Emergency-Aid Seizures After Case v. Montana: Objective Reasonableness (Not Probable Cause) Governs Fourth Amendment Emergency Intervention

Case: Abigail Jean Marbut v. Matthew Phillips, No. 24-13309 (11th Cir. May 22, 2026)

Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit

Disposition: Summary judgment for officers affirmed on qualified immunity

I. Introduction

This decision addresses a recurring Fourth Amendment problem: when police respond to a medical emergency—here, a suspected drug overdose—what standard governs a seizure undertaken to prevent serious harm, and how does that standard interact with qualified immunity?

Plaintiff-Appellant Abigail Jean Marbut alleged that Officers Matthew Phillips, Joshua Cash, Kirby Collier, and Justin Pena violated the Fourth Amendment by (1) unlawfully seizing her after she regained consciousness following a suspected GHB overdose, (2) using excessive force (as to Officer Phillips) during the ensuing struggle that resulted in a broken arm, and (3) failing to intervene (as to the other officers). The district court granted summary judgment based on qualified immunity. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed, but—critically—did so while announcing that intervening Supreme Court authority changed the governing standard for emergency-aid/mental-health seizures.

The central doctrinal development is the Eleventh Circuit’s recognition that the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Case v. Montana, 146 S. Ct. 500 (2026), abrogated Eleventh Circuit precedent that had imported a “probable cause of dangerousness” requirement for mental-health seizures. Under Case, emergency-aid interventions are judged by objective reasonableness, not probable cause.

II. Summary of the Opinion

The Eleventh Circuit affirmed qualified immunity on all claims, holding:

  • Unlawful seizure: The officers did not violate clearly established law because it was at least arguable that the seizure was justified under the emergency-aid doctrine, as clarified by Case v. Montana, which requires only an objectively reasonable basis for believing intervention is needed to prevent serious harm. Independently, the officers had probable cause to believe Marbut committed a crime (possession of GHB), which also supported the seizure.
  • Excessive force (Officer Phillips): Grabbing Marbut’s arm and pulling it behind her back was treated as a standard, de minimis restraint technique under Eleventh Circuit precedent, not constitutionally excessive even though it resulted in a serious and lasting injury.
  • Failure to intervene (other officers): Because the underlying force was not excessive, there was no duty to intervene.

The panel relied heavily on body-camera footage and applied video-depicted facts per Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372 (2007), construing unclear portions in Marbut’s favor per Baxter v. Santiago-Miranda, 121 F.4th 873 (11th Cir. 2024).

III. Analysis

A. Precedents Cited and How They Shaped the Decision

1. Video evidence and summary-judgment framing

  • Scott v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372 (2007): Directed the court to recount facts “in the light depicted by the video[s],” limiting a plaintiff’s ability to rely on a competing narrative when footage is clear.
  • Baxter v. Santiago-Miranda, 121 F.4th 873 (11th Cir. 2024): Where video is unclear, facts are construed in the nonmovant’s favor, preserving standard summary-judgment protections.

2. Qualified immunity architecture

  • Stryker v. City of Homewood, 978 F.3d 769 (11th Cir. 2020): Supplied the two-part qualified immunity inquiry (constitutional violation + clearly established law) and the “discretionary authority” framing.
  • Gates v. Khokhar, 884 F.3d 1290 (11th Cir. 2018): Reinforced the “clearly established” requirement: the unlawfulness must be apparent to every reasonable official; “beyond debate” appears later in the opinion’s synthesis.
  • Alston v. Swarbrick, 954 F.3d 1312 (11th Cir. 2020), and Jackson v. Sauls, 206 F.3d 1156 (11th Cir. 2000): Provided the “arguable” standard—officers receive immunity if conduct was arguably lawful.
  • Aguirre v. Seminole County, 158 F.4th 1276 (11th Cir. 2025), and Mata Chorwadi, Inc. v. City of Boynton Beach, 66 F.4th 1259 (11th Cir. 2023): Confirmed de novo review and the power to affirm on any record-supported ground.

