A conviction gets vacated. The charges go away. The person who served the time wants to know what happens next.
There are two doors. One is Minnesota’s exoneration compensation scheme, which I cover separately in Minnesota’s exoneration compensation statute. That route doesn’t require proving anyone violated the Constitution. The other is a federal civil rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for the constitutional violation that produced the conviction.
This article is about the second door, and why it’s narrower than it looks. A wrongful-conviction case can present a constitutional violation that’s easy to name and a set of defendants who are immune from paying for it. The immunities here are broader than the ones you’ll meet in a police force case, and I’ve seen what happens when a plaintiff misses the difference. The case gets built against the wrong defendant, and the immunity motion ends it.
The underlying violation: Brady
The constitutional theory I follow here is suppression of exculpatory evidence. Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963), holds “that the suppression by the prosecution of evidence favorable to an accused upon request violates due process where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punishment, irrespective of the good faith or bad faith of the prosecution.” Id. at 87.
Two later decisions shape how I actually build one of these cases.
Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972), extends the rule to impeachment material: when the “reliability of a given witness may well be determinative of guilt or innocence,” the Court held, “nondisclosure of evidence affecting credibility falls within this general rule.” Id. at 154. Evidence that a jailhouse informant received consideration, or that a key witness gave a prior inconsistent statement, is Brady material.
Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419 (1995), holds that the prosecutor can’t dodge the duty by not looking: “the individual prosecutor has a duty to learn of any favorable evidence known to the others acting on the government’s behalf in the case, including the police.” Id. at 437. In the criminal case, that makes the prosecution answerable for what the investigating agency knew.
That last point is where the trap sits. Brady puts a disclosure obligation on the prosecution regardless of fault. It doesn’t follow that a damages remedy runs against everyone in the chain on the same terms.
Absolute prosecutorial immunity
Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U.S. 409 (1976), governs whether the prosecutor can be a defendant. The Court agreed that the prosecutor’s activities there “were intimately associated with the judicial phase of the criminal process, and thus were functions to which the reasons for absolute immunity apply with full force,” id. at 430, and concluded: “We hold only that in initiating a prosecution and in presenting the State’s case, the prosecutor is immune from a civil suit for damages under § 1983.” Id. at 431.
Here’s what that means. Absolute immunity isn’t qualified immunity. It doesn’t ask whether the right was clearly established, and it doesn’t turn on the official’s state of mind. A prosecutor who deliberately withheld exculpatory evidence at trial — who committed a knowing Brady violation in the course of presenting the State’s case — is immune from damages under § 1983 for that act. The remedy for that conduct lies in post-conviction proceedings and in professional discipline. It doesn’t lie in a damages judgment against the prosecutor.
That’s a broader shield than a police officer gets, and it shapes everything else in the case. My article on qualified immunity and the “clearly established” standard covers the defense that applies to officers. It’s a weaker defense than the one prosecutors get when they’re acting as advocates.
Where these cases are actually decided
Imbler left the rest open. The Court said it had “no occasion to consider whether like or similar reasons require immunity for those aspects of the prosecutor’s responsibility that cast him in the role of an administrator or investigative officer rather than that of advocate.” 424 U.S. at 430–31. Four later decisions have filled in that gap. I’ll take them one at a time, because the map they draw is where these cases are won or lost.
The burden is on the official. In Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478 (1991), the Court noted that “the official seeking absolute immunity bears the burden of showing that such immunity is justified for the function in question,” and that “[t]he presumption is that qualified rather than absolute immunity is sufficient to protect government officials in the exercise of their duties.” Id. at 486–87.
Burns itself splits a single case in two. The Court held “that respondent’s appearance in court in support of an application for a search warrant and the presentation of evidence at that hearing are protected by absolute immunity,” id. at 492, but concluded on the same record “that [Reed] has not met his burden of showing that the relevant factors justify an extension of absolute immunity to the prosecutorial function of giving legal advice to the police.” Id. at 496. Same prosecutor, same investigation, two different immunities.
