Donald v. Cook County Sheriff's Dept., 94-3622

• Decision Date: 06 September 1996
• Docket Number: No. 94-3622,94-3622
• Parties: James T. DONALD, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COOK COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Seventh Circuit

Page 548

95 F.3d 548

35 Fed.R.Serv.3d 1324

James T. DONALD, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COOK COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 94-3622.

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued April 11, 1996.

Decided Sept. 6, 1996.

Robert J. Palmer, May, Oberfell & Lorber, (Maureen Fitzgerald & Ann Marie Niccolai, Law Students, argued), South Bend, IN, for plaintiff-appellant.

Terry L. McDonald, Margaret A. Glass (argued), Office of State's Atty. of Cook County, Fed. Lit. Div., Chicago, IL, for defendant-appellee.

Before BAUER, CUDAHY, and EVANS, Circuit Judges.

CUDAHY, Circuit Judge.

This appeal stems from Donald's attempt to recover damages under § 1983 for a heart attack he sustained while incarcerated in the Cook County Department of Corrections in February of 1991. Donald claims that jail officials took his heart medication away from him over his vehement protests. Two days after he alleges that his medication was confiscated, on February 16, 1991, Donald suffered a massive heart attack. He was hospitalized for thirty days as a result.

Our review of the case does not reach the merits of Donald's § 1983 claim, however. The suit was dismissed by the district court because Donald failed to name the individual officials of the Sheriff's Department as defendants in his complaint, naming, instead, the department itself, which, under Monell v. Dept. of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658, 98 S.Ct. 2018, 56 L.Ed.2d 611 (1978), is not liable when there is no allegation of an official policy or custom underlying the injury. Donald filed a post-judgment motion, which was construed as a Rule 60(b) motion for relief from the judgment and was denied by the district court. Because we find that the denial of the Rule 60(b) motion constituted an abuse of the district court's discretion, we reverse and remand for further proceedings.

I. Background

Donald filed his pro se civil rights complaint on January 27, 1993, relying on the Eighth Amendment prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. He was imprisoned in Dixon Correctional Center at the time and the complaint was filed using a standard form for prisoner complaints. The complaint was filed approximately three weeks before the two-year statute of limitations was to expire and named as defendant only the Cook County Sheriff's Department. In the complaint, Donald stated that he had been arrested on February 13, 1991, and held at police headquarters until February 14, when a bond hearing was held. After the hearing, he was processed into the Cook County Department of Corrections for pretrial detention. In the processing room, Donald alleged in his complaint, he told the officials who were present that it was essential for him to keep his heart medication with him at all times. He stated that he begged the officers to let him keep the medication, but that they told him to shut up and one officer said, "I hope that you got some good insurance." R. 1. As noted, Donald suffered a major heart attack on February 16, 1991.

Along with filing his complaint, Donald moved for appointment of counsel and, when later informed that it was necessary, for leave to proceed in forma pauperis. R. 3. He was granted leave to proceed in forma pauperis on March 26, 1993, but the district court took no action on his motion for appointment of counsel until September 13, 1993. The Sheriff's Department was served with the complaint on April 13, 1993. Despite the requirement that defendants file responsive pleadings within twenty days of service, Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(a), the attorney for the Department did not file an appearance until June 11, 1993. After filing an appearance, the defendant took no further action until ordered to respond to the complaint by the district court.

Nothing further transpired in the case until the district court issued an order on August 10, 1993, setting a status hearing for August 31 and granting the Sheriff's Department until August 30, 1993, to respond to the complaint, on pain of default. On August 23, 1993, Donald filed a document entitled "Supplement to Record of Complaint." R.11. In this document, obviously intended to amend the complaint, Donald added state law claims for breach of fiduciary duty and negligent infliction of emotional distress.

It wasn't until August 31, 1993, however, one day after the deadline, that the Department moved to dismiss the complaint on grounds that the complaint failed to allege an unconstitutional official policy and named no individual defendants against whom other claims might be viable.

