Town of Castle Rock v. Gonzales, 545 U.S. 748 (2005)
WASHINGTON,
June 27 – The Supreme Court ruled on Monday that the police did not
have a constitutional duty to protect a person from harm, even a woman
who had obtained a court-issued protective order against a violent
husband making an arrest mandatory for a violation.The
decision, with an opinion by Justice Antonin Scalia and dissents from
Justices John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, overturned a ruling
by a federal appeals court in Colorado. The appeals court had permitted a
lawsuit to proceed against a Colorado town, Castle Rock, for the
failure of the police to respond to a woman’s pleas for help after her
estranged husband violated a protective order by kidnapping their three
young daughters, whom he eventually killed.
Published
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