Price

ORDER

The panel has voted unanimously to deny appellants’ petition for rehearing, for reasons explained in part in the MEMORANDUM set forth below.

The full court has been advised of the petition for rehearing en banc and no active judge has requested a vote on whether to rehear the matter en banc. Fed. RApp. P. 35.

Accordingly, the petition for rehearing and the petition for rehearing en banc are DENIED.

MEMORANDUM

In their Petition for Rehearing (PFR), the appellants mischaracterize our opinion so that it appears we disagree with the general rule — as articulated in other federal circuits — that an interlocutory appeal on the issue of qualified immunity is mandatory not permissive. On the contrary, our decision is fully consistent with the PFR’s claim that the appropriate rule to apply is: “an interlocutory appeal from an adverse pretrial ruling on qualified immunity is permissive, not mandatory, and the issue is not waived in a later appeal.” See PFR at ii (emphasis added); see also Littlewind v. Rayl, 33 F.3d 985, 987 (8th Cir.1994) (“We acknowledge that defendants were not required to file an immediate interlocutory appeal from the ... pretrial order denying their…