Earl v. Racine Cnty. Jail

• Decision Date: 28 May 2013
• Docket Number: No. 12–3900.,12–3900.
• Citation: 718 F.3d 689
• Parties: Daryise L. EARL, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. RACINE COUNTY JAIL, et al., Defendants–Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

718 F.3d 689

Daryise L. EARL, Plaintiff–Appellant,

v.RACINE COUNTY JAIL, et al., Defendants–Appellees.

No. 12–3900.

United States Court of Appeals,Seventh Circuit.

Submitted May 9, 2013.^*

Decided May 28, 2013.

Daryise L. Earl (submitted), Green Bay Correctional Institution, Green Bay, WI, pro se.

Jacob A. Sosnay, Bascom, Budish & Ceman, Wauwatosa, WI, for Defendants–Appellees.

Before FLAUM, SYKES, and TINDER, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM.

Daryise Earl, a Wisconsin inmate, appeals the district court's grant of summary judgment for the Racine County Jail and various jail officers in his suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, contending that the jail (1) denied him due process by placing him on suicide watch without providing notice or a hearing and (2) was deliberately indifferent to an allergic reaction he suffered when forced to wear suicide-proof garments. We affirm.

The facts of Earl's case, construed in his favor, see Wells v. Coker, 707 F.3d 756, 760 (7th Cir.2013), show that after he was convicted of first-degree intentional homicide and jailed, he was placed for five days onto “suicide watch”—protective segregation where he was allowed limited possessions, dressed in a “suicide-proof gown,” served meals on Styrofoam trays, kept in continuous light for the first 24 hours, and closely and constantly monitored by prison staff. The jail says that Earl's placement on suicide watch was a matter of policy; this placement is required of every inmate convicted of a serious felony and lasts until he is examined by a mental-health expert and cleared for release into the general prison population. Earl, however, stated in an affidavit that he was placed on suicide watch as punishment after an officer relayed false information that he had threatened other guards.

While on suicide watch, Earl suffered an allergic reaction to the special gown he had to wear and requested medical attention. An officer called a nurse, who came and immediately examined him but found no rash. The nurse gave Earl medicine and cream but told the guards that he could continue wearing the gown. Two days later a mental-health worker recommended that Earl be discharged from suicide watch; but rather than being placed in the general population, Earl was placed for twelve days in administrative segregation, apparently as punishment for initially refusing to wear the suicide gown, and afterwards was transferred to a state prison. Two years later Earl returned to the jail for seven days for a court appearance and again was housed in administrative segregation rather than in the general prison population. He then brought this suit.

The district court granted the defendants' motion for summary judgment. First, the court concluded that, to the extent Earl's due-process claim involves his time in administrative segregation, his placement there was too short to deprive him of a liberty interest. And to the extent his claim concerned his five days on suicide watch (a more restrictive form of confinement), the court found these conditions neither “unusually harsh” nor sufficiently long to affect a liberty interest. Even if his placement on suicide watch affected a liberty interest, the court added, Earl did not contend that the policy was unconstitutional. As for Earl's deliberate-indifference claim, the court concluded that he produced no evidence suggesting that any of the defendants (1) delayed responding to his call while on suicide watch that he was suffering an allergic reaction or (2) acted maliciously by deferring to the nurse's medical judgment regarding his treatment.

Earl then moved to alter the judgment, seeFed.R.Civ.P. 59(e), attaching new affidavits from former inmates who asserted that they had also been convicted of serious felonies but were never placed on suicide watch. The district court stated that it stood by its original decision and denied Earl's motion.

On appeal, Earl first argues that summary judgment should not have been granted because a triable issue of fact exists regarding the jail's reason for putting him on suicide watch. He insists that his affidavit, asserting that he was placed on suicide watch for threatening the guards, contradicts the defendants' affidavits stating that he was placed on suicide watch for his own protection.

Regardless of why Earl was placed on suicide watch, the district court correctly determined that no liberty interest was implicated by his placement there. When an inmate is placed in conditions more restrictive than those in the general prison population, whether through protective segregation like suicide watch or discretionary administrative segregation, his liberty is affected only if the more restrictive conditions are particularly harsh compared to ordinary prison life or if he remains subject to those conditions for a significantly long time. See Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209, 223, 125 S.Ct. 2384, 162 L.Ed.2d 174 (2005); Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 484–87, 115 S.Ct. 2293, 132 L.Ed.2d 418 (1995); Marion v. Columbia Corr. Inst., 559 F.3d 693, 697–98 & n. 2 (7th Cir.2009); Townsend v. Fuchs, 522 F.3d 765, 771–72 (7th...