Oliver v. Keller

• Decision Date: 02 May 2002
• Docket Number: No. 00-15849.,00-15849.
• Parties: Eric D. OLIVER, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Jerry KELLER, Sheriff; Kyle Edwards; Dave Swiekert, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

289 F.3d 623

Eric D. OLIVER, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Jerry KELLER, Sheriff; Kyle Edwards; Dave Swiekert, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 00-15849.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted November 6, 2001.

Filed May 2, 2002.

Willie Jordan-Curtis, Assistant Dean for Student Affairs, Kevin Rudh (argued), Scott Shelley (argued), and Ernest Skinner, (argued), Law Students, The University of Arizona College of Law Pro Bono Appellate Project, Tucson, AZ, for appellant.

Thomas D. Dillard, Jr. (argued), Rawlings, Olson, Cannon, Gormley & Desruisseaux, Las Vegas, NV, for appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Nevada; Philip M. Pro, District Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. CV-97-00174-PMP.

Before HAWKINS and TASHIMA, Circuit Judges, and WILKEN,^* District Judge.

OPINION

MICHAEL DALY HAWKINS, Circuit Judge.

Appellant Eric Oliver brought a § 1983 action against Clark County, Nevada, the Clark County Sheriff, and two employees of the Clark County Detention Center ("Defendants"), alleging confinement in constitutionally infirm conditions.

In an issue of first impression in this Circuit, we must decide whether the district court correctly employed a de minimis standard to interpret "physical injury" under § 1997e(e) of the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995, Pub.L. No. 104-134, 110 Stat. 1321 (1996) ("PLRA").¹ We also decide whether any physical injury requirement applies to claims other than those for mental and emotional injury. The district court had jurisdiction pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1331. We have jurisdiction under 14 U.S.C. § 1291. We affirm in part, and reverse in part.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Appellant Eric Oliver's § 1983 claim arises out of three separate instances of pre-trial confinement at the Clark County Detention Center ("CCDC") occurring in April, August, and September of 1997. On April 1, 1997, Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department ("Metro") officers arrested Oliver and transported him to CCDC, where he was booked and medically screened. After it was determined that he had no injuries making him unfit for the general population, officers placed Oliver in a temporary holding cell. CCDC uses the temporary cells to house prisoners until they are classified and assigned to a permanent cell. The holding cells have a window to the booking area, benches, a telephone bank, toilets and sinks. Pre-trial detainees eat three meals per day in the cells. The cells do not have cots, and inmates are not provided with blankets or pillows. Long-term prisoners clean the holding cells daily as part of prison work duty.

CCDC records show that Oliver was initially jailed with approximately 50 other men in a cell measuring 404 square feet. The prisoner count fluctuated around 50 over the course of Oliver's 51-hour detention. On the morning of April 3, Oliver was allowed to shower, brush his teeth, and change into prison-issue clothing, and was then transferred to a smaller temporary holding cell, measuring 174 square feet. He remained there for 74 hours, during which time the cell housed an average of 18 prisoners.

In his complaint Oliver describes the cells as "a human carpet" without room to sit or stand. He alleges that inmates had to sleep on hard floors, were not provided with bed linens, had to drink out of unsanitary faucets, and were bothered by the 24-hour overhead lighting and excessive air conditioning. Oliver claims he experienced "severe back and leg pain" from sitting and sleeping in the temporary cells, and "was chilled to the bone" due to the cool cell temperatures. He also claims that while he sought treatment for his back condition, prison officials failed to provide him with medical attention.² Oliver was transferred out of the second temporary holding cell to a permanent cell on April 6, at 11:10 p.m. CCDC transferred Oliver to another incarceration facility on April 11, 1997.

Oliver was again arrested by Metro officers on August 12, 1997, and transported to CCDC. He was again booked, medically screened and placed in a series of temporary holding cells. He claims that the temporary cell conditions during this second detention period were similar to those he had experienced in April. Oliver also alleges that another prisoner beat him in a fight over sitting space. He claims that he again complained to officials of back pain, but was not given medical attention at any time before his release on August 29.³ Oliver was arrested three weeks later on September 19, and was housed in the temporary holding cells for approximately 50 hours. His complaint details similarly "dehumanizing" and overcrowded conditions during this third period of incarceration.

Oliver filed a § 1983 action against CCDC management, Clark County, and the Clark County Sheriff, alleging physical and emotional injuries resulting from a violation of his Fourteenth Amendment rights. The district court granted Defendants' motion for summary judgment and dismissed in full Oliver's complaint and the action. The court held that § 1997e(e) of the PLRA barred Oliver's claims, because he failed to demonstrate more than a de minimis injury.

