Brent Stroman, et al. v. John Wilson, et al.

This case involves issues relating to the arrest of respondents on the charge of engaging in organized criminal activity and the sufficiency of respondents’ pleadings to overcome the individual petitioners’ qualified immunity. On May 17, 2015, following a violent confrontation between rival motorcycle clubs (together with their affiliated support groups), which left nine people dead and at least twenty others wounded, law enforcement officers arrested 177 individuals on charges of engaging in organized criminal activity. The district court granted petitioners’ motions to dismiss respondents’ false arrest claims. The Fifth Circuit reversed and remanded, construing the holding of Franks v. Delaware, 438 U.S. 154 (1978)—previously considered by the Fifth Circuit as an exception to that court’s independent intermediary doctrine—as giving rise to a separate cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The lower court further applied its prior opinion in McLin v. Ard, 866 F.3d 682, 690 (5th Cir. 2017), to conclude that “mere allegations of taint” in the grand jury proceedings may be sufficient to survive dismissal “where the complaint alleges other facts supporting the inference” of taint. The questions are:

1. Is the Fifth Circuit’s decision declaring a so-called Franks violation to be a cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in conflict with this Court’s decisions in Vega v. Tekoh, 142 S. Ct. 2095 (2022) and Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335 (1986)?

2. Will the Fifth Circuit’s decision—that “there is no requirement to show that each and every defendant (i)