Barnes v. Felix

LII note: The U.S Supreme Court has now decided Barnes v. Felix

    Issues

    When analyzing whether a law enforcement officer used excessive force, should courts consider context outside of the narrow time when the officer’s safety was threatened?

    Oral argument:
    January 22, 2025
    Court below:
    United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit

    This case asks the Supreme Court to determine whether courts should consider context outside of the narrow time when the officer’s safety was threatened when analyzing whether a law enforcement officer used excessive force. The Fifth Circuit applies the “moment of the threat” doctrine when analyzing the reasonableness of the use of deadly force by a police officer. Under the “moment of the threat” doctrine, the court can only consider the instance at which an officer deployed the deadly force in its reasonableness analysis. Barnes argues that the “moment of the threat” doctrine should be rejected because it contravenes precedents established by the Supreme Court and because it raises impossible line-drawing problems. Felix counters that the “moment of the threat” doctrine is consistent with precedent and is a straightforward analysis that does not raise line-drawing issues. The outcome of this case has strong implications for law enforcement and community relations.

    Questions as Framed for the Court by the Parties

    Whether courts should apply the "moment of the threat" doctrine when evaluating an excessive force claim under the Fourth Amendment.

    Facts

    On April 28, 2016, Officer Roberto Felix, Jr. shot and killed Ashtian Barnes after a traffic stop.  Before the killing, the Harris County Toll Road Authority provided Felix with a plate number that had outstanding violations. Felix then spotted and pulled over Barnes’ car, which matched the plate number with outstanding violations. During the stop, Barnes stated that he did not have his license or proof of insurance and that the car had been rented by his girlfriend. Barnes then turned the car off after Felix asked him to stop digging around. Felix also stated that he smelled marijuana and asked Barnes if there was anything in the car that he should know about. Then Barnes stated that his license and insurance information may be in the trunk of his car.

    While remaining in his car, Barnes remotely opened the trunk. Felix then asked Barnes to get out of the car. Barnes then opened the driver's side door without exiting the vehicle. The car’s left blinker then turned on, indicating that the keys were in the ignition. At this point, Felix drew his weapon at Barnes and shouted, “don’t f---ing move.” Felix stepped onto the door sill of Barnes’s car and pushed Barnes’ head to the right with his gun. The car then started to drive forward with Felix still on the door sill. Felix then shot into the car twice without seeing where he was aiming. A few minutes later, Barnes was pronounced dead at the scene by paramedics.

    Barnes’ parents sued Felix and Harris County, claiming violations of his Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable force under Section 1983 and the Texas Tort Claims Act. The district court granted Felix and Harris County’s motion for summary judgment, finding that Barnes posed a serious threat to Felix when the car began to move and thus made his use of force not excessive. In reaching this conclusion, the district court found that Felix’s dash camera footage resolved any factual dispute that would be important to the resolution of the case. Specifically, the district court concluded that the dash camera footage showed that Barnes turned the car back on after being ordered to exit the car; because of this action by Barnes, the district court determined that it was immaterial whether Felix drew his gun before or after the car moved.

    Barnes then appealed, claiming that the district court was wrong both when they concluded that there was no dispute as to any material fact and when they concluded that Barnes’s constitutional rights were not violated.

    On appeal, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s ruling. In affirming, the Fifth Circuit clarified that, when dealing with an excessive force inquiry, the court only determines whether the officer was in imminent danger in the moment that caused the officer’s use of force; the officer’s actions prior to the use of force are irrelevant to the excessive force analysis. Since the district court determined that the moment of the threat occurred two seconds before the shooting at Felix was hanging off of the moving car at this time, Felix could have reasonably believed that his life was in danger. In conclusion, the circuit court emphasized that courts should only examine the short period of time from the moment of threat to the use of force in an excessive force inquiry.