Buckley draws the detective analogy. Buckley v. Fitzsimmons, 509 U.S. 259 (1993), says it straight out: “A prosecutor’s administrative duties and those investigatory functions that do not relate to an advocate’s preparation for the initiation of a prosecution or for judicial proceedings are not entitled to absolute immunity.” Id. at 273. The Court drew the line by function — “[t]here is a difference between the advocate’s role in evaluating evidence and interviewing witnesses as he prepares for trial, on the one hand, and the detective’s role in searching for the clues and corroboration that might give him probable cause to recommend that a suspect be arrested, on the other hand” — and added that “[w]hen a prosecutor performs the investigative functions normally performed by a detective or police officer, it is ‘neither appropriate nor justifiable that, for the same act, immunity should protect the one and not the other.’” Ibid. The Court also held that “Fitzsimmons’ statements to the media are not entitled to absolute immunity.” Id. at 277.
Kalina takes away the affidavit. In Kalina v. Fletcher, 522 U.S. 118 (1997), a prosecutor personally swore to the facts supporting an arrest warrant. The Court held that “[t]estifying about facts is the function of the witness, not of the lawyer,” id. at 130, and that “§ 1983 may provide a remedy for respondent insofar as petitioner performed the function of a complaining witness.” Id. at 131. In the same breath it reaffirmed that “the prosecutor is fully protected by absolute immunity when performing the traditional functions of an advocate.” Ibid.
Van de Kamp closes the office-wide theory. Van de Kamp v. Goldstein, 555 U.S. 335 (2009), took up claims that a district attorney’s office failed to train prosecutors on impeachment disclosure, failed to supervise them, and failed to build an information system tracking what informants had been promised. The Court held: “We conclude that a prosecutor’s absolute immunity extends to all these claims.” Id. at 339. A supervisory or systemic Brady theory aimed at prosecutors runs straight into that holding.
My translation: the question is never whether the defendant is called a prosecutor. It’s what function the defendant was performing at the moment of the conduct you’re complaining about. Building the record on that question — before probable cause or after, advocate or investigator, argument or sworn fact — is the work.
In the Eighth Circuit, the police claim has its own standard
Minnesota’s federal cases are governed by the Eighth Circuit, and the Eighth Circuit has decided this question in a way that cuts against plaintiffs.
Villasana v. Wilhoit, 368 F.3d 976 (8th Cir. 2004), holds: “In other words, Brady ensures that the defendant will obtain relief from a conviction tainted by the State’s nondisclosure of materially favorable evidence, regardless of fault, but the recovery of § 1983 damages requires proof that a law enforcement officer other than the prosecutor intended to deprive the defendant of a fair trial.” Id. at 980. The court got there by taking the bad-faith rule that governs destruction of potentially useful evidence and extending it to non-disclosure by officers.
White v. McKinley, 519 F.3d 806 (8th Cir. 2008), applies it. “The right Brady describes definitely applies to prosecutors and imposes upon them an absolute disclosure duty. But, Brady’s protections also extend to actions of other law enforcement officers such as investigating officers. However, an investigating officer’s failure to preserve evidence potentially useful to the accused or their failure to disclose such evidence does not constitute a denial of due process in the absence of bad faith.” Id. at 813–14 (citation omitted). On the facts alleged, the court agreed with the district court “that the facts alleged here meet the bad faith standard” where a detective was said to have steered the investigation to benefit a personal relationship, concealed that relationship from prosecutors, and failed to preserve a diary that didn’t corroborate the allegations. Id. at 814.
Put that together and here’s what a Minnesota wrongful-conviction plaintiff is up against. The prosecutor’s absolute disclosure duty comes with absolute immunity from damages for advocacy conduct. The officer, who has no absolute immunity, is liable only on proof of intent or bad faith. Brady is strict liability in the criminal case. That doesn’t carry over into the damages case.
The municipality
Suing the city or county instead doesn’t fix it. Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51 (2011), framed the question this way: “We granted certiorari to decide whether a district attorney’s office may be held liable under § 1983 for failure to train based on a single Brady violation. We hold that it cannot.” Id. at 54. Municipal liability has its own requirements, which I cover in Monell and municipal liability for police conduct.
