Latino v. Kaizer
United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
58 F.3d 310 (1995)
Police officer Edward Kaizer (defendant) arrested Daniel Latino and Robert Slawinski (plaintiffs) for scalping four basketball tickets, and after their release they sued him for false arrest and civil rights violations; the central factual dispute was whether the men intended to criminally scalp all four tickets or innocently sell only the two they didn't need, and the jury heard complex, contradictory testimony including Kaizer's own account before returning a verdict for Kaizer. The trial judge concluded the jury must have relied solely on Kaizer's testimony, found that testimony objectively improbable and likely perjured, and vacated the verdict for a new trial, which resulted in a verdict for Latino and Slawinski; Kaizer appealed.
Whether a trial judge may vacate a jury verdict as being against the weight of the evidence only if the verdict would result in a miscarriage of justice.