Ancata v. Prison Health Services, Inc.

• Decision Date: 26 August 1985
• Docket Number: No. 84-5923,84-5923
• Citation: 769 F.2d 700
• Parties: Carol ANCATA, individually, as natural guardian of Tara Ancata, and as personal representative of Anthony Ancata, deceased, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. PRISON HEALTH SERVICES, INC., a Delaware Corp., Susan Colligan, Karen Sutton, R. Hargrove, Henry Blady, Robert Butterworth, and George Brescher, in his capacity as Sheriff of Broward County, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 700

769 F.2d 700

Carol ANCATA, individually, as naturalguardian of Tara Ancata, and as personal representative of Anthony Ancata, deceased, Plaintiff-Appellant, v.PRISON HEALTH SERVICES, INC., a Delaware Corp., Susan Colligan, Karen Sutton, R. Hargrove, Henry Blady, Robert Butterworth, and George Brescher, in his capacity as Sheriff of Broward County, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 84-5923.

United States Court of Appeals Eleventh Circuit.

Aug. 26, 1985.

Peter M. Siegel, Randall C. Berg, Jr., Miami, Fla., for plaintiff-appellant.

Bruce W. Jolly, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., for R. Butterworth & G. Brescher.

Deborah Mann, Robert Klein, West Palm Beach, Fla., for H. Blady.

Edward R. Nicklaus, Miami, Fla., for Prison Health Services.

Alexander Cocalis, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., for Broward County.

Christopher R. Fertig, Fertig & Gamble, Lawrence J. Marraffino, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., for S. Colligan, K. Sutton, & R. Hargrove.

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

Before HENDERSON and CLARK, Circuit Judges and TUTTLE, Senior Circuit Judge.

CLARK, Circuit Judge:

I.FACTS

A.Procedural History

This is an appeal from an order of the district court dismissing all counts of plaintiff's first amended complaint based upon 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983.

Plaintiff is the personal representative of the deceased's, Anthony Ancata's, estate and the guardian of his minor child Tara Ancata.Defendant Prison Health Services is and was the entity responsible for providing medical care to those housed at the Broward County Jail.Defendants Colligan, Sutton, Hargrove and Blady were all medical personnel employed by Prison Health Services, Inc.Robert Butterworth was sued in his official capacity as the sheriff of Broward County at the time of the incidents forming the basis of this lawsuit.Sheriff Brescher was sued in his official capacity as the current sheriff of Broward County.Broward County was sued for its alleged failure to provide adequate funding to address the medical needs of individuals incarcerated there.

Plaintiff's original complaint was filed in August of 1984.Each defendant, other than Prison Health Services, filed a motion to dismiss.¹Before the court ruled on the motions to dismiss, the defendants consented to the filing of an amended complaint.This took place in October of 1984.Counts 1 and 2 of the complaint alleged that all the defendants violated plaintiff's decedent's right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment by the deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs.The remaining counts raised pendent state law claims.After the amended complaint was filed, defendantBroward County and defendant Blady filed motions to dismiss.The district court entered an order on November 19, 1984 dismissing all counts of the complaint against all defendants.²The district court determined that counts 1 and 2 of the complaint as amended, alleging the constitutional violations, alleged at most, only medical malpractice.Thus, the court determined that dismissal as to all medical defendants was proper.With respect to the non-medical defendants, the district court found that the allegations against them were grounded on notions of respondeat superior and therefore were subject to dismissal.The district court dismissed the pendent state law claims as it had found no valid federal claim.

B.The Facts as Alleged in Plaintiff's Complaint

The facts, as alleged in the plaintiff's complaint, indicate the following.Anthony Ancata was arrested and placed in pre-trial detention at the Broward County Jail on August 20, 1982.On August 29, 1982, he began to suffer from a variety of medical symptoms including swelling of the ankle, inability to sleep, chills, lower back pain, tingling and numbness of his hands, hyperventilation, severe pain in his back and right leg, double vision, and other serious problems.Despite his complaints, Prison Health Services and its employees, defendants Blady, Colligan, Sutton and Hargrove did little or nothing to evaluate the medical needs of Mr. Ancata.³

The defendants did administer such non-prescription drugs as Ben Gay and Tylenol II and suggested an orthopedic or psychiatric evaluation.However, they took no steps to have Ancata examined by either an orthopedic specialist or a psychiatrist.Rather, they informed Ancata and his family that he would not be referred to a non-staff specialist without a court order.Furthermore, they refused to acquiesce in the entry of a court order unless plaintiff agreed to bear the costs of the recommended diagnostic evaluation.Mr. Ancata, however, had already been declared indigent.

