Llovet v. City of Chicago , No. 13-3351 (7th Cir. 2014)
Annotate this CaseAfter being acquitted in a state court of aggravated battery, the plaintiff sued two Chicago police officers and the City of Chicago, under 42 U.S.C. 1983 for malicious prosecution. He claimed that the officers had prepared false police reports and used them to persuade a state prosecutor to file the charge. The district court dismissed, reasoning that a federal suit for malicious prosecution by state officers is permissible only if the state in which the plaintiff had been prosecuted does not provide an adequate remedy, which Illinois does. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, rejecting an argument that a federal suit for malicious prosecution can be based on the Fourth Amendment rather than on the due process clause, and that all that the plaintiff has to prove in order to establish a violation of the Fourth Amendment is that he was wrongfully in detention at some point. Because the initial seizure was supported by probable cause and did not violate the Fourth Amendment, the fact that the deprivation of liberty lasted longer than it should have, is irrelevant. The Fourth Amendment does not regulate the length of detentions.
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