Jenson v. Lane County

• Decision Date: 09 March 2000
• Docket Number: No. 98-35866,98-35866
• Citation: 222 F.3d 570
• Parties: (9th Cir. 2000) JERRY RICHARD JENSEN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. LANE COUNTY; RICHARD SHERMAN, individually and in his official capacity; PEACEHEALTH, a non-profit corporation of the State of Washington; SACRED HEARTGENERAL HOSPITAL; DOUGLAS PUTSCHLER, Defendants, and JEFFREY M. ROBBINS, M.D., Defendant-Appellee. Office of the Circuit Executive
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

Page 570

222 F.3d 570 (9th Cir. 2000)

JERRY RICHARD JENSEN, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. LANE COUNTY; RICHARD SHERMAN, individually and in his official capacity; PEACEHEALTH, a non-profit corporation of the State of Washington; SACRED HEARTGENERAL HOSPITAL; DOUGLAS PUTSCHLER, Defendants and JEFFREY M. ROBBINS, M.D., Defendant-Appellee.

No. 98-35866

Office of the Circuit Executive

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit

Argued and Submitted March 9, 2000--Portland, Oregon

Filed August 23, 2000

[Copyrighted Material Omitted]

Susan R. Pease, Harrison & Pease, Eugene, Oregon, for the plaintiff-appellant.

Ruth Casby Rocker, Hoffman, Hart & Wagner, Portland, Oregon, for the defendant-appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Oregon, Michael R. Hogan, Chief Judge, Presiding; D.C. No. CV 96-06101-JPC

Before: Alfred T. Goodwin, Susan P. Graber, and Raymond C. Fisher, Circuit Judges.

GOODWIN, Circuit Judge:

Jerry Richard Jensen filed an action for damages pursuant to 42 U.S.C. S 1983 for unlawful arrest and restraint against Lane County, certain officials, a hospital, and a private medical practitioner, Jeffrey M. Robbins, M.D. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of Dr. Robbins, and the other defendants went to trial, where the jury found in their favor. The only issue on this appeal is whether Dr. Robbins was entitled to summary judgment.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

The magistrate judge to whom the motion for summary judgment was assigned based his recommendation on two alternative grounds. First, he concluded that the doctor's conduct in signing a commitment order did not constitute "state action." For reasons that will be developed below, that was incorrect. In the alternative, the magistrate judge concluded that, if Dr. Robbins' conduct was state action, Dr. Robbins was entitled to qualified immunity. The district court adopted the magistrate judge's recommendation and later denied Jensen's motion to reconsider.

FACTUAL HISTORY

Shortly before midnight April 15, 1995, Jensen was arrested for "menacing with a firearm" after he pointed a gun out of his car window at a pedestrian. Officers apprehended Jensen and deemed it necessary for their safety to handcuff him. The officers found a loaded automatic handgun and an open can of beer in the vehicle. Jensen was uncooperative, smelled of alcohol, and had an unsteady gait. Jensen told the officers he was taking various medications for conditions including depression. Jensen was booked at the Lane County adult corrections facility ("LCAC").

On April 17, two days after the arrest, Richard Sherman, a senior mental health specialist employed by Lane County, received information from the jail that Jensen's work supervisor, Putschler, who was also a county employee, had called to report serious concerns about Jensen's recent behavior, which included: bringing a gun to work, commenting empathetically about "post-office" shootings by disgruntled employees, and drinking alcohol. Putschler reported that co-workers had felt threatened by these actions. Putschler's report resulted in his being named as one of the defendants who was later exonerated by the jury.

Sherman reviewed Jensen's arrest documents and other jail information and met with Jensen. After this meeting, and in light of the information previously obtained, Sherman concluded that probable cause existed to believe that Jensen was a danger to himself or others because of depression, paranoia, and alcoholism. Pursuant to his belief that he had a statutory duty to do so, Sherman brought the Jensen case to the attention of Dr. Robbins, a contract psychiatrist affiliated with a private group called Psychiatric Associates ("PA"), and consulted with Dr. Ekanger, a senior mental health specialist employed by Lane County. Sherman recommended that Jensen be held at Lane County Psychiatric Hospital ("LCPH") for evaluation.

LCPH is a county facility that has a contract with private Sacred Heart General Hospital ("SHGH") under which the hospital provides administration and hospital staff to the county. On April 17, relying on police reports and the information obtained from Sherman, but without personally examining Jensen, Dr. Robbins signed the order detaining Jensen for evaluation pursuant to Oregon Revised Statute 426.232.

