Johnnie Savory v. Allen Andrews

In the United States Court of Appeals For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ No. 24-2947 JOHNNIE L. SAVORY, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. ALLEN ANDREWS, et al., Defendants-Appellants. ____________________ Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of Illinois. No. 1:23-cv-01184 — Colleen R. Lawless, Judge. ____________________ ARGUED SEPTEMBER 11, 2025 — DECIDED AUGUST 14, 2026 ____________________ Before BRENNAN, Chief Judge, and KIRSCH and JACKSON- AKIWUMI, Circuit Judges. KIRSCH, Circuit Judge. In 1977, police officers in Peoria, Illi- nois investigated the murder of two teenagers. As part of the investigation, they brought Johnnie Lee Savory to the police department for questioning. Over two days, officers and a pri- vate polygrapher interrogated him, at times yelling at him. Eventually, Savory confessed, and he was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder. On appeal, the state court 2 No. 24-2947 threw out the conviction because it found Savory’s confession was involuntary. Savory was then retried and again con- victed. In 2006, he was released on parole, and in 2014, Illinois Governor Patrick Quinn pardoned him. Savory then filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, arguing that 16 former Peoria police officers, the City of Peoria, and private polygrapher Ed Bowers violated his rights. Relevant to this appeal, he contended that officers unlawfully detained him in violation of the Fourth Amendment, that officers and Bowers coerced his confession in violation of the Fifth Amendment, and that officers destroyed and fabricated evi- dence in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The officers and Bowers moved for summary judgment, arguing that they were entitled to qualified immunity from liability for the unlawful detention, destruction of evidence, and coerced confession claims and that they were entitled to absolute immunity from liability for the fabrication of evi- dence claim. The district court denied their motion. It found that disputes of material fact precluded review as to the un- lawful detention claim, that clearly established law put the of- ficers and Bowers on notice that their tactics to purportedly coerce Savory’s confession were unconstitutional, and that a reasonable jury could find that the officers destroyed and fab- ricated evidence in violation of clearly established law. We reverse. The officers are entitled to qualified immunity: they had arguable probable cause to detain Savory, no facts show when the missing evidence was destroyed or that they destroyed it in bad faith, and no clearly established law showed that their interrogation tactics were beyond a doubt illegal. Further, because individuals are entitled to absolute immunity regarding their trial testimony, the officers cannot No. 24-2947 3 be held liable, even if they testified consistently with fabri- cated evidence that was not introduced at trial. I We recite only the undisputed facts. On January 18, 1977, Connie Cooper (19 years old) and her brother James Robinson (14) were murdered in their home. Their bodies were found by their mother and stepfather around 4:15 pm. The two teen- agers had been stabbed to death, and Cooper’s autopsy indi- cated the presence of sperm or seminal fluid, suggesting that she had been raped. At the crime scene, officers collected evi- dence, including a black nightstick found on the kitchen floor, a pipe found next to Robinson’s body, blood near the victims’ bodies, and hairs found on the victims’ hands and in the bath- room sink and bathtub. An investigation followed. After about a week, Peoria Police Officers Edgar Haynes and George Pinkney learned that Johnnie Lee Savory (14 years old) had been with Robinson the night before the murders. News footage also showed that Savory was at the scene of the murders after the murders, and an officer documented Sa- vory’s presence at the crime scene. Officers Haynes and Pinkney went to Savory’s school to ask him questions. Alt- hough Savory initially did not want to speak with the officers, he agreed to answer questions at the Peoria Police Depart- ment (PPD). It was a long interrogation. Officers Haynes and Pinkney began questioning Savory inside an interrogation room around 4:00 pm. At a certain point, Detectives Charles Can- non and John Fiers subbed in. Over the course of the interro- gation, officers showed Savory photographs of the crime scene, ignored his question about whether he could go home, and accused him of lying. Around 9:30 pm, Savory spoke with 4 No. 24-2947 his probation officer. Afterward, the officers asked Savory to take a polygraph test, with one telling him that he could go home after the examination. Savory agreed, and they took him to the