Heck v. Humphrey — and what it does not say
Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994), is easy to state too broadly, and I hear it overstated a lot. Here’s what it actually holds:
We hold that, in order to recover damages for allegedly unconstitutional conviction or imprisonment, or for other harm caused by actions whose unlawfulness would render a conviction or sentence invalid, a § 1983 plaintiff must prove that the conviction or sentence has been reversed on direct appeal, expunged by executive order, declared invalid by a state tribunal authorized to make such determination, or called into question by a federal court’s issuance of a writ of habeas corpus, 28 U.S.C. § 2254. A claim for damages bearing that relationship to a conviction or sentence that has not been so invalidated is not cognizable under § 1983.
Id. at 486–87.
There are two limits built into that passage.
Heck is a favorable-termination requirement, not a prohibition. For someone whose conviction has been vacated, reversed, or set aside, the requirement is satisfied. Heck gets in the way of a person still under an outstanding conviction. It doesn’t get in the way of an exonerated person.
The bar also reaches only claims whose success would undermine the conviction. The Court was explicit: “if the district court determines that the plaintiff’s action, even if successful, will not demonstrate the invalidity of any outstanding criminal judgment against the plaintiff, the action should be allowed to proceed, in the absence of some other bar to the suit.” Id. at 487. A claim that doesn’t necessarily imply invalidity isn’t barred just because it comes out of the same arrest or prosecution.
Heck matters for timing, too. In McDonough v. Smith, 139 S. Ct. 2149 (2019), a plaintiff alleged that a prosecutor fabricated evidence and used it to charge him. He was acquitted and then sued. The Court held that “the limitations period did not begin to run until McDonough’s acquittal, and therefore reverse[d]” the contrary judgment. Accrual in this family of claims isn’t the same as accrual in a false-arrest case, and that difference matters enormously against the borrowed state limitations period I discuss in my article on the § 1983 limitations period in Minnesota.
How I build the case
Under Imbler, a wrongful-conviction case in Minnesota can’t be built on the prosecutor’s Brady violation itself, so far as that violation happened in initiating the prosecution and presenting the State’s case. It has to be a case about what the investigators did, whether their conduct crosses the Eighth Circuit’s bad-faith line, and whether any prosecutor’s conduct falls on the investigative or complaining-witness side of the Imbler line rather than the advocacy side. That turns on documents — investigative files, disclosure logs, informant files, supervisory records — and on a factual record of who did what, and when. Calling the conviction unjust doesn’t get you there.
I also build the state-law and statutory alternatives in parallel. Minnesota tort claims against officers and their employers follow different rules from § 1983, which I cover in state law claims against Minnesota police compared to § 1983. And the compensation scheme under Minn. Stat. § 590.11 and Minn. Stat. §§ 611.362 to 611.368 runs on its own short deadlines regardless of what happens in federal court.
Working with Madgett Law
I handle civil rights and police misconduct litigation at Madgett Law, LLC in Minnesota state and federal court, alongside the firm’s personal injury and general civil litigation practice. If a conviction in your family has been vacated or reversed and you’re trying to figure out what claims exist and how long you have to bring them, send us a message or call 612-470-6529.
Sources: Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83, 87 (1963); Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150, 154 (1972); Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419, 437 (1995); Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U.S. 409, 430–31, 431 (1976); Burns v. Reed, 500 U.S. 478, 486–87, 492, 496 (1991); Buckley v. Fitzsimmons, 509 U.S. 259, 273, 277 (1993); Kalina v. Fletcher, 522 U.S. 118, 130–31 (1997); Van de Kamp v. Goldstein, 555 U.S. 335, 339 (2009); Connick v. Thompson, 563 U.S. 51, 54 (2011); Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 486–87 (1994); McDonough v. Smith, 139 S. Ct. 2149 (2019); Villasana v. Wilhoit, 368 F.3d 976, 980 (8th Cir. 2004); White v. McKinley, 519 F.3d 806, 813–14 (8th Cir. 2008); 42 U.S.C. § 1983; Minn. Stat. § 590.11; Minn. Stat. §§ 611.362 to 611.368.
This article is general information about federal and Minnesota law. It is not legal advice, it does not create an attorney–client relationship, and it promises no particular outcome in any matter. Every case depends on its own facts.