> But as soon as the charges got to the department, they dropped it.
So?
> The police department did nothing egregiously wrong.
Insofar as the officers, as agents of the department, were trained and supervised in such a way that they did something egregiously wrong in the conduct of their duties, the police department did, in fact, due something equally wrong.
> It is the individual police officers that I would like to see be liable here.
Then you should favor suing the responsible department because, given QI, you need a clearly established right for their to be personal liability, and the only way to get there is to sue someone to clearly establish the right. Which can't be the individuals, because QI.
(Even without QI, you should favor suing the deoartment, because individual officers can be disposable and replaced with people selected and trained for the same tendencies, but department leadership and policies that keeping turning into a liability hole for the local government are more likely to trigger more significant changes.)
I should not favor suing the department when I can find no legal theory under which they should be liable. And in this case it was an individual officer mistake that directly did no harm, and was corrected as soon as it came to the department's attention. I'm not going to find anything in police training or general behavior that fits with this mistake being a general pattern that is endemic to the department. I see no damages or legal relief that makes sense here.
Arguing about what good might come from the department losing said lawsuit is like debating how convenient it might be if pigs could fly. The whole conversation is based on something that isn't going to happen, and therefore isn't a real possibility. And any attempt to go from discussion to reality by actually filing said lawsuit is a waste of effort.
So?
> The police department did nothing egregiously wrong.
Insofar as the officers, as agents of the department, were trained and supervised in such a way that they did something egregiously wrong in the conduct of their duties, the police department did, in fact, due something equally wrong.
> It is the individual police officers that I would like to see be liable here.
Then you should favor suing the responsible department because, given QI, you need a clearly established right for their to be personal liability, and the only way to get there is to sue someone to clearly establish the right. Which can't be the individuals, because QI.
(Even without QI, you should favor suing the deoartment, because individual officers can be disposable and replaced with people selected and trained for the same tendencies, but department leadership and policies that keeping turning into a liability hole for the local government are more likely to trigger more significant changes.)