A federal judge sided with a Springfield police officer who was being sued by a homeless man who accused the police officer of using excessive force during an arrest.
The plaintiff in the case, Devin Ledbetter, claimed Officer Brandon Helmers violated his Fourth Amendment rights and used excessive force when arresting him in 2020.
U.S. District Judge Roseann Ketchmark granted Helmers’ motion to dismiss Ledbetter’s lawsuit based on Helmers having qualified immunity in an order issued in February 2024. Qualified immunity is a defense that’s sometimes available to government officials who are accused of violating people’s constitutional rights.
Ketchmark also denied Ledbetter’s motions for judgment and for a new trial.
Helmers was represented by Christopher Hoeman, chief litigator in the civil division of the Springfield City Attorney’s Office.
“I felt from the beginning the officer did nothing wrong,” Hoeman said. “I think this order indicates that the judge agrees that the officer really did nothing wrong here, given the circumstances that he was facing.”
Ledbetter's attorney Charles C. Eblen said he and his client intend to appeal Ketchmark's decision.
Dispute over a knife and a concrete landing
During a civil trial in 2023 that resulted in a deadlocked jury, Hoeman argued Ledbetter was holding a large knife and not responding to police officers’ commands to drop it.
Ledbetter claimed he willfully dropped his knife, was moving away from the knife and was cooperating with the officers’ commands. Ledbetter claimed he was not resisting when Helmers picked him off the ground and slammed him onto a piece of concrete, shattering Ledbetter’s pelvis and driving one of his femurs through the back of his pelvis.
Ledbetter, 58, now uses a wheelchair and is currently serving time in a Missouri prison for a conviction for unlawful use of a weapon. He will likely be released in the fall of 2024.
Helmers testified that he did not lift Ledbetter into the air and slam Ledbetter down. Rather, Helmers said he pulled Ledbetter to the ground to handcuff him.
Jurors, judge weighed two key considerations
Although jurors were deadlocked on the issue of whether or not Helmers used excessive force, they were able to answer two of the special verdict interrogatories regarding if Helmers had qualified immunity under federal law.
Ketchmark used those answers to help her decide if Helmers had qualified immunity or if Ledbetter’s case should get another trial.
To the special verdict interrogatory of, “Did Helmers believe Ledbetter posed a safety risk to the officers at the time force was applied?” the jury answered yes. The jury also agreed this belief was reasonable.
However, on that other special verdict interrogatory of, “Did Helmers believe Ledbetter was resisting arrest at the time force was applied?” the jury said no.
In her order filed Feb. 9, 2024, Ketchmark wrote that she used a two-part test to determine whether a government official is entitled to qualified immunity.
The first part was to determine “whether the facts alleged, construed in the light most favorable to [Plaintiff], established a violation of a constitutional or statutory right.”
The second part of the test was to determine “whether that right was clearly established at the time of the alleged violation, such that a reasonable officer would have known his actions were lawful.”
As to the first part, Ketchmark noted the jury determined Helmers reasonably believed that Ledbetter posed an immediate threat to the safety of the police officers or others at the time the force was applied and that such belief was reasonable. The judge pointed out that the officers were responding to a 911 call of a scene described to them as a woman being held against her will in a tent in the woods.
When Ledbetter emerged from the tent, he was carrying a large knife, the judge wrote. The officers did not know who else was in the tent.
“While it is unfortunate Plaintiff suffered injuries, in this rapidly evolving situation, there is no claim that Defendant intended to make Plaintiff strike the cement when he brought Plaintiff to the ground,” Ketchmark wrote in part.
“In reviewing the totality of the circumstances, the Court finds Defendant Helmers was reasonable in his response to a possible kidnapping where he faced a man emerging from a tent with a heavy-duty machete and one or more unknown individuals still in the tent behind him,” the judge wrote.
Attorney explains qualified immunity analysis
Because Ledbetter could still appeal Ketchmark’s decision, Hoeman said he considers this case to be pending litigation, and would not be able to comment further about his opinions about the case or the judge’s decision.
