Radecki v. Barela’s Empirical Analysis

Citation profile

21 federal appellate · 14 district · 2 state decisions

Most-quoted passages

The sentences later courts lift from this opinion, ranked by how many decisions quote each — the parts of the opinion doing the work. These counts are smaller than the citation total above because most of the 54 citing decisions cite the case generally; a passage count includes only decisions quoting that exact language verbatim.

1. “It is true, of course, that state actors are generally only liable under the Due Process Clause for their own acts and not private violence. There are, however, two exceptions to that rule. First, the state may be subject to constitutional liability if it does not perform a duty to provide protection to an individual with whom the state has a special relationship because it has assumed control over that individual, such as in a prison. Second, the state may be constitutionally liable if it creates a danger that results in harm to an individual, even if that harm is ultimately inflicted by a private party. The shocks the conscience standard applies to both types of suits.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Manzanares v. Roosevelt Cnty. Adult Det. Ctr. · J.H. ex rel. J.P. v. Nation

2. “acted with an intent to harm the participants or to worsen their legal plight.”

   2 later decisions quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. Ellis ex rel. Estate of Ellis v. Ogden City · Childress v. City of Arapaho

3. “It should not be surprising that the constitutional concept of conscience shocking duplicates no traditional category of common-law fault, but rather points clearly away from liability, or clearly toward it, only at the ends of the tort law’s spectrum of culpability. Thus, we have made it clear that the due process guarantee does not entail a body of constitutional law imposing liability whenever someone cloaked with state authority causes harm.... We have accordingly rejected the lowest common denominator of customary tort liability as any mark of sufficiently shocking conduct, and have held that the Constitution does not guarantee due care on the part of state officials; liability for negligently inflicted harm is categorically beneath the threshold of constitutional due process .... It is, on the contrary, behavior at the other end of the culpability spectrum that would most probably support a substantive due process claim; conduct intended to injure in some way unjustifiable by any government interest is the sort of official action most likely to rise to the conscience-shocking level.”

   1 later decision quote this exact passage · from the majority
   e.g. 508 F. Supp. 2d 929 - Clark v. Summit County Sheriff