United States Fifth Circuit

In a civil rights case against a Louisiana city and various others brought by plaintiff who was incarcerated for twenty years before DNA testing proved him innocent, denial of defendant-laboratory technician's motion to dismiss on the grounds of qualified immunity is affirmed in part where: 1) the deliberate or knowing creation of a misleading and scientifically inaccurate serology report amounts to a violation of a defendant's due process rights, and a reasonable laboratory technician in 1984 would have understood that those actions violated those rights; and 2) denial of qualified immunity was also proper on a claim that defendant concealed, suppressed, or destroyed lab results that were conclusively exculpatory with respect to plaintiff.

Appellate Information

• Decided 02/27/2008
• Published 02/27/2008

Judges

• OWEN, Circuit Judge:, Before DeMOSS, DENNIS and OWEN, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Fifth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• John E. Bies (argued), Eric H. Holder, Jr., Covington & Burling, Washington, DC, William E. Rittenberg, Rittenberg, Samuel & Phillips, New Orleans, LA, for Plaintiff-Appellee., Lance Sterling Guest (argued), New Orleans, LA, for Defendant-Appellant.