Tyjuan Anderson v. City of Rockford, Illinois ( 2019 )


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  •                                In the
    United States Court of Appeals
    For the Seventh Circuit
    ____________________
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    TYJUAN ANDERSON, et al.,
    Plaintiffs-Appellants,
    v.
    CITY OF ROCKFORD, et al.,
    Defendants-Appellees.
    ____________________
    Appeals from the United States District Court for the
    Northern District of Illinois, Western Division.
    Nos. 3:15-cv-50065 & 3:15-cv-50064 — Frederick J. Kapala, Judge.
    ____________________
    ARGUED MAY 14, 2019 — DECIDED JULY 25, 2019
    ____________________
    Before FLAUM, KANNE, and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges.
    SCUDDER, Circuit Judge. Nowhere does the Constitution’s
    promise of due process mean more than in a criminal trial.
    This promise translates into an obligation when police and
    prosecutors find themselves in possession of information that
    exculpates a criminal defendant. That is the cornerstone of the
    Supreme Court’s 1963 decision in Brady v. Maryland, and this
    case presents serious and unresolved questions whether cer-
    tain detectives in Rockford, Illinois, failed to adhere to their
    2                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    Brady obligations when prosecuting three men for the murder
    of eight-year-old Demarcus Hanson on April 14, 2002. One of
    those detectives has since admitted—under oath no less—to
    engaging in serious misconduct during the investigation.
    In 2013 an Illinois court found a Brady violation as part of
    vacating the murder convictions of Tyjuan Anderson, Lumont
    Johnson, and Anthony Ross after each man served more than
    a decade in prison. The case entered federal court when An-
    derson, Johnson, and Ross then brought claims for money
    damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and state law against the City
    of Rockford and a score of individual defendants. The district
    court granted summary judgment on all claims in favor of all
    defendants. We reverse. While the case entails many complex-
    ities, Anderson, Johnson, and Ross have brought forth suffi-
    cient evidence to move forward against particular defendants
    on particular aspects of their alleged due process violations.
    I
    Demarcus Hanson was killed by shots fired into his grand-
    mother’s Rockford home. The State successfully prosecuted
    Tyjuan Anderson, Lumont Johnson, and Anthony Ross for the
    murder and each received a 50-year sentence. The men spent
    more than a decade in prison before an Illinois court ordered
    a new trial based on the delayed disclosure of Brady mate-
    rial—specifically, the recorded jail calls of the prosecution’s
    key witness in which he contradicted his trial testimony. An-
    derson, Johnson, and Ross were retried and acquitted. They
    then turned to federal court by filing this lawsuit against the
    City of Rockford and multiple Rockford police officers alleg-
    ing that the defendant officers violated their rights under the
    U.S. Constitution and Illinois law by not only withholding the
    recorded jail calls and other exculpatory information, but also
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        3
    by fabricating evidence leading to their convictions for a
    crime they insist they did not commit.
    A. The Murder and Investigation
    At approximately 2:51 a.m. on April 14, 2002, someone
    fired shots into Estelle Dowthard’s home. One of the bullets
    struck and killed her eight-year-old grandson Demarcus Han-
    son as he was sleeping in his bed. Responding officers from
    the Rockford Police Department soon learned that Estelle’s
    son, Alex Dowthard, was likely the shooter’s intended target.
    Dowthard would come to play a substantial role in the inves-
    tigation and, ultimately, the plaintiffs’ trials and convictions.
    Detectives Doug Palmer and Joseph Stevens—both de-
    fendants in this case—led the investigation. Within hours of
    the shooting, Palmer and another detective, defendant James
    Randall, interviewed Dowthard, who denied any knowledge
    about his nephew’s murder. Dowthard told the detectives
    that, in the hours before the murder, he had a verbal alterca-
    tion with Anderson, Johnson, and Ross near the M+M Market
    in Rockford and he shot at the trio as they drove in a white
    Suburban. Dowthard explained that he then drove to his
    mother’s home and hid his gun under a car parked outside.
    He insisted, however, that he was not present when shots
    were later fired at his mother’s house and therefore did not
    know who killed his nephew.
    The police used Dowthard’s admission that he possessed
    a gun (and shot at the plaintiffs) to detain him on a parole vi-
    olation. A few weeks later, on May 2, Detectives Palmer and
    Stevens again sought to speak with Dowthard, this time at Big
    Muddy River Correctional Center, where he was incarcerated
    on the parole violation. And Dowthard again denied any
    4                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    knowledge about his nephew’s murder. During this visit, De-
    tective Stevens also requested copies of Dowthard’s jail calls
    to assist with the investigation. Less than two weeks later, un-
    doubtedly to increase the pressure on Dowthard to cooperate,
    the State resurrected an old set of forgery allegations (dating
    to February 2002) that had gone uncharged. The new charges
    provided a second basis to revoke Dowthard’s parole.
    Rockford police met with Dowthard a third time on May
    31, 2002. This time Dowthard, who was still incarcerated for
    the parole violation, agreed to talk, but only if detectives
    agreed to inform the parole board of his cooperation. He then
    provided Sergeant Gregory Lindmark and defendant Detec-
    tive Theo Glover a written statement claiming, for the first
    time, that he was present when his nephew was shot. Despite
    his initial denials, Dowthard now claimed he saw three indi-
    viduals—Anderson, Johnson, and Ross—exit a red car with
    guns and then, as he was fleeing, heard shots fired toward his
    mother’s house. He told the police that he initially denied see-
    ing the shooters because he thought he could handle the mat-
    ter himself. Later that summer, Dowthard repeated this story
    before the grand jury, and on July 31, the State dismissed his
    forgery charge.
    Detectives Stevens and Palmer also interviewed Lataurean
    Brown, who was with Dowthard in the hours before the mur-
    der. While Brown would eventually become an important
    prosecution witness, during his initial interview on April 24,
    he denied knowing who shot at the Dowthard home. But he
    admitted to seeing Alex Dowthard fire shots at the plaintiffs’
    Suburban earlier that night. He also told police that he drove
    Dowthard to his mother’s house, where Dowthard hid his
    gun under a car. The two men then drove to the Concord
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                       5
    Commons, where Brown saw and spoke to his cousin
    Rickedda Young. A few weeks later, Detectives Stevens and
    Palmer interviewed Brown a second time. By the end of the
    ten-hour interview, Brown changed his account and signed a
    written statement claiming Anderson, Johnson, and Ross
    were responsible for Hanson’s death.
    In April 2002, and following up on the information pro-
    vided by Brown, the police spoke with Rickedda Young.
