Summary
Supreme Court Review - Case Note
Claims of malicious prosecution brought under 42 U.S.C. 1983 should be analyzed based on the Fourteenth Amendment's procedural due process clause and according to the Fourth Amendment's standard of 'objective reasonableness,' although substantive due process review under the Fourteenth Amendment does not apply. The U.S. Supreme Court in Albright v. Oliver correctly rejected a substantive due process claim for malicious prosecution, but failed to consider the issue of procedural due process. The Fourth Amendment claim was not raised in this case.See the full content of this document
Extract
Fourth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment - malicious prosecution and s. 1983: is there a constitutional violation remediable under Section 1983?
I. INTRODUCTION
In Albright v. Oliver,(1) the United States Supreme Court addressed whether the claim of malicious prosecution is actionable under 42 U.S.C. [sections] 1983.(2) The plurality concluded that "substantive due process may not furnish the constitutional peg on which to hang such a 'tort.'"(3) Therefore, it rejected petitioner's Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process claim to be free from prosecution absent probable cause.(4) This Note examines the development of the federal jurisprudence concerning claims for malicious prosecution under [sections] 1983. This Note argues that, in Albright, the Court correctly disposed of petitioner's Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process claim to be free from prosecution absent probable cause. However, this Note asserts that procedural due process is also implicated by an arrest and initiation of a criminal prosecution, and that application of the Fourth Amendment to a [sections] 1983 claim based on malicious prosecution, while precluding substantive due process review, should not preclude procedural due process review.(5) Ultimately, this Note concludes that alleged constitutional violations as a result of malicious prosecution are properly analyzed under both the procedural due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment and the "objective reasonableness" standard of the Fourth Amendment, but not under the "open-ended" Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. II. BACKGROUND 42 U.S.C. [sections] 1983(6) provides a legal remedy for the violation of constitutional rights conferred in other areas of the Constitution.(7) Under the statute, an individual must first "identify[] the specific constitutional right allegedly infringed."(8) The Supreme Court has recognized that the statute was "meant to give a remedy to parties deprived of constitutional rights, privileges, and immunities by an official's abuse of his position."(9) However, the courts have not held that every common-law tort committed by an individual acting "under color of law"(10) is actionable under [sections] 1983. In the case of malicious prosecution, there has been an "embarrassing diversity of judicial opinion" as to whether it is actionable under the section.(11) Until Albright, the Court had never addressed whether malicious prosecution could be actionable under [sections] 1983. A. THE COMMON LAW TORT OF MALICIOUS PROSECUTION The common law tort of malicious prosecution generally requires four elements: (1) the defendant must have initiated a criminal proceeding; (2) the proceeding must have ended in the plaintiff's favor; (3) the proceeding must have been initiated without probable cause; and (4) the defendant must have acted maliciously in the initiation of the prosecution.(12) Although the elements of the tort have been clearly established, courts have differed on whether a well-pleaded complaint based upon malicious prosecution by a government official "acting under color of law" provides a cause of action under [sections] 1983.(13) The debate entails not only whether malicious prosecution itself violates the federal Constitution, but also what particular provision the tort violates.(14) The federal courts have split almost evenly on the issue of whether a plaintiff must allege more than the common law tort of malicious prosecution to state a claim under [sections] 1983. 1. Allegation of Malicious Prosecution Violates the Constitution: The Expansive Approach The most liberal approach taken with respect to an allegation of malicious prosecution under [sections] 1983 has been clearly articulated by the Third Circuit, which held that an allegation of the elements of the common law tort, by itself, states a claim under [sections] 1983 for violation of a constitutional right.(15) In Lee v. Mihalich,(16) plaintiffs brought an action against investigators in the Medicaid Fraud Control Office Unit of the Office of the Pennsylvania Attorney General alleging abuse of process and malicious prosecution against them pursuant to a Medicaid fraud suit that was dismissed as time-barred.(17) While the court held that the defendants were entitled to a defense based upon qualified immunity,(18) the court determined that a successful allegation ...See the full content of this document
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