On April 18, 1995, Dr. Robbins took a history and performed a physical examination of Jensen. Dr. Robbins' notes from that day indicate a diagnosis of "Major depression in remission with Zoloft," alcoholism, and a "probable paranoid personality disorder." Jensen did not cooperate in the examination, so Dr. Robbins again relied heavily on police reports and information obtained from Sherman in deciding to continue Jensen's detention pursuant to Or. Rev. Stat.S 426.232, which permits temporary mental health detention for a period not to exceed five judicial days. Thereafter, Dr. Robbins saw Jensen briefly on each of the next three days.

While Jensen was at LCPH, Dr. Ekanger conducted an investigation to determine whether to pursue statutory involuntary commitment proceedings before the court. Dr. Ekanger concluded that there was insufficient evidence to proceed. Dr. Robbins agreed that Jensen was no longer mentally ill and should be released. Dr. Robbins' notes state: "No evidence of mental illness seen during stay here. No dx made. MMPI [a psychological test] not yet available. D/C [discharge] to LCAC [the jail]."

Jensen was released from LCPH on April 21, 1995 (the fifth day of his detention for evaluation). Dr. Robbins told Jensen at that time that he (Dr. Robbins) had been prepared 000to release Jensen "a couple of days ago."

Jensen then filed this action pursuant to S 1983 alleging that Dr. Robbins and the other named defendants had violated his constitutional rights by ordering him admitted to LCPH without due process of law. Jensen also asserted, remembering Dr. Robbins' comment at the time of his release, that the defendants violated his rights by continuing his involuntary detention beyond the reasonable time when the defendants, including Dr. Robbins, could no longer have had probable cause to detain him. Because Dr. Robins had been removed as a defendant by the summary judgment, the questions that went to the jury trying the claims against the other defendants were not reached with respect to Dr. Robbins. However, the jury in its special verdict found that there was probable cause to believe that Jensen was a danger to himself or others during the entire time that he was held at LCPH, but that there was not probable cause to believe that he was mentally ill for the entire time. The overall verdict was nonetheless rendered in favor of all defendants (except Dr. Robbins) after the jury had been properly instructed. Jensen now wants a jury to scrutinize Dr. Robbins' role in his detention.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

This court reviews a summary judgment as a question of law (de novo). See Smith v. Hughes Aircraft Co. , 22 F.3d 1432, 1435 (9th Cir. 1993). Summary judgment may be affirmed on any ground supported in the record, including reasons not relied upon by the district court. See Oregon Short Line R.R. Co. v. Department of Revenue, 139 F.3d 1259, 1265 (9th Cir. 1998).

STATE ACTION

Section 1983 of Title 42 provides:

Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State . . . subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured . . . .

Jensen alleges that his involuntary commitment constitutes a violation of his rights under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. Because S1983 and the Fourteenth Amendment are directed at the states, the statute supports a claim only when the alleged injury is caused by "state action" and not by a merely private actor, against whom tort remedies may be sought in state court. The Supreme Court has warned that "[c]areful adherence to the `state action' requirement preserves an area of individual freedom by limiting the reach of federal law and federal judicial power." Lugar v. Edmondson Oil Co., 457 U.S. 922, 936 (1982). The "color of law" requirement of S1983 is treated as the equivalent of the "state action" requirement under the Constitution. See RendellBaker v. Kohn, 457 U.S. 830, 838 (1982); West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 49 (1988).

Therefore, in order to prevail under S 1983, a plaintiff "must show (1) that Defendants deprived [him or] her of a right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States and (2) that, in doing so, Defendants acted under color of state law." Okunieff v. Rosenberg, 996 F. Supp. 343, 348 (S.D.N.Y. 1998) (citing Flagg Bros., Inc. v. Brooks, 436 U.S. 149, 15657 (1978)), aff'd per curiam on same reasoning , 166 F.3d 507 (2d Cir. 1999); see also Fred Meyer, Inc. v. Casey, 67 F.3d 1412, 1413 (9th Cir. 1995). It is established that involuntary confinement or civil commitment is a significant deprivation of liberty that requires due process protections. See Addington v. Texas, 441 U.S. 418, 425 (1979).

The district court, as noted, did not believe that Dr. Robbins' conduct constituted "state action" and therefore excluded him as a defendant within the scope ofS1983. This court has not had occasion to rule on whether contract services provided by licensed private physicians to municipal governments in the detention and examination of persons brought into treatment facilities by police officers as possible mental patients constitutes state action within the meaning of S 1983. On the facts of this case, we hold that Dr. Robbins was a "state actor" for the purposes of being a defendant in a S1983 action.

Courts have developed various tests for determining whether an individual's actions are "state action." See Sutton v. Providence St....