    Young told Detectives Stevens and Scott Mastroinanni (also a
    defendant in this case) that she saw and spoke to Brown and
    Dowthard at the Concord Commons during the early morn-
    ing hours of April 14. She stated that Dowthard and Brown
    told her that someone had just fired shots at them as they fled
    Dowthard’s mother’s house, but they did not know who. Nei-
    ther Stevens nor Mastroinanni documented or disclosed this
    fact—that immediately after the shooting, the State’s key wit-
    nesses told a family member they did not see the shooter—in
    the subsequent prosecution of Anderson, Johnson, and Ross.
    The Rockford police also investigated but ultimately ex-
    cluded two other possible suspects, Kefentse Taylor and Casel
    Montgomery, before arresting the three plaintiffs (Anderson,
    Johnson, and Ross) for Demarcus Hanson’s murder.
    B. Criminal Trials
    Anderson and Johnson proceeded to trial in October 2002.
    The Thursday before trial was to begin, the prosecution re-
    ceived more than 40 hours of Alex Dowthard’s recorded jail
    calls from the Rockford police. The tapes, which were made
    available to the plaintiffs’ then-defense attorneys the follow-
    ing afternoon, included Dowthard’s conversations with fam-
    6                                       Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    ily and friends while he was incarcerated for the parole viola-
    tion in May 2002. The conversations predated Dowthard’s
    May 31 written statement in which he first implicated the
    plaintiffs. Given the length and poor quality of the recordings,
    the attorneys for the plaintiffs (then defendants) requested a
    continuance for more time to listen to all of them and to de-
    termine whether they contained exculpatory or otherwise
    useful defense evidence. The trial court denied the request
    and proceeded with jury selection, affording the attorneys for
    Anderson and Johnson only a couple of days to review the
    recordings.
    With no physical or forensic evidence connecting the
    plaintiffs to the crime, the prosecution’s case rested on the tes-
    timony of Alex Dowthard and Lautaurean Brown. Dowthard
    testified consistent with his May 31 written statement impli-
    cating the plaintiffs, though he offered a different explanation
    for his evolving account of the murder. Recall that in his writ-
    ten statement Dowthard claimed that he initially lied to the
    police (by denying knowledge of who shot Hanson) because
    he thought he could handle the situation himself. At trial,
    however, Dowthard testified that during his first two inter-
    views he told detectives he did not witness the murder be-
    cause he was on parole and telling the police the true and full
    account of what happened during the early morning hours of
    April 14 would mean admitting that he had a gun and thus
    admitting to a parole violation. (This explanation made little
    sense because Dowthard admitted to possessing a gun during
    his first interview with police just hours after the murder,
    which resulted in a parole violation.)
    Dowthard further testified that he eventually cooperated
    with police without receiving anything in return. During
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                         7
    cross-examination, however, he conceded that following his
    testimony in the grand jury, the State dropped his unrelated
    forgery charge, sent a letter to the parole board relaying this
    information, and decided not to charge him for the shots he
    fired at the plaintiffs just before Hanson’s murder. Neither
    party introduced or otherwise used any aspect of Dowthard’s
    jail calls at Anderson and Johnson’s trial.
    Lautaurean Brown also testified for the prosecution and,
    like Dowthard, pointed the finger at the plaintiffs, though he
    denied seeing anyone carrying a gun.
    As for the defense case, Anderson and Johnson presented
    alibi witnesses and argued that two other individuals, Kefen-
    tse Taylor and Casel Montgomery, were the actual shooters.
    The jury found Anderson and Johnson guilty of murder, and
    the trial court later sentenced each of them to 50 years’ impris-
    onment.
    The third plaintiff, Anthony Ross, proceeded to trial in
    2004. Brown and Dowthard again testified for the prosecution
    and echoed the accounts provided in the trial of Johnson and
    Anderson. The jury also heard from Ross’s cousin, Sonya
    White, who claimed she was with Ross when he tossed the
    murder weapon into a lake and confessed to killing Hanson.
    Ross then testified in his own defense and denied any involve-
    ment in the murder while also presenting an alibi witness.
    The jury returned a guilty verdict, and, as with Johnson and
    Anderson, Ross received a sentence of 50 years.
    C. Post-conviction Proceedings
    Following unsuccessful direct appeals, all three plaintiffs
    filed petitions for post-conviction relief in which they asserted
    their innocence and alleged, as they do here, that the officers
    8                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    investigating Demarcus Hanson’s murder committed numer-
    ous Brady violations. They also alleged that the defendant of-
    ficers engaged in misconduct by coercing witnesses and fab-
    ricating evidence. In support of their claim, the plaintiffs sub-
    mitted an affidavit by Detective Palmer—the lead investiga-
    tor—in which Palmer admitted that he threatened witnesses,
    falsified witness statements, neutralized exculpatory evi-
    dence, and instructed witnesses to offer testimony he believed
    was false.
    The trial court reacted to Detective Palmer’s admissions of
    misconduct by holding an evidentiary hearing on the plain-
    tiffs’ petitions for post-conviction relief. The court heard tes-
    timony from Palmer and approximately 34 other witnesses.
    Palmer’s testimony focused on three topics: the circumstances
    surrounding his resignation from the Rockford Police Depart-
    ment in 2004, his own wrongdoing during the Hanson mur-
    der investigation, and his belief that Anderson, Johnson, and
    Ross did not commit the murder. We need focus only on the
    testimony regarding police misconduct.
    Palmer admitted at length and in substantial detail that he
    threatened and coerced witnesses to give statements and en-
    couraged witnesses to provide false testimony during the
    plaintiffs’ criminal trials. He described, for example, how he
    had instructed the two key prosecution witnesses—
    Dowthard and Brown—to testify consistently with their writ-
    ten statements implicating the plaintiffs even though he be-
    lieved those statements were false. He also explained how he
    falsified a statement from a man named Bryce Croft and then
    compelled Croft to sign the statement.
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                         9
    The details matter. According to Palmer, in the summer of
    2002 and before the plaintiffs’ trials, Bryce Croft, then an in-
    mate at Winnebago County Jail, requested to see him and,
    during the meeting that followed, provided detailed infor-
    mation implicating an alternative suspect, Casel Montgom-
    ery, in Hanson’s murder. Palmer testified that instead of pur-
    suing this lead against Montgomery, he took a deliberate step
    to prevent Croft’s statement from being of any use to the
    plaintiffs during their criminal trials. He told the court that he
    did so at the direction of his supervisor, testifying that “Ser-
    geant Lindmark told me to make a liar out of Bryce Croft.”
    Palmer explained that, upon receiving this instruction, he met
    a second time with Croft and, during that meeting, forced
    Croft to sign a pre-written and false statement recanting his
    original statement. The plaintiffs went to trial knowing none
    of the circumstances surrounding Croft’s second statement or
    that his recantation was false.