3. The emergency-aid doctrine and the opinion’s major doctrinal shift

  • Brigham City v. Stuart, 547 U.S. 398 (2006): The foundational emergency-aid test—whether officers have an objectively reasonable basis for believing emergency assistance is needed.
  • Mincey v. Arizona, 437 U.S. 385 (1978): Quoted via Brigham City for the principle that preserving life or avoiding serious injury can justify warrantless action in an emergency.
  • Eleventh Circuit pre-Case line: Roberts v. Spielman, 643 F.3d 899 (11th Cir. 2011), applied in Ingram v. Kubik, 30 F.4th 1241 (11th Cir. 2022), and May v. City of Nahunta, 846 F.3d 1320 (11th Cir. 2017): These cases stated that “mental-health seizures” require probable cause to believe the person is dangerous to self or others.
  • Case v. Montana, 146 S. Ct. 500 (2026): The intervening Supreme Court decision that the panel treats as abrogating the probable-cause approach in emergency-aid situations. Case held probable cause is “peculiarly related to criminal investigations” and inappropriate for “non-criminal, non-investigatory” emergency aid; the correct inquiry is objective reasonableness under Brigham City.
  • United States v. Lopez, 562 F.3d 1309 (11th Cir. 2009): Used to justify treating an intervening Supreme Court decision as abrogating prior circuit precedent even in the face of the prior panel precedent rule, when the Supreme Court has “undermined” the circuit’s rule “to the point of abrogation.”
  • Illinois v. McArthur, 531 U.S. 326 (2001), and Florida v. Jardines, 569 U.S. 1 (2013): Cited to reason that if Case permits warrantless home entry on objective reasonableness to prevent serious harm, then a less intrusive temporary restraint outside the home must also be permissible under the same emergency-aid logic.
  • United States v. Toussaint, 838 F.3d 503 (5th Cir. 2016): Offered as supporting authority that emergency-aid principles apply outside the home as well.

4. The “totality,” ambiguity, and real-time decisionmaking cases

  • United States v. Holloway, 290 F.3d 1331 (11th Cir. 2002): Emphasized prompt assessment in emergencies and warned against requiring “calm deliberation” in rapidly evolving circumstances.
  • Huebner v. Bradshaw, 935 F.3d 1183 (11th Cir. 2019): Officers need not resolve credibility disputes in the moment.
  • Prado Navarette v. California, 572 U.S. 393 (2014): Used by analogy for the proposition that a short period of improved behavior does not necessarily eliminate reasonable grounds for intervention (the court analogized to not losing suspicion after five minutes of careful driving).
  • Washington v. Howard, 25 F.4th 891 (11th Cir. 2022): Reinforced that probable cause is “not a high bar,” supporting both the emergency-aid discussion (as a comparative baseline) and the alternative crime-based justification.

5. Emergency-aid application to overdose contexts

  • United States v. Brand, 556 F.2d 1312 (5th Cir. 1977): Binding Fifth Circuit precedent (in the Eleventh Circuit via Bonner principles, though not discussed explicitly) cited for the proposition that emergency-aid intrusions are justified to assist a drug overdose victim.
  • United States v. Fisher, 289 F.3d 1329 (11th Cir. 2002): Cited for the dangers of GHB and the severity of overdose consequences, strengthening the reasonableness of perceiving a serious-harm risk.

6. State law vs. federal constitutional law

  • Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 327 (1986): Cited for the principle that not every violation of state law becomes a federal constitutional violation.
  • Hughes v. Locure, 166 F.4th 121 (11th Cir. 2026) (Pryor, C.J., concurring): Invoked to reinforce that the Fourth Amendment does not constitutionalize state-law constraints, here Georgia’s mental-health transport statute (GA. CODE ANN. § 37-3-42(a)).

7. Alternative seizure justification: probable cause of a crime

  • United States v. Thomas, 160 F.4th 1177 (11th Cir. 2025), and Brown v. City of Huntsville, 608 F.3d 724 (11th Cir. 2010): Stand for the rule that any crime supported by probable cause can justify an arrest/seizure even if the officer did not identify that crime contemporaneously.

8. Excessive force and “de minimis” force doctrine

  • Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989): Provided the baseline that officers may use some degree of physical coercion to effect a lawful seizure and framed reasonableness as objective.
  • Ingram v. Kubik, 30 F.4th 1241 (11th Cir. 2022), and Helm v. Rainbow City, 989 F.3d 1265 (11th Cir. 2021): Supplied the proportionality factors (severity, danger, flight risk) and the “reasonable officer on the scene” perspective.
  • Powell v. Snook, 25 F.4th 912 (11th Cir. 2022): Emphasized allowance for tense, uncertain, rapidly evolving conditions and avoidance of hindsight.
  • Nolin v. Isbell, 207 F.3d 1253 (11th Cir. 2000): “De minimis force” generally does not support a Fourth Amendment excessive-force claim.
  • Myers v. Bowman, 713 F.3d 1319 (11th Cir. 2013), and Rodriguez v. Farrell, 280 F.3d 1341 (11th Cir. 2002): Treated common restraint techniques—grabbing an arm, twisting behind the back, handcuffing, even forcing to the ground—as typically non-excessive; Rodriguez further held the force may remain de minimis despite unexpected severe injury (there, leading to amputation after a preexisting injury complication).

