LeVine v. Roebuck

• Decision Date: 04 December 2008
• Docket Number: No. 07-3388.,07-3388.
• Citation: 550 F.3d 684
• Parties: Joel LeVINE,<SMALL><SUP>1</SUP></SMALL> Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Kathleen ROEBUCK; Tonya Youngs; Donald Greim, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

550 F.3d 684

Joel LeVINE,¹ Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Kathleen ROEBUCK; Tonya Youngs; Donald Greim, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 07-3388.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

Submitted: May 15, 2008.

Filed: December 4, 2008.

William P. Nacy, Hanrahan Trapp, P.C., Jefferson City, MO, argued (Samuel E. Trapp, Samantha Anne Harris, on the brief), for appellant.

Mark A. Lynch, Holbrook & Osborn, P.A., Overland Park, KS, argued, for appellees Greim and Roebuck.

Ryan E. Bertels, Asst. Atty. Gen., Jefferson City, MO, argued (Jeremiah W. (Jay) Nixon, Atty. Gen., on the brief), for appellee Youngs.

Before LOKEN, Chief Judge, BEAM and BYE, Circuit Judges.

LOKEN, Chief Judge.

In this § 1983 action, Missouri inmate Joel LeVine alleges that a correctional officer and two prison nurses violated his Fourth and Eighth Amendment rights by forcing him to undergo catheterization to avoid prison discipline when he could not provide a urine sample for a random drug test. The district court dismissed the Eighth Amendment claims on the merits, and the Fourth Amendment claims on the basis of qualified immunity. LeVine appeals. Reviewing the grant of summary judgment de novo, we affirm.

I. Facts and Procedural History

In November 2004, Correctional Officer Tonya Youngs summoned LeVine, a sixty-eight year old inmate, to provide a urine sample for random drug testing being conducted pursuant to the Offender Substance Abuse Testing provisions adopted by the Missouri Department of Corrections in July 2004. Part III.B. of this policy provided in relevant part:

2. There shall be no physical contact between staff and offender during specimen collection.

* * * * * *

4. Offenders who refuse or fail to produce a urine specimen of at least 30cc (1 oz or half a bottle) within two hours will be subject to disciplinary action.

a. The offender will be provided with approximately 12 ounces of water.

LeVine tried but failed to provide a urine specimen within two hours. The parties disagree whether Youngs told LeVine he would lose visitation privileges and be placed in administrative segregation if he failed to provide a specimen. They agree that LeVine told Youngs he suffers from an enlarged prostate, and that Youngs then called a prison medical officer, who verified LeVine's condition and advised Youngs to give him more time. She allowed him another ten minutes and gave him more water to drink, but to no avail. Youngs submitted an affidavit averring that "LeVine then volunteered to go to medical for catheterization in order to provide a urine sample." Youngs called medical staff, who advised "it was ok for him to do this." LeVine was then escorted by correctional officer Patrick Dunlap to the medical unit.

LeVine submitted an affidavit averring, "Youngs instructed me that I would be taken to the hospital in order for a urine sample to be collected by catheterization." But at a prior deposition, he testified that, before entering prison, he had been catheterized by a private physician on two occasions when he could not urinate, and he was ambiguous on the question whether he volunteered to be catheterized:

Q. If ... it's Defendant Youngs' testimony that you made the offer to be catheterized, do you disagree with that?

A. Did I—that I agreed to it?

Q. That you proposed the idea of being catheterized.

A. No; because I had a swollen prostate and I got cancer. That's the only way I could keep from going to the hole. They would have put me in the hole if I didn't.

When they arrived at the medical unit, Dunlap told nurse Kathleen Roebuck that LeVine was there for catheterization so he could provide a urine sample for a drug test. There is some dispute whether LeVine consented to the procedure. Roebuck submitted an affidavit averring that, when Dunlap said LeVine wished to be catheterized, she "looked to Mr. Levine for confirmation," and he "shrugged and stated, `Go ahead. I don't mind.'" On the other hand, LeVine testified:

Q .... [I]sn't it true that you ... did tell Kathleen Roebuck that you were agreeing to be catheterized at that time?

A. No, I don't think so. I think Dunlap told her that he brought me over there for that purpose.

* * * * * *

Q. So your testimony is that she then catheterized you against your will?

A. I would say yes. It's my ... understanding after the fact that I was supposed to sign a paper giving them permission to do it but they never offered me one.

* * * * * *

Q .... Did you tell Kathleen Roebuck that you had any objections to being catheterized at that time?

