Spencer v. Knapheide Truck Equip. Co.

• Citation: 183 F.3d 902
• Decision Date: 20 April 1999
• Docket Number: No. 98-3717,DEFENDANTS-APPELLEE,PLAINTIFF-APPELLANT,KNAPHEIDE,THIRD-PARTY,98-3717
• Parties: (8th Cir. 1999) JOSEPH L. SPENCER,, v. KNAPHEIDE TRUCK EQUIPMENT CO.; DEFENDANT, THE BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS OF THE KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI POLICE DEPARTMENT, THROUGH IT MEMBERS: DR. STACY DANIELS, IN HER OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS VICE PRESIDENT, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; JEFFREY J. SIMON, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS TREASURER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; JOSEPH J. MULVIHILL, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS A MEMBER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; EMMANUEL CLEAVER, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS EX OFFICIO MEMBER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS AND MAYOR, CITY OF KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI;MANUFACTURING COMPANY, DEFENDANT. KNAPHEIDE TRUCK EQUIPMENT CO., KNAPHEIDE MANUFACTURING COMPANY,PLAINTIFFS. Submitted:
• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (8th Circuit)

Page 902

183 F.3d 902 (8th Cir. 1999)

JOSEPH L. SPENCER, PLAINTIFF-APPELLANT, v. KNAPHEIDE TRUCK EQUIPMENT CO.; DEFENDANT, THE BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS OF THE KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI POLICE DEPARTMENT, THROUGH IT MEMBERS: DR. STACY DANIELS, IN HER OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS VICE PRESIDENT, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; JEFFREY J. SIMON, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS TREASURER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; JOSEPH J. MULVIHILL, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS A MEMBER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS; EMMANUEL CLEAVER, IN HIS OFFICIAL CAPACITY AS EX OFFICIO MEMBER, BOARD OF POLICE COMMISSIONERS AND MAYOR, CITY OF KANSAS CITY, MISSOURI; DEFENDANTS-APPELLEES, KNAPHEIDE MANUFACTURING COMPANY, DEFENDANT. KNAPHEIDE TRUCK EQUIPMENT CO., KNAPHEIDE MANUFACTURING COMPANY, THIRD-PARTY PLAINTIFFS.

No. 98-3717

U.S. Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit

Submitted: April 20, 1999.

July 26, 1999

Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc Denied Sept. 13, 1999.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. [Copyrighted Material Omitted] David L. Neuhaus, Kansas City, MO, argued, for Appellant.

Dale H. Close, Kansas City, MO, argued (Lisa S. Morris, Kansas City, MO, on the brief), for appellee.

Before Beam and Hansen, Circuit Judges, and KOPF,¹ District Judge.

Beam, Circuit Judge.

Joseph Spencer appeals from the district court's adverse grant of summary judgment in his section 1983 suit for personal injuries allegedly sustained as a result of his arrest and subsequent transportation to a police facility in a patrol wagon. For the reasons discussed below, we affirm.

I. BACKGROUND

On January 30, 1992, while on patrol wagon duty, Officer Trussler of the Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department, responded to a call to transport Spencer to the police station. Spencer had been arrested for simple assault. Upon arriving at the scene, Officer Trussler handcuffed an intoxicated Spencer with his hands behind his back and escorted him to the rear of a patrol wagon and into the prisoner compartment. Once inside the compartment, Spencer sat on one of two steel benches which run lengthwise along each side of the compartment's interior.² There were no seatbelts or other safety restraint devices installed in the compartment. Spencer claims that during the trip to the police station, he had difficulty maintaining his balance on the bench and that he was tossed around as Officer Trussler made turns, stops, and starts. At some point during the ride, Spencer claims he was thrown forward into the bulkhead of the compartment causing severe injuries and rendering him a quadriplegic.

Spencer filed an eleven-count complaint in federal district court raising various claims against members of the Board of Police Commissioners of Kansas City, Missouri (Board), in their official capacities, and Knapheide Truck Equipment Company and Knapheide Manufacturing Company (Knapheide), the manufacturer and seller of the patrol wagon. The claims against Knapheide were either dismissed or settled and are not the subject matter of this appeal. One of the claims asserted against the Board was also settled, and the Board moved for summary judgment on the remaining allegations.