    Croft, too, testified at the evidentiary hearing and corrob-
    orated much of Detective Palmer’s account. He explained that
    he met with Palmer in July 2002 to provide information about
    Casel Montgomery’s role in the murder. After doing so,
    though, Palmer returned a few months later and, as Croft re-
    counted, threatened him with perjury charges if he did not
    recant his original statement implicating Montgomery. Croft
    recalled that Palmer brought with him a pre-written state-
    ment and, as part of leveling a threat of prosecution, de-
    manded Croft sign it. Croft explained that he signed the sec-
    ond statement—even though he knew it was false—because
    of Palmer’s threats.
    10                                     Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    The plaintiffs also called Alex Dowthard as a witness, but
    he asserted his Fifth Amendment privilege against self-in-
    crimination and did not testify.
    As part of assessing the plaintiffs’ Brady claims, the trial
    court also considered statements Dowthard made during tel-
    ephone calls from jail in May 2002. It was undisputed that
    these recorded conversations, which totaled approximately
    40 hours, were not made available to the attorneys for Ander-
    son, Johnson, and Ross until Friday, October 18, and Ander-
    son and Johnson’s joint trial was to begin the following Mon-
    day, October 21.
    Contrary to his testimony at the plaintiffs’ criminal trials,
    during several conversations with family, Dowthard denied
    being present when his nephew was shot and killed. These
    conversations took place shortly after Dowthard’s incarcera-
    tion for the parole violation and, importantly, at the time the
    police were visiting him and pressing for information on the
    Hanson murder. On May 2, for example, the same day Detec-
    tives Palmer and Stevens visited Dowthard at Big Muddy,
    Dowthard told his mother that “he told them the truth,” a
    clear reference to telling the police that he did not know who
    shot the young boy. And again, on May 11, Dowthard told his
    cousin Antowan Lambert that, at the time of the murder, he
    “wasn’t no mother f* * * ing where around, you know what
    I’m saying.”
    The jail calls further revealed that Lambert, who officers
    were also pressing for information about Hanson’s murder,
    coached Dowthard on what to tell the police about the mur-
    der and fed him information about what Lautaurean Brown
    had told the police—all in an effort to enable Dowthard to
    align his account with Brown’s. For example, on May 16, two
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        11
    weeks before Dowthard gave police a statement incriminating
    the plaintiffs, Lambert told Dowthard to memorize what he
    was telling him so that Dowthard’s statement “w[ould] coin-
    cide” with what Brown had already told police.
    In other calls from jail, Dowthard told friends and family
    that the police were pressuring him to cooperate. In early
    May, for instance, he told his mother that “[the police] talkin’
    about bringin’ me up on some federal charges or whatever.”
    On May 13, Dowthard learned he was being charged with an
    unrelated forgery that would impact his parole status. On
    May 20, Dowthard told someone named Maria that the police
    were “playin’ with me, hurtin’ me until I’m damn near at the
    point man, you just don’t know.” In this same call, Dowthard
    added “[Detective] Palmer man got—hittin’ me all upside my
    head and everything, man tellin’ my sister what to—put his
    hands on me.”
    Following the hearing, the court rejected any claims of po-
    lice misconduct, emphasizing that it did not find Detective
    Palmer’s testimony credible. While recognizing the extraordi-
    nary nature of Palmer’s admissions, the court concluded that
    “through his words, actions and timing of his ‘disclosures,’”
    the former detective had “cast a pall over the credibility of his
    latter day revelations.” Our review of the record suggests that
    the court’s credibility finding may have been driven in large
    part by the circumstances surrounding Palmer’s resignation
    from the Rockford Police Department. Those circumstances
    are not relevant here.
    Turning to the plaintiffs’ arguments regarding
    Dowthard’s jail calls, the court awarded each plaintiff a new
    trial, concluding that the State impermissibly delayed disclo-
    sure of the recordings. The calls, the court explained, included
    12                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    “outright denials of knowledge about the facts of the case” as
    well as “potential coaching” and “potential incentive” to im-
    plicate the plaintiffs—and without timely access to the record-
    ings, the plaintiffs were “denied an essential tool in testing the
    credibility of Alex Dowthard.” The delayed disclosure was
    particularly concerning, the court emphasized, because this
    was “essentially a one-eyewitness case,” and the key im-
    peachment material was turned over “on the virtual eve of
    trial,” making it impossible for the attorneys to “meaningfully
    listen to [the tapes] and evaluate them.” Due process de-
    manded a new trial, the court concluded, because it could not
    be sufficiently assured that the outcome of the trial would
    have been the same had Dowthard been cross-examined with
    his statements on the tapes.
    The State unsuccessfully appealed the trial court’s award
    of post-conviction relief. See People v. Johnson, 2014 IL App
    (2d) 130368-U. The Illinois appellate court did not upset the
    trial court’s finding that Anderson and Johnson established
    a Brady violation. But the court reached a different conclusion
    as to Ross. Because Ross’s trial took place in 2004—more than
    a year after the prosecution turned over the Dowthard
    tapes—the court determined that he was not prejudiced by
    the delayed disclosure of the recordings. Instead, the court af-
    firmed the grant of post-conviction relief as to Ross on alter-
    native grounds, holding that Ross’s counsel was ineffective
    for failing to impeach Dowthard with the statements from his
    recorded jail calls.
    D. Criminal Retrial
    In 2015 the defendants were retried for the Hanson mur-
    der in a bench trial. This time Alex Dowthard invoked his
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                          13
    Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination and re-
    fused to testify. Lautaurean Brown initially did the same but
    then ultimately took the stand and stated that he “couldn’t see
    [the shooting] ‘cause I pulled off.” Finally, Sonya White, who
    testified at Ross’s original trial that Ross confessed to the mur-
    der, recanted her prior testimony and stated that she did not
    know who was responsible for Hanson’s death.
    The court acquitted all three men of murder.
    E. Civil Litigation
    In March 2015 the plaintiffs filed this lawsuit, raising
    many of the same issues that formed the basis of their state
    post-conviction petitions. In two separate complaints, the
    plaintiffs asserted nine claims against the City of Rockford
    and multiple Rockford police officers pursuant to 42 U.S.C.
    § 1983: violation of their due process right to a fair trial under
    the Fourteenth Amendment, conspiracy to deprive them of a
    right to a fair trial, failure to intervene, supervisory liability,
    and malicious prosecution. Each claim alleged that the de-
    fendant officers engaged in gross misconduct while investi-
    gating Demarcus Hanson’s murder. The plaintiffs further al-
    leged that the officers’ misconduct was undertaken pursuant
    to a policy and practice of the Rockford Police Department.
    They also advanced four separate claims under Illinois law:
    malicious prosecution, intentional infliction of emotional dis-
    tress, respondeat superior, and indemnification based on the
    same underlying conduct as alleged in their federal claims.
