MacKintrush v. Hodge, No. 20-1162 (8th Cir. 2021)
Annotate this Case
Plaintiff filed suit against a deputy and the County under 42 U.S.C. 1983 for violations of his Fourth Amendment rights. In this case, defendant was arrested at a halfway house and booked for second-degree criminal mischief, a misdemeanor.
The Eighth Circuit affirmed the district court's denial of defendant's motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity where a jury could find that plaintiff's constitutional rights were violated when the deputy body-slammed plaintiff to the floor, knocking him out. Assuming that plaintiff was a nonviolent, nonthreatening misdemeanant who pulled his arm away from the officer, Karels v. Storz, 906 F.3d 740, 747 (8th Cir. 2018), put the deputy on notice that his body slam was excessive force.
Court Description: [Benton, Author, with Gruender and Stras, Circuit Judges] Civil case - Civil rights. The district court did not err in denying the defendant jail employee's motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity as a jury could find plaintiff's constitutional right to be free from excessive force was violated when the defendant slammed plaintiff to the ground, knocking him unconscious; it was clear from Eighth Circuit precedent that a body slam was excessive force when used against a nonviolent, nonthreatening misdemeanant who pulled his arm away from the officer. [ February 04, 2021 ]
Some case metadata and case summaries were written with the help of AI, which can produce inaccuracies. You should read the full case before relying on it for legal research purposes.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.