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Civil Rights — qualified immunity

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//March 13, 2012//

Civil Rights — qualified immunity

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//March 13, 2012//

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United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Civil Rights — qualified immunity

Where a plaintiff in a civil rights case against a police officer changed his story after being confronted with videotape evidence, the officer was entitled to qualified immunity on a false arrest claim.

“The district court focused on the fact that the object in McComas’s hand as he is leaving the bar’s office and walking through the kitchen is unidentifiable. Accepting this, it still does not render unreasonable a conclusion that McComas was assisting a criminal. This is especially true given the suspicious quality of McComas’s statement immediately prior to his arrest. At best, McComas gave an unclear and hazy account of what happened that night. At worst, he lied. He initially claimed not to have seen any altercation and that he became aware of a shooting only when a body was dragged into the bar. He further claimed that he did not use a taser that night. He also told a story about helping a woman to the back office to retrieve her coat. None of these things jibed with what was clear in the surveillance footage, which showed that McComas was directly involved in at least part of an altercation inside the bar and that he used a taser on a group of patrons. It further shows that at around 3:00 a.m., he was walking out of the back office not with a coat, but with a smaller, unidentifiable object in his hand. Only when Brickley revealed to McComas that the surviellance video contradicted his story did McComas change that story. Under these circumstances, it was certainly not unreasonable for Brickley to conclude he had been lied to. Lying to the police is a bad idea, in part because it creates the impression that the liar has something to hide. This applied especially to McComas, who as a former police officer can reasonably be expected to know the consequences of lying to the police in the course of a murder investigation.”

Reversed and Remanded.

11-2138 McComas v. Brickley

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Indiana, Barker, J., Bauer, J.

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