    The case proceeded to discovery. What is most relevant for
    purposes of appeal is that during the depositions of Detective
    Palmer and Alex Dowthard, both individuals invoked their
    14                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    protection under the Fifth Amendment and declined to tes-
    tify.
    The district court entered summary judgment for all de-
    fendants on all claims. Beginning with the plaintiffs’ § 1983
    due process claim, the court concluded the plaintiffs failed to
    identify sufficient evidence to demonstrate that any of the de-
    fendant police officers committed any of the alleged Brady vi-
    olations or instances of evidence fabrication. Because each of
    the remaining claims allege the same underlying conduct, this
    conclusion led directly to the entry of summary judgment in
    the defendants’ favor on every other claim.
    The plaintiffs now appeal.
    II
    We begin with the plaintiffs’ contention that the defendant
    police officers deprived them of a fair trial in violation of their
    rights under the Fourteenth Amendment’s Due Process
    Clause. The plaintiffs root their claim in two different theo-
    ries: the defendant officers both withheld exculpatory evi-
    dence in violation of their Brady obligations and fabricated
    false witness statements. While we agree that summary judg-
    ment was proper on the fabrication allegations (with one lim-
    ited exception), we conclude that the plaintiffs presented
    enough evidence to move forward on four particular grounds
    supporting their due process claim based on alleged Brady vi-
    olations.
    A. Due Process Claim: Brady Violations
    The district court concluded that the record showed no
    genuine dispute as to whether the defendant police officers
    suppressed exculpatory evidence. In reaching this conclusion,
    however, the court failed to view the evidence in the light
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                          15
    most favorable to the plaintiffs and adhere to the fundamental
    principle that “at the summary judgment stage the judgeʹs
    function is not himself to weigh the evidence and determine
    the truth of the matter but to determine whether there is a
    genuine issue for trial.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 
    477 U.S. 242
    , 249 (1986).
    The teachings of Brady are clear. In Brady itself the Su-
    preme Court held that “the suppression by the prosecution of
    evidence favorable to an accused…violates due process
    where the evidence is material either to guilt or to punish-
    ment, irrespective of the good faith or bad faith of the prose-
    cution.” 
    373 U.S. 83
    , 87 (1963). Subsequent decisions make
    plain that this precept translates into an affirmative duty to
    disclose to defendants all potentially exculpatory evidence,
    including impeachment evidence. See United States v. Bagley,
    
    473 U.S. 667
    , 676 (1985). Because Brady material also “encom-
    passes evidence ‘known only to police investigators and not
    to the prosecutor,’” prosecutors have an affirmative duty “to
    learn of any favorable evidence known to the others acting on
    the governmentʹs behalf in [a] case, including the police.”
    Strickler v. Greene, 
    527 U.S. 263
    , 280–81 (1999) (quoting Kyles v.
    Whitley, 
    514 U.S. 419
    , 437–38 (1995)). This “Brady rule,” the
    Court has explained, is not intended “to displace the adver-
    sary system as the primary means by which truth is uncov-
    ered, but to ensure that a miscarriage of justice does not oc-
    cur.” 
    Bagley, 473 U.S. at 675
    .
    “While most commonly viewed as a prosecutor’s duty to
    disclose to the defense,” it is settled that the duty imposed by
    Brady “extends to the police and requires that they similarly
    turn over exculpatory/impeaching evidence to the prosecu-
    tor.” Carvajal v. Dominguez, 
    542 F.3d 561
    , 566 (7th Cir. 2008);
    16                                        Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    see also Coleman v. City of Peoria, Illinois, 
    925 F.3d 336
    , 349 (7th
    Cir. 2019).
    To prevail on a civil Brady-based due process claim against
    a police officer, a plaintiff must demonstrate that the evidence
    in question was favorable to him, the police “suppressed” the
    favorable evidence, and prejudice ensued because the sup-
    pressed evidence was material. See 
    Carvajal, 542 F.3d at 566
    –
    67; see also Cairel v. Alderden, 
    821 F.3d 823
    , 832 & n.2 (7th Cir.
    2016). Evidence is suppressed for Brady purposes if the “pros-
    ecution failed to disclose evidence that it or law enforcement
    was aware of before it was too late for the defendant to make
    use of the evidence” and “the evidence was not otherwise
    available to the defendant through the exercise of reasonable
    diligence.” Boss v. Pierce, 
    263 F.3d 734
    , 740 (7th Cir. 2001).
    To satisfy Brady’s prejudice prong, a civil plaintiff must
    demonstrate that the withheld evidence was material, mean-
    ing “there is a ‘reasonable probability’ that the result would
    have been different had the suppressed evidence been put be-
    fore the jury.” Goudy v. Cummings, 
    922 F.3d 834
    , 842 (7th Cir.
    2019) (quoting 
    Kyles, 514 U.S. at 422
    ). The Supreme Court has
    made clear that Brady’s “reasonable probability” standard is
    less onerous than the traditional preponderance standard. See
    
    Kyles, 514 U.S. at 434
    . Indeed, “[t]he question is not whether
    the defendant would more likely than not have received a dif-
    ferent verdict with the evidence, but whether in its absence he
    received a fair trial, understood as a trial resulting in a verdict
    worthy of confidence.” 
    Id. To make
    this determination, courts
    must assess the cumulative effect of all the suppressed evi-
    dence “in the context of the entire record.” United States v.
    Agurs, 
    427 U.S. 97
    , 112 (1976); see also 
    Kyles, 514 U.S. at 460
    .
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                     17
    Turning to the merits, the plaintiffs argue that the defend-
    ant officers failed to adhere to Brady’s mandate—and violated
    their due process rights—by:
       Failing to disclose impeachment evidence of-
    fered by Rickedda Young;
       Failing to disclose the circumstances surround-
    ing Bryce Croft’s second statement;
       Failing to disclose the improper police tactics
    that produced Lautaurean Brown’s May 9, 2002
    statement;
       Failing to disclose the improper police tactics
    that produced Alex Dowthard’s May 31, 2002
    statement and, relatedly, failing to timely dis-
    close Dowthard’s jail calls; and
       Failing to disclose the circumstances surround-
    ing Sonya White’s statement implicating Ross in
    the murder.
    With the exception of the allegations involving Sonya
    White, which lack support in the record, and the allegations
    involving the improper police tactics used on Dowthard,
    which lack admissible evidence in the record, we conclude
    that the plaintiffs have come forward with enough evidence
    to move forward with each of their alleged Brady violations
    against particular defendants.
