Leeks v. Cunningham

• Decision Date: 18 May 1993
• Docket Number: No. 92-2106,92-2106
• Citation: 997 F.2d 1330
• Parties: Joseph D. LEEKS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lowell K. CUNNINGHAM, Defendant-Appellant, Mr. Carson; P. Bass; Joseph A. Kemper; M. Press, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1330

997 F.2d 1330

Joseph D. LEEKS, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Lowell K. CUNNINGHAM, Defendant-Appellant, Mr. Carson; P. Bass; Joseph A. Kemper; M. Press, Defendants.

No. 92-2106.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

May 18, 1993.

Russell W. LaPeer, Robert R. Wheeler, Pattillo & McKeever, PA, Ocala, FL, defendant-appellant.

Thomas G. Fallis, Jacksonville, FL, for plaintiff-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Middle District of Florida.

Before FAY, Circuit Judge, JOHNSON, Senior Circuit Judge, and MERHIGE ^*, Senior District Judge.

PER CURIAM:

In this matter, a county jail physician appeals the district court's denial of his motion for summary judgment as to a prisoner's claim for damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for allegedly unnecessarily and forcibly subjecting him to antipsychotic medication in violation of his constitutional rights. Finding that the district court erred in its refusal to find appellant qualifiedly immune under the instant facts, we reverse.

The facts pertinent to this matter are as follows. On June 1, 1989, Plaintiff-appellee Joseph Leeks was admitted as a pre-trial detainee to the Lake County Jail in Tavares, Lake County, Florida. Subsequent to being informed by appellee's mother that he was suicidal, jail officials placed appellee on suicide watch. Pursuant to a request by jail officials, on June 7, 1989, Defendant-appellant Dr. Lowell K. Cunningham examined appellee and, finding appellee non-suicidal, removed appellee from suicide watch. On June 28, 1989, the supervising nurse at the Lake County Jail informed appellant by telephone that appellee had become agitated, requiring officers to shackle him to gain control and prevent harm to himself. Based on that information, appellant authorized an intramuscular injection of 25 mg. of Thorazine, an antipsychotic medication. This injection occurred over appellee's objections.

Again, on July 1, 1989, the nurse phoned appellant to inform him of a similar instance of appellee's misbehavior, requiring officers to shackle appellee to prevent harm to himself and others. Once again, based on information provided to him, appellant authorized another injection of 25 mg. of Thorazine. Jail officials carried out this injection, once again over the objection of appellee. From July 5, 1989 to October 18, 1989 appellant also prescribed another antipsychotic, Mellaril, to be taken twice a day by mouth. Appellee voluntarily consumed this drug pursuant to the prescription.

On October 19, 1990, appellee filed an amended complaint pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that his rights under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution were violated by the involuntary administration of the antipsychotic medications.

Appellant, on July 9, 1991, moved for summary judgment, asserting the affirmative defense of qualified immunity. On November 19, 1991, the district court denied appellant's motion for summary judgment. ¹ The court reached its conclusion on the basis of a recent decision of the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals. In Bee v. Greaves, 910 F.2d 686 (10th Cir.1990), the Court reviewed the trial court's denial of summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity as to a jail psychiatrist who allegedly ordered that a pretrial detainee forcibly undergo the administration of an antipsychotic drug. The Tenth Circuit affirmed the denial of qualified immunity, finding that as of 1980 it was "unequivocal" that the law as to the forced medication of a pretrial detainee was clearly established. Id. at 688. In support, the Court stated as follows:

The Supreme Court recently considered 'whether a judicial hearing is required before the state may treat a mentally ill prisoner with antipsychotic drugs against his will.' Washington v. Harper, U.S. 110 S.Ct. 1028, 1032, 108 L.Ed.2d 178 (1990). In describing the substantive right at stake, the Court stated that it had 'no doubt that ... respondent possesses a significant liberty interest in avoiding the unwanted administration of antipsychotic drugs under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.' Id., 110 S.Ct. at 1036 (emphasis added). In support of this declaration, the Court cited its opinions in Vitek v. Jones, 445 U.S. 480, 100 S.Ct. 1254, 63 L.Ed.2d 552 (1980), and Parham v. J.R., 442 U.S. 584, 600-01, 99 S.Ct. 2493, 2503-04, 61 L.Ed.2d 101 (1979), both of which predate Bee's involuntary medication. If those cases established the law beyond doubt with respect to a convicted prisoner, they indisputably did so with respect to a pretrial detainee as well. See Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 545, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 1877, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979)....

Id. (footnote omitted).

