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Younger bars injunction in preemptive strike in federal court over state investigation

By John Wesley Hall, Jr.

Preemptive civil suit against a criminal investigation to enjoin it is barred under Younger v. Harris. The defendant was charged with a crime after the suit was brought. Bernegger v. Haney, 2008 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 70740 (N.D. Miss. September 18, 2008): Certain types of injury, such as the cost, anxiety, and inconvenience of having to defend against as single criminal prosecution, could not by themselves be considered "irreparable" in the special legal sense of the term. Younger, 401 U.S. at 46. Rather, "the threat to the plaintiff's federally protected rights must be one that cannot be eliminated by his defense against a single criminal prosecution." Id. "No citizen or member of the community is immune from prosecution, in good faith, for his alleged criminal acts...continue to full post

Full post as published by Fourth Amendment on September 23, 2008 (boomark / email).