    Rickedda Young Testimony. The plaintiffs contend that
    two of the defendants, Detectives Joseph Stevens and Scott
    Mastroianni, committed a Brady violation by failing to dis-
    close that Rickedda Young informed them that she saw Brown
    and Dowthard immediately following the murder and they
    18                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    told her they did not see who shot at Dowthard’s mother’s
    house and killed Hanson. For purposes of summary judg-
    ment, the defendants do not dispute that this evidence was
    favorable to the plaintiffs and that Stevens and Mastroianni
    suppressed it by not including it in their police reports or oth-
    erwise disclosing it to the prosecutors or plaintiffs. The de-
    fendants nonetheless urge us to view the evidence as falling
    short of Brady’s materiality threshold. Because the evidence
    allows a contrary inference, we decline this invitation.
    As the district court saw it, Young’s statement was imma-
    terial—and therefore its omission did not prejudice the plain-
    tiffs—because “it merely echoed the fact that [Alex]
    Dowthard and [Lautaurean] Brown had initially indicated
    that they did not know who [fired] shot[s] [at] Dowthard’s
    mother’s house.” The district court, in short, saw Young’s
    statement as cumulative of information the jury heard and
    knew.
    But this perspective reflects too narrow a view of the evi-
    dence, divorced from favorable and indeed exculpatory infer-
    ences available to the plaintiffs on these facts. The district
    court correctly observed that the jurors learned that both
    Brown and Dowthard initially told police they did not see the
    shooters—in direct contradiction to their ultimate trial testi-
    mony. What the court did not account for, though, was the
    testimony explaining these inconsistencies. Dowthard, for ex-
    ample, testified that he told police he did not know who killed
    his nephew because he was on parole and was not supposed
    to have a gun. Young’s statement—that immediately after the
    shooting, Brown and Dowthard told her, a family member,
    that they did not know who had just shot at them—would
    have directly impeached Dowthard’s explanation for why his
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                          19
    story changed. And the impeachment was on a point of sub-
    stantial significance. Had the trial testimony included
    Young’s statement, the jury could have concluded that
    Dowthard in fact did not see who fired the shots into his
    mother’s house. Put differently, the jury could have con-
    cluded that Dowthard’s and Brown’s statements to Young im-
    mediately following the murder were true—that, in fact, they
    did not know who shot into Dowthard’s mother’s house—
    and that their trial testimony (and Dowthard’s explanation of
    his original statement to police) was false.
    Suppressed impeachment evidence “may not be material
    if the State’s other evidence is strong enough to sustain confi-
    dence in the verdict.” Smith v. Cain, 
    565 U.S. 73
    , 76 (2012). But
    suppressed evidence takes on particular significance—and is
    “plainly material”—where the prosecution’s case rests solely
    on the credibility of an eyewitness. 
    Id. That is
    the case here. No physical or forensic evidence
    linked the plaintiffs to the Hanson murder. Rather, the State’s
    case hinged on the reliability of what the prosecution insisted
    was eyewitness testimony from Brown and Dowthard.
    Rickedda Young’s suppressed evidence would have directly
    impeached Brown and Dowthard’s testimony that they saw
    the plaintiffs commit the murder—the central issue at trial.
    Young’s statement also would have lent credibility to the
    plaintiffs’ argument that Dowthard, the State’s key witness,
    initially told the police the truth (that he did not see the shoot-
    ing) but later lied during his trial testimony to garner personal
    favor with the State. Based on these inferences, reasonably
    available from the record, the plaintiffs came forward with
    enough evidence to survive summary judgement on their the-
    20                                     Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    ory that the defendant officers (in particular, Detectives Ste-
    vens and Mastroianni) violated Brady by withholding Young’s
    statement. The district court erred in concluding otherwise.
    Bryce Croft Evidence. What the record shows regarding
    Bryce Croft is most troubling. In the summer of 2002—before
    the plaintiffs’ criminal trials—Croft provided Detective
    Palmer with firsthand information that someone other than
    the plaintiffs committed the murder. This development,
    Palmer has admitted, later led him to prepare a false state-
    ment on behalf of Bryce Croft, which he then forced Croft to
    sign. The statement was significant because it recanted the in-
    formation Croft previously provided police about the alterna-
    tive suspect (Casel Montgomery). Palmer did so—he has
    stated under oath—not only knowing the statement was false,
    but also for the sole purpose of neutralizing a witness who
    had a meaningful chance of undermining the prosecution’s
    case against the plaintiffs.
    The district court accepted that the plaintiffs knew nothing
    of Detective Palmer’s misconduct before their criminal trials
    or that Croft’s recantation was false. But it nonetheless con-
    cluded that “the concealment of the coercion and fabrication
    of Croft’s second statement did not prevent plaintiffs from
    calling him as a witness at their trials” because “[e]ither side
    could have called Croft and allowed the adversarial trial pro-
    cess to flesh out the truth.”
    This conclusion too discounts the evidence, especially at
    summary judgment. Nothing we see in the record shows that,
    at the time of their criminal trials, the plaintiffs had any idea
    that Croft’s recantation was the product of police coercion or
    fabrication. And, without Detective Palmer’s admission, the
    plaintiffs had no way to prove the recantation was false.
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                           21
    Due process entitled the plaintiffs to learn before their trial
    what went on with Bryce Croft. See Avery v. City of Milwaukee,
    
    847 F.3d 433
    , 443 (7th Cir. 2017) (explaining that the right to a
    fair trial is implicated if the State fails to disclose “facts about
    the coercive tactics used to obtain” a witness’s statement). Re-
    member that Croft was not a fringe player for the plaintiffs’
    defense. To the contrary, he was a witness the plaintiffs very
    well may have called to assign responsibility for the Hanson
    murder to someone else. Croft had given an initial statement
    to the police saying that he had firsthand knowledge that Ca-
    sel Montgomery—not the plaintiffs—was responsible for the
    murder. But there was no way the plaintiffs would have run
    the risk of calling Croft as a witness at their criminal trials in
    the wake of his statement recanting that Montgomery was re-
    sponsible for the murder. And that simple observation—as
    Detective Palmer has since admitted—is precisely why he fal-
    sified the recantation and then forced Croft to sign it. The
    whole point was to neutralize Croft without the plaintiffs ever
    knowing that Croft’s about-face was the fruit of police mis-
    conduct. The plaintiffs have brought forth plenty here to
    move forward on this alleged Brady violation.
    Lautaurean Brown’s Statement. We next consider the
    plaintiffs’ contention that Detectives Palmer and Stevens vio-
    lated Brady by failing to disclose the coercive tactics used to
    extract Lautaurean Brown’s statement implicating them in
    Hanson’s murder. The district court accepted that, when
    viewed in the light most favorable to the plaintiffs, the evi-
    dence showed that Brown’s May 9, 2002 statement (and his
    corresponding trial testimony) implicating the plaintiffs was
    the product of Palmer’s threat that he would go to jail if he
    did not give a written statement incriminating the plaintiffs.
