El Paso, Tex. police respond to 911 call at dusk, discover unarmed man in the process of hanging himself from basketball hoop. Police demand he show his hands. When he fails to comply, they tase him, and he immediately goes limp. They remove him from the hoop and begin CPR, but he dies at the hospital. District court: No qualified immunity. Fifth Circuit: If the officer wanted us to address the question of whether he had qualified immunity, he should have briefed it. He didn’t (he addressed other issues in his brief instead), so the case can go on.
