Via per curiam (with lots of separate opinions), SCOTUS reverses Fifth Circuit’s approach to retaliatory arrest claim

The Supreme Court this morning handed down a short per curiam opinion today in Gonzalez v. Trevino, No. 22-1025 (S. Ct. June 20, 2024) (available here). That opinion runs less than five full pages and starts this way:

In Nieves v. Bartlett, 587 U.S. 391, 402 (2019), this Court held that, as a general rule, a plaintiff bringing a retaliatory-arrest claim “must plead and prove the absence of probable cause for the arrest.”  At the same time, we recognized a narrow exception to that rule.  The existence of probable cause does not defeat a plaintiff ’s claim if he produces “objective evidence that he was arrested when otherwise similarly situated individuals not engaged in the same sort of protected speech had not been.” Id., at 407.  We granted certiorari in this case to consider whether the Fifth Circuit properly applied these principles.  It did not.  We therefore vacate that court’s judgment and remand for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

Three Justices (Alito, Kavanaugh and Jackson) authored concurring opinons of various lengths, and Justice Thomas authored a solo dissent.