    But from there the court concluded that the plaintiffs failed to
    22                                     Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    identify adequate evidence to satisfy Brady’s prejudice ele-
    ment because, during the plaintiffs’ retrial in 2015, Brown tes-
    tified that the threat did not impact the accuracy of his state-
    ment. We cannot agree.
    The district court’s reasoning effectively required the
    plaintiffs to accept that Brown’s testimony in 2002 and 2004
    was true because he later said so. The proper Brady analysis
    works a different way. Regardless of whether Brown’s state-
    ment (and resulting testimony) was true or false, Brady im-
    posed a disclosure obligation: due process required disclo-
    sure to the plaintiffs of the coercive tactics used to obtain
    Brown’s statement. See 
    Avery, 847 F.3d at 439
    . Armed with
    that information, the plaintiffs could have contended, in their
    cross examinations of Brown and during closing arguments,
    that Brown’s testimony implicating the plaintiffs in the Han-
    son murder was false—the fruit of police coercion. Put most
    simply, a criminal defendant has a due process right to infor-
    mation that may materially impeach the testimony of a state’s
    witness. Indeed, that is the very promise—the essential pro-
    tection—of Brady. Because it is undisputed that the defend-
    ants failed to disclose the coercive tactics used to obtain
    Brown’s statement, the district court erred by granting sum-
    mary judgment on this alleged Brady violation.
    Alex Dowthard’s Jail Calls. Finally, the district court com-
    pounded these errors by rejecting the plaintiffs’ contention
    that an interrelated Brady violation occurred with the delayed
    disclosure of the recordings of Alex Dowthard’s telephone
    calls from Big Muddy River Correctional Center. Recall that
    the tapes contain 40 hours of conversations Dowthard had
    with his family and friends in May 2002, following his incar-
    ceration on a parole violation. In the recorded conversations,
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                          23
    Dowthard told his family and friends that he was not present
    when his nephew was shot; he was threatened with addi-
    tional charges if he failed to cooperate; he was physically
    threatened by police; and he was coached on what to say to
    police. Without question this evidence is both favorable and
    material to the plaintiffs. The only issue, then, is whether the
    tapes were suppressed within the meaning of Brady. The
    plaintiffs have come forward with enough at summary judg-
    ment showing the answer may well be yes.
    To establish that the tapes were suppressed, the plaintiffs
    must show that the State “failed to disclose known evidence
    before it was too late for [them] to make use of the evidence”
    at their criminal trials. Collier v. Davis, 
    301 F.3d 843
    , 850 (7th
    Cir. 2002). “The relevant inquiry,” we have emphasized, “is
    not whether the [State] disclosed the potentially exculpatory
    information at all, but whether [the criminal defendant] had
    sufficient time to use any exculpatory information revealed to
    him during trial.” Petty v. City of Chicago, 
    754 F.3d 416
    , 423 (7th
    Cir. 2014).
    The record shows that the prosecution received the
    Dowthard recordings from Rockford police on October 17,
    2002—the Thursday before Anderson and Johnson’s trial. The
    State produced the tapes to the plaintiffs’ (then defendants’)
    attorneys the next day, a period that two Illinois courts con-
    cluded was insufficient to allow for meaningful review and
    use of the tapes at trial. The plaintiffs contend, however, that
    Detective Stevens—not the prosecutors—suppressed the
    tapes by willfully withholding them from the prosecution un-
    til the eve of trial.
    In most circumstances “a police officer’s Brady obligations
    are discharged by disclosing material exculpatory evidence to
    24                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    the prosecutor, [because] it is the prosecutor’s responsibility
    to turn the evidence over to defense counsel.” Beaman v.
    Freesmeyer, 
    776 F.3d 500
    , 512 (7th Cir. 2015). Here, though, the
    facts as they presently stand permit a different conclusion.
    The record shows that Detective Stevens requested
    Dowthard’s jail calls on May 2, 2002. He testified that the jail
    sent him the recorded calls piecemeal on 20 different tapes,
    and he then listened to each of them. Though we are unable
    to discern with precision when Stevens actually received or
    listened to each of the tapes, there are indications in the record
    that he received them in May and June. In a supplemental po-
    lice report dated September 9, 2002, for example, Stevens de-
    scribed his work on the Hanson case in May 2002, noting that
    “[w]hile Dowthard was in prison, [Stevens] received pack-
    ages of cassette tapes which had recorded phone calls Alex
    Dowthard made while incarcerated at Big Muddy River Cor-
    rectional Center.” Dowthard testified that he was released
    from custody at the end of June 2002, permitting the inference
    that Detective Stevens possessed the jail tapes for at least three
    months before Anderson and Johnson’s criminal trial yet
    waited to disclose them until the Thursday before trial, while
    also assuring the lead prosecutor that the calls contained
    nothing relevant to the Hanson case.
    When we view the evidence in the light most favorable to
    the plaintiffs—as we must on summary judgment—the rec-
    ord allows the inference that, after receiving the tapes in May
    and June 2002, Detective Stevens withheld the calls, waited
    until the eve of trial to turn them over (when it was already
    too late for the plaintiffs to use them), and may well have com-
    pounded the delay by inaccurately describing their content
    and significance when he eventually turned them over to the
    prosecution. On this record, we conclude that there is enough
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        25
    here to infer that Stevens suppressed the Dowthard tapes
    within the meaning of Brady. Of course, the ultimate facts may
    come out differently at trial and fully absolve Detective Ste-
    vens. Our conclusion is limited to observing that the record,
    as it now stands, allows the plaintiffs to survive summary
    judgment on this alleged Brady violation.
    For the sake of completeness, we briefly address an evi-
    dentiary matter the parties have raised with respect to the
    Dowthard tapes. The parties devote considerable attention to
    the admissibility of the recordings. The district court con-
    cluded that Dowthard’s calls could not be used as evidence in
    opposition to summary judgment because they contain inad-
    missible hearsay. See Gunville v. Walker, 
    583 F.3d 979
    , 985 (7th
    Cir. 2009) (“[A] court may consider only admissible evidence
    in assessing a motion for summary judgment.”). To the extent
    that the plaintiffs seek to admit Dowthard’s statements on the
    calls for their truth, we agree.