    The United States Supreme Court granted Barnes’s petition for certiorari on October 4, 2024

    Analysis

    ADHERANCE TO PRECEDENT

    Petitioner Barnes argues that the Supreme Court should reject the moment of the threat doctrine when evaluating an excessive force claim under the Fourth Amendment because the doctrine conflicts with the Court’s precedents. Brief for Petitioner, More specifically, Barnes cites United States v. Place to contend that the Court should ask whether the totality of circumstances, rather than only the precise instant at which an officer deployed force under the moment of the threat doctrine, justified a particular search or seizure in question. Barnes then asserts that the Court has considered factors beyond the precise instant at which an officer deployed deadly force to evaluate the reasonableness of a seizure. For example, Barnes refers to the non-exhaustive factors the Supreme Court considered in Graham v. Connor such as the severity of the crime at issue, the immediacy of the threat posed by the suspect to the officers or others, and whether the suspect is actively resisting arrest to demonstrate that the Court has considered factors beyond the moment of threat. Barnes includes additional examples of the Court considering a broad range of factors such as the preceding moments of a chase, the relative culpability of the driver and innocent bystanders, the effort to temper the amount of force, and the foreseeable consequence of an officer’s actions.

    Barnes also claims that the moment of the threat prevents the Court from balancing a private person’s interest against a seizure with the state’s interest in apprehending criminals as was required in Tennessee v. Garner. According to Barnes, Ashtian Barnes’s liberty interest—his interest in his own life—was at its peak in this case, whereas the state lacked meaningful interest in Officer Felix jumping on Ashtian Barnes’s car. Furthermore, Barnes states that contrary to the moment of the threat doctrine, the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against unreasonable seizures does not differentiate between deadly and non-deadly seizures. Finally, Barnes argues that the common law considered factors the moment of the threat doctrine ignores such as the severity of the crime, the role an officer played in bringing about the situation said to necessitate deadly force, and whether an office attempting arrest identified himself.

    Respondent Roberto Felix counters that for the past three decades, the Court has scrutinized excessive force claims by applying the reasonableness standard “at the moment” the force was used. Brief for Respondent, Felix argues that the Supreme Court in Graham required a determination of the reasonableness of the use of force to be applied at the moment the force was used, which is consistent with the way that courts using the moment of the threat doctrine analyze claims of excessive force. Felix also notes that Graham underscored the reasonableness of a particular use of force being judged from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene rather than with the benefit of hindsight. According to Felix, other cases have affirmed Graham’s focus on the moment when the force was used by examining the reasonableness of force “when the conduct occurred,” “‘at the moment force’ was employed,” or “at the time of the shooting.” Felix also points out that the moment of the threat doctrine is consistent with the directive that the totality of the circumstances is considered in analyzing the reasonableness of force used. Felix points out that the Graham factors such as whether the suspect posed an immediate threat to the officer or whether the suspect actively resisted arrest reflect the “temporal perspective of the inquiry” under Graham. Felix posits that the totality of the circumstances doctrine must take the moment an officer experienced threat into account in its analysis of the reasonableness of the officer’s use of force and is simply recognizing that under Graham, the threat of harm factor typically predominates the analysis when lethal force was deployed.

    In addition, Felix contends that the balancing of private and public interests is incorporated into the moment of the threat doctrine because the government has a strong interest in effecting arrest and in ensuring public safety by means of deadly force if necessary. Felix notes that the moment of the threat doctrine limits the consideration of contextual factors to only those relevant to the inquiry of whether the use of deadly force was necessary and not to the determination of whether an officer created such a need. For this reason, Felix argues that the moment of the threat doctrine is not inconsistent with the common law doctrines of reasonable use of force; and, Felix also claims that the common law’s constraint on officers from using deadly force in the context of an unlawful arrest is irrelevant in this case since the initial stop was lawful. Similarly, Felix contends that even though the fleeing suspect had not committed a felony as the common law requires for an officer to use deadly force, such a constraint is not pertinent here because the officer used force out of fear rather than to catch a fleeing suspect.

    ADMINISTRABILITY

    Barnes argues that the moment of the threat doctrine produces unjust outcomes. For example, Barnes claims that by limiting the timeframe for which an officer might bear responsibility for inciting threat, the moment of threat doctrine requires courts to sanction a police officer’s behavior when the officer themselves used violence to escalate an arrest situation in which deadly force was necessary. Barnes notes that the doctrine may also impose unwarranted liability on officers that acted reasonably by taking the officers’ actions out of broader context that could have justified use of force. Finally, Barnes contends that the moment of the threat doctrine raises impossible line-drawing questions. Barnes explains that courts that apply the moment of the threat doctrine lack a principled way determining when pre-seizure events start.Barnes points out that the case at hand proves the difficulty in choosing what conduct to include and exclude in the analysis of reasonableness of an officer’s conduct, since including the fact that Officer Felix jumped onto the car before feeling threatened enough to warrant the shooting may have led to a different verdict. Instead, Barnes contends that courts can use ordinary ideas of causation to fall within the reasonable calculus.

