SCOTUS Refuses to Hear "Qualified Immunity" Case
Police officers have sovereign immunity, meaning, if they are acting within the scope of their employment, they are immune from civil lawsuits. What happens if they deviate from the scope of their employment? Well, then they have "qualified immunity."
The modern test for Qualified Immunity was created by the Supreme Court in 1982, in Harlow vs. Fitzgerald. Police officers are immune from civil lawsuits under the test of: (1) Was excessive force used? (2) If so, would a reasonable person believe in good faith that her conduct was lawful. So, in other words, officers can use excessive force as long as their conduct was reasonable.
Many people believe that this is a license to kill without any repercussions. Keep in mind, this only applies to civil lawsuits, where the only thing at stake is money, not criminal charges that can take away an officer's liberty. But, often times, if theres no civil case, then there's no criminal case.
Qualified Immunity is no where to be found in any legislation. The Supreme Court created it and now they're not going to revamp it.
When the Supreme Court decided to hijack Congress' job and legislate from the bench, their thought process was that when there's danger, civilians tend to run away, but police officers run toward that danger. Maybe excessive force needs to happen in order to save lives. But, many believe that excessive force should never be used. SCOTUS figured that the legislatures gave sovereign immunity, so it should be difficult to sue police officers to prevent an onslaught of legislation and government actors need to fulfill their duties by whatever means necessary.
I am tired of seeing people get shot in the back and killed. I am tired of seeing police officers place their knees on the necks of people. Congress needs to enact legislation that defines excessive force and make it illegal. We have separation of powers for a reason. Congress needs to enact the laws, SCOTUS needs to interpret and ensure that they don't violate the constitution. If they do violate the constitution, SCOTUS needs to make that legislation void as opposed to trying to make it work by creating bifurcated tests.