The Barnes vs. Indiana Page, April 11, 2024


This webpage contains links to various materials relevant to the case Barnes v. Indiana.

Police answered a domestic violence call, but everything had calmed down and the 50ish husband was in the parking lot leaving. He argued with them up to the door, which his wife opened. The police wanted to enter; he said no; his wife was silent; he shoved a policeman; he was tasered, sent to the hospital, and charged with assault. The Indiana Supreme Court, overturning ancient precedent and a recent statute, criminalized citizen resistance to illegal police entry. The Statehouse was upset, and passed a new statute with even my liberal state rep. voting for it, despite heavy lobbying and misrepresentation by the police union. The legislators submitted an amicus brief pointing out the recent statute that the Supreme Court hadn't noticed, and I organized an amicus brief with a diverse group of conservative and liberal lawyers. The Supreme Court did grant a rehearing, but didn't change its ruling.

Scholars' amicus brief

Supreme Court of Indiana final decision, rehearing granted, Barnes loses, September 20, 2011. Don't believe what you read in it, though-- I am confident in asserting that the Court was dishonest in its presentation of the facts and the law and just didn't want to be embarassed by how badly wrong it got the law. Here is my fisking of the opinion after rehearing, paragraph by paragraph.

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    URL: http://www.rasmusen.org/special/barnes or http://www.rasmusen.org/special/barnes/index.html. I live in Bloomington, Indiana and work in the Department of Business Economics and Public Policy, Indiana University. Comments: Erasmuse@Indiana.edu.