Montez v. Hickenlooper
| Decision Date | 10 May 2011 |
| Docket Number | No. 08–1399.,08–1399. |
| Citation | 640 F.3d 1126 |
| Parties | Jesse F. MONTEZ, Plaintiff,v.John HICKENLOOPER; Frank Gunter, Former Executive Director of the Colorado Department of Corrections; Ben Johnson, Former Warden of Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility; Cheryl Smith, Medical Administrator at CTCF; Ari Zavaras, Executive Director of Colorado Department of Corrections; Bob Furlong, Warden of Limon Correctional Facility; Colorado Department of Corrections; Bill Price, Warden of the Arkansas Valley Correctional Center; R. Mark McDuff, Warden of the Arrowhead Correctional Center, the Four Mile Correctional Facility, the Skyline Correctional Center, and the Pre–Release Correctional Center; Gary Neet, Warden of the Buena Vista Correctional Facility; Warren Diesslin, Former Warden of the Buena Vista Correctional Facility; Frank Miller, Warden of the Centennial Correctional Facility; Donice Neal, Warden of the Colorado State Penitentiary; Mark Williams, Warden of the Colorado Women's Facility; Mark McKinna, Warden of the Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility; J. Frank Rice, Dr. Warden of the Denver Reception and Diagnostic Center; Larry Embry, Warden of the Fremont Correctional Facility; Tom Cooper, Former Warden of the Fremont Correctional Facility; Bill Boggs, Warden of the Rifle Correctional Facility; Bill Bokros, Warden of the Pueblo Minimum Center; David Holt, Medical Administrator at the Arrowhead Correctional Facility, the Centennial Correctional Facility, the Colorado State Penitentiary, the Fremont Correctional Facility, and the Skyline Correctional Facility; Jean Moltz, Medical Administrator at the Buena Vista Correctional Facility and the Rifle Correctional Facility; Ron Johnson, Medical Administrator at the Denver Reception and Diagnostic Center; Don Lawson, Clinical Administration Director at the Limon Correctional Facility and the Arkansas Valley Correctional Facility; Bob Moore, who supervises the medical department at the Pueblo Minimum Center, and John Doe(s), Current and former Wardens of any Correctional facility maintained, operated or controlled by the Colorado Department of Corrections, and John Roe(s); Ronald G. Pierce; Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility; Brad Rockwill; Annette Porter; Denver Reception & Diagnostic Center; Sgt. R. Murphy; Glenntte [sic] Smith; Becky Rhomona; Jim Weber; Nard Claar; Bill Reed; Fremont Correctional Facility, Defendants–Appellees.Larry Gordon, Claimant–Appellant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Tenth Circuit |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Eric V. Hall of Rothgerber Johnson & Lyons LLP, Colorado Springs, CO, for Claimant–Appellant.James X. Quinn, Assistant Attorney General (John W. Suthers, Attorney General; Berina Ibrisagic and Chris W. Alber, Assistant Attorneys General, with him on the briefs), Civil Litigation and Employment Law Section, Denver, CO, for Defendants–Appellees.*Before KELLY, McKAY, and MATHESON, Circuit Judges.McKAY, Circuit Judge.
This case raises several issues relating to our appellate jurisdiction. In particular, we are called upon to decide whether we have jurisdiction over an appeal from the district court's review of a claim for damages filed by an individual claimant pursuant to the dispute-resolution mechanism established in a class action consent decree.
In the early 1990s, Colorado state prisoners initiated a class action lawsuit alleging that state officials were committing ongoing violations of disabled prisoners' rights under the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Rehabilitation Act, and 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In 2003, the parties entered into a consent decree, called a “Remedial Plan,” setting forth the actions Defendants would take to bring the state prison system into compliance with the applicable statutes and establishing a procedure through which individual inmates could bring damage claims for injuries incurred. Specifically, the consent decree provided that the damage claims of individual class members would be determined by a special master, subject to abuse-of-discretion review by the district court. The consent decree was silent as to the possibility of further review by this court. Although class counsel's involvement was required for compliance issues relating to the prison system as a whole, the consent decree explained that “[c]lass counsel does not have an obligation to represent any individual with respect to their individual damage claim.” (Appellant's App. to Supplemental Br. at 79.)