    But observing that the statements made on the recorded
    calls may not be admissible for their truth under one or an-
    other exception to the hearsay rule does not mean the evi-
    dence is not relevant and admissible for another purpose. The
    alternative purpose here is to establish the existence of a Brady
    violation based on Detectives Stevens’s failure to disclose the
    impeachment material contained on the tapes. To succeed on
    this aspect of their due process claim, Anderson and Johnson
    must show not that Dowthard was telling the truth during his
    phone conversations with family and friends, but rather that
    the plaintiffs could have used his statements for impeachment
    purposes during their criminal trial—to undermine the cred-
    ibility of testimony offered by Dowthard. See 28 Wright &
    Gold, Federal Practice and Procedure § 6206 at 593 (2012)
    26                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    (“Where a prior inconsistent statement is offered only to im-
    peach, it is not hearsay since it merely shows the witness is
    unreliable and says nothing about the truth of the facts as-
    serted in the statement.”).
    To the extent that the parties debate the authenticity of the
    Dowthard tapes, we note only that, as best we can tell, no one
    questions whether the tapes came from the State and reflect
    Dowthard’s voice and telephone discussions while incarcer-
    ated at Big Muddy. And what we see in the summary judg-
    ment record are certified transcripts of the recorded calls (just
    as a deposition transcript would be certified), and there too
    nobody seems to say the certification is false. We have no rea-
    son, in short, to question that the plaintiffs have sufficiently
    authenticated the tapes and transcripts to allow us to consider
    their impeachment value for purposes of assessing this aspect
    of their Brady claim.
    B. Due Process Claim: Fabricated Evidence
    In their amended complaint, the plaintiffs also alleged that
    the officers fabricated a laundry list of evidence. Those allega-
    tions extend to Alex Dowthard’s and Lautaurean Brown’s
    statements (and subsequent trial testimony) implicating the
    plaintiffs in Hanson’s murder as well as Bryce Croft’s recan-
    tation. While we agree that the plaintiffs brought forward ev-
    idence of coercion, we see no error with the district court dis-
    allowing the due process claim to go forward on a theory of
    fabricated evidence with one limited exception as it pertains
    to Detective Palmer.
    It is well-established that “a police officer who manufac-
    tures false evidence against a criminal defendant violates due
    process if that evidence is later used to deprive the defendant
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        27
    of [his] liberty in some way.” Whitlock v. Brueggemann, 
    682 F.3d 567
    , 580 (7th Cir. 2012). To establish such a violation, the
    plaintiffs must demonstrate not only that the defendant offic-
    ers “created evidence that they knew to be false,” 
    Petty, 754 F.3d at 423
    , but also that the evidence was used “in some way”
    to deprive them of liberty, 
    Whitlock, 682 F.3d at 580
    .
    The plaintiffs’ primary contention is that the defendant of-
    ficers coerced the prosecution’s two key witnesses, Dowthard
    and Brown, to give statements implicating the plaintiffs that
    the defendants knew were false, with the statements then be-
    ing used to convict the plaintiffs of the Hanson murder. Be-
    ginning with Brown, the plaintiffs assert that Detectives
    Palmer and Stevens secured a false statement blaming Ander-
    son, Johnson, and Ross for Hanson’s murder by threatening
    Brown with jail time if he failed to cooperate and detaining
    him for more than ten hours. They also contend that Palmer
    and Stevens, along with Detective Theo Glover, coerced
    Dowthard into falsely implicating the plaintiffs, this time
    through physical force and by threatening him with addi-
    tional charges if he failed to cooperate. And, with respective
    to both Dowthard and Brown, the plaintiffs maintain that De-
    tective Palmer instructed both witnesses to testify consistently
    with their statements, even though he knew those statements
    were false.
    As a threshold matter, we agree that the record shows a
    genuine and unresolved dispute about whether the police co-
    erced Brown and Dowthard to provide statements blaming
    the plaintiffs for Hanson’s murder. But coercion and fabrica-
    tion are not synonyms, and we have stressed that “[an allega-
    tion] that an officer coerced a witness to give incriminating
    evidence does not, at least standing alone, violate the wrongly
    28                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    convicted person’s due-process rights.” 
    Avery, 847 F.3d at 439
    .
    Even more specifically, we have drawn a line between coerced
    testimony—“testimony that a witness is forced by improper
    means to give… [it] may be true or false”—and fabricated tes-
    timony—which is “invariably false.” Fields v. Wharrie, 
    740 F.3d 1107
    , 1110 (7th Cir. 2014). Only the latter supports a due
    process claim, and even then, only if the record shows that the
    officers “created evidence they knew to be false.” 
    Avery, 847 F.3d at 439
    ; see also 
    Whitlock, 682 F.3d at 584
    (explaining that
    “[c]oercively interrogating witnesses, paying witnesses for
    testimony, and witness-shopping may be deplorable, and
    these tactics may contribute to wrongful convictions, but they
    do not necessarily add up to a constitutional violation even
    when their fruits are introduced at trial” because “[e]vidence
    collected with these kinds of suspect techniques, unlike falsi-
    fied evidence and perjured testimony, may turn out to be
    true”).
    The plaintiffs have not brought forth enough evidence to
    create a genuine material dispute as to whether Detectives
    Stevens or Glover knew that Brown and Dowthard’s state-
    ments implicating the plaintiffs were false as required to
    maintain a due process claim premised on a theory of evi-
    dence fabrication. But we reach a different conclusion with re-
    spect to Detective Palmer.
    The plaintiffs insist that the record shows more than mere
    coercion because Detective Palmer admitted that he knew that
    Brown and Dowthard’s statements were false and nonethe-
    less instructed them to testify consistent with these false state-
    ments at the plaintiffs’ criminal trials. See 
    Fields, 740 F.3d at 1112
    (explaining that investigators fabricated evidence when
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        29
    they “told witnesses what to say knowing that what the [wit-
    ness] was telling them was false”). Indeed during the state
    post-conviction proceedings, Palmer repeatedly shared his
    belief that Anderson, Johnson, and Ross did not shoot Demar-
    cus Hanson—and that Dowthard’s claim that he witnessed
    the plaintiffs shoot at his mother’s house was not true. And,
    perhaps most critical to our analysis, Palmer testified that, de-
    spite this belief, he instructed Dowthard and Brown to testify
    consistent with their written statements implicating the plain-
    tiffs. Against the backdrop of Palmer’s admissions of wrong-
    doing—not an everyday occurrence—it is very difficult to
    conclude that the plaintiffs have not done enough to survive
    summary judgment on this dimension of their due process
    claim.
    This conclusion finds additional support in the record.
    When deposed in this matter, for example, Detective Palmer
    exercised his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimina-
    tion when asked whether he told Brown and Dowthard to tes-
    tify consistent with their statements “even though [he] be-
    lieve[d] their statements [were] not truthful.” The Fifth
    Amendment permits an adverse inference against parties in
    civil actions when they refuse to testify in response to proba-
    tive evidence against them. See Baxter v. Palmigiano, 
    425 U.S. 308
    , 318 (1976). Based on the record before us, and upon com-
    bining the weight of Palmer’s admissions during the state
    post-conviction proceedings with this adverse factual infer-
    ence, we conclude that the plaintiffs have carried their sum-
    mary judgment burden on their allegation that Detective
    Palmer fabricated Brown and Dowthard’s statements. Palmer
    did so by coercing the witnesses to give statements he be-
    lieved were false—and this evidence was used to deprive the
    plaintiffs of their liberty when Palmer then instructed Brown
    30                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    and Dowthard to testify consistent with these allegedly false
    statements.
