Thompson v. Clark

Summary

The Supreme Court held that to satisfy the favorable-termination element of a Fourth Amendment malicious-prosecution claim under 42 U.S.C. §1983, a plaintiff need only show that the criminal prosecution ended without a conviction; no affirmative indication of innocence is required. Following its practice of deriving §1983 claim elements from the most analogous common-law tort as of 1871, the Court found that American malicious-prosecution law at that time treated any termination without conviction—including abandonment by the prosecutor or dismissal without stated reason—as favorable, and that Thompson's unexplained pretrial dismissal satisfied the element. Because Thompson's charges were dismissed without explanation, the Second Circuit, applying its Lanning precedent, had required an affirmative innocence indication and affirmed dismissal of his claim; the Court reversed and remanded while reserving questions of seizure, probable cause, and qualified immunity. Justice Alito, joined by Justices Thomas and Gorsuch, dissented, contending that the Fourth Amendment houses no malicious-prosecution claim and that the Court fabricated an unfounded hybrid tort.