490 U.S. 386 (1989)
In November 1984, Dethorne Graham, a diabetic, felt the onset of an insulin reaction while in Charlotte, North Carolina.1 He asked his friend William Berry to drive him to a convenience store to purchase orange juice to counteract the reaction.2 Upon entering the store and seeing people ahead in the checkout line, Graham hurried out without buying anything and asked Berry to drive him to a friend's house instead.3
Officer Connor of the Charlotte Police Department observed Graham's hasty entry and exit from the store and became suspicious.4 Connor followed Berry's car and made an investigative stop about one-half mile from the store.5 Although Berry explained that Graham was suffering from a sugar reaction, Connor ordered them to wait while he investigated what had happened at the store.6 Graham then got out of the car, ran around it twice, sat on the curb, and passed out briefly.7
Additional officers arrived on the scene in response to Connor's request for backup.8 They rolled Graham over on the sidewalk and cuffed his hands tightly behind his back, ignoring Berry's pleas to get him some sugar.9 One officer commented that Graham was drunk and said to lock him up.10 The officers lifted Graham up, placed him face down on the hood of Berry's car, shoved his face down when he asked them to check his wallet for a diabetic decal, and threw him headfirst into a police car.11 A friend brought orange juice but the officers refused to let Graham have it.12 Graham was eventually released after Connor received a report that he had done nothing wrong at the store.13 During the encounter Graham sustained a broken foot, cuts on his wrists, a bruised forehead, an injured shoulder, and a ringing in his right ear that continued afterward.14
Graham commenced this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the individual officers, alleging they had used excessive force.15 The District Court applied a four-factor test, found the force appropriate under the circumstances with no discernible injury and no malice, and granted respondents' motion for a directed verdict.16 A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed.17 The Supreme Court granted certiorari.18
Whether a free citizen's claim that law enforcement officials used excessive force in the course of making an arrest, investigatory stop, or other seizure of his person is governed by the Fourth Amendment's objective reasonableness standard?19
All claims that law enforcement officers have used excessive force—deadly or not—in the course of an arrest, investigatory stop, or other seizure of a free citizen should be analyzed under the Fourth Amendment and its reasonableness standard, rather than under a substantive due process approach.20 The Fourth Amendment guarantees citizens the right to be secure in their persons against unreasonable seizures of the person.21 Determining whether the force used to effect a particular seizure is reasonable under the Fourth Amendment requires a careful balancing of the nature and quality of the intrusion on the individual's Fourth Amendment interests against the countervailing governmental interests at stake.22 The reasonableness of a particular use of force must be judged from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, rather than with the 20/20 vision of hindsight.23 The inquiry is an objective one that does not consider the officers' underlying intent or motivation.24
Yes. The excessive force claim arises in the context of an arrest or investigatory stop of a free citizen.25 This occurred here when Dethorne Graham, a diabetic experiencing the onset of an insulin reaction, was subjected to an investigative stop by Officer Connor after hastily entering and leaving a convenience store without making a purchase.26 The officers' subsequent actions, including rolling Graham over on the sidewalk, cuffing his hands tightly behind his back, placing him face down on the hood of the car, shoving his face down, and throwing him headfirst into the police car, must therefore be evaluated under the Fourth Amendment's objective reasonableness standard.27 This standard incorporates allowance for the fact that police officers are often forced to make split-second judgments in tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving circumstances about the amount of force necessary in a particular situation.28
The lower courts instead applied the four-part Johnson v. Glick test focused on subjective good faith or malice.29 This test is incompatible with Fourth Amendment analysis because it improperly injects consideration of the officers' subjective motivations.30 Application of the correct standard requires remand to the Court of Appeals for reconsideration of the directed verdict ruling under the proper objective inquiry.31 The inquiry examines the severity of the crime at issue, whether the suspect poses an immediate threat to the safety of the officers or others, and whether he is actively resisting arrest or attempting to evade arrest by flight.32
Graham's claim that the officers used excessive force during the investigatory stop is governed by the Fourth Amendment's objective reasonableness standard.33
Related opinions on this issue
Justice Blackmun joins the Court's opinion insofar as it rules that the Fourth Amendment is the primary tool for analyzing claims of excessive force in the prearrest context.34 He concurs in the judgment remanding the case to the Court of Appeals for reconsideration of the evidence under a reasonableness standard.35 He notes respondents' concession that the pleadings properly may be construed as raising a Fourth Amendment claim.36 He sees no reason for the Court to reach out further to decide that prearrest excessive force claims must be analyzed under the Fourth Amendment rather than under a substantive due process standard.37 Blackmun also sees no basis for the suggestion that Tennessee v. Garner implicitly held that prearrest excessive force claims are governed by the Fourth Amendment.38 Nowhere in Garner is a substantive due process standard discussed or rejected as an alternative.39
He would have left the question whether substantive due process analysis remains available in prearrest cases for another day when it is squarely raised with full adversary presentation.40 He observes that force not demonstrably unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment will only rarely raise substantive due process concerns.41
Whether such excessive force claims should instead be analyzed under a substantive due process standard?42
Because the Fourth Amendment provides an explicit textual source of constitutional protection against physically intrusive governmental conduct during seizures, that Amendment, not the more generalized notion of substantive due process, must be the guide for analyzing these claims.43 Section 1983 is not itself a source of substantive rights but merely provides a method for vindicating federal rights elsewhere conferred, so analysis begins by identifying the specific constitutional right allegedly infringed.44 The validity of an excessive force claim must then be judged by reference to the specific constitutional standard that governs that right rather than to some generalized excessive force standard.45 The Johnson v. Glick four-factor test, which inquires into whether force was applied in good faith or maliciously and sadistically for the very purpose of causing harm, is incompatible with a proper Fourth Amendment analysis because it puts in issue the subjective motivations of the officers.46
No. The Court rejects the notion that all excessive force claims brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 are governed by a single generic standard such as the four-part Johnson v. Glick test applied by the District Court and affirmed by the Court of Appeals.47 That test considered the need for the application of force, the relationship between that need and the amount of force used, the extent of the injury inflicted, and whether the force was applied in a good faith effort to maintain and restore discipline or maliciously and sadistically for the very purpose of causing harm.48 In the present case the District Court used those factors to find that the amount of force was appropriate under the circumstances, that there was no discernible injury inflicted, and that the force was not applied maliciously or sadistically but in a good faith effort to maintain order, leading to the directed verdict for the officers.49 The Court of Appeals endorsed the same test and held that a reasonable jury could not find the force constitutionally excessive.50
Because the Fourth Amendment supplies the explicit textual source of protection for seizures of free citizens, the generalized substantive due process approach and its subjective elements have no proper place in the analysis of Graham's claim arising from the investigatory stop and the physical force applied to him while he was experiencing a medical emergency.51
Excessive force claims by free citizens during seizures should not be analyzed under a substantive due process standard.52