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What legal hurdles must be overcome to win a lawsuit for excessive force?
What legal hurdles must be overcome to win a lawsuit for excessive force?
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00:04
you know there have been a number of
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cases in recent years of police
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00:10
shooting and killing unarmed
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00:14
people
00:15
and that often becomes
00:18
a situation where
00:20
the families
00:22
sue the police officers and the police
00:24
department
00:25
but the courts have
00:28
provided
00:30
extreme
00:32
obstacles to overcome
00:35
holding those police officers
00:37
accountable one of those things is
00:39
called qualified immunity and it’s
00:42
become very controversial
00:44
uh police officers have this
00:48
unique defense that they are allowed to
00:51
raise
00:52
uh that they’re immune from suit
00:56
based on certain qualifications based on
00:58
certain circumstances and that is if
01:01
they perceived
01:03
uh
01:05
that the person they shot and killed was
01:07
a threat to them or to others
01:10
it’s supposed to be an objective
01:11
perception but it’s often interpreted in
01:14
a subjective way
01:17
which means that if the officer had a
01:19
legitimate reason to believe that the
01:21
person he or she shot was a threat
01:25
they’re immune from liability that’s a
01:28
difficult standard to overcome and the
01:30
supreme court has recently doubled down
01:33
on that even though a number of
01:36
intermediate federal appellate courts
01:39
have questioned that doctrine and so
01:41
there’s a lot of
01:42
effort in the u.s congress to legislate
01:47
that away and to pass a law that that is
01:50
not a legit legitimate defense
01:52
but that is still a significant obstacle
01:55
to overcoming a police brutality case
Austin, TX personal injury attorney Scott Hendler discusses the legal hurdles one must be overcome to win a lawsuit for excessive force by a police officer.