9. Failure to intervene

  • Crenshaw v. Lister, 556 F.3d 1283 (11th Cir. 2009): Established that an officer may be liable for failing to intervene in another’s use of excessive force, but only where excessive force occurs; no constitutional duty arises absent an underlying violation.

B. Legal Reasoning

1. Qualified immunity and the “clearly established” lens

The panel’s structure is classic qualified immunity analysis: even if a seizure occurred, liability depends on whether the challenged conduct violated clearly established Fourth Amendment law. Importantly, the court did not need to definitively decide the best view of the Fourth Amendment in every respect; it needed only to determine whether the officers’ actions were at least “arguably” lawful under existing (and newly clarified) standards.

2. The key doctrinal holding: Case v. Montana displaces the Eleventh Circuit’s probable-cause requirement for “mental-health seizures”

The most consequential part of the opinion is not its outcome (qualified immunity affirmed), but its recalibration of the governing test for emergency-aid seizures. The court expressly recognized that its prior decisions—Roberts v. Spielman, followed by Ingram v. Kubik and May v. City of Nahunta—required probable cause of dangerousness for mental-health seizures. The court then held that Case v. Montana “abrogated” that standard.

Under Case, emergency aid is assessed under Brigham City v. Stuart’s “objectively reasonable basis” inquiry. The panel treated Case as controlling even though Case involved warrantless home entry, reasoning that restraining someone outside a home is less intrusive than entering the home (Illinois v. McArthur), so the objective-reasonableness threshold must also apply—if anything, more comfortably—in seizures outside the home.

3. Applying objective reasonableness to the facts

On the record as depicted by body-camera video, the court emphasized:

  • Marbut was reported “unresponsive,” had been unconscious for about 20 minutes, and was suspected (by her mother) of GHB overdose—a drug associated with respiratory depression, seizures, coma (United States v. Fisher).
  • On arrival, Marbut could not answer basic questions and appeared “on the nod.”
  • Although she improved somewhat, there was not a stable medical consensus that she could safely leave; a medic still wanted to “get her up to the truck and check her out.”
  • She abruptly attempted to end the encounter by going inside, leading to a rapidly evolving, confined-space confrontation.

The panel’s emergency-aid analysis is notable for its tolerance of ambiguity: even if some evidence suggested competence (she could state name/address/birthday though not birth year), qualified immunity does not require officers to “sift through conflicting evidence” (Huebner v. Bradshaw) and does not demand prolonged observation before acting (Prado Navarette v. California by analogy). The court treated these considerations as sufficient, at minimum, to make the emergency-aid seizure “arguably” lawful—defeating the “clearly established” requirement.

4. Independent alternative ground: crime-based probable cause

Separately, the panel held the seizure was justified because officers had probable cause to believe Marbut possessed GHB, a crime under federal and Georgia law (citing 21 U.S.C. § 844(a) and GA. CODE ANN. §§ 16-13-30(a), 16-13-25(5)(A)). Relying on United States v. Thomas and Brown v. City of Huntsville, the court reasoned that any offense supported by probable cause can justify a seizure even if the officer did not articulate that basis at the time. The mother’s overdose report, which Marbut conceded officers could credit, plus on-scene observations, cleared the “not a high bar” probable cause threshold (Washington v. Howard).

5. Rejecting a state-law limitation theory

Marbut argued Georgia’s mental-health transport statute (GA. CODE ANN. § 37-3-42(a)) limited the officers’ authority absent a penal offense or physician consultation. The panel rejected the move from state-law limits to Fourth Amendment violations, invoking Daniels v. Williams and Hughes v. Locure. The constitutional question remained whether the seizure was reasonable under the Fourth Amendment, not whether state procedures were followed.

