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City of Chico, California, et al. v. Estate of Tyler S. Rushing, et al.

Paid petition · United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, No. 20-16428 · judgment November 30, 2021


Certiorari denied · May 16, 2022
Pre-decision estimate: 4% cert probability

Before the decision, roughly the 4.1% base rate. The model weighted this up for a state or local-government petitioner, a Ninth Circuit decision below, and a petition filed soon after the judgment below.

Questions presented

The questions presented by this petition are:

  1. As a matter of first impression, does the Fourth Amendment prevent law enforcement officers from deploying a Taser to safely arrest a suspect who violently attacked the officers but who has not clearly been subdued?

  2. Did the Ninth Circuit’s decision conflict with this Court’s legal precedent in determining that a reasonable officer would have had fair notice that the use of the Taser to safely handcuff decedent Tyler Rushing might violate the Fourth Amendment?

  3. Does the Ninth Circuit’s decision conflict with Graham v. Connor and decisions of other Circuits insofar as it ignores the totality of the circumstances and confines its Fourth Amendment analysis to the approximate minute between Officer Ruppel’s second shot and deployment of the Taser?

Counsel of record

For petitioner
Sharon Ponce de Leon Medellin
Alvarez-Glasman & Colvin

For respondent
Dennis P. Riordan
Riordan & Horgan

Case

Conference history
Distributed for 1 conference

Proceedings

  1. May 16 2022
    Petition DENIED.
  2. Apr 20 2022
    DISTRIBUTED for Conference of 5/12/2022.
  3. Apr 15 2022
    Reply of petitioners City of Chico, California, et al. filed.
  4. Apr 04 2022
    Brief of respondents Estate of Tyler Rushing, et al. in opposition filed.
  5. Feb 28 2022
    Petition for a writ of certiorari filed. (Response due April 4, 2022)