DISCUSSION

Standard of Review

A grant of summary judgment is reviewed de novo. See Clicks Billiards, Inc. v. Sixshooters, Inc., 251 F.3d 1252, 1257 (9th Cir.2001). Viewing the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party, we must determine whether there are any genuine issues of material fact and whether the district court correctly applied the relevant substantive law. Id. Further, Oliver's pro se complaint should be dismissed only if it is "beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Akao v. Shimoda, 832 F.2d 119, 120 (9th Cir.1987) (citations omitted).

The "Physical Injury" Requirement

We begin by considering whether the district court properly interpreted § 1997e(e). We note at the outset that the phrase "physical injury" does not wear its meaning on its face. In drafting § 1997e(e), Congress failed to specify the type, duration, extent, or cause of "physical injury" that it intended to serve as a threshold qualification for mental and emotional injury claims. Nor did it define the meaning or limits of "mental or emotional injury." The district court based its de minimis analysis of "physical injury" on Siglar v. Hightower, 112 F.3d 191 (5th Cir.1997). In Siglar, a prisoner filed a § 1983 claim against Texas prison officials after guards bruised his ear during a search. Id. at 192. The ear remained bruised and sore for three days. The prisoner did not seek or receive medical treatment, nor did he allege that he had suffered any long-term physical injuries. The court dismissed the prisoner's claim, stating "In the absence of any definition of `physical injury' in [Section 1997e(e)], we hold that the well established Eighth Amendment standards guide our analysis in determining whether a prisoner has sustained the necessary physical injury to support a claim for mental or emotional suffering. That is, the injury must be more than de minimus [sic], but need not be significant." Id. at 193.

The Eleventh Circuit has explicitly adopted the Siglar de minimis approach, see Harris v. Garner, 190 F.3d 1279, 1286 (11th Cir.1999), vacated by Harris v. Garner, 197 F.3d 1059 (11th Cir.1999), reinstated in part on reh'g by Harris v. Garner, 216 F.3d 970 (11th Cir.2000) (en banc), reasoning that an interpretation that "any allegation of physical injury is sufficient... would undermine the statute's essential purpose — `to curtail frivolous and abusive prisoner litigation.'"<sup>4</sup> Id. (emphasis in original). Similarly, the Second Circuit cited Siglar in holding that alleged sexual assaults "would constitute more than `de minimis' injury" and were thus sufficient under § 1997e(e) to sustain a § 1983 claim. Liner v. Goord, 196 F.3d 132, 135 (2d Cir.1999).

Appellant argues that a plain reading of § 1997e(e) does not qualify the term "physical injury," and therefore any physical injury should be enough to sustain a claim under the statute, citing Gomez v. Chandler, 163 F.3d 921 (5th Cir.1999), and Waters v. Andrews, 2000 WL 1611126 (W.D.N.Y.2000). Appellant's reliance on these authorities is unavailing, as Gomez explicitly endorses the Siglar approach, see Gomez, 163 F.3d at 924, and Waters, a district court decision, appears to be out of step with the Second Circuit's reasoning in Liner. Further, the phrase "physical injury" standing alone does not more readily yield to modification by the word "any" than it does to modification by other words. Certainly, if Congress had meant that "any" physical injury was sufficient to permit a prisoner's mental and emotional injury claim, it could have said as much. See United States v. Gonzales, 520 U.S. 1, 6, 117 S.Ct. 1032, 137 L.Ed.2d 132 (1997). We are thus left to determine how "physical injury" should be understood absent modifiers in the statutory language itself.

Our survey of case law on the meaning of "physical injury" in § 1997e(e) demonstrates a consistent application of the de minimis approach first adopted in Siglar. Following the Second, Fifth and Eleventh Circuits, we hold today that for all claims to which it applies, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(e) requires a prior showing of physical injury that need not be significant but must be more than de minimis.⁵ This interpretation reflects Congress's intent in passing the PLRA. See, e.g., Harris v. Garner, 216 F.3d at 977 (analyzing in detail the legislative history behind § 1997e(e) to conclude that the legislation was intended to curtail frivolous prisoner litigation); Dawes v. Walker, 239 F.3d 489, 495 (2d Cir.2001) ("Congress intended § 1997e(e) to reduce the burgeoning volume of prisoner litigation in the federal courts.").⁶

However, in embracing the de minimis physical injury standard under § 1997e(e) adopted by the Second, Fifth, and Eleventh Circuits, we do not...