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Civil Rights — malicious prosecution

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//April 20, 2012//

Civil Rights — malicious prosecution

By: WISCONSIN LAW JOURNAL STAFF//April 20, 2012//

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United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Civil Rights — malicious prosecution

Where the plaintiff in a malicious prosecution action pleaded guilty, summary judgment was properly granted to the defendants on his civil rights claim.

“Lewis pled guilty to class A misdemeanor charges of obstruction of justice and official misconduct. But, here, a judgment in Lewis’s favor would to some degree vindicate him, given that defendants allegedly participated in a scheme to fabricate evidence against him. Importantly, however, such vindication is inconsistent with his guilty plea. On this point, it is well-settled that Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 447 (1994) bars a plaintiff from maintaining a § 1983 action where a judgment in favor of the plaintiff would necessarily imply that his conviction was invalid. See McCann v. Neilsen, 466 F.3d 619, 621 (7th Cir. 2006). In other words, in light of Lewis’s guilty plea, an argument exists that his claims against defendants were doomed from the outset. At oral arguments, Lewis’s counsel suggested that the guilty plea— for four class A misdemeanors—is, in effect, severable from the far more serious original 49 felony charges. Fortunately, we need not wade deeply into this issue, given the lack of evidence supporting Lewis’s overarching theory of a conspiracy.”

Affirmed.

11-2012 Lewis v. Mills

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois, McCuskey, J., Pratt, J.

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