Introduction

In Krueger v. Orr, ___ F.4th ___ (10th Cir. 2025), the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit delivered a sweeping opinion that clarifies—and significantly strengthens—two pillars of Fourth Amendment jurisprudence:

1. Prolonged prone restraint of a handcuffed suspect, coupled with body-weight pressure, is clearly established excessive force once the suspect is effectively subdued, and
2. Every officer on the scene—whether or not personally applying force—has a clearly established duty to intervene when a colleague deploys such unconstitutional force.

The case arose from the tragic in-custody death of Jeffrey Krueger during a 2019 traffic stop in Wagoner County, Oklahoma. Eight officers from two agencies sought qualified immunity at summary judgment. The district court denied immunity; the officers pursued interlocutory appeals. Affirming the district court, Judge McHugh’s 83-page opinion painstakingly reconstructs the record, corrects factual omissions, and cements a robust precedent likely to reverberate well beyond the Tenth Circuit.

Summary of the Judgment

The court consolidated three appeals (Nos. 24-7035, 24-7037, 24-7066) and addressed two clusters of claims:

• Excessive Force
  • Deputies Orr & Phillips: pulling Mr. Krueger from his car by the hair, slamming his head onto pavement, and tasing him eight times in drive-stun mode, including after effective restraint.
  • Lt. Crockett, Deputy Lott, Officers Craig & McFarland: placing a combined ≈665 lbs. on the handcuffed, prone arrestee for up to four minutes while shackling and hobbling him.
• Failure to Intervene
  All eight defendants allegedly watched the unlawful force and failed to stop it.

The Tenth Circuit:

1. Held that each use of force, viewed in the light most favorable to the estate, violated the Fourth Amendment under Graham v. Connor.
2. Found the violations “clearly established” by prior Tenth Circuit precedents, chiefly Weigel v. Broad, Perea v. Baca, and Booker v. Gomez.
3. Reaffirmed that officers present at the scene bear individual liability for failure to intervene, even if they applied little or no force themselves.
4. Consequently affirmed the district court’s denial of qualified immunity and remanded for trial.

Analytical Commentary

1. Precedents Cited and Their Influence

• Weigel v. Broad, 544 F.3d 1143 (10th Cir. 2008)
  The cornerstone for prone-restraint cases; held that sitting or kneeling on a restrained suspect’s back for three minutes is excessive. Krueger extends Weigel from two troopers to a multi-officer scrum and links it explicitly to both excessive-force and failure-to-intervene liability.
• Booker v. Gomez, 745 F.3d 405 (10th Cir. 2014)
  Recognised that body-weight pressure plus prolonged prone positioning is deadly force. Krueger quotes Booker for the “substantial pressure” rule and applies it to a street-level arrest, not only a jail setting.
• Perea v. Baca, 817 F.3d 1198 (10th Cir. 2016)
  Established that repeated drive-stun taser deployments after a suspect stops resisting are excessive. Krueger synthesises Perea with Booker, confirming that tasers and body weight share the same constitutional ceiling once resistance ceases.
• Fogarty v. Gallegos, 523 F.3d 1147 (10th Cir. 2008) & Maresca v. Bernalillo County, 804 F.3d 1301 (10th Cir. 2015)
  Form the doctrinal backbone for failure-to-intervene claims. Krueger deploys them to hold that all on-scene officers had notice of a duty to act.
• Barnes v. Felix, 145 S. Ct. 1353 (2025)
  SCOTUS’s fresh mandate to consider “all relevant circumstances” rather than the “moment-of-threat” informs the panel’s granular fact framing.

2. The Court’s Legal Reasoning

a. Jurisdiction & Standard
Under the collateral-order doctrine (Mitchell v. Forsyth), the court’s review is limited to pure questions of law. Yet three exceptions (Johnson v. Jones) allowed a “cumbersome review” of the record: (i) district-court silence on material facts, (ii) findings “blatantly contradicted” by video, and (iii) legal errors infecting fact determinations.

b. De-novo Fact Reconstruction
The panel meticulously spliced body-cam footage, CAD logs, and forensic photos to:

• Discount deputies’ “shifting accounts.”
• Establish that Krueger stopped meaningfully resisting well before the last taser cycle and during most of the prone restraint.
• Quantify officer body weight and time on Krueger’s torso.

c. Graham Factors Applied Twice
The opinion separates (1) force during extraction/tasing from (2) force during the prone restraint. In both phases the second and third Graham factors—immediacy of threat and active resistance—ultimately tipped to Krueger once he was neutralised.

d. Clearly Established Analysis
Citing a trio of published Tenth Circuit cases plus persuasive precedent, the court found the unlawfulness “beyond debate.” Notably, it rejected officers’ attempts to frame the scenario at a “high level of generality,” insisting on particularised similarities yet refusing a “scavenger hunt” for identical facts.

3. Impact on Future Litigation

• Prone Restraint = Deadly Force
  Krueger re-emphasises that any weight on a handcuffed, prone subject can be deemed deadly force, triggering heightened scrutiny and Larsen sub-factor analysis.
• Group Liability Doctrine Strengthened
  Officers cannot avoid trial by claiming minimal contact; presence plus opportunity to intercede suffices (Booker/Fogarty revived).
• Interlocutory Fact-Checking Blueprint
  The decision supplies a roadmap for appellate courts to correct district-court factual lacunae without venturing into impermissible sufficiency review.
• Training & Policy Implications
  • Expect widespread retraining on “handcuffs + prone = roll the suspect” within seconds.
  • Agencies must stress affirmative intervention in policy manuals; mere verbal concern is inadequate.
  • Taser use-of-force continuums will need explicit post-submission restrictions.
• Plaintiff Pleading Practices
  The court’s liberal reading of the complaint underlines that failure-to-intervene allegations need not appear as a stand-alone count if the narrative and citations provide notice.

Complex Concepts Simplified

• Qualified Immunity (QI) – a legal shield protecting officers from suit unless (1) their actions violate a constitutional right and (2) that right was “clearly established” at the time.
• Prone Restraint – placing a suspect face-down while applying body weight; can impair breathing and lead to “positional asphyxia.”
• Drive-Stun Mode (Taser) – the taser’s probes are pressed directly to the skin, delivering pain compliance rather than neuromuscular incapacitation. Repeated cycles increase medical risk.
• Failure to Intervene – liability attaching to an officer who has (a) knowledge of excessive force, (b) a realistic chance to stop it, and (c) chooses inaction.
• “Clearly Established” Test – requires prior case law with sufficiently similar facts such that any reasonable officer would know the conduct was unlawful.

Conclusion

Krueger v. Orr is now the Tenth Circuit’s most comprehensive pronouncement on two recurring police-misconduct issues: body-weight prone restraints and the duty to intervene. The court’s methodical fact audit, synthesis of precedent, and express application to both direct actors and bystanders produce a powerful cautionary tale for officers and a strategic roadmap for civil-rights litigators. Going forward, any official within the Tenth Circuit who leaves a subdued suspect face-down, or who watches a colleague do so, risks personal liability. The decision thus advances the constitutional guarantee against unreasonable seizures while offering clear behavioral benchmarks to law enforcement agencies nationwide.