Whether a law enforcement officer violated substantive-due-process rights by recklessly gathering unreliable evidence

QUESTIONS PRESENTED After twice reversing district-court judgments for Petitioners, the Eighth Circuit affirmed judgments of approximately 30 million dollars against them, finding that liability was supported under two theories of liability applied to a 1989 murder investigation. Petitioners ask the Court to review: I. Whether in 1989 a law-enforcement officer violated a plaintiff’s rights merely by recklessly gathering “unreliable” evidence implicating the plaintiff in a crime (1) even if the prosecutor and defense counsel had access to all information needed to assess the reliability of the evidence gathered; and (2) even if the evidence gathered was never used at a plaintiff’s criminal trial because the plaintiff voluntarily pleaded to charges. II. Whether in 1989 a law-enforcement officer violated a plaintiff’s clearly established right prohibiting the “manufacture of false evidence” by conducting an interview or interrogation during which false statements incriminating the plaintiff were made, even if the plaintiff voluntarily pleaded to charges. III. Whether a county can be liable for the decision of a sheriff, as final policymaker, to fail to stop a multi-suspect investigation when (1) the jury found that the sheriff ii QUESTIONS PRESENTED Continued was not responsible for any constitutional violation or any conspiracy; (2) the plaintiffs identified no municipal policy; and (3) there was no evidence of a historical pattern of constitutional violations.