Plumhoff v. Rickard

Rickard led the officers on a chase with speeds exceeding 100 miles per hour and lasted over five minutes. During the chase, Rickard passed more than two dozen other vehicles, several of which were forced to alter their course. After Rickard’s car collided with a police car and appeared to be stopped, Rickard resumed maneuvering his car in an attempt to escape. Under the circumstances, the court found Rickard’s outrageously reckless driving posed a grave public safety risk. As a result, a reasonable officer could have concluded that Rickard was intent on resuming his flight, and if he were allowed to do so, he would once again pose a deadly threat for others on the road. Consequently, the court held the police officers acted reasonably by firing at Rickard to end that risk.

The court added the officers were justified in firing 15 shots at Rickard, stating, “If police officers are justified in firing at a suspect in order to end a severe threat to public safety, the officers need not stop shooting until the threat has ended.” Here, during the 10-second span when the officers fired their shots, Rickard continued to flee until he crashed. In addition, the court stated Allen’s presence in the car had no bearing in the analysis of whether the officers acted reasonably by firing at Rickard because Fourth Amendment rights are personal and cannot be asserted by another person. As such, the court did not consider Allen’s presence in the car when determining the reasonableness of the officers’ actions. Finally, the court held even if the officers’ use of force against Rickard had been unreasonable, the officers would still have been entitled to qualified immunity. The court found that at the time of the incident, no clearly established law prohibited the officers from firing at a fleeing vehicle to prevent harm to others.