polygraph examiner. At 11:30 pm, after the test, Savory received warnings pursuant to Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966); at that point, he told the officers he didn’t want to speak with them. That night, Savory was held in a detention center. Around midnight, the PPD notified Savory’s father that his son was being held. Savory fell asleep at about 1:30 am, and around 8:00 am he was taken back to the PPD to resume questioning. Officers again gave Savory Miranda warnings and then asked him rapid-fire and confusing questions. At 10:00 am, he met with his father. Later, at different points, Savory was forced to remove his clothing so that officers could pluck hairs from his body and to take another polygraph test. During the test, the examiner, Ed Bowers, got close to him, raised his voice, and accused him of being a murderer. After the polygraph, Savory stood by the window and cried. At 7:35 pm, about 29 hours after the officers met him at his school, Savory con- fessed to the murders, though he made no mention of rape or sexual assault. Later that night, Savory changed his story and denied his involvement in the murders. Sometime later, the officers col- lected a knife and pair of pants from Savory’s father (though the pants were unlikely to have been worn by Savory given their size). Testing showed blood on a cut-out of the pants. The officers also conducted interviews with witnesses. One explained that he’d seen Robinson and Savory with a nightstick. Further, a news reporter told an officer that Savory had inquired about whether Robinson was alive before the No. 24-2947 5 bodies had been removed from the crime scene. And Savory’s foster mother, Marva Jones, told an officer that Savory had come to her in an emotional state and described Cooper’s wounds. His statements suggested that he’d seen them. On February 15, 1977, Savory was indicted on first-degree murder charges. Before the 1977 trial, officers interviewed Tina, Ella, Ruby, and James Ivy. The group told the officers that Savory was at their house on the day of the murders from approximately 1:00-3:00 pm, about an hour before the victims’ bodies were found. The officers say the Ivys additionally pro- vided other, disputed information, but that evidence was not used at trial. A jury convicted Savory after the Illinois trial court denied his motion to suppress his confessions. In 1980, the state appellate court reversed and remanded, finding that Savory’s confession wasn’t voluntary. In 1981, Savory was tried again and was again found guilty. This time, the trial included evidence from the Ivy chil- dren, with whom the police had reconnected. Tina, Ella, and Frank Ivy testified that Savory said he had cut Robinson acci- dentally, but that Robinson was all right when Savory left. Sa- vory was sentenced to 40-80 years in prison. In 1983, Tina and Frank Ivy signed affidavits recanting their testimony. Afterward, Savory filed a post-conviction pe- tition claiming that he was entitled to a new trial, but it was denied by the state trial court and affirmed on appeal. A year later, Savory filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in fed- eral court, but this too was denied and then affirmed on ap- peal. United States ex rel. Savory v. Lane, No. 84 C 8112, 1985 WL 2108, at *4 (N.D. Ill. July 25, 1985), aff’d, 832 F.2d 1011 (7th Cir. 1987). In 2003, Frank Ivy signed another affidavit stating 6 No. 24-2947 his 1981 testimony was incorrect and that he felt pressured by an officer to make false statements. In 2006, Savory was released on parole. Six years later, he filed a motion for post-conviction DNA testing, seeking to have the hairs from the crime scene and the original cut-out of the pants taken from Savory’s father tested to prove his in- nocence. The petition was granted, but testing was impossible because the department had not preserved the evidence. (Tests of the remainder of the pants did not indicate the pres- ence of blood.) In 2014, Savory filed a motion for a new trial, but as it was pending, Illinois Governor Patrick Quinn par- doned him. In 2017, Savory sued 16 former Peoria police officers, the City of Peoria, and private polygrapher Bowers under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging (as relevant here) that they unlawfully detained him in violation of the Fourth Amendment, coerced a confession from him in violation of the Fifth Amendment, and fabricated and destroyed evidence in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case was originally dismissed as untimely, but that determination was overturned by our en banc court. See Savory v. Cannon, 947 F.3d 409 (7th Cir. 2020) (en banc). In 2023, the case was transferred to the Central Dis- trict of Illinois. The officers and Bowers moved for summary judgment, raising qualified and absolute immunity defenses. The district court denied their motion. The officers and Bow- ers now appeal the denials of qualified and absolute immun- ity. II We begin with jurisdiction. See Villalobos v. Picicco, 168 F.4th 1057, 1061 (7th Cir. 2026). Typically, we only have No. 24-2947 7 jurisdiction over final judgments. 