Civil Rights
False arrest

Where police officers received a detailed description of an armed robber which matched the defendant, summary judgment was properly granted to the officers on the arrestee's claim of false arrest.

"The security guard who alerted the police to a robbery he thought had been committed by someone in the Williams's van was mistaken, perhaps carelessly; and we shall take up the question of his liability and that of his employer in due course. But his carelessness, if that is the correct characterization of his mistake, cannot be pasted on to the police officers. They could hardly have ignored a security guard's report of a robbery-a detailed report that included a license plate number that led them directly to the Williams house and van. It is true that the report had not said that the robbery was an armed robbery, but neither had it said it wasn't; and it was therefore prudent for the police to assume the worst-that the van might contain an armed criminal. And if you are a police officer with reason to believe there may be an armed robber in a van you approach with utmost caution, which may include pointing a gun at the occupants. Foote v. Dunagan, 33 F.3d 445, 448-49 (4th Cir. 1994), and cases cited there; see also Wilkins v. May, 872 F.2d 190, 194 (7th Cir. 1989); Mellott v. Heemer, 161 F.3d 117, 122-23 (3d Cir. 1998); compare Jacobs v. City of Chicago, 215 F.3d 758, 773-74 (7th Cir. 2000). The fact that it was dark by the time the police arrived (the robbery occurred in late afternoon in January), and that they did not know who might be in the Williams home, were additional reasons for caution."

Affirmed.

07-1619 Williams v. City of Champaign

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois, Bernthal, Mag. J., Posner, J.

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