The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania denied the majority of two state troopers’ motion of summary judgment, after claiming qualified immunity in response to plaintiffs’ claims regarding deadly force. 

In a Jan. 26 ruling, U.S. District Judge Edward Smith of the Eastern District of Pennsylvania denied the majority of the defendants’ motion for summary judgment, finding the “plaintiffs’ factual allegations and the evidence of record sufficiently show that Troopers [Eddie] Pagan and [Jay] Splain violated [plaintiffs-decent Anthony] Ardo’s Fourth Amendment right to be free from excessive force, both in their initial use of deadly force and in Trooper Splain’s continued use of it.”