28 U.S.C. § 1291. But be- cause an entitlement to qualified or absolute immunity “is an immunity from suit rather than a mere defense to liability,” we can sometimes review the district court’s denial of sum- mary judgment on qualified or absolute immunity grounds. Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526–27 (1985). But we may only review “where the appeal focuses exclusively on legal questions about immunity, rather than factual disputes tied up with the merits of the case.” Mabes v. Thompson, 136 F.4th 697, 705 (7th Cir. 2025) (citation modified). The line between legal and factual disputes is “not always clear.” Smith v. Whitsel, 134 F.4th 962, 966 (7th Cir. 2025) (per curiam). To help us assess whether an appeal focuses on legal ar- guments, we “closely examine two things.” Smith v. Finkley, 10 F.4th 725, 736 (7th Cir. 2021). We first look at whether the district court specified disputes of fact as the reason for deny- ing qualified immunity. Id. Second, we review whether the officers on appeal take evidence in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, or whether they instead make back-door efforts to rely on their own version of disputed facts. Id. At bottom, the ultimate question is whether “disputed facts affect the qualified immunity analysis.” Mabes, 136 F.4th at 705. In other words, so long as we can decide the appeal without looking at the genuinely disputed facts, we have jurisdiction. Id. We have appellate jurisdiction to consider the appeal of Savory’s Fourth Amendment unlawful detention claim. The district court declared that this claim should go to trial be- cause of genuine disputes of material fact. And the officers do, at times, attempt to contest facts that the district court de- clared disputed. But the officers’ argument doesn’t depend on genuinely disputed facts. See Brumitt v. Smith, 102 F.4th 444, 8 No. 24-2947 448 (7th Cir. 2024) (separating factual and legal arguments). Where the district court has expressed that a fact is disputed, we defer to its judgment. See Via v. LaGrand, 469 F.3d 618, 623– 25 (7th Cir. 2006). But the district court did not go fact by fact and did not rule on whether certain material facts were dis- puted. Only where the district court did not express a view on a particular fact do we conduct “our own careful review of the record,” and take the facts in a light most favorable to Sa- vory. Mabes, 136 F.4th at 705 (citing Johnson v. Jones, 515 U.S. 304, 319 (1995)). Under this approach, which we utilized in Mabes, we find that we have jurisdiction and can resolve the officers’ assertion of qualified immunity on the merits, con- sidering the undisputed facts in the record. See id. The district court also denied immunity to the officers as to the coerced confession and the fabrication and destruction of evidence claims. In doing so, it did not identify factual dis- putes as the basis for denying summary judgment. And (with respect to these claims) the defendants accept plaintiff’s ver- sion of the facts. Therefore, we have appellate jurisdiction to decide these claims of immunity on an interlocutory basis. III “Qualified immunity protects all but the plainly incompe- tent or those who knowingly violate the law.” City of Tahlequah v. Bond, 595 U.S. 9, 12 (2021) (per curiam) (citation modified). That means when officers don’t “violate clearly es- tablished statutory or constitutional rights of which a reason- able person would have known,” they cannot be held liable. Id. The officers argue they are entitled to qualified immunity for the unlawful detention, coerced confession, and destruc- tion of evidence claims. So, Savory must show that the officers violated the law and that their conduct was clearly No. 24-2947 9 established as unlawful. District of Columbia v. Wesby, 583 U.S. 48, 62–63 (2018); Purtell v. Mason, 527 F.3d 615, 621 (7th Cir. 2008) (showing the plaintiff bears the burden of proving a right was clearly established). The standard is primarily iden- tified in objective terms, and it requires courts to look back to the law at the time of the official’s acts, because “an official could not reasonably be expected to anticipate subsequent le- gal developments, nor could he fairly be said to know that the law forbade conduct not previously identified as unlawful.” Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982) (citation modi- fied). Thus, we’ll have to analyze the law as it stood back when the acts occurred. We construe facts in favor of Savory, and the officers must “accept the district court’s view [when the court assessed] that there are factual disputes.” Manery v. Lee, 124 F.4th 1073, 1077–78 & n.5 (7th Cir. 2025) (citation mod- ified). A We first consider the detention liability claim, which Sa- vory, at oral argument, clarified was for the period between his indictment and his first conviction. “Nothing is more clear than that the Fourth Amendment was meant to prevent wholesale intrusions upon the personal security of our citi- zenry, whether these intrusions be termed arrests or investi- gatory detentions.” Davis v. Mississippi, 394 U.S. 721, 726–27 (1969) (citation modified). At the same time, in our case, if the officers had probable cause to detain Savory, the detention could have been valid. See Beck v. Ohio, 379 U.S. 89, 91 (1964). Probable cause is a fact-dependent, “nontechnical … compro- mise” that looks to protect citizens from law enforcement without “unduly hamper[ing]” its function. Id. “[G]ood faith is not enough to constitute probable cause.” Dir. Gen. of R.Rs. 10 No. 24-2947 v. Kastenbaum, 263 U.S. 25, 28 (1923). Rather, it must be that a “prudent man” would “believe that the suspect had commit- ted or was committing an offense.” Gerstein v. Pugh, 420 U.S. 103, 111–12 (1975) (citation modified). Because “a reasonable officer could have mistakenly believed that probable cause existed,” our inquiry to decide qualified immunity is whether the defendants had “arguable probable cause” to detain Sa- vory. Schimandle v. Dekalb Cnty. Sheriff’s Off., 114 F.4th 648, 655–56 (7th Cir. 2024) (citation modified). Whether arguable probable cause existed depends on the totality of the circumstances. See id. at 656. The district court held that the parties agreed upon certain facts: that the offic- ers found a nightstick and pole at the crime scene; that a wit- ness had seen Robinson and Savory with that nightstick; and that Savory was placed at the scene of the murders after the crime by Officer Glen Perkins and others that reviewed the local news footage. It also said that the “overwhelming ma- jority of the facts surrounding the arrest are disputed.” This means that, at the very least, the district court found some facts were undisputed. Looking through the record, we were able to determine additional facts that were not genuinely dis- puted. See Mabes, 136 F.4th at 707 (looking at record evi- dence); D.Z. v. Buell, 796 F.3d 749, 755–56 & n.2 (7th Cir. 2015) (rejecting plaintiff’s argument that there was a genuine dis- pute of fact in the qualified immunity context). We see no evidence that it was disputed at the district court that the victims were found dead at 4:15 pm or that the nightstick was found in the victims’ kitchen. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e); Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 249–50 (1986); United States v. Waldrip, 859 F.3d 446, 449 (7th Cir. 2017) (arguments not made are waived). And Savory did not No. 24-2947 11 contest at the district court that the police collected hairs from the bathroom sink that were consistent in color and character- istic with Savory’s hair. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e); Waldrip, 859 F.3d at 449. To the extent that there is a dispute, it is as to the scientific validity of the comparison. And even then, challeng- ing the scientific validity of the comparison is not the same as challenging what a prudent officer would have thought about the comparison. See Gerstein, 420 U.S. at 111. Further, in his Rule 56 motion at the district court, Savory did not properly controvert the asserted fact—that a news reporter told Officer Marcella Teplitz that Savory had asked about whether Robin- son was dead before the bodies were removed from the house. There’s evidence that Savory did not make the state- ment to the reporter, but that does not create a genuine dis- pute of fact as to what the reporter told Officer Teplitz. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e); Waldrip, 859 F.3d at 449. Nor did he ade- quately controvert that his foster mother, Marva Jones, told officers that he approached her in an emotional state and told her that the murderer “slit her stomach wide open, Marva, you should have seen it.” While there’s evidence that Savory never made that statement to Jones, Savory’s testimony that he didn’t make the original statement to Jones doesn’t create a genuine dispute of fact as to what Jones told the officers be- cause he had no firsthand knowledge of the interview. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). These facts, taken together, are enough to give rise to ar- guable probable cause. See Schimandle, 114 F.4th at 655–56. Even if Savory did not ask the reporter about whether Robin- son was alive or describe Cooper’s wounds to Jones, the offic- ers could have reasonably trusted the witnesses’ statements. Williamson v. Curran, 714 F.3d 432, 441 (7th Cir. 2013) (“So long as an officer reasonably believes [a witness] is telling the 12 No. 24-2947 truth, he may rely on the information provided to him by such persons in deciding to make an arrest, without having to con- duct an independent investigation into their accounts.”). And Savory provided no evidence to suggest that the officers fab- ricated any of this evidence. The reporter and Jones’s state- ments to police, along with the other undisputed facts, give rise to at least arguable probable cause, so the officers are en- titled to qualified immunity. See Schimandle, 114 F.4th at 655– 56. B The officers next ask us to overturn the district court’s de- nial of qualified immunity for the destruction of evidence claim. First, the officers argue that the district court did not address the issue of qualified immunity as to this claim in vi- olation of Circuit Rule 50. See 7th Cir. R. 50. Circuit Rule 50 requires the district court to state its reasons for resolving a claim. Id. Our circuit’s “customary approach” to resolving a violation of this rule is to remand. W. States Ins. Co. v. Wis. Wholesale Tire, 148 F.3d 756, 759–60 (7th Cir. 1998). But be- cause we have sufficient information to decide this issue and the officers do not request a remand given the extensive length of this litigation, we proceed to the merits. Savory argues that Detectives Walter Jatkowski and Can- non destroyed the blue pants cut-out and that Detectives Pinkney and Fiers, as well as Officer Jatkowski destroyed the hairs found on the victims’ hands in violation of the Four- teenth Amendment. The hairs, we note, are not the same as those found in the sink; because it didn’t look like Savory’s hair, this evidence would only be relevant insofar as it could help identify another individual who encountered the mur- der victims. Officers can violate a criminal defendant’s No. 24-2947 13 Fourteenth Amendment rights if they destroy evidence in bad faith, the evidence has apparent exculpatory value, and there is no way to obtain comparable evidence by other reasonably available means. California v. Trombetta, 467 U.S. 479, 489 (1984); Arizona v. Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51, 58 (1988); McCarthy v. Pollard, 656 F.3d 478, 485 (7th Cir. 2011) (reading Trombetta and Youngblood together). Savory’s claim fails at both steps of the qualified immunity analysis. Savory didn’t show that the officers violated his due process rights. He failed to offer any evidence that the pants cut-out or hairs were destroyed in bad faith or that they had apparent exculpatory value when they were destroyed. As to bad faith, Savory only argues that because the officers acted in supposed bad faith in other contexts, they must have acted similarly with this evidence. But it is not enough to extrapo- late bad faith from one context into another. Savory cannot merely speculate: he must offer some evidence that they de- stroyed that specific evidence in bad faith. See United States v. Holly, 940 F.3d 995, 1001–02 (7th Cir. 2019). He has also failed to provide any evidence on when the items were destroyed. And at summary judgment, the plaintiff cannot rely on “mere allegations,” but instead must put forth “specific facts” that we’ll take as true. Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 561 (1992); Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e). So, if there isn’t enough evidence on the record for Savory to meet his burden, the officers are entitled to summary judgment. Without any evidence sug- gesting specific facts, we cannot reach any conclusions about whether the cut-out and hairs had apparent exculpatory value. Certainly, in the late 1970s or early 1980s, officers were not required to predict scientific advances in DNA testing technologies. See Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 489 n.10 (the reliability of available testing bears on the evidence’s exculpatory—and 14 No. 24-2947 therefore its apparent exculpatory—value). And even so, the evidence “was simply an avenue of investigation that might have led in a number of directions.” Youngblood, 488 U.S. at 56 n.