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- Title
MUNICIPAL IMMUNITY.
- Authors
Schwartz, Joanna C.
- Abstract
Although qualified immunity has taken center stage in recent debates about police misconduct and paths to reform, this Article focuses on another doctrine that has been largely overlooked yet merits at least equal attention--the standards for holding local governments liable for constitutional violations of their officers (also referred to as Monell doctrine, in reference to the Supreme Court case that first recognized the right to sue municipalities under Section 1983). This Article reports the findings of the largest and most comprehensive study to date examining and comparing the challenges of qualified immunity and Monell doctrine in almost 1,200 police misconduct lawsuits filed in five federal districts across the country. I find that it is far more difficult for plaintiffs to prove Monell claims against municipalities than it is for plaintiffs to defeat qualified immunity. In my dataset, local governments challenged Monell claims more often than individual defendants raised qualified immunity--at both the motion to dismiss and summary judgment stages--and, at both stages, courts dismissed Monell claims more often than they granted officers qualified immunity. Plaintiffs regularly abandoned their Monell claims against local governments during the course of litigation as well. Very few Monell claims made it to trial; even fewer succeeded. If popular commentary has overstated the harms of qualified immunity doctrine, it has understated the challenges of Monell. To ensure that people are compensated when their constitutional rights are violated, local governments should be held vicariously liable for their officers' constitutional violations. Strengthening the deterrent effect of Section 1983 suits on officers and local governments is a more complicated task, but a package of state and local reforms I outline holds promise. These proposed reforms may be even more important than ending qualified immunity to our system of constitutional remediation; they may also be more palatable to lawmakers and law enforcement officials who have thus far opposed ending qualified immunity. This may be one of those rare instances when the most pressing reform--ending Monell--is also the most pragmatic.
- Subjects
POLICE misconduct; LOCAL government; UNITED States. Supreme Court; IMMUNITY; CIVIL rights
- Publication
Virginia Law Review, 2023, Vol 109, Issue 6, p1181
- ISSN
0042-6601
- Publication type
Article