One of the most common mantras you hear about the federal court system is that judges should not make law—that is, legislate from the bench—but should interpret and apply the law as it is written. A new case that could make its way to the Supreme Court would be a particularly powerful reminder of this.

A bipartisan group of congressmen, including Sens. Rand Paul (R–Ky.), Ron Wyden (D–Ore.) and Cynthia Lummis (R–Wyo.), and Reps. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.). Nikema Williams (D–Ga.), Harriet Hageman (R–Wyo.) and Dan Bishop (R–NC) are urging the high court to take up the case surrounding a family whose home was mistakenly raided by police. FBI in the middle of the night and were later denied the right to sue for damages.*

But the family’s reason for rejection is particularly perverse, congressmen wrote in a recent op-ed. brief information He appealed to the high court, arguing that the 11th Circuit of the US Court of Appeals had reversed the relevant law. blocked Plaintiff Curtrina Martin from the case.

Early one morning in 2017, Martin and her then-fiancée, Hilliard Toi Cliatt, awoke to the FBI detonating a flash grenade in their home and ripping their door off its hinges. Agents then went to their bedroom and found the couple hiding in the closet, to which they retreated in fear; An officer dragged Cliatt outside and handcuffed him, while another pointed a gun and shouted at Martin. Martin said he ended up on the shelf during the rapidly developing chaos. Her 7-year-old son was in his room and says his mind had gone to a dark place.

“I don’t know if there’s an appropriate word to use” to express the fear he felt, Martin said. said me this summer.

The FBI couldn’t find out who they were coming for because the suspect didn’t live there and wasn’t associated with Martin or Cliatt. When Martin sued, the 11th Circuit not only granted immunity to Lawrence Guerra, the leader of the SWAT raid, but the justices also said his claims could not advance under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), which allows people to file a variety of lawsuits. the state’s unfair treatment of the federal government.

What is rather ironic, however, is that the FTCA was revised in the 1970s with a law enforcement requirement providing for a green light against the federal government for intentional torts committed by federal law enforcement. The inspiration for this law, members of Congress write, were two false home invasions of families in Collinsville, Illinois, in April 1973.

These raids attracted national attention more than 50 years ago. On the evening in question, federal officers raided the home of Herbert and Evelyn Giglotto; About 30 minutes later, separate agents raided Donald and Virginia Askew’s home. Neither house was the real target of the federal government.

“Mr. and Mrs. Giglotto testified today under oath that they were handcuffed by screaming agents, thrown onto their beds, verbally abused with a series of obscenities, and repeatedly threatened with death while an agent held a cocked gun to Mr. Giglotto’s head.” wrote New York TimesReporting on testimony before the Senate in May 1973. “Many of their apartments were ransacked and damaged.”

Charles Percy, then a Republican senator from Illinois, presided over this hearing. “You can rest assured,” he allegedly said. Times“I will find out who ordered this investigation.” He would continue to defend the FTCA’s law enforcement requirement.

As members of Congress wrote in their brief to the Supreme Court, it’s hard to ignore the similarities between Martin’s experiences and those of the Giglottos and Askews.

“The plain text of the (law enforcement) provision provides for—and was specifically enacted to ensure—that victims of wrongful home raids by federal agents, such as the Collinsville families, may seek compensation from the United States for their wrongful home raids,” they write. “But the Eleventh Circuit’s decision invalidates law enforcement requirements in this very case.”

The debate over law enforcement accountability in the United States has been a torturous one. Qualified immunity (the legal doctrine that protects state and local government actors from federal civil suits if their alleged misconduct is not “clearly established” in prior case law) was implemented by the Supreme Court. On the contrary some movement Congress in 2020 and 2021 I didn’t fix this legally. A lot victims related to alleged state abuse like this seized from find relief.

But in Martin’s case, it seems Congress I did offered a workable legal solution, and the 11th Circuit disagreed. “This asymmetry is indefensible,” the members of Congress write, “and is contrary to Congress’ intentional decision 50 years ago to accept responsibility and provide compensation to those harmed by federal law enforcement misconduct.”

*CORRECTION: A congressman was named incorrectly in the original version of this article.