Fight to hold officer who framed teen accountable gets elevated

A fight to hold accountable a cop who framed a teen for a crime she did not commit and watched her go to prison for two years is being elevated.

The Institute for Justice confirms it is seeking a review by the full 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals after a panel affirmed the dismissal of a civil rights case brought on behalf of Hamdi Mohamud.

She sued St. Paul officer Heather Weyker, “who framed Mohamud in 2011,” the IJ explained.

“Because Weyker was working on a state-federal task force and cross-deputized as a federal officer at the time, the court held that Weyker cannot be held accountable for fabricating evidence that put then-teenaged Mohamud behind bars for nearly two years,” the IJ charged.

It now will petition the entire 8th Circuit for en banc review so that all active judges may reconsider the panel’s decision.

“Today’s decision is deeply disappointing,” said Patrick Jaicomo, senior attorney at the Institute for Justice. “Despite clear evidence that Officer Weyker lied to frame Hamdi, the courts continue to grant her immunity. No constitutional right is safe if judges invent or maintain loopholes for officers who flout the law.”

The decision being targeted was from a three-judge panel of the court.

“At the heart of Mohamud v. Weyker is a growing accountability gap created when local police officers join work cooperatively with federal officers on task forces. Ordinarily, a federal law known as ‘Section 1983’ allows victims to sue state and local officers who violate the Constitution. But when those officers work alongside federal colleagues, courts tend to bless them with sweeping immunities that leave their victims with no legal remedy. This long-running is a case in point,” the IJ charged.

It reported in 2019, the Eighth Circuit first held that Weyker could not hide behind qualified immunity because “a reasonable officer would know that deliberately misleading another officer into arresting an innocent individual to protect a sham investigation is unlawful,” the legal team explained.

Then a year later the court claimed Weyker could not be sued “as a federal officer,” but that Mohamud had to show Weyker was acting as a state officer.

The IJ presented extensive documentation describing how Weyker was working as a state officer—on a St. Paul led task force with its mission to benefit Minnesota.

But the decision disregarded the evidence, the IJ said.

“Today’s decision allows Officer Weyker to escape scot-free for framing an innocent teenager. But IJ will continue the legal battle by appealing this case to the full Eighth Circuit and, if necessary, Supreme Court,” the IJ said.