Coscia v. Town of Pembroke, 10–1714.

• Decision Date: 14 September 2011
• Docket Number: No. 10–1714.,10–1714.
• Citation: 659 F.3d 37
• Parties: Donna COSCIA, Administratrix of the Estate of Jason Coscia, Plymouth Probate Court Docket # 08P–0409AD1, Plaintiff, Appellee,v.TOWN OF PEMBROKE, MASSACHUSETTS, et al., Defendants, Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — First Circuit

659 F.3d 37

Donna COSCIA, Administratrix of the Estate of Jason Coscia, Plymouth Probate Court Docket # 08P–0409AD1, Plaintiff, Appellee,

v.TOWN OF PEMBROKE, MASSACHUSETTS, et al., Defendants, Appellants.

No. 10–1714.

United States Court of Appeals, First Circuit.

Heard March 9, 2011.Decided Sept. 14, 2011.

Joseph L. Tehan, Jr., with whom Katharine I. Doyle and Kopelman and Paige, P.C., were on brief, for appellants.Albert L. Farrah, with whom Karl F. Stammen, II, and Stammen & Associates, were on brief, for appellee.Before BOUDIN, Circuit Judge, SOUTER, Associate Justice,^* and SELYA, Circuit Judge.SOUTER, Associate Justice.

In her capacity as Administratrix of the estate of her son, Jason Coscia, the plaintiff, Donna Coscia, has claimed violations of Fourteenth Amendment due process in a suit for damages under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (2006) against a number of Pembroke, Massachusetts police officers, their superiors, and the town, for failing to prevent Jason Coscia's death. The nub of her case is the charge that they failed to provide medical services for the decedent who threatened suicide in police custody, as an alleged consequence of which he killed himself some fourteen hours after release. This appeal in advance of trial is brought by the individual defendants, who moved for judgment on the pleadings under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c) on grounds including qualified immunity, see Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 1946, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009), and the issue is the sufficiency of the complaint to state a due process claim resting on law established with sufficient clarity to apprise the defendants of the duty they are said to have breached. We hold that the complaint failed to allege a constitutional violation and reverse the district court's ruling sustaining the claim.

On this de novo review of a purely legal issue, see Estate of Bennett v. Wainwright, 548 F.3d 155, 163 (1st Cir.2008), the governing allegations of the complaint can be stated shortly. After twenty-one-year-old Jason Coscia had a one-car accident, he was arrested about eleven o'clock in the morning and brought to the Pembroke police station. On the way there he said he intended to throw himself in front of a train, and he continued to utter suicide threats at the station house accompanied by self-destructive behavior, to the point of licking an electrical outlet. As a consequence, the police did not lock him in a cell, but placed him in leg restraints and followed an evaluation protocol that showed a high suicide risk. He was not examined by a doctor, but was released on his own recognizance about six o'clock that evening.¹ Just before eight o'clock the next morning he committed suicide by stepping in front of a train. The complaint claims that “[t]he failure of the defendants to take appropriate action to have Jason Coscia evaluated by medical professionals caused his death by suicide.” ²

A defense motion for judgment on grounds of qualified immunity raises issues about the recognition of the constitutional right said to have been violated, and the requisite clarity by which it is established in the law. Failing either of them, dismissal follows, Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 129 S.Ct. 808, 172 L.Ed.2d 565 (2009); failing both, a court dismissing the action has discretion to choose either issue as cause for the disposition, see id. at 236, 129 S.Ct. 808. The trial court held against the defendants on both points, of course, but we decide the appeal on the ground that the complaint fails to allege a due process violation.³ The question is thus whether the allegations as considered most favorably to the plaintiff “raise a right to relief above the speculative level on the assumption that [those] allegations are true.” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 167 L.Ed.2d 929 (2007).

A state and its subdivisions are under a substantive obligation imposed by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to refrain at least from treating a pretrial detainee with deliberate indifference to a substantial risk of serious harm to health. City of Revere v. Mass. Gen. Hosp., 463 U.S. 239, 244, 103 S.Ct. 2979, 77 L.Ed.2d 605 (1983); see Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 835, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994) (standard of deliberate indifference except as to excessive force claims). Proof of deliberate indifference requires a showing of greater culpability than negligence but less than a purpose to do harm, Farmer, 511 U.S. at 835, 114 S.Ct. 1970, and it may consist of showing a conscious failure to provide medical services where they would be reasonably appropriate, Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 104, 97 S.Ct. 285, 50 L.Ed.2d 251 (1976).

With these general legal premises to start with, the argument that the complaint fails to state a claim for relief turns on the allegation that Jason Coscia killed himself, not while in custody, but some fourteen hours after his release.⁴ Like the district judge, we have been apprised of no case recognizing due process liability for suicide based on police conduct except for death during custody, and the defendants have cited one case comparable to this one that found no liability for the reason that the suicide occurred after release. The district court nonetheless decided that a liability claim had been pleaded adequately despite the non-custodial death because a causal relationship (in fact and law) had been plausibly stated between the failure to furnish medical care during the temporary custody and the self-destructive act the next morning:

[T]he plaintiff's theory depends on whether the officers violated Coscia's rights by failing to offer medical care during his custody and whether these actions caused his suicide.... [T]raditional causation principles provide the appropriate limits on a government official's liability for harms that occur after a detainee has left the official's custody.Coscia v. Town of Pembroke, 715 F.Supp.2d 212, 223, 226 (D.Mass.2010).

We assume that the District Court was correct that the familiar principles of tort causation requiring connection in fact would be satisfied by the complaint here. It is plausible for pleading purposes that medical intervention during the seven-hour custody (say, by administering psychotropic medication to relieve suicidal anxiety, or by observation and care in a hospital) could have deflected the decedent from the course leading to the suicidal act fourteen hours after custody ended. Hence, we can accept the allegations as claiming causation in fact of foreseeable harm. See Rodriguez–Cirilo v. Garcia, 115 F.3d 50, 52 (1st Cir.1997). But although principles of liability under Section 1983 borrow from the understanding of tort causation, Garcia, 115 F.3d at 52, we think the rationale for official responsibility under the Due Process Clause requires a limit on liability that stops short of the point that may be reached by fact causation analysis, and this accounts for our disagreement with the district court.

In setting out our reasons, it is well to keep in mind that we are not dealing with an allegation of harm from a risk...