Facts
Paul Cantu was suicidal and suffering from mental distress when the Austin Police Department (APD) encountered him on January 29, 2019. APD Sergeant Michael Joseph located Cantu’s car off-road in a grassy field while responding to a service call around 1:40 a.m. that morning. Joseph parked behind the car and shined his spotlights on it. Cantu exited the driver’s seat with a handgun drawn and aimed at the officer. Joseph drew his own weapon and exited his cruiser to engage Cantu. His body-camera footage shows that Joseph repeatedly ordered Cantu to drop the gun and to get on the ground. Cantu ultimately knelt; he did not drop the gun, pointing it to his own head. For the next six minutes, Joseph urged Cantu to drop the gun, to no avail.
Joseph called for backup, saying there was a gun and requested a ballistic shield. At about 1:45 a.m., APD Officer Luis Alberto Camacho, III arrived and took a position to provide lethal cover. About a minute later, APD Officer Robert Mattingly arrived with the ballistic shield and began to position it by Joseph’s cruiser. As Mattingly did so, Cantu stood up and pointed his gun towards Joseph and Mattingly, the two officers who fired sixteen rounds at Cantu over the ensuing two-to-three seconds. Cantu was struck five times and fell to the ground on his back. For the next two minutes, the officers ordered Cantu to show his hands and place them on his stomach.
Body-camera footage shows Cantu complied. Once he followed their instructions, the officers approached and handcuffed Cantu. APD Officers Jacob Beirowski and Julian Pardo-Martin began administering first aid before Cantu was transported to a hospital where he was later pronounced dead. Cantu’s parents sued the APD and seven of its officers— Joseph, Beirowski, Camacho, Mattingly, Pardo-Martin, Peterson, and Knodel. Plaintiffs asserted § 1983 claims against the officers, alleging Fourth Amendment violations for excessive force. The district court dismissed all claims on summary judgment. The 5th affirmed.
Analysis
To prevail on an excessive-force claim, a § 1983 plaintiff must establish: (1) an injury (2) which resulted directly and only from a use of force that was clearly excessive, and (3) the excessiveness of which was clearly unreasonable. An officer’s use of deadly force is presumptively reasonable when the officer has reason to believe that the suspect poses a threat of serious harm to the officer or to others.
The district court held that Camacho and Mattingly acted reasonably in response to Cantu’s threat. Plaintiffs argue otherwise, contending Cantu was incapacitated by a single shot and thus the officers were clearly unreasonable in continuing their fire. Plaintiffs, however, offer no evidence that the first shot incapacitated Cantu. What’s more, the officers’ body-camera footage establishes that Camacho and Mattingly shot all sixteen rounds within just two-to-three seconds. Their response in a tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving situation was not clearly unreasonable.
We agree with the district court that the officers’ use of force was not objectively unreasonable and Plaintiffs failed to demonstrate their son’s Fourth Amendment rights were violated.
Even if we found, contrary to our above conclusion, that Camacho and Mattingly violated Cantu’s Fourth Amendment rights, they are still entitled to qualified immunity because their actions were objectively unreasonable in light of clearly established law at the time of the shooting. The law was well-established, at the time of the shooting, that any reasonable officer would have known that Camacho’s and Mattingly’s behavior was lawful.
https://www.ca5.uscourts.gov/opinions/unpub/24/24-50397.0.pdf