Overview

• In October 2017, an FBI SWAT team broke down Trina Martin’s front door, deployed a flashbang grenade and held her, her then-partner Toi Cliatt and their seven-year-old son at gunpoint before realizing they had the wrong house.
• Martin and Cliatt filed suit under the Federal Tort Claims Act in 2019 alleging assault, battery and false arrest, but a federal judge and the 11th Circuit dismissed the case citing qualified immunity and the Supremacy Clause.
• Justice Neil Gorsuch’s majority opinion held that the FTCA, not the Supremacy Clause, is the proper framework for assessing federal agents’ liability and cleared the way for the family’s claims to proceed.
• Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined a concurrence indicating that the FTCA’s discretionary-function exception may not shield the agents’ tactical decisions from suit.
• On remand, the 11th Circuit must decide whether the discretionary-function exception bars the family’s negligent-or-intentional tort claims or if the lawsuit can advance to merits review.