Recently, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments about excessive force and lawsuits resulting from it. The Justices seemed to lean toward rejecting the traditional legal practice of courts that considered the history of an officer in regard to the use of force versus focusing only on the danger perceived by officers during aggressive arrests, known as “the moment of threat.”

The case is Barnes v. Felix. It was argued in the Supreme Court on January 22, 2025.

The legal issue being determined in the High Court centers around the current limits on lawsuits that hold police officers accountable when they are accused of using deadly force. However, looking at data showing police violence against black people versus others is shocking.

For example, in the U.S. from 2013 to 2024, Statista reports that “The rate of police shootings of Black Americans is much higher than any other ethnicity, at 6.2 per million people. This rate stands at 2.8 per million for Hispanic people and 2.4 per million for white people.”

Indeed, a national fear of being pulled over by police officers is so ingrained among Black families in the U.S, that many parents warn their children when they learn to drive to always stay extremely calm, have their driving documents nearby, and hold their hands up if pulled over by the police for “Driving while black.”

The Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is clear: a police officer may not use "unreasonable" force during a search or seizure. However, there is an acknowledged grey area in how any police officer may perceive danger, from his/her prior experiences with violence to the level of menace “in the moment.”

The Supreme Court will soon decide on how much weight, if any, should be considered by courts regarding a police officer’s involvement in prior incidents of force, as compared to the real-time danger or “in the moment” of threat by a suspect.

In a 1989 case, Graham v. Connor, the Supreme Court said that besides the history of a police officer’s violence under duress, other circumstances must be also considered, such as when a suspect is menacing police officers or not, during an arrest.

However, numerous lower courts have disagreed on the answer to this legal conundrum.

The legal case that launched the latest oral arguments in the High Court is based on a Texas 2016 shooting of 24-year-old Ashtian Barnes. Mr. Barnes was driving a rented car that his girlfriend lent to him so he could drive to pick up his young daughter from daycare.

Unknown to Mr. Barnes, the license plate was connected to numerous unpaid tolls that were linked to a different driver. He was pulled over by Houston Officer Roberto Felix Jr. of the Harris County Constable’s Office because the officer saw the record of the unpaid tolls.

When he was pulled over, Mr. Barnes panicked since he could not find his license and the registration for the officer. Then, Officer Felix told the 24-year-old to step out of the car as he started to open the door. Mr. Barnes panicked and started to drive away, and Officer Felix shot the driver two times, killing him.

The incident was recorded on the officer’s dashcam video. At the time of the shooting, the officer was partly in the car, and on the interior sideboard, so when Mr. Barnes pulled away, the officer said he was fearful for his safety. The family of Mr. Barnes sued, claiming that the police officer’s use of force violated the Fourth Amendment since it was “unreasonable.’

The Supreme Court will be announcing its decision later this year, but as of now, the Justices appear to be leaning toward the “moment of threat” and not the history of the officer’s use of force. Another question to be resolved is the scope of the “moment of threat” and whether it includes only the seconds before the use of force or the larger context surrounding the entire encounter.