established at the time of Sattele’s alleged conduct.

Donald M. Johnson v. Bob Odom

910 F.2d 1273 · Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit · Sep 7, 1990

An appeal may be taken from a finding against qualified immunity where the issue involved is the purely legal one of “whether the legal norms allegedly violated by the defendant were clearly established at the time of the … qualified immunities was proper.

Holland Ex Rel. Overdorff v. Harrington

268 F.3d 1179 · Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · Oct 19, 2001

entitled to qualified immunity. … "An order denying summary judgment based on qualified immunity necessarily involves a legal determination that certain alleged actions violate clearly established law.”

Ratliff v. DeKalb County, GA

62 F.3d 338 · Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit · Aug 9, 1995

court assumed for the purposes of its decision about whether the applicable law was clearly established. … The right to be free from retaliation is clearly established as a first amendment right and as a statutory right under Title VII; but no clearly established right exists under the equal protection clause to be free from

Blackmon v. Sutton

734 F.3d 1237 · Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit · Nov 8, 2013

True, qualified immunity is strong stuff: the defense shields public officials from suit as long as their conduct didn’t infringe any legal rights clearly established at the time. See Camretta v. Greene, 131 S. … Conduct that violates the clearly established rights of convicts necessarily violates the clearly established rights of pretrial detainees.

Frederick Jackson v. City of Madison

Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit · May 28, 2026

We reiterate that to defeat qualified immunity, a plaintiff must point us to law that is established clearly enough “that every reasonable official would interpret it to establish the particular rule the plaintiff seeks to … Officers are entitled to qualified immunity unless “(1) they violated a federal stat- utory or constitutional right, and (2) the unlawfulness of their conduct was ‘clearly established at the time.’”