A. I wasn't given the opportunity to do that.

In the medical unit, Roebuck attempted to insert a catheter through LeVine's urethra into the bladder but encountered resistance, presumably because LeVine's urethra had been narrowed by his enlarged prostate gland. Several times, Roebuck backed the catheter out and attempted to reinsert it. LeVine claims he asked Roebuck to stop because the procedure was extremely painful. Another nurse, Donnie Greim, attempted to assist Roebuck; he too was unsuccessful. A medical unit physician was summoned and directed the nurses to cease. When they withdrew the catheter, blood and tissue were evident on its tip. LeVine was given antibiotics and pain medication and returned to his cell. When he complained of continued pain and inability to urinate, physician Milo Farnham ordered him transferred to a public hospital, where he was successfully catheterized and provided a urine sample that tested drug-free. At Dr. Farnham's direction, the catheter remained in place for as many as nine days. LeVine had no complications or permanent injury after the catheter was removed.

After exhausting prison remedies, LeVine commenced this § 1983 damage action against Youngs, Roebuck, and Greim. Defendants filed separate motions for summary judgment. The motions assumed for summary judgment purposes that Youngs threatened LeVine with a conduct violation and that LeVine did not consent to be catheterized. The district court granted the motions, concluding that defendants were entitled to qualified immunity from LeVine's Fourth Amendment claims and did not violate his Eighth Amendment rights. This appeal followed.

II. Fourth Amendment Claims

LeVine first argues that the district court erred in granting defendants qualified immunity on his Fourth Amendment claims "because the right of a prisoner to be free from an involuntary catheterization as part of random drug testing" was clearly established at the time he was required to undergo this procedure. See Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818-19, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982) (qualified immunity standard). We agree with two principles on which this argument is premised. First, "state-compelled collection and testing of urine ... constitutes a `search' subject to the demands of the Fourth Amendment." Vernonia Sch. Dist. 47J v. Acton, 515 U.S. 646, 652, 115 S.Ct. 2386, 132 L.Ed.2d 564 (1995). Second, prison inmates are entitled to Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches of their bodies, see Seltzer-Bey v. Delo, 66 F.3d 961, 963 (8th Cir. 1995), although "a prison inmate has a far lower expectation of privacy than do most other individuals in our society." Goff v. Nix, 803 F.2d 358, 365 (8th Cir. 1986), cert denied, 484 U.S. 835, 108 S.Ct. 115, 98 L.Ed.2d 73 (1987); see generally Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. 517, 525-28, 104 S.Ct. 3194, 82 L.Ed.2d 393 (1984); Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 558-60, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979).

In Spence v. Farrier, 807 F.2d 753, 755 (8th Cir.1986), we held that random urinalysis testing of inmates did not violate the Fourth Amendment because the prison system's security interest in detecting the unauthorized use of narcotics,² and the inmates' diminished expectations of privacy, justified a "truly random" procedure for selecting the inmates to be tested. Spence did not involve use of the more intrusive procedure of involuntary catheterization to obtain a urine sample. That procedure was at issue in Sparks v. Stutler, 71 F.3d 259 (7th Cir.1995), cert. denied, 519 U.S. 948, 117 S.Ct. 357, 136 L.Ed.2d 249 (1996), where prison officials ordered an inmate catheterized after they found a syringe in his shoe and he failed to provide a urine sample. The Seventh Circuit described catheterization as "more intrusive than a needle but less intrusive than a scalpel, making it hard to classify ... under an objective reasonableness inquiry." Id. at 261. Without concluding whether a Fourth Amendment violation had occurred, the court reversed the district court's denial of qualified immunity. In Sparks, there was reasonable suspicion of drug use, a factor not present in this case. In another group of cases, exemplified by Tinius v. Carroll County Sheriff Dept., 321 F.Supp.2d 1064, 1070, 1074-76 (N.D.Ia. 2004), courts have held that involuntary catheterization to obtain a urine sample for medical purposes—such as determining the proper course of treatment—does not violate the Fourth Amendment. Relying on these cases, defendants argue that LeVine's Fourth Amendment rights were not violated even if he was involuntarily catheterized to obtain a urine sample for a random drug test. We need not accept that argument to decide this case.

The district court rejected defendants' categorical argument and concluded that correctional officer Youngs violated LeVine's Fourth Amendment rights because "involuntary catheterization of a 68-year-old man with a history of prostate problems, as part of a random drug screening and without suspicion, is unreasonable" when other less intrusive options are available, such as keeping LeVine in a room until he was able to urinate. The court then granted Youngs qualified immunity because "the law of the Eighth Circuit was not clearly established at the time of [her] actions."

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