Hunt v. Sycamore Community Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ.

Decision Date11 September 2008
Docket NumberNo. 07-4082.,07-4082.
Citation542 F.3d 529
PartiesRosella HUNT, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. SYCAMORE COMMUNITY SCHOOL DISTRICT BOARD OF EDUCATION, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

ARGUED: Marc D. Mezibov, Law Office Of Marc Mezibov, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellant. R. Gary Winters, McCaslin, Imbus & McCaslin, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Marc D. Mezibov, Stacy A. Hinners, Law Office of Marc Mezibov, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellant. R. Gary Winters, Ian R. Smith, McCaslin, Imbus & McCaslin, Cincinnati, Ohio, for Appellees.

Before: MARTIN, GRIFFIN, and GIBSON, Circuit Judges.*

OPINION

JOHN R. GIBSON, Circuit Judge.

Rosella Hunt appeals from the district court's entry of summary judgment against her on her 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claim against the Board of Education of the school district that employed her and the superintendent of that school district, Dr. Karen Mantia, alleging that the defendants violated her right to substantive due process by subjecting her to dangerous working conditions in her job as a teacher's aide for special education students. On an extra-curricular field trip to a bowling alley, an autistic girl, A—, assaulted Hunt, rupturing disks in her neck. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants, concluding that there was no affirmative action by the school district that endangered Hunt. We affirm the judgment of the district court.

I. Facts.

On review of a grant of summary judgment, we take the facts in the light most favorable to Hunt.

Hunt was hired in 1999 as an "educational assistant," or teacher's aide, helping with special education children in the Sycamore Community School District. In her first year, she was injured when an autistic child attacked her and she fell to the ground, cracking her elbow.

In 2002, Hunt was assigned to work in the classroom where A— was an eighth-grader. A — is autistic. At that time A— was 5'8" and weighed over 150 pounds. She had a history of assaultive behavior, as shown by the incident reports appearing in the record. There is a dispute about how many reports there are, but the school district contends the number is thirty-one up to and including the date of Hunt's injury. These reports show numerous injuries to the people taking care of A—, including injuries caused by biting, kicking, hitting, and scratching. The reports extend from March 1999 through December 2002, and they indicate that at least some of the people taking care of A — were frustrated with the situation. For instance, one victim answered the incident form's question: "What is being done to prevent this type of incident from happening in the future?" A: "Nothing that I can see. This behavior of ___ just goes on & on."

The record indicates that the school district had a system for information on such incidents to be collected and ultimately addressed through a disabled child's Individualized Education Program and a behavioral intervention plan. Indeed, the district initiated a behavioral intervention plan for A— in November 2002.

In the 2000-01 school year, before being assigned to A—'s classroom, Hunt heard from two aides and a bus driver that A— hit, kicked, and bit other students and staff and had injured an aide. During the 2002-03 school year, Hunt saw A— bite and hit Priscilla Masters, her teacher, and two aides. A— was such a problem on the school bus that the junior high school assistant principal hired Hunt to ride the bus with her to keep her from hurting other people and to make her get off the bus when they got to school. Hunt received extra pay for that assignment. On October 7, 2002, while riding the bus, A— hit Hunt in the back and bit her hand.

On December 2, 2002, there was an extra-curricular field trip of the "Partners Club" at a bowling alley. The Partners Club paired special education students with other children for social activities. Hunt volunteered to help at Partners Club events and received extra pay for doing so. She and A— had been at the bowling alley with the Partners Club before. On this occasion, there were two teachers and two aides along to supervise. When A— ventured into another bowling lane and began trying to hit a child from another school, Hunt went to intervene. A— hit her in the chest and pulled a lanyard around Hunt's neck, choking her. Hunt heard her neck pop. Hunt was injured and has been diagnosed with two herniated disks in her neck.

Hunt sued the Sycamore Community School District Board of Education, its superintendent, Dr. Karen Mantia, and A—'s parents for violation of her federal rights under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and for negligence. Her section 1983 claim was for violation of her right "to personal security and bodily integrity by failing to provide or maintain a workplace that was free of foreseeable and unreasonable risks of physical harm." She alleged that the school district and Dr. Mantia knew that the injury she sustained was substantially certain to result from the way the school district had chosen to handle A—. The school district and the superintendent moved for summary judgment.

The district court examined whether the school district could be liable under § 1983 based on the state-created danger doctrine. The district court held that there was no state-created danger in this case for two reasons: (1) "The mere act of permitting [A—] to attend (or not prohibiting her attendance at) the extracurricular event is not an affirmative act that can support a state-created danger claim," and (2) "Hunt attended the after-school bowling alley event voluntarily despite knowing that [A—] had attended past Partners Club bowling events and despite knowing firsthand about [A-'s] physically aggressive behavior in other situations." The district court specifically declined to decide the questions of the schools district's liability under Monell1 and the school superintendent's supervisory liability because it held there was no underlying constitutional violation.

The district court entered summary judgment for the school district and the superintendent. Hunt then settled the case against A—'s parents, which was dismissed with prejudice. She now appeals from the final judgment against her.