6. Excessive force: de minimis technique even with severe injury

The court held Officer Phillips’s initial restraint—placing a hand on Marbut’s arm and pulling it behind her back—fell within a category of common, ordinarily accepted restraint techniques treated as de minimis in Eleventh Circuit precedent (Rodriguez v. Farrell; Myers v. Bowman; Nolin v. Isbell). The resulting broken humerus and lasting radial nerve injury did not change the constitutional characterization because, under Rodriguez, unexpected severe injury does not necessarily make an otherwise standard technique excessive.

The panel also stressed real-time dynamics: Marbut turned abruptly, attempted to pass the officer in a tight space, made contact that the officer could reasonably perceive as a push, and the situation rapidly escalated. Under Graham v. Connor, Helm v. Rainbow City, and Powell v. Snook, the “reasonable officer on the scene” perspective controlled.

7. Failure to intervene depends on an underlying violation

Under Crenshaw v. Lister, there is no duty to intervene absent excessive force. Because Officer Phillips’s conduct was held reasonable, the claim against the other officers failed as a matter of law.

C. Impact

1. A new governing standard in the Eleventh Circuit for emergency-aid/mental-health seizures

The opinion’s most significant forward-looking effect is its explicit acknowledgment that Case v. Montana abrogates the circuit’s earlier “probable cause of dangerousness” formulation for mental-health seizures found in Roberts v. Spielman and repeated in Ingram v. Kubik and May v. City of Nahunta.

Going forward, litigants and district courts in the Eleventh Circuit should expect emergency-aid seizures—including welfare checks, overdose interventions, and other non-criminal crisis responses—to be analyzed primarily under Brigham City v. Stuart’s objective reasonableness standard as clarified by Case v. Montana.

2. Qualified immunity remains a substantial barrier in emergency contexts

Even if plaintiffs can contest whether an emergency truly existed, the panel’s approach underscores how the “arguable” lawfulness standard (Alston v. Swarbrick) often resolves close, fact-intensive disputes in favor of officers—especially where consequences of inaction could be severe and information is ambiguous.

3. Reinforcement of alternative justifications

The court’s alternative probable-cause-of-crime rationale suggests that, in overdose/welfare-check cases with suspected contraband, defendants may increasingly argue dual bases: emergency aid (non-criminal objective reasonableness) and conventional crime control (probable cause), with either sufficient to defeat an unlawful-seizure claim.

4. Excessive force doctrine: serious injury does not necessarily imply unconstitutional force

The decision reiterates an important—and often counterintuitive—principle in Eleventh Circuit force jurisprudence: severe injury can be constitutionally incidental to de minimis or commonplace restraint techniques (Rodriguez v. Farrell). This can shape future cases where plaintiffs focus on outcome (injury severity) rather than the nature of the force used and the circumstances confronting the officer.

IV. Complex Concepts Simplified

  • Qualified immunity: A defense shielding officers from damages unless the plaintiff shows both a constitutional violation and that the violated right was “clearly established” at the time. If officers acted in a way that was at least “arguably” lawful, they win.
  • Clearly established law: The rule must be so clear that every reasonable officer would know the conduct was unlawful. Novel or unsettled questions often favor defendants.
  • Emergency-aid doctrine: Allows warrantless searches/seizures when officers have an objectively reasonable basis to believe immediate action is needed to prevent serious harm (e.g., overdose, suicide risk, severe injury).
  • “Mental-health seizure”: A seizure motivated by safety/medical concerns rather than criminal investigation; after Case v. Montana, the controlling standard is objective reasonableness, not probable cause.
  • Probable cause vs. objective reasonableness: Probable cause is a crime-investigation standard tied to likelihood of criminal activity; objective reasonableness in emergency aid asks whether intervention to prevent harm was reasonable under the circumstances.
  • De minimis force: Minimal, commonly accepted physical control techniques that generally do not amount to excessive force under the Fourth Amendment, even if an unexpected injury occurs.
  • Failure to intervene: Liability for bystanding officers arises only if another officer is actually using excessive force and there is a realistic opportunity to stop it.

V. Conclusion

Marbut v. Phillips affirms qualified immunity for officers responding to a suspected overdose and reinforces that common restraint techniques are often treated as de minimis force in the Eleventh Circuit. Its principal jurisprudential significance, however, is doctrinal: the court holds that Case v. Montana abrogates Eleventh Circuit precedent requiring probable cause for emergency-aid/mental-health seizures. The governing Fourth Amendment inquiry in emergency aid is now whether officers had an objectively reasonable basis for believing intervention was needed to prevent serious harm.