Opinion ID: 222688
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Rights Were Clearly Established

Text: To decide qualified immunity, we turn next to whether the alleged rights were clearly established. The relevant, dispositive inquiry in determining whether a right is clearly established is whether it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted. Brosseau v. Haugen, 543 U.S. 194, 199, 125 S.Ct. 596, 160 L.Ed.2d 583 (2004), quoting Saucier, 533 U.S. at 202, 121 S.Ct. 2151. The question is whether a reasonable official in Secretary Rumsfeld's position would have known that the conduct he allegedly authorized violated the Constitution of the United States. This is not a case where the precise violation must have been previously held unlawful. Where the constitutional violation is patently obvious and the contours of the right sufficiently clear, a controlling case on point is not needed to defeat a defense of qualified immunity. See, e.g., Hope, 536 U.S. at 741, 122 S.Ct. 2508 (reversing grant of qualified immunity for prison officials who chained a prisoner to a post for seven hours in the hot sun); Nanda v. Moss, 412 F.3d 836, 844 (7th Cir.2005). Given the totality of the plaintiffs' allegations, that they were interrogated with physical violence and threats, were kept in extremely cold cells without adequate clothing, were continuously deprived of sleep, and were often deprived of food, clothing, and medical care, a reasonable official in Secretary Rumsfeld's position in 2006 would have known that this amounted to unconstitutional treatment of a civilian U.S. citizen detainee. See, e.g., Farmer, 511 U.S. at 832, 114 S.Ct. 1970; Hudson, 503 U.S. at 4, 112 S.Ct. 995; Estelle, 429 U.S. at 104, 97 S.Ct. 285. Lest there might have been any uncertainty on the point, Congress had twice recently and expressly provided as much as a matter of statutory law. See Ronald W. Reagan National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2005, 10 U.S.C. § 801, stat. note § 1092 (stating that U.S. military policy prohibits techniques that violate the Constitution and instructing Secretary of Defense to ensure that polices are consistent with international obligations and laws of the United States); Detainee Treatment Act, 10 U.S.C. § 801, stat. note § 1002 (limiting interrogation techniques to those authorized in the Army Field Manual). The defendants offer a final argument that the law was not sufficiently developed with respect to the treatment of detainees in the context of military detention for the plaintiffs to allege adequately the violation of a clearly established constitutional right by Secretary Rumsfeld. The defendants argue that the Supreme Court and appellate courts have struggled, and continue to struggle, with the precise constitutional contours applicable to the detention of individuals  citizen and non-citizen alike  seized in a foreign war zone. On this point, however, the defendants cite only cases involving procedural due process claims: Munaf v. Geren, 553 U.S. 674, 128 S.Ct. 2207, 171 L.Ed.2d 1 (2008), Boumediene v. Bush, 553 U.S. 723, 128 S.Ct. 2229, 171 L.Ed.2d 41 (2008), and Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, 542 U.S. 507, 124 S.Ct. 2633, 159 L.Ed.2d 578 (2004). Those procedural issues are undoubtedly difficult. But they shed no useful light on how a reasonable federal official might have thought that the Constitution permitted him to torture, or to authorize the torture of, a civilian U.S. citizen. The defendants themselves acknowledge that, if properly pled, allegations of violations of substantive due process, the likes of which the plaintiffs have raised, would amount to a constitutional violation. In sum, a reasonable official in Secretary Rumsfeld's position in 2006 would have realized that the right of a United States citizen to be free from torture at the hands of one's own government was a clearly established constitutional right and that the techniques alleged by plaintiffs add up to torture. We affirm the district court's decision to deny dismissal based on qualified immunity.