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A civil liability law publication for officers, jails, detention
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ISSN 0739-0998 - Cite this issue as: 2018 JB July
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Bail
Medical Care: Dental |
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Prisoner Assault: By Officers (2 cases)
Prisoner Restraint
Prisoner Suicide
Religion
Sexual Assault
Transsexual Inmates
AELE Seminars:
Public Safety Discipline and Internal Investigations
Oct. 29-Nov. 1, 2018– Orleans Hotel, Las Vegas
Jail and Prisoner Legal Issues
Jan. 14-17, 2019 - Orleans
Hotel, Las Vegas
Click here for further information about all AELE Seminars.
Some of the case digests do not have a link to the full opinion.
- Most Federal District Court opinions can be accessed via PACER. Registration required. Opinions are usually free; other documents are 10¢ per page.
- Access to cases linked to www.findlaw.com may require registration, which is free.
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A class action alleged that a county’s system of setting bail for indigent misdemeanor arrestees violated Texas constitutional and statutory law as well as federal constitutional due process and equal protection. The federal trial court denied the county’s summary judgment motion and granted the plaintiffs’ motion for a preliminary injunction. A federal appeals court upheld most of the trial court’s rulings, including its decision that plaintiff established a likelihood of success on the merits of its claims that the county’s policies violated procedural due process and equal protection. However, the appeals court held that the trial court’s definition of arrestees’ liberty interest under due process was too broad, and the procedures it required to protect that interest were too onerous. Further, the trial court erroneously concluded that the county sheriff could be considered a county policymaker for purposes of federal civil rights liability, and that the issued injunction was overbroad. The appeals court vacated the injunction and ordered the trial court to modify its terms. ODonnell v. Harris County, Tex., #17-20333, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 14578 (5th Cir.).
First Amendment ****Editor's Case Alert**** The Florida Department of Corrections’ impoundment of the publication Prison Legal News (PLN), sent in the mail to state prisoners, did not violate the First Amendment, but the failure to provide proper notice of the impoundments to the publisher so that they could be challenged did. The appeals court held that limiting three-way calling ads, pen pal solicitation ads, cash-for-stamps ads, prisoner concierge and people locator ads contained in the publication was not so remote from the Department’s security and safety interests as to render the impoundments arbitrary or irrational. Further, there were alternative means for PLN to send alternate publications, and the defendant’s decision to impound was not an exaggerated response. However, the power to impound comes with a duty to inform PLN of the reasons for the impoundments, and therefore the trial court did not abuse its discretion in entering an injunction to require the defendant to adhere to its own notice rules. Prison Legal News v. Secretary, Florida Dept. of Corrections, #15-14220, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 12798 (11th Cir.).Medical Care: Dental
A trial court did not abuse its discretion in refusing to reconsider its denial of qualified immunity to defendants who the plaintiff inmate accused of deliberate indifference to his painful dental condition. The defendants failed to show that they tried to get the plaintiff treatment after they were alerted to his condition. The court held that they were constitutionally obligated to see that the inmates in their custody who need dental care receive it and the lawsuit’s allegations would support a finding that they were deliberately indifferent to the plaintiff's serious dental condition. Williams v. York, #17-1019, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 14349 (8th Cir.). |
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Prisoner Assault: By Officers
A federal appeals court upheld judgment for the five plaintiff prisoners who were severely injured during cell extractions in two high security units. While the trial court lacked jurisdiction to conduct a trial while an interlocutory appeal from a prior qualified immunity ruling was pending, its error in doing so was harmless. As for an issue as to whether administrative remedies were exhausted as required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act, the trial court did not “clearly err in ruling that a reasonable fear of retaliation made the grievance system effectively unavailable for plaintiffs because they reasonably believed that they would suffer additional physical force if they complained. Further, the trial court did not err in denying the defendants qualified immunity because abundant evidence was presented that the defendants inflicted severe injuries on the inmates while they were not resisting, and even while they were unconscious. The force used included multiple activations of Tasers. An award of attorneys’ fees of $5,378,174.66 was upheld. The attorneys; fees limitations of the Prison Litigation Reform Act were not applied because of California state law claims. $740,000 in compensatory damages was awarded, along with $210,000 in punitive damages. Rodriguez v. County of Los Angeles, #13-56292, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 14186 (9th Cir.).
A federal appeals court upheld a trial court’s denial of a plaintiff arrestee’s motion for a new trial in a lawsuit claiming that a police officer used excessive force by slamming his head into the bars and wall of his holding cell. The trial court properly determined that the jury’s seemingly contradictory verdict (finding that excessive force was used but awarding no damages) “could be harmonized” and therefore the plaintiff was not entitled to an award of compensatory damages. In doing this, the trial court was not limited to the specific theories of the case presented by the parties to the lawsuit, but may adopt any reasonable view of the case that was consistent with the facts and the testimony. In this case, the jury's finding on causation of the plaintiff’s injuries was ambiguous and might have referred only to the de minimus (minimal) injuries that the plaintiff suffered while being forced into the holding cell. Ali v. Kipp, #16-4225, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 13263 (2nd Cir.).
