Knight Ex Rel. Kerr v. Miami-Dade County, 856 F.3d 795

Background

On Nov. 12, 2007, Miami-Dade Officers Robinson and Mendez shot at a Cadillac driven by Frisco Blackwood, killing Blackwood and Michael Knight and wounding passenger Latasha Cure; plaintiffs (Knight’s estate and Cure) sued under § 1983 and state law.
After pleadings and summary-judgment motions, the district court dismissed some counts and granted summary judgment to Miami-Dade County, two supervising directors, and Detectives Goldston and Raphael; excessive-force and assault/battery claims against the shooting officers proceeded to trial.
At trial, plaintiffs’ police-practices and reconstruction/ballistics experts faced evidentiary limits; the court admitted the defendants’ police-practices rebuttal expert (Katsaris) but excluded plaintiffs’ ballistics/reconstruction experts as untimely; pursuit-policy evidence was also excluded.
The jury (by 7–1 supermajority) returned verdicts for defendants on all remaining counts; plaintiffs moved for a new trial and appealed, challenging evidentiary rulings, a refused jury instruction, admission of criminal-history evidence, and the denial of summary judgment arguments.
The Eleventh Circuit affirmed: it found no abuse of discretion in the trial-court evidentiary rulings or jury-instruction decision, and no error in granting summary judgment to the County, supervisors, or detectives (qualified immunity and no constitutional violation shown).

Issues

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Admissibility of defendants’ police-practices expert (Katsaris)	Katsaris’ methods unreliable, relied on hearsay and facts not known to officers	Katsaris reviewed reports, photos, visited scene, relied on sources experts reasonably use; testimony probative rebuttal	Admission was within trial court’s discretion; no abuse — expert admissible
Exclusion of plaintiffs’ ballistics/reconstruction experts	Exclusion prejudiced plaintiffs; experts crucial to reconstructing events	Disclosures were untimely under the court’s scheduling order and prejudicial to defendants	Exclusion was not an abuse of discretion; lateness not substantially justified or harmless
Exclusion of pursuit-policy evidence and related jury instruction	Policy violations showed officers created risk that led to deadly force and negated qualified immunity; instruction (Swofford-style) required	Policy evidence attenuated from the immediate use of force; policy violations do not by themselves establish Fourth Amendment violation	Court did not abuse discretion excluding pursuit-policy evidence or instruction; risk of jury confusion and temporal attenuation justified exclusion
Admission of plaintiffs’/driver’s criminal-history and drug-use testimony	Criminal-history and drug-use evidence unduly prejudicial and irrelevant	Prior convictions relevant to motive to flee (driver) and impeachment (Cure); drug use relevant to perception/recall; limited by court	Admission was within discretion under Rules 404(b), 609, and 403; limiting instruction given regarding drug use

Key Cases Cited

Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharm., Inc., 509 U.S. 579 (trial courts gatekeep expert reliability)
Kumho Tire Co. v. Carmichael, 526 U.S. 137 (trial-court discretion in assessing expert methodology)
United States v. Frazier, 387 F.3d 1244 (11th Cir.) (three-part Rule 702 analysis)
Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs. of City of New York, 436 U.S. 658 (municipal § 1983 liability requires policy or custom)
City & County of San Francisco v. Sheehan, 135 S. Ct. 1765 (violation of department policy alone does not negate qualified immunity)
Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800 (qualified immunity standard)
Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223 (qualified-immunity two-step analysis)
Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51 (failure-to-train requires deliberate indifference)
County of Los Angeles v. Heller, 475 U.S. 796 (no municipal liability absent underlying constitutional violation)