On September 9, 1993, Donald mailed to the district court another paper attempting to amend his complaint. This submission, received by the court and filed on September 20, 1993, included another version of the prisoner civil rights suit form, which he entitled "Proposed Supplement to the Record of Complaint." In this document, Donald named as "additional defendants" the Cook County Sheriff, James O'Grady; the "Cook County under Sheriff," James Dvorak; "the doctor on duty during the scheduled assignment time hours of the 11:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. shift, 14th of Feb. 1991;" and "police officers on duty during the scheduled assignment shift hours of 11:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. on the 14th/16th day of Feb. 1991." R. 15. At the same time, Donald submitted a handwritten "Supplement to Record of Complaint" in which he made specific allegations against each of the individual defendants.

On September 13, 1993, as already mentioned, the district court denied Donald's motion for appointment of counsel. The motion was denied "for failure to make a showing that he has made reasonable efforts to retain counsel or was effectively precluded from making such efforts." R. 14. Donald had neglected to fill in a portion of the motion form for appointment of counsel which asked about prior efforts to retain counsel. The motion form did not alert movants to the dispositive importance of their efforts to obtain retained counsel. R. 3. Jackson v. County of McLean, 953 F.2d 1070 (7th Cir.1992).

On September 24, 1993, Donald submitted a second motion for appointment of counsel. This time he listed several attorneys he had contacted in January, 1993, and attached a letter, postmarked January 8, 1993, in which he had requested representation from one of them. This motion was denied on October 15, 1993. The district court stated: "Because this pro se party has the capability to present the case and because we do not believe that the case is unusually complex, we find that the interests of justice will not be served by appointment of counsel at this time." R.19. On December 31, 1993, Donald sent a letter to the district court requesting reconsideration of the denial of appointed counsel, which was in turn denied on August 8, 1994.

On October 19, 1993, Donald filed a response to the motion to dismiss his complaint. In his response, he argued that "the plaintiff[']s 1983 action is not against a local government, municipality or city, thus is not required to demonstrate any such [official] policy." R. 20. He went on to say that "[t]he tortfeasors action[s] of injury are their own individual official policy of the immediate moments of injury to the plaintiff." Finally, he "pointedly notes that his § 1983 action is not against Cook County, thus is not against a local government."

The district court granted the motion to dismiss on January 20, 1994, stating that "Plaintiff has brought this action against the Sheriff's Department and has not alleged any individual capacity violation." R. 23 at 2. The court not only dismissed the complaint, but entered judgment in the case, stating only that "[t]his case is hereby terminated and all other pending motions are deemed moot by this order." Id. at 3. The court never ruled explicitly on Donald's motions to amend his complaint nor gave reasons for dismissing the case with prejudice rather than simply dismissing the complaint.

On February 8, 1994, Donald filed a Motion to Reconsider the dismissal. In this motion, Donald again listed the individual defendants he had named in his September 20, 1993, filing and again stated that he "[was] not tak[ ]ing action against a local government municipality or city."

On August 8, 1994, the district court denied Donald's motion to reconsider. The court noted that, since the motion to reconsider was filed more than ten days after the entry of the judgment, it would be construed as a motion for relief from judgment under Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b) rather than as a motion to alter or amend the judgment under Rule 59(e). The court then, for the first time, addressed Donald's attempt to add the individual defendants. The court stated:

Plaintiff also appears to seek reconsideration on the grounds that his claims against individual defendants were sufficient to survive a motion to dismiss. The court notes, however, that plaintiff did not name any individual defendants in the captions of either the amended or supplemental complaint until after the statute of limitations had run on his claim. Thus, plaintiff could not have proceeded with his claims against the individual defendants even if the court had construed the amended complaint as one seeking to join new defendants to the case. See Worthington v. Wilson, 8 F.3d 1253, 1257 (7th Cir.1993) (amended complaint joining new parties does not relate back under Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(c)).

R.32.

Donald also filed a notice of appeal with respect to the dismissal on March 21, 1994. Because the notice of appeal was filed more than thirty days after entry of judgment without a showing of excusable neglect, we dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction on September 7, 1994.

Finally, on October 7, 1994, Donald submitted a "Motion to Resubmit" the case. Attached to this motion was another form complaint in which Donald listed "John Raba, Dr. and hosp. administrator; John Doe, Doctor; John Doe, officers; James O'Grady, Sheriff; James Dvorak under Sheriff; Cook...