In sum, the district court in the instant case denied appellant's claim of qualified immunity on the basis of the Tenth Circuit's Bee opinion, decided thirteen months after appellant's actions here, and Bee's interpretation of Washington v. Harper, supra, itself decided some seven months after the Thorazine injections at issue here. The question squarely before this Court is whether this outcome and rationale are proper.

Whether the district court properly denied appellant's motion for summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity is a question of law we review de novo. James v. Douglas, 941 F.2d 1539, 1542 (11th Cir.1991); Howell v. Evans, 922 F.2d 712, 718-19 (11th Cir.1991). ² In deciding whether the district court erred, our task, as was the trial court's, is to ascertain whether the record reveals that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c); Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 159, 90 S.Ct. 1598, 1609, 26 L.Ed.2d 142 (1970). We consider the record as it was presented to the district court and view it in the light most favorable to the non- movant, appellee. Waldrop v. Evans, 871 F.2d 1030, 1034-35 (11th Cir.1989)

The law attending qualified immunity is well-settled. Officials ³ enjoy immunity from civil damages for their discretionary acts so long as "their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known." Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818, 102 S.Ct. 2727, 2738, 73 L.Ed.2d 396 (1982). In reaching this determination, the court must ensure that "[t]he contours of the right [are] sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would understand that what he is doing violates that right." Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 640, 107 S.Ct. 3034, 3039, 97 L.Ed.2d 523 (1987). This analysis focuses on the state of the law at the time of the alleged violation. Acoff v. Abston, 762 F.2d 1543, 1549-50 (11th Cir.1985). Plaintiff bears the burden of showing that the official violated such clearly established law. Zeigler v. Jackson, 716 F.2d 847, 849 (11th Cir.1983) (per curiam). Thus, in assessing appellant's qualified immunity claim, our concern is whether statutory or case law existed in July 1989 to clearly establish that a county jail pretrial detainee had a right under the Due Process Clause to be free of unwanted administration of antipsychotic medication. ⁴

To this end, we consider the law originating in this Circuit, as well as the Supreme Court, the courts of appeals, and the district courts. Greason v. Kemp, 891 F.2d 829, 833 (11th Cir.1990). As noted above, the Supreme Court in 1990 decided Washington v. Harper, 494 U.S. 210, 110 S.Ct. 1028, 108 L.Ed.2d 178 (1990), wherein the Court held that "[t]he forcible injection of medication into a nonconsenting person's body represents a substantial interference with that person's liberty." Id. at 229, 110 S.Ct. at 1040. In Harper, a prison inmate alleged that the State of Washington and various individuals violated his due process rights by giving him Mellaril and other antipsychotic drugs against his will. Although the Court held that Harper had a protectible liberty interest, the Court nonetheless concluded that the State's policy as to administering unwanted antipsychotic medication comported with due process requirements as it was reasonably related to the State's legitimate interest in preventing harm to the inmate and others and was in the inmate's medical interest.

More recently, in Riggins v. Nevada, --- U.S. ----, 112 S.Ct. 1810, 118 L.Ed.2d 479 (1992), the Supreme Court considered whether the involuntary administration of the antipsychotic drug Mellaril during a criminal defendant's trial violated the defendant's rights under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments. Citing Harper, the Court concluded that such a practice was impermissible insofar as the State of Nevada failed to show the need for the application and its medical appropriateness. ⁵

As a threshold matter, Harper, and the Court's revisiting of the question of forced administration of antipsychotic drugs in Riggins v. Nevada, are not controlling as both cases were decided well after the allegedly improper Thorazine injections involved in this appeal. Acoff v. Abston, 762 F.2d 1543 1549-50 (11th Cir.1985); Zook v. Brown, 748 F.2d 1161, 1164 (7th Cir.1984). Nor is the result in this appeal dictated by the result reached by the Tenth Circuit in Bee v. Greaves. Generali v. D'Amico, 766 F.2d 485, 489 (11th Cir.1985); Bonner v. City of Prichard, Ala., 661 F.2d 1206, 1209 (11th Cir.1981). See also Davis v. Holly, 835 F.2d 1175, 1182 (6th Cir.1987) ("A single idiosyncratic opinion from the court of appeals for another circuit was hardly sufficient to put the defendants on notice of where this circuit or the Supreme Court would come out on the issue in question."). Of potential import in the Bee decision, however, is the court's view as to the applicability of Supreme Court case law, most notably Vitek v. Jones, 445 U.S. 480, 100 S.Ct. 1254, 63 L.Ed.2d 552 (1980), and Parham v. J.R., 442 U.S. 584, 99 S.Ct. 2493, 61 L.Ed.2d 101 (1979). In Vitek, the Court...