Ancata's appointed public defender successfully obtained a court order compelling an evaluation by an orthopedic specialist.The orthopedist recommended a neurological evaluation.However, Prison Health Services would again not agree to a medical evaluation by a neurologist without a court order.The second court order was again obtained by the public defender representing Mr. Ancata.After the neurological examination was conducted, Anthony Ancata was hospitalized.He was soon diagnosed as having leukemia.He died in the hospital on December 30, 1982 from respiratory failure.⁴

The appellant raises the following issues on appeal: (1) whether the complaint sufficiently alleged a case of deliberate indifference to serious medical needs thus rendering dismissal improper; (2) whether the federal claims asserted against the sheriff of Broward County and Broward County itself were premised solely on notions of respondeat superior; and (3) whether the dismissal of the pendent state law claims, if the federal claims are found to state a cause of action, was premature.

II.THE LEGAL ISSUES IN CONTEXT

When reviewing an order granting a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, this court must accept the facts as pleaded to be true and resolve them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.The motion to dismiss should not be granted unless it appears to a certainty, "that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief."Milburn v. United States, 734 F.2d 762, 765(11th Cir.1984).The threshold of sufficiency that a complaint must meet to survive a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim is, as we have stated previously, "exceedingly low."Quality Foods de Centro America, S.A. v. Latin American Agribusiness Devel., 711 F.2d 989, 995(11th Cir.1983).

It should also be noted at the outset in this case that the defendants fall into several different groups.Prison Health Services, as was noted previously, is the entity responsible, pursuant to an agreement between it and the county, for providing medical care to those housed at the Broward County Jail.Defendants Colligan, Sutton, Hargrove and Blady were all medical personnel employed by Prison Health Services.The issue to be resolved as to Prison Health Services and its employees, i.e. the medical defendants, is whether plaintiff's allegations sufficiently stated a constitutional tort of deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.

The county and the current sheriff are sued as public bodies ultimately responsible for providing medical care to those incarcerated in Broward County.Mr. Butterworth was the sheriff at the time of Ancata's death.The issue to be resolved as to these defendants, i.e., the non-medical defendants, is whether the district court properly dismissed the claims against them when it determined that any liability they may be exposed to was based solely upon notions of respondeat superior.

A.The Medical Defendants and the Deliberate Indifference to Serious Medical Needs Claim

The question before us is whether the allegations of plaintiff's complaint are sufficient to permit a jury to find that the medical defendants' conduct amounted to a deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.SeeEstelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 97 S.Ct. 285, 50 L.Ed.2d 251(1976).⁵

The medical defendants do not contest, and there can be no serious dispute, that if their actions resulted in a deprivation of Ancata's constitutional rights, they would be subject to liability pursuant to 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983.Although Prison Health Services and its employees are not strictly speaking public employees, state action is clearly present.Where a function which is traditionally the exclusive prerogative of the state(or here, county) is performed by a private entity, state action is present.Jackson v. Metropolitan Edison Co., 419 U.S. 345, 95 S.Ct. 449, 42 L.Ed.2d 477(1974);see alsoLawyer v. Kernodle, 721 F.2d 632(8th Cir.1983)(private physician hired by county to perform autopsies was acting under color of state law);Morrison v. Washington County, Alabama, 700 F.2d 678(11th Cir.1983)(refusing to dismiss physician employed by county from Sec. 1983 action);Perez v. Sugarman, 499 F.2d 761(2d Cir.1974)(holding that state action was present for private institution's acts where the City of New York removed a child from the mother's custody and placed the child in a private child care institution).

If the complaint is sufficient, then dismissal for failure to state a claim is improper.Accepting plaintiff's allegations as true, and giving the plaintiff the benefit of all legitimate inferences from the complaint as we must, we conclude that the complaint sufficiently alleges a claim of deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.

There are at least three separate although somewhat overlapping aspects to plaintiff's claim of deliberate indifference.The first is plaintiff's allegation that the defendants failed to provide even that level of diagnostic care that they themselves believed necessary.The knowledge of the need for medical care and intentional refusal to provide that care has consistently been held to surpass negligence and constitute deliberate indifference.SeeRobinson v. Moreland, ...