*; Hubanks v. Frank, 392 F.3d 926, 931 (7th Cir. 2004) (evi- dence that cannot exonerate the petitioner is not apparently exculpatory). Surely, without some proof of when the evi- dence was destroyed, Savory cannot establish the apparent exculpatory value of the evidence at the time of its destruc- tion. Regardless, the officers’ conduct wasn’t clearly estab- lished as unlawful by either the Supreme Court or this circuit. In Trombetta, the Supreme Court told us that it was not clearly established before 1984 that the government had a “duty to take affirmative steps to preserve evidence on behalf of crim- inal defendants.” Trombetta, 467 U.S. at 486. And Savory points us to Armstrong v. Daily, 786 F.3d 529 (7th Cir. 2015), to show the officers’ actions were shown as clearly established as early as the 1960s. But that case describes the pretrial de- struction of evidence. Id. at 532. Since Savory doesn’t argue when the evidence was destroyed (even conceding at oral ar- gument that the timing of the supposed destruction of evi- dence didn’t matter and that the officers had the duty to pre- serve the evidence indefinitely), he cannot meet his burden to show that it was clearly established that the officers’ conduct was unconstitutional. C We finally consider the district court’s denial of qualified immunity as to Savory’s coerced confession claim. Savory un- derwent many hours of interrogation over two days. He was repeatedly questioned, told he could go home after taking a polygraph test, and was told to remove his clothes so that No. 24-2947 15 officers could collect hair samples. Because no clearly estab- lished law shows that the officers should have been on notice that their conduct was unconstitutional, we reverse. The district court cited a string of cases that it found should have put the officers on notice that their tactics were unlawful. But in 1977, it was not beyond debate that the offic- ers’ conduct was unconstitutional. See Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563 U.S. 731, 741 (2011). At oral argument, Savory cited Haley v. Ohio, 332 U.S. 596, 601 (1948) (plurality) as the precedent with the facts most analogous to those in this case. But despite some factual similarities to our case, Haley is not sufficiently analogous. In that case, the police suspected a 15-year-old boy of murder and questioned him for five hours in rotating teams of officers from midnight until 5:00 am. 332 U.S. at 597–98. Be- fore he had been informed of his rights, he verbally confessed. Id. at 598; see also id. at 610 (Burton, J., dissenting). Only later was he provided with a written confession to sign; that con- fession included a statement informing him of certain consti- tutional rights. Id. at 598. But at no point was he advised of his right to counsel. Id. Around 5:00 am, he signed the written confession. Id. at 598–99. The Court expressed concern with Haley’s treatment. It noted that evidence suggested that “he was beaten” by the police, id. at 597, and that the record showed that after he con- fessed, “he was kept incommunicado for over three days,” a period during which the lawyer who was retained on his be- half was twice denied the opportunity to see and counsel him. Id. at 600. The Court nonetheless did not weigh the evidence that the boy was beaten and the evidence that his lawyer was barred from seeing him. See id. That said, it admonished the officers and expressed that “[w]hen the police are so 16 No. 24-2947 unmindful of these basic standards of conduct in their public dealings, their secret treatment of a 15-year-old boy behind closed doors in the dead of night becomes darkly suspicious.” Id. The Court additionally highlighted that, especially where the minor petitioner wasn’t informed of his right to counsel (and was later denied access to that right), it could not “in- dulge the assumption” that Haley had “full appreciation” of his rights. Id. at 601 (citation modified). In the end, the Court concluded that, considering the combination of factors, “[t]he Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the police from using the private, secret custody of either man or child as a device for wringing confessions from them.” Id. at 600–01. This case has similarities with Haley, but they are not enough to overcome our standard. The police gave Savory his Miranda warnings and, in doing so, informed him of his right to counsel. When Savory told the officers he did not want to speak with them, the questioning ended. The next morning, the officers once again read him his Miranda rights before questioning resumed. At different points, Savory met with his father and probation officer. And only after that did he con- fess. But in Haley, the boy was questioned through the night and never informed of his right to counsel, he was only in- formed of his other rights after he verbally confessed, and his lawyer was restricted from seeing him. Gallegos v. Colorado, 370 U.S. 49 (1962) is also an inapposite analog. In that case, the “crucial evidence” was a signed con- fession from the minor suspect. Id. at 50. That confession was obtained only after the police held the suspect for five days without a lawyer, parent, or friendly adult, despite at least his mother’s efforts to see him. See id. 53–54. Savory, like the pe- titioner in Gallegos, was only 14 years old. But that’s not No. 24-2947 17 enough: in