The claims assert a section 1983 cause of action for alleged violations of Spencer's Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Specifically, Spencer asserts that: (1) the Board maintained an official policy of purchasing and using patrol wagons that were inherently unsafe; (2) the Board had a policy of transporting intoxicated individuals with their hands handcuffed behind their back in these patrol wagons, even after it had notice that such policy was resulting in injuries; and (3) these policies constituted a form of punishment for pretrial detainees. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the Board. We affirm.

II. DISCUSSION

We review a grant of summary judgment de novo. See Liebe v. Norton 157 F.3d 574, 578 (8th Cir. 1998). Summary judgment is appropriate if the evidence, viewed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, shows that no genuine issue of material fact exists and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. See Smith v. Watkins, 159 F.3d 1137, 1138 (8th Cir. 1998). Our analysis begins with the recognition that because Spencer's section 1983 suit is against the members of the Board in their official capacities, it must be treated as a suit against the municipality. See Liebe, 157 F.3d at 578. A plaintiff may establish municipal liability under section 1983 by proving that his or her constitutional rights were violated by an "'action pursuant to official municipal policy' or misconduct so pervasive among non-policymaking employees of the municipality'as to constitute a "custom or usage" with the force of law.'" Ware v. Jackson County, 150 F.3d 873, 880 (8th Cir. 1998) (quoting Monell v. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 691 (1978)).

The district court stated that for liability to attach, Spencer must also establish that the Board was "deliberately indifferent" to or tacitly authorized such misconduct after notice of the misconduct. The court then went on to find that: (1) Spencer failed to establish evidence of a pattern of constitutional violations and (2) even if he had, he failed to demonstrate that the Board was deliberately indifferent to the safety of the individuals transported in the patrol wagons. The district court's application of the "deliberate indifference" standard forms the gravamen of Spencer's argument on appeal. Specifically, Spencer claims that the district court erred in analyzing his claims under an Eighth Amendment subjective deliberate indifference standard instead of an objective deliberate indifference test.

"'[W]hen the State takes a person into its custody and holds him there against his will, the Constitution imposes upon it a corresponding duty to assume some responsibility for his safety and general well-being.'" County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 118 S. Ct. 1708, 1719 (1998) (quoting DeShaney v. Winnebago County Dep't of Soc. Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 199-200 (1989)). Thus, a prisoner's Eighth Amendment rights are violated when government entities or officials are deliberately indifferent to a prisoner's medical needs, see Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 104 (1976), or to his or her safety. See Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 834 (1994). In this case, however, because Spencer was a pretrial detainee his claims are properly analyzed under the due³ process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment rather than the Eighth Amendment. See Davis v. Hall, 992 F.2d 151, 152 (8th Cir. 1993). The question before us then is whether we analyze the government's actions or inactions in such cases under the Eighth Amendment "deliberate indifference" standard or some other, less stringent, exercise.

Spencer concedes that deliberate indifference is the correct standard to apply in this case. However, he contends that the term has different meanings depending on the context in which it is being used. He argues that the district court erred in applying the subjective "deliberate indifference" standard used in Eighth Amendment cases in this pretrial detainee case alleging due process violations. That standard requires a plaintiff alleging deliberate indifference to prove that the official both knew of and disregarded an excessive risk to health or safety. See Farmer, 511 U.S. at 837. Instead, Spencer argues, the district court should have analyzed his claims under an objective deliberate indifference standard. Under such a standard, a municipality is liable for maintaining a policy in which an inadequacy is "so obvious, and the inadequacy so likely to result in the violation of constitutional rights, that the policymakers of the city can reasonably be said to have been deliberately indifferent." City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 390 (1989); see also Farmer, 511 U.S. at 840-41.

The standard to be applied in assessing a pretrial detainee's claim of due process violations, such as this one, is not entirely clear. The Supreme Court has held that pretrial detainees are entitled under the Fourteenth Amendment to "at least as great" protection as that afforded convicted prisoners...