Scott v. Harris

Incident Summary & Facts

In March 2001, a Georgia county deputy clocked Victor Harris driving 73 mph in a 55-mph zone and activated his blue lights. Harris sped away, leading police on a chase down mostly two-lane roads at speeds over 85 mph. Deputy Timothy Scott joined the pursuit. In a shopping-center parking lot, Harris was nearly boxed in, but he escaped by making a sharp turn, colliding with Scott’s patrol car, and speeding off again. Scott then took over as lead pursuit vehicle.

Six minutes and nearly 10 miles into the chase, Scott radioed his supervisor for permission to use a PIT maneuver and was told to “[g]o ahead and take him out.” Concerned that the vehicles were moving too fast to execute a PIT safely, Scott instead applied his push bumper to the rear of Harris’s car. Harris lost control, left the roadway, ran down an embankment, overturned, and crashed. He was rendered a quadriplegic. A dash-camera videotape recorded the chase. The Court said it showed Harris swerving around more than a dozen cars, crossing the double-yellow line, forcing cars onto the shoulders, and running multiple red lights, a “Hollywood-style car chase of the most frightening sort.” The Court acknowledged that at the moment of the ramming, no other vehicles or pedestrians were being threatened.

Harris sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for excessive force in violation of the Fourth Amendment. The district court denied Scott summary judgment on qualified immunity, and the Eleventh Circuit affirmed on interlocutory appeal. The Supreme Court reversed.

Core Legal Issue

Whether, under the Fourth Amendment’s objective-reasonableness standard, an officer may end a dangerous high-speed chase by ramming the fleeing car, placing the motorist at risk of serious injury or death, in order to protect innocent bystanders. A related question was whether a court at summary judgment must accept a plaintiff’s account that is blatantly contradicted by video evidence.

The Holding

Scott’s attempt to terminate the chase by forcing Harris off the road was objectively reasonable, so he did not violate the Fourth Amendment and was entitled to summary judgment. The Eleventh Circuit’s judgment was reversed (8-1).

The Court’s Analysis:

• Video controls at summary judgment. “When opposing parties tell two different stories, one of which is blatantly contradicted by the record, so that no reasonable jury could believe it, a court should not adopt that version of the facts.” The Eleventh Circuit “should not have relied on such visible fiction.”
• No Garner on/off switch. Tennessee v. Garner “did not establish a magical on/off switch that triggers rigid preconditions whenever an officer’s actions constitute ‘deadly force.’” It was simply an application of Graham’s reasonableness test. “Whether or not Scott’s actions constituted application of ‘deadly force,’ all that matters is whether Scott’s actions were reasonable.”
• Balancing. The Court weighed the intrusion against the governmental interest, considering “not only the number of lives at risk, but also their relative culpability.” Harris “intentionally placed himself and the public in danger,” while those at risk from the chase “were entirely innocent.”
• No duty to abandon the chase. Ending the pursuit would not have reliably ended the danger, and requiring police to let reckless drivers go would create an “invitation to impunity-earned-by-recklessness.” The Court’s rule: an officer’s attempt to end a dangerous high-speed chase that threatens innocent bystanders “does not violate the Fourth Amendment, even when it places the fleeing motorist at risk of serious injury or death.”
• Concurrences: Justices Ginsburg and Breyer said the inquiry is situation-specific, not a per se rule. Breyer also urged reconsidering Saucier’s mandatory order of analysis.
• Dissent (Stevens, J.): He argued that the video showed no close calls or pedestrians, that sirens had cleared traffic, and that police had Harris’s license plate. In his view, whether the force was reasonable was a jury question, and less drastic options (stop sticks, a loudspeaker warning) were available.