Gallegos, the Court highlighted that age was just one factor of many that “combine[d]” to show a Due Process violation. See id. at 55. The other factors are distinguishable. Savory confessed to the murders about 29 hours after he was first questioned and less than a day after he was first given his Miranda rights. The petitioner in Gallegos was held for nearly five times as long as Savory was. And Savory met with his father and probation officer before he confessed; the peti- tioner in Gallegos was “cut off from contact” with any analo- gous adult. See id. at 54. These differences show that it is not clear that had the officers read the Supreme Court’s decision in Gallegos, they would have known that their specific conduct was unconstitutional. See Zorn v. Linton, 146 S. Ct. 926, 930 (2026) (per curiam). Savory points us to other controlling cases, but none put it beyond debate that the officers acted unlawfully. In Spano v. New York, 360 U.S. 315 (1959), the officers interrogated the sus- pect through the night and ignored “his repeated refusals” to answer their questions as well as “his reasonable requests to contact the local attorney whom he had already retained.” Id. at 322–23. In contrast, Savory was given Miranda warnings and the officers ceased questioning after he told them he didn’t wish to speak with them. Savory also cites Payne v. Ar- kansas, 356 U.S. 560 (1958) as evidence that the length of his interrogation and lack of food and water gave rise to a consti- tutional violation. See id. at 563–64. But Payne is distinguisha- ble. There, the Supreme Court considered the totality of the “course of conduct” that coerced the defendant’s confession, highlighting that there was a “culminating threat of mob vio- lence.” Id. at 567. That situation is entirely different from this one. And in Payne, the petitioner was not fed for a period of 25 hours, while Savory was given a candy bar on the first 18 No. 24-2947 evening and a hamburger on the second day of interrogation. Id. at 564. And in Blackburn v. Alabama, 361 U.S. 199 (1960), the Court found that the petitioner’s confession was involuntary be- cause he was likely “insane and incompetent” when he con- fessed. Id. at 207. In Culombe v. Connecticut, 367 U.S. 568 (1961), the Court likewise highlighted the significance that the de- fendant had “a mental age of nine to nine and a half years,” that his “request” for counsel was “in effect frustrated,” and that he was held for five days before he confessed. Id. at 620, 625, 630. And in Fikes v. Alabama, 352 U.S. 191 (1957), mental capacity was also at issue: the petitioner was schizophrenic and was denied access to his lawyer. Id. at 193–95, 197. There’s no evidence that Savory lacked mental capacity, distinguish- ing our case from those three. Beyond controlling precedent, plaintiffs can argue that the violation “was so obvious that no reasonable officer could be- lieve his actions were constitutional.” Villalobos, 168 F.4th at 1603 n.2. But courts usually “reserve this escape hatch … for egregious factual scenarios.” Id. And plaintiffs can also look to “all relevant caselaw” to see “whether there was such a clear trend in the caselaw that we can say with fair assurance that the recognition of the right by a controlling precedent was merely a question of time.” Kemp v. Liebel, 877 F.3d 346, 351 (7th Cir. 2017) (citation modified). But the out-of-circuit and state precedent Savory points to does not show with any certainty that we were about to recognize that the officers’ be- havior was clearly unlawful. The officers’ conduct wasn’t textbook (certainly not by today’s standards), but it was not “so egregious and unreasonable that no reasonable official could have thought he was acting lawfully.” Id. (citation No. 24-2947 19 modified). As a result, we reverse the district court and hold that the officers are entitled to qualified immunity as to the coerced confession claim. The analysis for the claim against private polygrapher Ed Bowers is the same. Even if Bowers was a state actor, his acts were not beyond a doubt unconstitutional. See United States v. Jones, 359 F.3d 921, 924 (7th Cir. 2004) (yelling at a defendant until he agrees with the interrogator is not enough to call the confession coerced). And even if Bowers was part of a con- spiracy to coerce a confession from Savory, for the reasons we have expressed, there was no clearly established law showing that the officers’ behavior was beyond a doubt unconstitu- tional. IV Savory argues that Detectives Cannon and Fiers, and Of- ficers Teplitz and Pinkney, fabricated police reports of his confessions; he argues that when officers testified consistently with those reports, they violated his Fourteenth Amendment due process right to a fair trial. The detectives and officers as- serted absolute