05-3461 - Marie Gaston, etc. v. Warren Ploeger, et al, Appellants
U.S. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals
(March 7, 2007)

Briefs

Briefs require requires Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Case Summary (prepared at Washburn Law)

Procedure

This is an interlocutory appeal from an order denying Defendants-Appellants' Motion for Summary Judgment. Defendants-Appellants seek to have the denial of the trial court reversed and the case remanded with instruction to the trial court to grant defendants' summary judgment.

Facts

Jeffrey Belden ("Belden") committed suicide while he was incarcerated in the Brown County Jail. The administrator of his estate ("Appellees") filed suit against the Brown County Sheriff, and Brett Hollister ("Hollister"), the sergeant who was responsible for the supervision of the Brown County Jail.

Belden's girlfriend was outside his cell honking and yelling at him. He was transferred from this cell to another because Hollister had noticed that the window in his cell had been altered to facilitate bringing in contraband. Belden did not like the cell he was transferred to so he stopped up the toilet with a piece of fruit. Hollister transferred him to a single person cell. When Hollister left the jail he told Officer Roberts ("Roberts") that Belden was moved to a different cell for disciplinary reasons. Roberts served dinner to Belden and Belden threw his teacup in the hallway. Roberts asked Belden what was going on and Belden told Roberts that he wanted to be moved and that he didn't understand why he was moved. Roberts told Belden that Hollister would take care of his cell problem the next day and that he needed to get back in his cell. Belden refused and told Roberts that he would "get him" if he came back to the cell area alone.

Belden was finally put back in his cell around 5:30 pm. It was noticed at around 6:05 pm that Belden covered the window to his cell with paper. Roberts told Belden to remove the paper and Belden responded saying that he would not remove it and that he would "whoop" Roberts if he came into the cell. Roberts contacted Hollister at home and told him about the incidents with Belden and Hollister told Roberts to remove the paper when he had a second officer with him and to remove Belden to cell 14. Cell 14 is the cell that is used, inter alia, for suicide watches. At 7:45 pm Roberts did another jail check and told Belden to remove the paper from the window at which point Belden responded with profanity. At 8:15 pm Roberts had Anthony Lawson, an inmate trustee, help him remove the paper from Belden's cell window at which point he saw that Belden had hung himself.

Issues

  1. Whether Hollister or Roberts can be deliberately indifferent to a known risk that Belden would commit suicide when they did not know about his suicidal tendencies, and all they knew was that Belden had common disciplinary issues on the day of his death.
  2. Whether Sheriff Shoemaker can be constitutionally liable for inadequate supervision and failure to provide suicide prevention training for one officer when Brown County had a procedure for monitoring suicidal inmates and Sheriff did not know that Belden was suicidal.

Appellants' arguments

  1. Hollister is protected by qualified immunity because he and Roberts were neither plainly incompetent nor did they knowingly violate the law. Once a defendant raises a defense of qualified immunity then plaintiff must show that defendant did, in fact, commit the constitutional violation alleged. Plaintiffs do not meet their burden in proving that Hollister violated the 8th and 14th amendments by being deliberately indifferent to the inmate's health and safety. Plaintiffs merely show that defendants were, at most, negligent in their duties but were not deliberately indifferent. They did not possess the sufficient culpable state of mind. They were not aware of facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of serious harm existed, and they did not draw the inference from those facts. Defendants were not aware that Belden was suicidal and the facts that the trial court based its decision on do not support this conclusion. The facts just show that Belden was acting out as a protest against cell reassignment and that his future movement to cell 14 does not necessarily mean that they thought he was suicidal. The cell is used for other inmates, such as disciplinary problems, who need more frequent watch. These facts are insufficient to find that defendants were deliberately indifferent and the ruling of the trial court should, therefore, be reversed.
  2. Sheriff Shoemaker was entitled to qualified immunity because the evidence showed that he had no actual knowledge of any constitutional violation. The trial court based its findings on his role as a supervisor and his failure to properly train Roberts. In order to overcome a defense of qualified immunity for a supervisor, plaintiff must show that the supervisor took deliberate action in directing the constitutional violation or had actual knowledge of the violation and allowed it to continue. The evidence, at best, shows that Sheriff was negligent. It does not show that he acted deliberately. The facts show that there were procedures in place for monitoring inmates who displayed suicidal tendencies and it had been used numerous times. There were no inmate suicides since Shoemaker became Sheriff. There was no evidence that would show that Sheriff had knowledge of a risk that Belden would commit suicide.

Appellees' Arguments

  1. Threshold argument that the court does not have jurisdiction to hear the appeal because appellants' fail to correctly state the issues in their brief. They fail to address the issue of qualified immunity that would be the only issue that would give this court jurisdiction to hear an interlocutory appeal. Because of their failure to correctly state and address the issue of qualified immunity, the court lacks jurisdiction and the appeal should be denied. Further, appellants waive their right to have the court hear the appeal because of the misstatement of the issues.
  2. Hollister and Roberts were deliberately indifferent to the risk of Belden's suicide because Hollister knew that he was suicidal when he told Roberts to transfer him to cell 14. Once Roberts was told to place Belden in cell 14 he should have known that he was suicidal because cell 14 is used for suicide watch. Because Roberts did not take further steps to remove the paper from the window of Belden's cell he failed to act despite the substantial risk of serious harm. Further, Belden was on 30-minute check status which indicates that he was on a heightened status than those in the general population, i.e. he was on suicide watch. Belden was also normally a very calm and well-behaved inmate. His erratic behavior on the day of his death should have indicated to Roberts and Hollister that something was wrong. When Roberts enlisted the help of Lawson, the inmate trustee, this was an indication that he had grave concerns for Belden otherwise he would have continued to wait for another officer to help remove the paper from Belden's cell window. Hollister failed to act despite his knowledge of the suicide risk by not following up with Roberts.
  3. Sheriff is responsible because he did not train Roberts, especially suicide training. Because of his lack of training to correction officers on signs to determine if an inmate is suicidal Sheriff was deliberately indifferent to the known risks that the jail would inevitably house suicidal inmates.