It only took minutes for the FBI to realize it had raided the wrong home.
But in that time, masked federal agents smashed through an Atlanta family’s front door, startling Trina Martin and her boyfriend at the time out of bed with a flash-bang grenade and guns raised, as her 7-year-old son screamed from another room.
Now, the Supreme Court has been asked to decide whether the family can seek damages for the 2017 botched raid, to hold law enforcement accountable for the error.
The justices Tuesday seemed likely to punt on the question and have a lower court weigh the matter further. However, they also expressed skepticism of the government’s contention that the officers were acting with discretion — a detail that could be key to deciding whether they’re left on the hook.
“You might look at the address … the right street,” Justice Neil Gorsuch said of the officers who raided the home.
“Is that asking too much?” Gorsuch asked.
At the heart of the case is the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), which waives the government’s sovereign immunity and lets people injured by certain actions of federal officers bring some claims for damages against it under state law.
The law was amended in 1974, after a pair of wrong-house raids made headlines, which Martin argues makes it clear that her lawsuit should be allowed to proceed. But other exceptions to the law, which seem to conflict, make it more complicated.
An Atlanta federal judge threw out the suit in 2022, and last year, the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision. The justices agreed to hear the case in January.
Patrick Jaicomo, a lawyer for Martin, said Tuesday that “innocent victims” of the government’s mistakes must have a legal remedy available. He suggested that by ruling for the government, the justices would eliminate “most, if not all, of the thrust” of the FTCA.
“The government’s policy is to raid the right house,” Jaicomo said, suggesting that if a delivery person dropped a pizza at the wrong address, the pizza shop would still have to issue a refund.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor questioned what Congress’s intention when it amended the law would have been if not to provide protection for situations like Martin’s.
One exception to the FTCA prevents plaintiffs from suing the government for damages that arise out of an officer’s discretionary acts, which the government says applies to this case. Sotomayor also questioned the government’s position that the agents were acting within their discretion.
“I don’t know how going into the wrong house can be described as discretionary,” she said.
Frederick Liu, who argued for the government, suggested it was a “reasonable mistake” to enter the wrong home — an example of the “policy trade-offs” officers make when placed in risky situations.
When Gorsuch pushed back that verifying the address, or even the street, seemed like a low bar, Liu said the officers might have been weighing other public safety considerations, such as their visibility to the targets if they were to examine the location more closely.
Despite that, several justices suggested sending the questions back to the 11th Circuit for further consideration might be the best course of action.
A decision is expected by this summer.
