Court rules that family can not sue officer who fired fatal shots in Harding Street raid

HOUSTON, Texas (KTRK) -- An appeals court has ruled that the families of Rhogena Nicholas and Dennis Tuttle cannot pursue a civil lawsuit against the former Houston police officer who fired the shots that killed them during the botched Harding Street raid.

The decision comes more than seven years after Nicholas and Tuttle were killed inside their southeast Houston home during a January 2019 no-knock drug raid that was based on false information.

Former Officer Gerald Goines, the lead case agent who obtained the search warrant, is already serving a 60-year prison sentence for using fake information to obtain the no-knock warrant. The latest ruling focuses instead on whether former Officer Felipe Gallegos can be held financially liable for the fatal shooting.

Gallegos has maintained throughout the case that he acted appropriately, arguing he had no way of knowing the no-knock warrant was based on false statements made by Goines.

A three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit agreed, ruling that Gallegos "acted like an objectively reasonable officer" and that the court would not second-guess his "training and judgment," which required split-second decisions during the exchange of gunfire.

Gallegos' attorney, Rusty Hardin, said the ruling reinforces the purpose of qualified immunity.

"It's a tragedy these folks were killed," Hardin said. "We've never said otherwise. It's horrible, but it's also a tragedy what happened to Felipe."

Hardin argued that without qualified immunity, officers would face personal financial risk every time someone challenged their actions, discouraging people from becoming police officers.

Attorneys representing the Nicholas family strongly disagreed with the ruling.

In a statement, attorney Mike Doyle said, "Felipe Gallegos deliberately killed an unarmed woman on her own couch and then kept changing his story to justify something that is never justifiable. We believe Judge Bennett was dead right when he confirmed a jury needed to make the decision about his honesty and the real facts."

Doyle said the family plans to appeal the decision, hoping to ultimately present the case before a jury to determine who should be held responsible for the deaths of Nicholas and Tuttle.