## Facts

- Howard Wyatt and Bill Cole were former business partners in a cattle partnership that deteriorated.
- Cole, assisted by attorney John Robbins II, filed a Mississippi state-court replevin action in 1986 and posted an $18,000 bond under a statute that required issuance of a writ upon specified filings.
- A judge issued a writ directing the sheriff to seize Wyatt’s property, including 24 head of cattle, a tractor, and other items.
- After a post-seizure hearing, the state court dismissed Cole’s replevin complaint and ordered the property returned; Cole allegedly refused to comply.
- Wyatt sued in federal court under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Cole, Robbins, and law enforcement officers, seeking damages and injunctive relief and challenging the statute as unconstitutional.
- The district court held the replevin statute violated due process and granted qualified immunity to the government officials; it also granted qualified immunity to Cole and Robbins for conduct predating the statute’s invalidation.
- The Fifth Circuit affirmed qualified immunity for Cole and Robbins.
- The Supreme Court granted review to resolve whether private parties sued under § 1983 for invoking such statutes are entitled to qualified immunity.

## Issues

1. Whether private defendants who invoke a state replevin statute later held unconstitutional may assert the same qualified immunity from suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 that protects government officials.
2. Whether any protection for such private defendants, if available, is limited to merits defenses (e.g., good faith or probable cause) rather than an immunity from suit.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court reversed and remanded.
- Private defendants sued under § 1983 for invoking state replevin, garnishment, or attachment procedures later declared unconstitutional are not entitled to the qualified immunity from suit available to government officials.
- The Court left open whether private defendants may assert good-faith or probable-cause defenses on the merits, but held that such defenses are distinct from qualified immunity from suit.

## Legal Principles

- Qualified immunity from suit, as developed for government officials in § 1983 litigation, does not extend to private parties who use state seizure procedures later found unconstitutional.
- Immunities under § 1983 are recognized only where supported by a sufficiently rooted common-law tradition and by policy reasons strong enough to justify shielding defendants from the burdens of litigation.
- Treating private parties as acting “under color of state law” for § 1983 liability purposes does not entail granting them the status-based immunities afforded to public officials.
- Potential good-faith or probable-cause defenses (if recognized) operate as substantive defenses to liability and do not provide an immediately appealable immunity from suit.

## Conclusion

The Court held that private litigants who invoke state replevin procedures later held unconstitutional cannot claim government-style qualified immunity from § 1983 suits, though they may attempt to raise any applicable good-faith or probable-cause defenses in litigating liability.


Wyatt v. Cole, 504 U.S. 158 (1992)