Municipal Immunity for Brady Violations

Connick v Thompson, __ US __; 131 S Ct 1350 (2011)(march’11). Justice Thomas authored this opinion which reversed a fourteen-million-dollar award in favor of Thompson, who served eighteen years in prison for murder and armed robbery before his convictions were vacated after it was discovered that prosecutors failed to turn over exculpatory evidence. The Court held that the prosecutor’s office could not be held liable under Section 1983 for failing to properly train its attorneys based on a single Brady violation. The main issue was how one can show deliberate indifference, a required element in Thompson’s failure to train claim under Section 1983. The majority held that deliberate indifference is, almost exclusively, shown by proving a pattern of similar constitutional violations. However, Justice Ginsberg wrote, in a dissenting opinion joined by three other justices, that there are many ways to demonstrate deliberate indifference short of an established pattern of violations, and the evidence presented at trial was more than sufficient for the jury to find deliberate indifference.