Our previous decisions do not establish the constitutionality of Tenn. Code Ann. s 40-808, permitting a city to authorize its officers to use deadly force against a fleeing felon, nor have they established the constitutionality of the city's use of hollow point bullets. Although there is discussion of the constitutionality of the Tennessee statute in the Beech, Qualls and Wiley cases, Supra, all three of those cases dealt with actions against individual officers under
s 1983, and not liability based on the “policy or custom” of a governmental entity. Those cases held that it “would be unfair” to impose liability on an officer “who relied, in good faith, upon the settled law of his state that he relieved him from liability for the particular acts performed in his official capacity.”
Qualls v. Parrish, supra at 694, quoted in
Wiley v. Memphis Police Department, supra at 1253. The essential holding of those cases was that an individual officer has a qualified privilege or immunity from liability for constitutional claims based on good faith performance of his duties in accordance with statutory or administrative authority, a holding subsequently approved by the Supreme Court in
Butz v. Economou, 438 U.S. 478, 496-508, 98 S.Ct. 2894, 57 L.Ed.2d 895 (1978). Although the qualified immunity developed in those cases insulates the officers and officials from personal liability in this case, as the District Court held, the following questions in the case against the city are still open under Monell: