O'QUINN v. Manuel

• Decision Date: 07 October 1985
• Docket Number: No. 84-4307.,84-4307.
• Citation: 773 F.2d 605
• Parties: James Richard O'QUINN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Albert MANUEL, T.A. Morvant, Robert Searcy, Calcasieu Parish, Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Department etc., et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

773 F.2d 605

James Richard O'QUINN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Albert MANUEL, T.A. Morvant, Robert Searcy, Calcasieu Parish, Calcasieu Parish Sheriff's Department etc., et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 84-4307.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

August 5, 1985.

As Amended October 7, 1985.

Stephen E. Everett, Alexandria, La., for plaintiff-appellant.

Terry J. Manuel, Lake Charles, La., for defendants-appellees.

Before GOLDBERG, RUBIN and HILL, Circuit Judges.

GOLDBERG, Circuit Judge:

Appellant O'Quinn, an inmate of the Calcasieu Parish Jail in Calcasieu Parish, Louisiana, brought this civil rights suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (1982) against the Calcasieu Parish Police Jury,¹ the Sheriff, two deputies, and four other inmates of the Jail. Appellant alleged that he suffered severe injuries from a beating he had received from other inmates while incarcerated at the Jail — an event which would have been less likely, if at all possible, had the Jail been better equipped and administered. Specifically, appellant alleged that his "injuries resulted from the willful or negligent acts or omissions of the defendants with respect to the plaintiff's incarceration in failing to provide adequate supervision and protection for plaintiff ... and in failing to administer properly the incarceration of prisoners." This appeal involves only appellant's claim against the Police Jury.

The Police Jury filed a motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, for failure to state a claim, and, as a third alternative, for summary judgment. On October 15, 1982, the district court orally granted defendant's motion on the ground that because plaintiff had available an adequate state court remedy, there was no subject matter jurisdiction. On November 2, however, the court issued a written order granting the motion to dismiss, but this time on the ground that plaintiff had failed to state a claim because "the Police Jury is in no way responsible for maintaining the proper custody of prisoners."

Appellant originally appealed on October 26 from the oral dismissal of the Police Jury on the jurisdictional ground. In an unpublished decision, this Court dismissed the appeal because the district court had not made the certificate required by Fed.R.Civ.P. 54(b). Since other defendants remained in the case, the appeal was premature. On remand, the district court dismissed the last of the parties in response to plaintiff's motion, and appellant then timely filed his notice of appeal.

The district court apparently relied on two separate grounds for dismissing appellant's claim against the Police Jury. The minute entry cites a lack of subject matter jurisdiction, while the written order relies on the failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. Neither ground applies here.

It is well-settled that the difference between dismissing a complaint because the court lacks subject matter jurisdiction under Rule 12(b)(1) versus where the plaintiff has failed to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6) is a difference not of degree but of kind. See, e.g., Bell v. Hood, 327 U.S. 678, 682, 66 S.Ct. 773, 776, 90 L.Ed. 939 (1946).

The distinction between factual Rule 12(b)(1) motions and factual Rule 12(b)(6) motions is rooted in the unique nature of the jurisdictional question. It is elementary that a district court has broader power to decide its own right to hear the case than it has when the merits of the case are reached. Jurisdictional issues are for the court — not a jury — to decide, whether they hinge on legal or factual determinations.

Williamson v. Tucker, 645 F.2d 404, 413 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 897, 102 S.Ct. 396, 70 L.Ed.2d 212 (1981). The issue of whether a federal question is involved requires the court to determine whether the complaint purports to state a claim "arising under" federal law. E.g., American Well Works Co. v. Layne & Bowler Co., 241 U.S. 257, 258-60, 36 S.Ct. 585, 586, 60 L.Ed. 987 (1916). Under the well-pleaded complaint rule, an action arises under federal law for purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 1331 (1982) "if in order for the plaintiff to secure the relief sought he will be obliged to establish both the correctness and the applicability to his case of a proposition of federal law." P. Bator, P. Mishkin, D. Shapiro & H. Wechsler, The Federal Courts and the Federal System 889 (2d ed. 1973), quoted in Franchise Tax Board v. Construction Laborers Vacation Trust for Southern California, 463 U.S. 1, 103 S.Ct. 2841, 2846, 77 L.Ed.2d 420 (1983). In the present case, the face of plaintiff's complaint clearly states a federal question sufficient to confer subject matter jurisdiction on the district court. The complaint invokes section 1983 as well as the first, fourth, and fourteenth amendments to the Constitution; in addition, although plaintiff has not expressly named it, the cruel and unusual punishments clause of the eighth amendment is implicit in his allegation of injury by the state.² Federal law thus provides both the substantive rights and the remedy for violation of those rights. "In such cases jurisdiction is taken as a matter of course." 13B C. Wright, A. Miller & E. Cooper, Federal Practice and Procedure § 3562, at 40 (2d ed. 1984) (footnote omitted).

To the extent the district court nonetheless dismissed the complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, it did so in apparent reliance on Parratt v. Taylor, 451 U.S. 527, 101 S.Ct. 1908, 68 L.Ed.2d 420 (1981), which held that section 1983 does not support a negligence claim based solely on the denial of procedural due process under the fourteenth amendment where adequate state tort remedies are available. Id. at 536, 544, 101 S.Ct. at 1917; see Hudson v. Palmer, ___ U.S. ___, 104 S.Ct. 3194, 3203-04, 82 L.Ed.2d 393 (1984) (extending Parratt to intentional deprivations of property). This argument gives us little pause. In the present case, appellant's case is clearly based at least on the alleged violation of his substantive eighth amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment.³ As we discussed at greater length in Augustine v. Doe, 740 F.2d 322, 325-27 (5th Cir.1984), the Parratt rule does not apply to alleged violations of substantive rights incorporated into the fourteenth amendment, and the existence of subject matter jurisdiction over appellant's civil rights claims is therefore not affected by the availability of state remedies. See also Thibodeaux v. Bordelon, 740 F.2d 329, 333 (5th Cir.1984).

Turning to the district court's other ground for decision, our task is equally well-defined in reviewing a dismissal for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. We must accept all well-pleaded averments as true and resolve all factual disputes in favor of the plaintiff. Rankin v. City of Wichita Falls, 762 F.2d 444, 445-46 (5th Cir.1985). We cannot look outside the pleadings, nor can we uphold the dismissal "unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 101-02, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957). In the section 1983 context, the plaintiff is required to state specific facts rather than conclusory allegations, Elliot v. Perez, 751 F.2d 1472, 1479 & n. 20 (5th Cir.1985); still, we remain faithful to the liberal notice-pleading requirements of the Federal Rules, and note that "often the litigants may plead generally and discover the precise factual basis for their claim through equally liberal pretrial discovery procedures." Auster Oil & Gas, Inc. v. Stream, 764 F.2d 381, 385-87 (5th Cir.1985); Morrison v. City of Baton Rouge, 761 F.2d 242, 244 (5th Cir.1985).

Although municipalities cannot be held liable under section 1983 by virtue of the doctrine of respondeat superior, they are subject to such liability where official custom or policy is involved in the injury. City of Oklahoma City v. Tuttle, ___ U.S. ___, 105 S.Ct. 2427, 2433-34, 85 L.Ed.2d 791 (1985); Monell v. New York City Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658, 691, 694, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 2036, 2037, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978). Monell liability can occur in a variety of ways, one of which is by "`systematic maladministration' of the laws." Bennett v. City of Slidell, 728 F.2d 762, 768 (5th Cir.1984) (en banc) (quoting Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 167 & n. 39, 90 S.Ct. 1598, 1613 & n. 39, 26 L.Ed.2d 142 (1970)). Moreover, this Court has repeatedly held that municipalities or supervisors may face liability under section 1983 where they breach duties imposed by state or local law. See, e.g., Harvey v. Andrist, 754 F.2d 569, 572 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, ___ U.S. ___, 105 S.Ct. 2659, 86 L.Ed.2d 276 (1985); Lozano v. Smith, 718 F.2d 756, 768 (5th Cir.1983); Barksdale v. King, 699 F.2d 744, 746 (5th Cir.1983); Douthit v. Jones, 641 F.2d 345, 346 (5th Cir.1981); Sims v. Adams, 537 F.2d 829, 831 (5th Cir.1976). The critical point for this case is that such liability may result if municipal officials have actual or constructive knowledge of constitutional violations and fail to carry out their duty to correct them. Bennett, 728 F.2d at 768.

Under Louisiana law, the Police Jury had no responsibility over the daily operation of the Jail. However, state law does require the Police Jury to "provide ... a good and sufficient jail," La.Rev.Stat.Ann. § 33:4715 (West 1966), to be "responsible for the physical maintenance of all parish jails and prisons," id. § 15:702 (West 1981), and to pay all expenses incurred in "the arrest, confinement, maintenance and prosecution of persons accused or convicted of crimes," id. § 15:304. See Amiss v. Dumas, 411 So.2d 1137, 1140-42 (La.Ct.App.) (discussing statutory allocation of prison responsibility), writ denied, 415 So.2d 940 (La.1982). Clearly the Police Jury had a duty to fund and maintain the Jail.

Where a municipal body is vested with this sort of fiscal obligation to a jail,...