Opinion ID: 3035469
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Parameters of the Constitutional Right

Text: [12] Claims that law enforcement officers have used excessive force in the course of an arrest, investigatory stop, or other seizure12 “are properly analyzed under the Fourth Amendment’s ‘objective reasonableness’ standard.” Graham, 490 U.S. at 388. The use of a force against a person who is helpless or has been subdued is constitutionally prohibited. Robinson, 278 F.3d at 1014-15 (holding that officers’ use of firearms at close range, pointed at unarmed misdemeanor suspect’s head, was excessive force); see also Drummond v. City of Anaheim, 343 F.3d 1052, 1057-58 (9th Cir. 2003) (holding that officers’ alleged act of prolonged pressure onto detainee’s prone body as he lay on the ground handcuffed and gasping for air constituted excessive force), cert. denied, 542 U.S. 918 (2004); Headwaters Forest Def. v. County of Humboldt, 276 F.3d 1125, 1130 (9th Cir. 2002) (holding that repeated use of pepper spray against nonviolent protestors under police control rose to the level of excessive force). [13] An officer’s show of force is subject to Fourth Amendment reasonableness requirements even where no actual force is applied. See Robinson, 278 F.3d at 1014-15 (indicating agreement with the Fifth Circuit that “ ‘[a] police officer who terrorizes a civilian by brandishing a cocked gun in front of that civilian’s face may not cause physical injury, but he has certainly laid the building blocks for a section 1983 claim against him.’ ” (quoting Petta v. Rivera, 143 F.3d 895, 905 (5th Cir. 1998) (per curiam))). The Seventh Circuit has also 12 “A ‘seizure’ triggering the Fourth Amendment’s protections occurs only when government actors have, ‘by means of physical force or show of authority, . . . in some way restrained the liberty of a citizen.” Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 395 n.10 (1989) (quoting Terry v. Ohio, 392 U.S. 1, 19 n.16 (1968)). MOTLEY v. PARKS 16853 reached this conclusion. In McDonald v. Haskins, 966 F.2d 292 (7th Cir. 1992), the court held that It should have been obvious to [the officer] that his threat of deadly force — holding a gun to the head of a 9-year-old and threatening to pull the trigger — was objectively unreasonable given the alleged absence of any danger to [the officer] or other officers at the scene and the fact that the victim, a child, was neither a suspect nor attempting to evade the officers or posing any other threat. Id. at 295. [14] In this case, as in McDonald, none of the factors justifying the use of force toward Juan exists. While it may have been reasonable for Kading to have drawn his firearm during the initial sweep of a known gang member’s house, his keeping the weapon trained on the infant, as he was alleged to have done, falls outside the Fourth Amendment’s objective reasonableness standard. Motley has stated a constitutional violation.