California, United States of America
The following excerpt is from Asgari v. City of Los Angeles, 15 Cal.4th 744, 63 Cal.Rptr.2d 842, 937 P.2d 273 (Cal. 1997):
"For executive officials in general, ... qualified immunity represents the norm." (Harlow v. Fitzgerald (1982) 457 U.S. 800, 807, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2732, 73 L.Ed.2d 396.) Police officers are granted a qualified immunity shielding them from liability for damages caused by their official acts "insofar as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." (Id. at p. 818, 102 S.Ct. at 2738.) Under federal law, therefore, a police officer is liable for all damages proximately caused by his or her official acts that a reasonable person would have known to violate clearly established rights, including such acts that would constitute malicious prosecution. (Cook v. Sheldon (2d Cir.1994) 41 F.3d 73, 79 ["Section 1983 liability may also be anchored in a claim for malicious prosecution, as this tort 'typically implicates constitutional rights secured by the fourteenth amendment, such as deprivation of liberty.' [Citation.]"].)
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