Myers v. County of Lake, Ind., 93-2469

Decision Date22 July 1994
Docket NumberNo. 93-2469,93-2469
Citation30 F.3d 847
PartiesRobert MYERS and Steven R. Myers, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. COUNTY OF LAKE, INDIANA, Defendant-Appellant.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Ivan E. Bodensteiner (argued), Terry E. Johnston, Valparaiso, IN, for plaintiffs-appellees.

Robert P. Kennedy, F. Amin Istrabadi (argued), Spangler, Jennings & Dougherty, Merrillville, IN, for defendant-appellant.

Before EASTERBROOK and RIPPLE, Circuit Judges, and MIHM, District Judge. *

EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge.

Steven Myers, age 16, was in the custody of Lake County, Indiana, during 1988 as a juvenile delinquent. While at an "open" facility he stole a staff member's car, leading to a transfer to more secure custody at the Lake County Juvenile Center (LCJC). Steven had been at the LCJC before, and his caseworker believed that he would be better off at a facility in Maine specializing in intelligent children who treated ordinary detention facilities as challenges to be overcome. On December 27, 1988, a state court authorized Steven's transfer to Maine. Eight days later, while still at the LCJC, Steven hanged himself with a sheet. He survived but suffered severe and permanent brain damage. A jury concluded that the LCJC negligently failed to take precautions against suicide attempts, and Lake County appeals from an award of $600,000 in damages to Steven and his father Robert.

I

All parties to this case are citizens of Indiana. Plaintiffs invoked federal jurisdiction on the theory that the LCJC's deliberate indifference to suicide risks violated the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment, permitting recovery under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983 and supplying jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1343(a)(3). Shortly before trial the magistrate judge, presiding by consent under 28 U.S.C. Sec. 636(c), granted summary judgment on the constitutional claim, ruling that plaintiffs had not produced evidence that the defendants acted with the mental state necessary to violate the Constitution. See Tittle v. Jefferson County Commission, 10 F.3d 1535 (11th Cir.1994) (en banc) (minimum mental state is "deliberate indifference" to suicide risk); cf. Farmer v. Brennan, --- U.S. ----, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994); McGill v. Duckworth, 944 F.2d 344 (7th Cir.1991). That decision left for trial only plaintiffs' negligence claim under Indiana law, which lacks an independent basis of federal jurisdiction. The magistrate judge exercised supplemental jurisdiction, see 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1367, on the theory that the constitutional claim had been resolved such a short time before trial that it would be more convenient to continue the federal proceeding than to resume the case in state court.

Whether it was prudent to try this case in federal court may be doubted. Before the enactment of Sec. 1367 in 1990, we took the position that the dismissal of the federal claim on the eve of trial is not by itself sufficient to justify resolving the remaining claims in federal court. Olive Can Co. v. Martin, 906 F.2d 1147, 1153 (7th Cir.1990); Manor Healthcare Corp. v. Guzzo, 894 F.2d 919, 922 (7th Cir.1990). Section 1367(d), giving the plaintiff at least 30 days to re-file in state court after a federal court declines to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, removes the principal reason for retaining a case in federal court when the federal claim belatedly disappears. Our case presents several novel issues under Indiana law, and such contentions presumptively belong in state court--especially when a unit of state government is a defendant. How far state law exposes state and local agencies to liability is a delicate question that federal judges should hesitate to tackle. See Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 465 U.S. 89, 106, 104 S.Ct. 900, 911, 79 L.Ed.2d 67 (1984). We held in Brazinski v. Amoco Petroleum Additives Co., 6 F.3d 1176, 1181-82 (7th Cir.1993), that the enactment of Sec. 1367 did not change the standards guiding the exercise of discretion to hear pendent claims, which implies that the magistrate judge should not have tried this case. But see Executive Software North America, Inc. v. United States District Court, 24 F.3d 1545 (9th Cir.1994) (disagreeing with Brazinski ).

Neither side has questioned the exercise of supplemental jurisdiction, however. Whether or not it was a good idea to try the case in federal court in the first place, it is assuredly a bad idea to shuttle a case from one system of courts to another after trial, when no one asserts injury from the choice of forum. One trial per case is enough. A desire to curtail the cost of litigation is inadequate to support the judgment if the federal court lacks the power to decide. Litigants may not stipulate to federal jurisdiction, and federal judges must respect the limits on their adjudicatory power even if all litigants are content with the decision. The American Law Institute has questioned even this principle, calling dismissal of a case because of belated discovery of jurisdictional problems a "fetish of federal jurisdiction ... wholly inconsistent with sound judicial administration [that] can only serve to diminish respect for a system that tolerates it." Study of the Division of Jurisdiction Between State and Federal Courts 366 (1969). The Supreme Court has not heeded the ALI's call to alter the rule that federal courts must satisfy themselves of the existence of subject-matter jurisdiction, but it has suggested that federal courts are not obliged to extend this directive to its maximum possible extent. See Newman-Green, Inc. v. Alfonzo-Larrain, 490 U.S. 826, 109 S.Ct. 2218, 104 L.Ed.2d 893 (1989) (holding that courts may permit a change in the identity of parties to preserve jurisdiction, even though subject-matter jurisdiction was absent at the outset of the case).

To date, no court has considered the extent to which judges must resolve questions under Sec. 1367 without prompting from the parties. Section 1367 divides into stages the identification of pendent claims suitable for federal adjudication. Section 1367(a) spells out the limits of supplemental jurisdiction:

[T]he district courts shall have supplemental jurisdiction over all other claims that are so related to claims in the action within such original [federal] jurisdiction that they form part of the same case or controversy under Article III of the United States Constitution.

Section 1367(b) limits this principle in certain cases under the diversity jurisdiction; these restrictions do not concern us here. Section 1367(c) provides:

The district courts may decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over a claim under subsection (a) if--

(1) the claim raises a novel or complex issue of State law,

(2) the claim substantially predominates over the claim or claims over which the district court has original jurisdiction,

(3) the district court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction, or

(4) in exceptional circumstances, there are other compelling reasons for declining jurisdiction.

Section 1367(c), identifying criteria that influence the prudent exercise of discretion to resolve claims under the supplemental jurisdiction, supposes the raw power to resolve these claims. Adjudicatory power comes from the link between the claim creating federal jurisdiction and the pendent claims, which must be "so related to claims in the action within such original [federal] jurisdiction that they form part of the same case or controversy under Article III of the United States Constitution."

This division between the requisites of judicial competence in Sec. 1367(a) and the criteria for the exercise of discretion in Sec. 1367(c) also marks, we believe, the division between matters the court must examine on its own and those that depend on an assertion of error by the litigants. A court must satisfy itself that a claim falls within the category laid out in Sec. 1367(a), for otherwise there is no federal jurisdiction. Once subject-matter jurisdiction is present, the district court "may decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction," but a court's failure to act wisely in the exercise of this discretion does not justify forcing the litigants to start from scratch in state court. An imprudent exercise of supplemental jurisdiction injures litigants in other federal cases, for they must wait in a longer queue. Nothing the court of appeals can do after the case has already been tried can redress this injury. Vacating the judgment would add to these litigants' costs--and lengthen the queue in state court--without offering benefits to other litigants in federal court. Although the prospect of appellate dismissal sua sponte would make district courts more sensitive to their duties under Sec. 1367(c), the cost of the marginal improvement would be high and the benefits remote.

Plaintiffs' claim under Sec. 1983 fell within federal jurisdiction. They lost, not because of any defect in their legal theory, but because of a failure of proof. Their claims under Indiana law are "part of the same case or controversy"; there is only one nucleus of operative facts, one claim with different legal theories offered in support of recovery. Subject-matter jurisdiction under Sec. 1367(a) is secure. Because no one has contested the magistrate judge's decision to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, that is as far as we need go. Accord, Schneider v. TRW, Inc., 938 F.2d 986, 993 (9th Cir.1991) (same conclusion under law preceding Sec. 1367).

II

Indiana requires institutions to use reasonable care to prevent their wards from committing suicide. Fowler v. Norways Sanatorium, 112 Ind.App. 347, 42 N.E.2d 415 (1942); Breese v. State, 449 N.E.2d 1098, 1104, 1117-18 (Ind.App.1983); cf. Tittle v. Mahan, 582 N.E.2d 796, 801 (Ind.1991). These opinions recognize that public employees fill the roles of parents and relatives, who may watch over their loved ones in times of stress--that,...

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