Prisoner Restraint
A federal district court adopted a district-wide policy allowing the use of full restraints—handcuffs connected to a waist chain, with legs shackled—on most in-custody defendants produced in court for non-jury proceedings by the U.S. Marshals Service. Before a federal appeals court could issue a decision on a challenge to the policy, the underlying criminal cases ended. The appeals court, viewing the case as a “functional class action” seeking “class-like relief,” ruled that the case was not moot and the policy was unconstitutional. A unanimous U.S. Supreme Court vacated the ruling, finding the case moot. Federal courts may decide only “actual and concrete disputes, the resolutions of which have direct consequences on the parties involved.” The U.S. Supreme Court has never permitted criminal defendants to band together to seek prospective relief in their individual cases on behalf of a class. The “exception to the mootness doctrine for a controversy that is capable of repetition, yet evading review” does not apply, based only the possibility that some of the parties will again be prosecuted for violating valid criminal laws. United States v. Sanchez-Gomez, #17-312, 2018 U.S. Lexis 2804.
Prisoner Suicide
In a lawsuit over the death of an inmate who committed suicide by hanging himself with a bed sheet in his cell in a county facility, a federal appeals court held that the plaintiffs failed to prove that any of the defendants were deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk that the decedent would commit suicide. A clinical psychologist’s professional judgment, even if negligent, fell far short of deliberate indifference. A defendant corrections officer’s failure to recall the details of her monitoring at a deposition three years later did not create a genuine issue that she failed to conduct the hourly monitoring of inmates under the jail’s suicide prevention policy. As to a Missouri wrongful death claim, the jailer performed her duties in accordance with the suicide prevention policy and was not shown to have breached a ministerial duty. The appeals court also found that Rehabilitation Act and Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) disability discrimination claims lacked merit. A.H. v. St. Louis County, Missouri, #17-1198, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis14724 (8th Cir.).
A plaintiff prisoner who claimed to be a devout Christian claimed that his right to religious liberty under the First Amendment and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act (RLUIPA), 42 U.S.C. 2000cc-1 was violated, as well as his right to due process when he was disciplined and fired from his kitchen assignment job after he refused to work on a religious holiday. The plaintiff adequately exhausted his available administrative remedies through the disciplinary process. A federal appeals court found that the defendants did not consider the prisoner’s request for accommodation of his religious beliefs and that the RLUIPA required such consideration. The case was remanded for further consideration of the merits of the First Amendment and RLUIPA claims. Fuqua v. Ryan, #16-15597, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 12924 (9th Cir.).
Sexual Assault
****Editor's Case Alert****
A former inmate at a state correctional facility claimed that a corrections officer, during a routine morning pat-down, rubbed his erect penis against the inmate’s buttocks through both men’s clothing. When the plaintiff stepped away and verbally complained to the officer’s supervisor, the supervisor allegedly “slammed” him against a wall, injuring his face, neck, head, and back. The trial court dismissed his federal civil rights claim, stating that “a small number of incidents in which a prisoner is verbally harassed, touched, and pressed against without his consent do not amount” to an Eighth Amendment violation. A federal appeals court reversed, ruling that a single incident of sexual abuse can constitute “cruel and unusual punishment” under the Eighth Amendment if the incident was objectively sufficiently intolerable and cruel, capable of causing harm, and the defendant had a culpable state of mind rather than a legitimate penological purpose. While the sexual abuse claim as to the supervisor under a participation or failure-to-intervene theory was properly dismissed, the excessive force claim against the supervisor should have been permitted to survive the motion to dismiss. Ricks v. Shover, #16-2939, 2018 U.S. App. Lexis 15057 (3rd Cir.).
Transsexual Inmates
The Federal Bureau of Prisons (FOP) on May 11, 2018 altered its guidelines for treatment of transgender prisoners in its custody. This represented a roll back of protections for transgender prison inmates introduced under former President Barack Obama after some prisoners challenged the policies in court. An inmate’s biological sex will now be used to make the initial decision as to where transgender prisoners are housed, instead of the gender to which they identify. The action came after four women held at a Texas detention center filed a federal lawsuit arguing that the previous prison guidelines, introduced in January 2017 just days before Obama left office, put them at greater risk of rape because they might have to share facilities with transgender women. Under the new guidelines, prison authorities are instructed to consider the health and safety of transgender inmates, as well as “whether placement would threaten the management and security of the institution and/or pose a risk to other inmates in the institution.” Transgender Offender Manual, Federal Bureau of Prisons Program Statement 5200,04 CN-1 (May 11, 2018).
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Statistics: 2018 Update on Prisoner Recidivism: A 9-Year Follow-up Period (2005-2014), by Mariel Alper, Matthew R. Durose, and Joshua Markman, Bureau of Justice Statistics (May 23, 2018 NCJ 250975).
Transsexual Prisoners: Transgender Offender Manual, Federal Bureau of Prisons Program Statement 5200,04 CN-1 (May 11, 2018).
Reference:
• Abbreviations of Law Reports, laws and agencies used in our publications.
• AELE's list of recently-noted jail and prisoner law resources.
AELE Seminars
Public Safety Discipline and Internal Investigations
Oct. 29-Nov. 1, 2018– Orleans Hotel, Las Vegas
Jail and Prisoner Legal Issues
Jan. 14-17, 2019 -
Orleans Hotel, Las Vegas
Click here for further information about all AELE Seminars.
Disability Discrimination – See also, Prisoner Suicide Prison Litigation Reform Act: Attorneys’ Fees – See also, Prisoner Assault: By Officers (1st case) U.S. Supreme Court Decisions – See also, Prisoner Restraint Work/Education Programs – See also, Religion
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