Opinion ID: 728357
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Legal Framework Governing Applications of Qualified Immunity

Text: We need not address on this appeal whether the officers' no-knock, nighttime search violated appellees' Fourth Amendment rights. See Pearson, 555 U.S. at 236-38, 243, 129 S.Ct. 808. The dispositive question here is whether, given the circumstances presented by the undisputed record facts, a reasonable police officer would have known that the failure to knock or the nighttime search violated appellees' clearly established Fourth Amendment rights. In other words, the protection of qualified immunity is available if a reasonable officer could have believed that [his or her actions were] lawful, in light of clearly established law and the information the officers possessed. Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 615, 119 S.Ct. 1692, 143 L.Ed.2d 818 (1999) (citation omitted). The Supreme Court adopted this criterion of `objective legal reasonableness,' rather than good faith, precisely in order to `permit the defeat of insubstantial claims without resort to trial.' Behrens v. Pelletier, 516 U.S. 299, 306, 116 S.Ct. 834, 133 L.Ed.2d 773 (1996) (quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 819, 813, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982)). [I]n practice ... [the inquiry] turns on the objective legal reasonableness of the action, assessed in light of the legal rules that were clearly established at the time it was taken. Wilson, 526 U.S. at 614, 119 S.Ct. 1692 (citations omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). Qualified immunity thus operates to ensure that before they are subjected to suit, officers are on notice their conduct is unlawful. Hope v. Pelzer, 536 U.S. 730, 739, 122 S.Ct. 2508, 153 L.Ed.2d 666 (2002) (citation omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). This is not to say that an official action is protected by qualified immunity unless the very action in question has previously been held unlawful, but it is to say that in the light of pre-existing law the unlawfulness must be apparent. Wilson, 526 U.S. at 615, 119 S.Ct. 1692 (citations omitted) (internal quotation marks omitted). In determining whether the legal rules at issue are clearly established, a court must look to cases of controlling authority in [its] jurisdiction. Id. at 617, 119 S.Ct. 1692. If there is no such controlling authority, then we must determine whether there is a consensus of cases of persuasive authority. Id.; see also Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, ___ U.S. ___, 131 S.Ct. 2074, 2084, 179 L.Ed.2d 1149 (2011) (explaining that in the absence of controlling authority, a robust `consensus of cases of persuasive authority' is necessary to demonstrate clearly established law (quoting Wilson, 526 U.S. at 617, 119 S.Ct. 1692)). Since we have found neither controlling precedent of the Supreme Court or this circuit, nor a consensus of persuasive authority from our sister circuits, we must reverse. Because this appeal challenges the denial of appellants' motions for summary judgment, we are required to view all facts and draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the nonmoving part[ies], appellees Youngbey and Butler. Brosseau v. Haugen, 543 U.S. 194, 195 n. 2, 125 S.Ct. 596, 160 L.Ed.2d 583 (2004) (per curiam) (citation omitted). We turn now to the relevant facts underlying appellees' Fourth Amendment claims.