    Felix counters that the moment of the threat doctrine does not immunize officers from excessive force liability. According to Felix, not only have courts found officers liable for violation of Fourth Amendment rights under the moment of the threat doctrine, but petitioners can also bring separate Fourth Amendment claims for actions committed before the deadly force. Felix goes further to add that, practically speaking, the moment of the threat doctrine never immunizes officers from excessive force liability given that Barnes could not provide a single example of such a case from an annual average of 240 million emergency calls and 49.2 million officer-citizen interactions in the United States. Felix also contends that the moment of the threat doctrine does not require courts to determine what constitutes pre-seizure activity and what does not; instead, Felix argues that the moment of the threat doctrine requires a straightforward approach to construing whether an officer was in danger when the deadly force was used and does not warrant difficult line-drawing questions.

    Discussion

    LAW ENFORCEMENT ACTIONS

    In support of Barnes, Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence and Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence (“Giffords”) argue that the moment of the threat doctrine encourages the use of deadly force; and, when law enforcement officers use deadly force, victims are deprived of their right to have a trial to determine their potential guilt. Furthermore, Giffords argues that the moment of the threat doctrine does not disincentivize an officer from using deadly force because, under this doctrine, courts do not consider the totality of the circumstances leading to the use of deadly force, thus immunizing law enforcement from responsibility in cases where they might escalate the situation unnecessarily.

    In support of Felix, the States of Texas, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Virginia (“States”) respond that the financial impact of Barnes’s resolution would reduce police department resources at a time when enrollment and recruitment is low and where police budgets could more usefully be used on personnel. . Additionally, the States claim that Barnes’s proposed course of action would put law enforcement in a bind where they either must choose between professional discipline for not arresting a suspect or civil damages if the arrest goes wrong.

    COMMUNITY RELATIONS

    In support of Barnes, Color of Change (“Change”) proposes that low-level traffic stops disproportionately affect minority communities, with the drawbacks outweighing the benefits.  Specifically, Change articulates that low-level traffic stops, such as the one leading to the death of Barnes, undermine the public’s trust in the police because black and Hispanic drivers are more likely to be stopped than white drivers since the moment of the threat doctrine overly protects police enforcement actions from liability and minority communities are more likely to receive low-level stops than their white counterparts, the moment of the threat doctrine has a disproportionate potential to harm black and Hispanic drivers. When this trust is reduced, black and Hispanic people are less likely to communicate with the police for important functions, such as reporting crimes or aiding in investigations. From the perspective of the officers, these low-level stops reduce the amount of time that can be spent on more serious offenses that more directly correlate with public safety. In this same vein, Giffords explains that the moment of the threat doctrine perpetuates racial disparities in enforcement because studies show that law enforcement officers may feel more threatened by Black Americans; the moment of the threat doctrine would not take this context into account when asking if the use of force was unreasonable.

    In support of Felix, the States fear that increased potential for liability would change the way that officers conduct their work, with increased liability causing them to act with extreme caution instead of following their professional objectives independent of outside considerations. The States further posit that staffing shortages combined with this cautious policing leads to more crime, reduced public safety, and burnt-out officers, leading to a cycle of increased liability due to poor performance. Explaining the real effects of staffing shortages in recent years, the States explain that effects include increased crime rates, increased response times, and an increased rate of murder cases not being solved. Furthermore, the States claim that because the effects of the police shortage are felt more greatly in urban centers, urban citizens and officers alike are moving to less populated areas, exacerbating the problem in cities. Lastly, the States claim that increasing the liability of law enforcement officers through the resolution proposed by Barnes would increase the financial burden on states who often indemnify law enforcement officers who either settle or are found to be liable in excessive force cases.

    Conclusion

    Authors

    Written by:    Richard Han and Ty Lisi

    Edited by:      Sarah Stevenson-Peck

    Additional Resources