Civil Rights & Police Abuse
Bedi & Singer handles select civil rights and police-abuse matters, particularly where wrongful convictions, coerced confessions, unlawful searches or arrests, or other alleged police misconduct intersect with its criminal-defense work.
How a civil rights case begins
Some civil rights matters begin as criminal cases. A person may be arrested after an unlawful search, say that a confession was coerced, or be convicted in a case later challenged because of alleged police misconduct. In other situations, excessive force, a false arrest, or mistreatment in custody can raise constitutional questions even when no criminal conviction follows.
Bedi & Singer handles select civil rights and police-abuse matters, with particular experience where constitutional issues overlap with criminal defense and wrongful-conviction work. Bedi & Singer takes a focused approach to these cases rather than operating a high-volume civil-rights practice.
When criminal defense and civil rights overlap
Federal law provides a civil remedy when a person acting under color of state law deprives someone of rights protected by the Constitution or federal law. Many police-misconduct cases are brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, but whether a viable claim exists depends on the specific constitutional right, the conduct involved, causation, timing, and other case-specific rules.
These matters can involve wrongful convictions and coerced confessions, unlawful searches or seizures, false arrest, excessive force, police shootings, mistreatment in jail or prison, or other alleged misconduct by government officials. Not every arrest that ends without a conviction creates a civil-rights claim, and not every use of force is unconstitutional. The facts and the legal theory have to be evaluated carefully.
Experience informed by criminal courtroom work
Bedi & Singer’s criminal-defense background is especially relevant when a civil-rights matter grows out of a prosecution. Bedi & Singer regularly litigates constitutional issues involving searches, arrests, statements, police conduct, and the admissibility of evidence, and it understands how those issues develop inside an actual criminal case.
In one recent matter, Bedi & Singer represented a man who had been convicted of murder after a confession he maintained was coerced through police torture. Bedi & Singer began representing him in 2022. His conviction was later vacated, the challenged statement was suppressed, he was released from custody, and in 2026 he was found not guilty after a five-day retrial.
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
That kind of work illustrates the connection between criminal defense, post-conviction litigation, and potential civil-rights issues. The appropriate path in any new matter depends on what happened, what proceedings have already occurred, and what remedies may be available.
Contact Bedi & Singer
If your matter involves a wrongful conviction, alleged police abuse, an unlawful search or arrest, excessive force, or another potential constitutional violation, contact Bedi & Singer.
Bedi & Singer can evaluate whether the matter fits its civil-rights practice and how any civil issues may intersect with criminal or post-conviction proceedings.