immunity, which the district court denied. To begin, we reject Savory’s contention that the allegedly fabricated reports violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to a fair trial because they were used to secure charges against Savory and detain him. Any claim that fabricated reports led to Savory being unlawfully detained sounds in the Fourth Amendment, not the Fourteenth. See Patrick v. City of Chicago, 974 F.3d 824, 834 (7th Cir. 2020). In Patrick, we clarified that for a fabricated evidence claim to survive, there must be fabricated evidence, the evidence must have been material, it must have been used against the 20 No. 24-2947 plaintiff at his criminal trial, and he must have been damaged as a result. Id. at 835. Because the reports were never used, admitted, or relied upon at trial, even if they were false, their production did not contribute to a violation of Savory’s right to a fair trial. See id. Indeed, though law enforcement officers cannot “retroactively immunize” themselves from liability af- ter introducing fabricated evidence at trial by testifying con- sistently with those reports, “if the evidence [was not] used against the defendant, he would not have been harmed by it.” Fields v. Wharrie, 740 F.3d 1107, 1114 (7th Cir. 2014). And tes- timony consistent with the reports is not enough to deny them absolute immunity. As we said in Avery v. City of Milwaukee, 847 F.3d 433 (7th Cir. 2011), “trial testimony, standing alone” cannot subject officers to liability. Id. at 443. At worst, the false testimony—but not the reports—caused Savory harm. But testimony is covered by absolute immunity. Briscoe v. LaHue, 460 U.S. 325, 336 (1983). REVERSED No. 24-2947 21 JACKSON-AKIWUMI, Circuit Judge, concurring in part and dissenting in part. I agree that controlling precedent entitles the police officer defendants to qualified immunity on John- nie Savory’s Fourteenth Amendment destruction of evidence claim. But I would resolve this claim differently than my col- leagues do, so I concur only in the judgment as to Part III.B of the majority opinion. Furthermore, I agree that the officers are entitled to absolute immunity on Savory’s Fourth Amend- ment false testimony claim. So I join Part IV of the majority opinion in full. As to the remaining claims, I part ways with the majority. My colleagues err procedurally by reversing the district court’s denial of qualified immunity to the officers on Sa- vory’s Fourth Amendment unlawful detention claim. And they err substantively by concluding it was not clearly estab- lished by 1977 that the officers’ interrogation techniques vio- lated the Fifth Amendment. It clearly was, so the officers are not entitled to qualified immunity on this claim. I therefore respectfully dissent from Parts III.A and III.C of the majority opinion. I I begin with Savory’s Fourteenth Amendment destruction of evidence claim. The majority reaches the correct conclu- sion—that is, that the officers are entitled to qualified immun- ity—but I depart from its reasoning. I take issue with two as- pects of the majority’s analysis. First, the majority incorrectly implies that the government no longer has an obligation to preserve exculpatory evidence once a criminal defendant’s trial begins. This mischaracterizes the governing preservation-of-evidence caselaw, namely 22 No. 24-2947 Arizona v. Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51 (1988). In Youngblood, the Supreme Court neither explicitly nor implicitly limited its holding to the pre-trial context—the case’s reasoning applies with equal force to a criminal defendant’s post-trial rights. In- deed, at least one of our sister circuits has held as much. See Yarris v. Cnty. of Delaware, 465 F.3d 129, 142 (3d Cir. 2006) (“[T]he Youngblood decision did not indicate that it was lim- ited to its temporal context.”); id. (applying Youngblood to po- lice detectives’ “post-conviction conduct”). This approach makes sense. The government’s destruction of exculpatory evidence during or after trial prevents a defendant from meaningfully availing himself of his post-conviction legal remedies. This is no less insidious than the government vio- lating its obligation under Brady v. Maryland to disclose excul- patory evidence before trial. Cf. Cannon v. Burge, 752 F.3d 1079, 1098 (7th Cir. 2014) (“[E]fforts by state actors to impede an individual’s access to courts may provide the basis for a constitutional claim under section 1983.”). That’s why this court has never held that the government’s obligation to pre- serve exculpatory evidence runs only to the moment of trial. Second, the majority makes two problematic declarations about the evidence at issue in this appeal—the hairs police found in the victim’s hand and the sample fabric from Sa- vory’s pants. The majority says that