An All-Too-Familiar Gesture With Her Hand and Without Four of Her Fingers Showing

An All-To-Familiar Gesture With Her Hand and Without Four of Her Fingers Showing

      While this decision from 2019 by the Sixth Circuit Cout of Appeals has nothing to do with business law, it is at least entertaining. In this case, the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals considered whether a police officer violated a driver’s civil rights by pulling her over after she flipped him off. The court found that indeed her rights were violated. Cruise-Gulyas v. Minard, 918 F.3d 494 (6^th Cir. 2019).

      Minard, a police officer in Michigan, stopped Cruise-Gulyas for speeding. He however, wrote the ticket for a non-moving violation. Cruise-Gulyas, as she pulled away from the traffic stop, as described by the Sixth Circuit “made in all-too-familiar gesture to Minard with her hand and without four of her fingers showing.” Minard pulled her over again and wrote out a ticket for a moving violation. 

      Cruise-Gulyas sued Minard under § 1983, alleging that by pulling her over a second time and changing the non-moving moving violation ticket to a moving violation, he violated her constitutional rights. Specifically, she claimed violation of the Fourth Amendment against unreasonable search and seizure, as well as retaliation for having engaged in protected speech under the First Amendment and restriction of her liberty in violation of the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment. Minard sought to have the suit dismissed on the basis that he had qualified immunity for his actions. When the federal district court denied that effort, he brought this appeal to the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.

      The Sixth Circuit would hold that Minard was in the wrong. 

      In pulling Cruise-Gulyas over a second time, Minard violated her rights against unreasonable search and seizure. While he may have had probable cause for pulling her over the first time, his authority to do so in connection with her having been speeding ended when that first stop concluded. Relying on prior law, flipping off a police officer is not illegal or indicative of an illegal violation. 

      With respect to the First Amendment issue, the court observed, again in reliance upon prior law, that “Any reasonable officer would know that a citizen who raises her middle finger engages in speech protected by the First Amendment.”

       Having denied Minard qualified immunity, the case would have gone back to the District Court for further fact-finding and a decision on the merits.