Garner Follow Up
Slate got to the Alito-Garner memo story
on Friday night, pointing out that Alito didn’t believe that shooting
an unarmed fleeing suspect posed any constitutional issue:
By a vote of 6 to 3, the court ruled in favor of Edward Garner’s
father. “It is not better that all felony suspects die than that they
escape,” Justice Byron White wrote for the majority. Alito had argued
that the court shouldn’t set a constitutional standard for police
shootings of fleeing suspects, questioning whether the shooting of
Garner counted as a “seizure” as defined by the Fourth Amendment. White
dismissed both ideas. “Whenever an officer restrains the freedom of a
person to walk away, he has seized that person,” White wrote. “There
can be no question that apprehension by the use of deadly force is a
seizure subject to the reasonableness requirement of the Fourth
Amendment.”
father. “It is not better that all felony suspects die than that they
escape,” Justice Byron White wrote for the majority. Alito had argued
that the court shouldn’t set a constitutional standard for police
shootings of fleeing suspects, questioning whether the shooting of
Garner counted as a “seizure” as defined by the Fourth Amendment. White
dismissed both ideas. “Whenever an officer restrains the freedom of a
person to walk away, he has seized that person,” White wrote. “There
can be no question that apprehension by the use of deadly force is a
seizure subject to the reasonableness requirement of the Fourth
Amendment.”