402
Opinion of the Court
and Walker asserted a qualified immunity from § 1983 lawsuits, see Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U. S. 800, 807 (1982), and moved to dismiss the action. The District Court noted that Tennessee had "privatized" the management of a number of its correctional facilities, and that consequently a private firm, not the state government, employed the guards. See Tenn. Code Ann. § 41-24-101 et seq. (1990 and Supp. 1996); see generally Cody & Bennett, The Privatization of Correctional Institutions: The Tennessee Experience, 40 Vand. L. Rev. 829 (1987) (outlining State's history with private correctional services). The court held that, because they worked for a private company rather than the government, the law did not grant the guards immunity from suit. It therefore denied the guards' motion to dismiss. The guards appealed to the Sixth Circuit. See Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U. S. 511, 530 (1985) (permitting interlocutory appeals of qualified immunity determinations); see also Johnson v. Jones, 515 U. S. 304 (1995); Behrens v. Pelletier, 516 U. S. 299 (1996). That court also ruled against them. McKnight v. Rees, 88 F. 3d 417, 425 (CA6 1996). The Court of Appeals conceded that other courts had reached varying conclusions about whether, or the extent to which, private sector defendants are entitled to immunities of the sort the law provides governmental defendants. See, e. g., Eagon v. Elk City, 72 F. 3d 1480, 1489- 1490 (CA10 1996); Williams v. O'Leary, 55 F. 3d 320, 323-324 (CA7), cert. denied, 516 U. S. 993 (1995); Frazier v. Bailey, 957 F. 2d 920, 928-929 (CA1 1992). But the court concluded, primarily for reasons of "public policy," that the privately employed prison guards were not entitled to the immunity provided their governmental counterparts. 88 F. 3d, at 425. We granted certiorari to review this holding. We now affirm.
II
A
We take the Court's recent case, Wyatt v. Cole, 504 U. S. 158 (1992), as pertinent authority. The Court there considered whether private defendants, charged with § 1983 liabil-
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