Reached by phone Feb. 20, Hoeman explained the concept of qualified immunity and the reasons why the jury’s answers to the special questions were important.
To determine if a public official has qualified immunity, Hoeman said courts ask two questions: Do the facts establish a violation of a constitutional right? And if so, was that right clearly established at the time of the incident such that a reasonable official (in this case, a reasonable law enforcement officer) would have known they were violating someone’s rights through their conduct?
For the plaintiff — Ledbetter — to succeed in his lawsuit, the answer to both of those questions needed to be yes, Hoeman explained.
“The judge in this case found the answer to both of those questions was no,” Hoeman said.
Since Ledbetter claimed he was compliant with the officers’ commands that night and Officer Helmers claimed he believed Ledbetter was a threat, it was left to the jury to decide via those special interrogatories.
“The jury found that yes, he (Ledbetter) was a threat,” Hoeman explained. “So now the judge can go back and instead of construing it as a possibility that he wasn’t a threat, now treats it as true that he was a threat.”
History of the Ledbetter case
Ledbetter initially represented himself in the civil lawsuit, filing handwritten pleadings from the Greene County Jail in 2021.
In those early filings, Ledbetter asked for $8 million in damages and also named Police Chief Paul Williams and then-Corporal Gilbert Correa.
Ketchmark later dismissed Williams appointed attorney Charles C. Eblen with Shook, Hardy & Bacon L.L.P. in Kansas City to represent Ledbetter.
In June of 2021, Helmers and Correa answered Ledbetter’s amended complaint and asserted the affirmative defense of qualified immunity. The officers filed a motion for summary judgment in November of 2021. The Court granted the summary judgment as to Correa but denied Helmer’s request for summary judgment.
The case then proceeded to a two-day jury trial on Oct. 23, 2023.
Ledbetter: ‘I’ve never resisted an officer in my life’
During that trial, Ledbetter testified that he often hung out and drank alcohol with his friends at the homeless camp. Since it was cold, they’d build a fire. He said the knife in question, which has a 9-inch blade and serrated edge, was used to cut up wood and branches to burn.
Ledbetter testified when he heard the police outside of the tent, he thought it was a friend returning with fire wood, and that is why he had the knife in his hand.
Ledbetter said he came out of the tent and saw Officer Correa pointing a gun at him, Ledbetter dropped the knife and put his hands up. Ledbetter testified that Helmers, “scooped me up, carrying me three to five feet[…] and body slammed me on concrete.”
Ledbetter said he was complying with the officers orders, adding that he’s been arrested before and “I’ve never resisted an officer in my life.”
Officer believed Ledbetter was a threat, aggressive
In his testimony, Helmers denied picking up Ledbetter off the ground.
“I grabbed him and pulled him down,” Helmers said at the trial. He described feeling Ledbetter “tense up” when Helmers grabbed Ledbetter’s wrist. Helmers said he was concerned because Ledbetter wasn’t following the officers’ commands to move away from the knife.
Asked why Helmers didn’t tell Ledbetter to put Ledbetter’s hands behind his back and attempt to handcuff him standing up, Helmers said it was “due to his aggressive nature when he came out of the tent.”
Helmers explained that police have a hierarchy of whose safety they are most concerned with. At the top are hostages, followed by innocent people, then police officers. At the bottom is the safety of crime suspects.
Helmers said his biggest concern at that time was, “(Ledbetter) would pick up the knife or he would turn and get back in the tent,” and hold whomever was in the tent hostage.
Helmers testified that despite being ordered to move away from the knife, Helmers did not see Ledbetter move.
“I started to escort him away from the knife,” Helmers said at the trial.
Asked if Helmers still considered Ledbetter a threat even after the knife was on the ground, Helmers said yes.
“If he starts to pull away or fight,” Helmers said, “we’ve just put a weapon in there.”
A juror submitted a question for Helmers, asking why Helmers felt it was safe to holster his weapon and approach Ledbetter.
“Honestly I didn’t feel safe,” Helmers said. “Hostages and innocents are above the police. We have to, in our job, risk our lives in those situations to get containment of the threat.”
