New York City Ends Qualified Immunity For Police Officers, Becoming 1st In Nation To Do So

[Jason]

New York City Ends Qualified Immunity For Police Officers, Becoming 1st In Nation To Do So

NEWYORK.CBSLOCAL.COM

---

The protection has prevented officers from being sued or liable for misconduct.

 

[Kal-El814]

Police strike in 3... 2... 

 

Great news tho.

[Uaarkson]

“New York City is going to shit” says every conservative who doesn’t know two minutes of history 

[Spawn_of_Apathy]

If they obey the law and follow the rules they’ll have nothing to worry about. 

[Brick]

A step in the right direction. 

[SaysWho?]

20 hours ago, Kal-El814 said:

Police strike in 3... 2... 

 

Great news tho.

I don’t know a ton about the history of this. On its surface it seems fine. But the amount of cops who are looking to quit or move states is high just based on my feelers (doesn’t mean they’ll follow through).

 

 What’s the history of this and why is it a good idea? I’d like to delve into this more.

[PaladinSolo]

20 hours ago, Uaarkson said:

“New York City is going to shit” says every conservative who doesn’t know two minutes of history 

Its pretty much every city to them at this point.

[b_m_b_m_b_m]

31 minutes ago, SaysWho? said:

I don’t know a ton about the history of this. On its surface it seems fine. But the amount of cops who are looking to quit or move states is high just based on my feelers (doesn’t mean they’ll follow through).

 

 What’s the history of this and why is it a good idea? I’d like to delve into this more.

Part of the reason cops want to quit/retire is that their pensions are based upon their salary for the past couple of years and they got a ton of overtime in 2020

[Joe]

Absolutely unbelievable news. It felt like what we endured in the summer was all for naught at times, but this is momentous news!

[PaladinSolo]

8 minutes ago, b_m_b_m_b_m said:

Part of the reason cops want to quit/retire is that their pensions are based upon their salary for the past couple of years and they got a ton of overtime in 2020

Unless theres is different from the mine, its based off their best years, and you can only "boost" your salary for pension consideration by 10% above your salary.  Its just usually your most recent years are your best years since you get yearly raises.

 

Edit: Looked it up, Tiers 2-5 is 20% above salary, and 6 is 10% for cops.

[Kal-El814]

1 hour ago, SaysWho? said:

 What’s the history of this and why is it a good idea? I’d like to delve into this more.

 

I don't know the legal specifics in detail, but qualified immunity prevents government officials from being the target of civil suits while carrying out government work, provided they're not breaking laws / violating rights while doing so. People in favor of allowing qualified immunity to protect police say it'll keep police from hesitating to act, since they won't be afraid of frivolous lawsuits. Opponents to it say it gives police legal protection to shoot first and ask questions later, since they know they won't be able to be taken to civil trial for doing so. There's more to it than that legally, but I think that's the gist.

[Ghost_MH]

1 hour ago, SaysWho? said:

I don’t know a ton about the history of this. On its surface it seems fine. But the amount of cops who are looking to quit or move states is high just based on my feelers (doesn’t mean they’ll follow through).

 

 What’s the history of this and why is it a good idea? I’d like to delve into this more.

 

 

[LazyPiranha]

You’re half right, although it’s been a while since I’ve studied this so I’m probably rusty.  Anyone better informed can correct me.

 

What you’re talking about is absolute immunity, which applies to any government agent in the course of their duties taking LEGAL action.  Legal actions take place all the time that harm people, and absolute immunity shields rightful actors from that.  A judge taking away custody of children after a proper hearing is still harming someone, it doesn’t mean that the person gets to recover damages.  You got due process, your rights were not violated, you suffered at the hands of the state but the state did no wrong.  Even if the judge is appealed and you win, you still don’t get to recover anything because the appeal is a part of due process and you ultimately prevailed.  
 

Qualified immunity is specifically when your constitutional rights HAVE been violated, even if the violation is intentional or even possibly malicious.  The best case you could make for qualified immunity is that occasionally honest mistakes happen and the state shouldn’t be so afraid to act that they do nothing.  Unfortunately, qualified immunity in the states is a wall with a hole the size of an eye of a needle to squeeze through.  You have to prove that a reasonable person would have known they were breaking an established law.  On paper, that arguably makes some sort of sense, in reality that’s been read so narrowly as to be useless.  Unless you can point to an already successful case with facts essentially identical to your own, you’re fucked.  
 

Case in point, someone sued and it went to the Supreme Court last year because they had surrendered to police, they were lying flat on the ground, and the police intentionally had their dog attack them.  Seems pretty clear right?  Obviously wrong?  Nope.  You see, it’s been clearly established that it’s illegal for a cop to make their dog attack a surrendered suspect who is SITTING, but no clear established law that they can’t do it while you’re lying down, so........ qualified immunity get fucked.  
 

