Former Trumbull County Commissioner Niki Frenchko has filed a petition in the US Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit for a panel rehearing or a rehearing en banc, following the late November court ruling that said Trumbull County sheriff's deputies had probable cause to arrest her during a 2022 meeting.

The court ruled in late November that Frenchko's behavior during the July 7, 2022, meeting gave Sgts. Harold Wix and Robert Ross had reasonable grounds to charge her with disrupting a lawful meeting.

The filing is asking the Court of Appeals to reconsider its decision because the ruling alleged that her counsel never raised the civil rights conspiracy claim; a ruling disputed by her counsel.  

The petition is asking for the court to correct an alleged error and consider the conspiracy issue on the merits.

A filing states that the three-judge panel ruled that Frenchko didn't "raise or preserve her § 1983 conspiracy claim," a federal law that allows citizens to sue government officials/entities for violating constitutional rights while abusing the authority granted to them, which the filing calls "objectively incorrect."

The case stems from a meeting where Frenchko was arrested while protesting the reading of a letter from Sheriff Monroe that criticized her previous comments about medical care at the county jail.

The filing also alleges that the panel wrongly suggested that the then-commissioner was required to file a cross-appeal to preserve the conspiracy issue, and the panel did not review the district court's ruling or records supporting it. 

A rehearing is a request asking the original three-judge panel to reconsider their decision and not for a simple argument, and a rehearing en banc is a request for all judges at a circuit court to hear the case instead of a three-judge panel.

The court concluded that, because the officers observed conduct that impeded the meeting's progress, the arrest was objectively reasonable under the Fourth Amendment. This ruling held that the deputies and county officials were immune from the claim of unlawful seizure.

In Frenchko v. Monroe, one circuit judge dissented on one key point, stating that by "failing to apply the longstanding rule that conspirators can be liable for each other’s acts under § 1983, the majority improperly grants qualified immunity to (Former Commissioner Frank) Fuda, (former Commissioner Mauro) Cantalamessa, and (former Trumbull County Sheriff Paul) Monroe on Frenchko’s First Amendment retaliation claim. But at the same time, it properly recognizes that live questions remain as to whether Wix and Ross (the Officer Defendants) should receive qualified immunity on that claim. That differential result flows from the majority’s conclusion that the conspiracy issue is not properly before us. I disagree. So I would remand the retaliation claim for all the individual defendants, not just the Officers," said Judge John Nalbandian.

The incident drew media attention after a video showed deputies removing Frenchko from her seat and leading her out of the meeting room in handcuffs.