The standard of review for summary judgment is de novo. Sperle v. Mich. Dep't of Corr., 297 F.3d 483, 490 (6th Cir.2002). Summary judgment is proper where no genuine issue of material fact exists and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Id.

II. Substantive Due Process and the State-Created Danger Doctrine.

To establish a cause of action under § 1983, Hunt must marshal evidence that could establish two elements: (1) deprivation of a right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States (2) caused by a person acting under color of state law. McQueen v. Beecher Cmty. Sch., 433 F.3d 460, 463 (6th Cir.2006). The right Hunt contends was violated was her right to substantive due process. In a § 1983 claim predicated on a due process violation, there is a certain redundancy in the two elements; both require a link between the injury and the government, since the due process clause is not violated by purely private wrongs. See DeShaney v. Winnebago County Dep't of Soc. Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 195, 109 S.Ct. 998, 103 L.Ed.2d 249 (1989).

Hunt contends the school district actors violated her due process rights by providing and maintaining a workplace in which A— was likely to and did in fact injure her. "[N]othing in the language of the Due Process Clause itself requires the State to protect the life, liberty, and property of its citizens against invasion by private actors." Id. A governmental actor may, however, violate the due process clause by allowing a third party to harm a person in government custody, see id. at 200, 109 S.Ct. 998; Stemler v. City of Florence, 126 F.3d 856, 868 (6th Cir.1997), or by creating a particular danger to the victim. This latter theory of liability, which the Supreme Court adverted to, but did not espouse, in DeShaney, see 489 U.S. at 201, 109 S.Ct. 998, has been recognized in this Circuit as a viable species of substantive due process claim. Kallstrom v. City of Columbus, 136 F.3d 1055, 1065-67 (6th Cir.1998). Under the "state-created danger doctrine," a governmental actor can be held responsible for an injury committed by a private person if

(1) an affirmative act by the governmental actor either created or increased the risk that the plaintiff would be exposed to the injurious conduct of the private person;

(2) the governmental actor's act especially endangered the plaintiff or a small class of which the plaintiff was a member; and

(3) the governmental actor had the requisite degree of culpability.

McQueen, 433 F.3d at 464.

Of these three elements, we will focus on the question of culpability.2 In McQueen, the court explicitly stated that the level of culpability for the state-created danger doctrine is that level that would suffice to establish a substantive due process violation. Id. at 469.

III. Substantive Due Process Culpability.

The leading case on the standard of culpability in substantive due process cases based on executive action is County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 118 S.Ct. 1708, 140 L.Ed.2d 1043 (1998). In Lewis, the Supreme Court considered whether the personal representatives of a boy who was killed in a high-speed car chase established a claim for a substantive due process violation against a sheriff's deputy and others by alleging that the deputy caused the boy's death through deliberate indifference or reckless disregard for the boy's life. Justice Souter's discussion defined the issue as a question of whether the executive action of engaging in the car chase was "arbitrary":

Since the time of our early explanations of due process, we have understood the core of the concept to be protection against arbitrary action.... We have emphasized time and...

To continue reading

Request your trial
233 cases
  • Crawford v. Commonwealth
    • United States
    • Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court
    • May 26, 2022
    ...act in furtherance of a countervailing governmental purpose that justified taking that risk." Hunt v. Sycamore Community School District Board of Education , 542 F.3d 529, 541 (6th Cir. 2008). As we have noted, "[i]t is in the very nature of deliberative bodies to choose between and among c......
  • Jdc Management, LLC v. Reich, Case No. 1:08-cv-760.
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Western District of Michigan
    • July 24, 2009
    ...government discriminated against him by irrationally departing from a clear, objective standard. See also Hunt v. Sycamore Cmty. Sch. Dist. Bd. of Ed., 542 F.3d 529, 539 (6th Cir.2008) (Martin, Richard Allen Griffin, 8th Cir. J. John R. Gibson) (unlike a decision made by a government in its......
  • Dillingham v. Millsaps, 3:07–CV–214.
    • United States
    • U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Tennessee
    • August 10, 2011
    ...indifference towards the plaintiff's federally protected rights.” Id. at 853, 118 S.Ct. 1708. See also Hunt v. Sycamore Comm. Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ., 542 F.3d 529, 541 (6th Cir.2008) (stating that “if the situation is an emergency, the heightened intent standard would apply, and if there i......
  • Guertin v. Michigan
    • United States
    • U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit
    • January 4, 2019
    ...of culpability 'may or may not be shocking depending on the context,'" Range, 763 F.3d at 590 (quoting Hunt v. Sycamore Cmty. Sch. Dist. Bd. of Educ., 542 F.3d 529, 535 (6th Cir. 2008)), for what may "constitute a denial of fundamental fairness, shocking to the universal sense of justice, m......
  • Request a trial to view additional results

VLEX uses login cookies to provide you with a better browsing experience. If you click on 'Accept' or continue browsing this site we consider that you accept our cookie policy. ACCEPT