Basically, the law rewards people for being novel.  Oh you beat a suspect with a left handed 1 iron?  No ones ever done that before, who can say if it’s actually illegal?  It deters anyone from filing anything because unless you’re a mirror image of another case you’re extremely likely to lose.  This creates a snake eating its own tail, if people don’t bother filing, no new successful cases will occur, if no new successful cases occur there are fewer options to point to, if there are fewer options to point to, people don’t bother to file, and so on.

[SaysWho?]

Appreciate the responses. Gonna look through that vid and I’m reading some of the history of the protection.

 

So what do you make of an officer who’s worried about frivolous lawsuits coming out of this? Let’s assume those person isn’t malevolent and is just scared.

 

I do have some friends thinking this is going to get bad, people I don’t think of as being bad actors, and I just tell them I don’t know enough to give them a good answer.

[Guest]

Frivolous lawsuits are what your union is there to protect you from.

[Kal-El814]

Personally I believe two things are true. 
 

1) Police should be less inclined towards violent solutions in general. I’m in favor of letting some crimes slide in the interest of having fewer George Floyd and Brianna Taylor killings happen. If, “maybe I’ll be sued if I shove this old man to the ground and fuck up his skull,” is what it takes to get a cop to not do that... fine. If it’s what it takes to have the police triple check someone’s address before serving a no knock warrant or tossing a flashbang into someone’s home... good. 
 

2) For as much “anti cop” rhetoric you see online, I believe people in general would be inclined to side with police in court by default. It seems unlikely that eliminating qualified immunity would lead to police being successfully sued en masse.

 

4 minutes ago, sblfilms said:

Frivolous lawsuits are what your union is there to protect you from.

Also this. 

 

[Jason]

SCOTUS also gave government actors that gaping "good-faith misunderstanding of the law" bullshit for qualified immunity.

[Guest]

I should also add that “frivolous lawsuits” is the bogeyman GOP lawmakers invented to make it harder for normies to sue powerful interests. Don’t fall for it!

[LazyPiranha]

5 hours ago, SaysWho? said:

Appreciate the responses. Gonna look through that vid and I’m reading some of the history of the protection.

 

So what do you make of an officer who’s worried about frivolous lawsuits coming out of this? Let’s assume those person isn’t malevolent and is just scared.

 

I do have some friends thinking this is going to get bad, people I don’t think of as being bad actors, and I just tell them I don’t know enough to give them a good answer.

Even in the rare event that an officer is actually successfully sued, they basically never pay out of pocket.  The department as a whole, so basically the municipality or whatever larger governing body foots the cost, and sometimes those are insured so the insurance company foots the cost.  Even removing qualified immunity, there is little to no direct, personal consequence to an officer financially for absolutely wronging someone even in awful ways.  If you want to be doom and gloom about ramifications, a department could decide to part ways with officers they see as likely to be a financial burden because of their behavior.  It’s hard to view that as a negative though, if you’re such a bad cop that you’re department is genuinely concerned about being sued and immunity not bailing them out, you probably have no business carrying a badge and gun in the first place.

Second and more importantly, even if you believe in the legend of massive frivolous lawsuits, qualified immunity doesn’t stop them.  A frivolous lawsuit is a lawsuit that has no merits and is just a meaningless annoyance you have to deal with.  Qualified immunity is not a bar from filing, it is a defense to make in response to a lawsuit that has already been filed.  If someone runs to court and files against a cop, it’s not like the filing clerk has a fat “QUALIFIED IMMUNITY GTFO” stamp on their desk and they spit on the paperwork before burning it.  Lawyers still need to get involved, and it still goes in front of a judge for a decision on the merits, the only difference is part of deciding the merits is dealing with qualified immunity.  The department and cop avoid nothing but possible responsibility.  If a plaintiff would ultimately prevail at a trial, then by definition the suit is not frivolous.  The only person that qualified immunity stops from filing a frivolous suit is the imaginary person who is content to waste everyone’s time and money on a loser case but is such a purist for legal doctrine that they can’t help but respect the game.  These people don’t exist.

 

Besides, I see absolutely no problem in police having to live in the same world as the rest of us.  Absolute immunity still protects you from legal acts and the law on the books that the Supreme Court barfed qualified immunity out of whole cloth was never written with the intent of being the absurd shield it has become.  There’s no proof that aggressive and unrestrained policing has any net positive effect on crime or safety, so the public is essentially giving the police a pass for intentional misbehavior and gaining basically nothing in return.