Burnikel v. Fong

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Plaintiff filed suit against defendants under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging claims of excessive force and municipal liability, as well as state tort claims. The Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of the officers' motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity where plaintiff established that the officers violated his Fourth Amendment right to be free from excessive force. In this case, the officers delivered repeated strikes, punches, and blows to plaintiff while plaintiff pleaded with them to stop hitting him because he was not resisting arrest or doing anything wrong. Therefore, a reasonable officer standing in defendants' shoes would have understood that the amount of force used to subdue plaintiff was excessive, as was their action in purposefully dropping plaintiff face-first onto the sidewalk after he had been subdued and handcuffed. The court also held that it lacked jurisdiction over the officers' appeal of the denial of summary judgment on the state law claims because the court's resolution of the qualified immunity appeal did not necessarily resolve plaintiff's state law claims against the officers. View "Burnikel v. Fong" on Justia Law