    We turn next to the allegations involving Bryce Croft.
    Again, the plaintiffs maintain that Detective Palmer drafted a
    statement for Croft to sign which falsely recanted the infor-
    mation he previously provided about Casel Montgomery’s
    involvement in the murder. Palmer’s actions, the plaintiffs
    contend, prohibited them from presenting evidence of an al-
    ternate suspect through Croft because, if called as a witness,
    he would have been impeached by his false recantation.
    While this description of events finds support in the record,
    the plaintiffs cannot show that the prosecution used Croft’s
    second statement (the one prepared by Palmer) to convict any
    of the plaintiffs. Summary judgment, therefore, was appropri-
    ate as it pertains to the plaintiffs’ evidence fabrication theory.
    III
    The plaintiffs’ amended complaints are expansive—nam-
    ing nine defendants and advancing nine separate claims. On
    appeal, their arguments are equally sprawling, advancing nu-
    merous claims against numerous parties and raising multiple
    legal issues. Based upon our thorough review of the record
    and the parties’ briefs, we have focused only on those issues
    we believe warrant discussion and on those aspects of the
    plaintiffs’ claims that survive summary judgment. We have
    done so in part to aid and sharpen the focus of the proceed-
    ings as the case returns to the district court.
    In furtherance of this effort, we conclude by recapping
    which of the plaintiffs’ claims (or aspects of claims) may pro-
    ceed against which defendants on remand.
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                         31
    Beginning with Count I, we affirm the entry of summary
    judgment for the defendants on the plaintiffs’ evidence fabri-
    cation allegations with respect to all defendants except Detec-
    tive Doug Palmer, and only then as it pertains to the testi-
    mony of Brown and Dowthard. On this same count, the plain-
    tiffs may proceed with a due process claim rooted in each of
    following alleged Brady violations:
       Failure to disclose impeachment evidence of-
    fered by Rickedda Young: defendants Joseph
    Stevens and Scott Mastroianni;
       Failure to disclose the circumstances surround-
    ing Bryce Croft’s statement: defendant Doug
    Palmer;
       Failure to disclose the improper police tactics
    that produced Lautaurean Brown’s statement:
    defendants Joseph Stevens and Doug Palmer;
    and
       Failure to timely disclose the recordings of Alex
    Dowthard’s jailhouse telephone calls: defend-
    ant Joseph Stevens.
    As for the remaining defendants named in Count I (on ei-
    ther theory), we affirm the entry of summary judgment in fa-
    vor of defendants Theo Glover, Dominic Iasparro, James Ran-
    dall, and Torrey Regez because the plaintiffs have failed to set
    forth any arguments or identify any evidence that any of these
    officers engaged in any of the alleged due process violations.
    Turning to Count II (failure to intervene), Count III (con-
    spiracy), and Count VII (supervisor liability), the district court
    concluded that the defendants necessarily were entitled to
    summary judgment owing to its determination that plaintiffs
    32                                      Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232
    failed to bring forth enough evidence to support their Brady
    and fabrication allegations. In these circumstances, and espe-
    cially given the expanse and complexity of the factual record,
    remand is appropriate to allow the district court to consider
    each of these claims in the first instance—and to determine
    whether they may proceed and, if so, against which defend-
    ants.
    The district court also granted summary judgment on
    Count VIII (§ 1983 malicious prosecution) and Count IX (Illi-
    nois malicious prosecution). We affirm this aspect of the dis-
    trict court’s judgment. Beginning with the § 1983 claim, the
    plaintiffs’ amended complaint alleges that the defendant of-
    ficers violated their rights under the Fourth and Fourteenth
    Amendments by improperly subjecting them to judicial pro-
    ceedings without probable cause. But “[t]here is no such thing
    as a constitutional right not to be prosecuted without proba-
    ble cause.” Manuel v. City of Joliet, Illinois, 
    903 F.3d 667
    , 670
    (7th Cir. 2018) (quoting Serino v. Hensley, 
    735 F.3d 588
    , 593 (7th
    Cir. 2013)). There is, however, “a constitutional right not to be
    held in custody without probable cause,” 
    id., and the
    Supreme
    Court has “ma[de] clear that the Fourth Amendment, not the
    Due Process Clause, governs a claim for wrongful pretrial de-
    tention,” Lewis v. City of Chicago, 
    914 F.3d 472
    , 475 (7th Cir.
    2019) (citing Manuel v. City of Joliet, Illinois, 
    137 S. Ct. 911
    (2017)).
    The plaintiffs do not assert they were subjected to pretrial
    detention (though evidence in the record suggests they
    were)—but even if they had, their claim would still fail be-
    cause it hinges upon showing the absence of probable cause
    to support their arrests and confinement. The record supports
    Nos. 18-2211 & 18-2232                                        33
    the district court’s conclusion that at least some of the defend-
    ant officers reasonably believed that the plaintiffs were guilty
    of murder based on the accounts given by Dowthard and
    Brown. And it cannot reasonably be disputed that the written
    statements of Dowthard and Brown provided probable cause
    to support the arrests. Summary judgment, therefore, was ap-
    propriate on the plaintiffs’ federal claim. Because an Illinois
    claim for malicious prosecution likewise requires the absence
    of probable cause, the district court properly granted sum-
    mary judgment on this claim as well. See Johnson v. Saville, 
    575 F.3d 656
    , 659 (7th Cir. 2009) (identifying the elements of a ma-
    licious prosecution claim under Illinois law).
    Finally, the district court concluded that the City of Rock-
    ford was entitled to summary judgment on Count XI (re-
    spondeat superior) and Count XII (indemnification) because
    the plaintiffs failed to maintain a claim against any defendant
    police officer. In light of our conclusion regarding the poten-
    tial liability of certain individual officers, the entry of sum-
    mary judgment on these claims was likewise premature. We
    leave it to the district court to evaluate these claims on the
    merits in the first instance on remand. For the sake of com-
    pleteness, however, we note that the district court rejected the
    plaintiffs’ claims against the City premised on a Monell theory
    of liability. Because the plaintiffs failed to challenge this as-
    pect of the district court’s ruling, we consider this argument
    waived and the plaintiffs may not seek to revive this aspect of
    their claims on remand.
    For all of these reasons, we AFFIRM in part, REVERSE in
    part, and REMAND for further proceedings.