Pursuant to the dispute-resolution mechanism established in the consent decree, Claimant Larry Gordon filed an individual claim for damages. After reviewing the evidence, the special master denied Mr. Gordon's claim, concluding that he did not suffer from a covered disability as defined by the consent decree and, moreover, that there was no evidence Mr. Gordon was discriminated against based upon his claimed disabilities. The district court affirmed this ruling and held that Mr. Gordon's complaints regarding the quality of his medical care needed to be “addressed through a separate individual action, and not as a part of the remedial plan in this case.” ( Id. at 130.)
Mr. Gordon then filed an appeal to this court. In response, Defendants filed a jurisdictional memorandum brief and motion to dismiss, arguing, inter alia, that the consent decree did not authorize the district court's rulings on individual damage claims to be appealed to this court. Because this issue had been raised and remanded in a related appeal brought by a different individual claimant in the underlying class action litigation, see Montanez v. Owens, 307 Fed.Appx. 160, 163–64 (10th Cir.2009), the panel abated Mr. Gordon's appeal pending resolution of that remand order.
In the earlier appeal, the panel reasoned that remand was appropriate “in deference to the terms of the parties' own agreement.” Id. at 163. Specifically, the panel noted that the consent decree provided a process under which a disagreement concerning the proper interpretation of the Remedial Plan would first be subjected to a good-faith attempt by the representatives of each party to resolve the disagreement and, if unsuccessful, thereafter submitted to the district court for resolution. The panel reasoned that because the appeal authorization issue involved a disagreement concerning the proper interpretation of the Remedial Plan, the contractually agreed-upon process should be followed in the first instance before this court took up the matter. The panel also suggested, without deciding, the involvement of class counsel might be necessary in this process, “as ‘individual prisoners lack standing to individually litigate matters relating to a class action.’ ” Id. at 164 (brackets omitted) (quoting McNeil v. Guthrie, 945 F.2d 1163, 1166 (10th Cir.1991)).
On remand, the parties could not resolve their disagreement concerning the interpretation of the Remedial Plan, and the matter was submitted to the district court for consideration. The district court then ruled that its orders on appeal from the special master's decisions “were intended under the operative consent decree to be FINAL decisions [that] ARE NOT APPEALABLE to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals.” (Appellant's App. at 299.) This court subsequently lifted the abatement of Mr. Gordon's appeal and appointed counsel to represent him on issues relating to appellate jurisdiction. Having received supplemental briefing and heard arguments from the parties, we are now prepared to rule on the matter.
We first consider Defendants' argument that Mr. Gordon's appeal is unequivocally barred by the district court's ruling on appealability, which this court cannot review as a matter of law because it was not appealed by class counsel. We are not persuaded by this argument. The consent decree makes clear that class counsel's involvement is not necessary with respect to individual claimants' damage claims. This contractual provision is in accordance with our precedent, which explains that “class members may bring individual actions when they seek money damages,” McNeil, 945 F.2d at 1166 n. 4, despite the rule that “individual prisoners lack standing to individually litigate matters relating to the class action,” id. at 1166. Although we suggested in our earlier remand order that the involvement of class counsel might be necessary to resolve the dispute regarding the proper interpretation of the consent decree, we did not definitively decide this question. Moreover, even if class counsel's participation might be deemed necessary in the contractually agreed-upon process for resolving disputes in interpretation, it does not thereby follow that class counsel's involvement is necessary for us to determine whether we have appellate jurisdiction over an individual claimant's appeal from an order affecting only his own right to individual damages. Although as a matter of stare decisis our ruling on the matter may affect Defendants' ability to rely on the consent decree to argue against appellate jurisdiction in other individual claimants' appeals, this does not change the fact that Mr. Gordon is appealing only the resolution of his own individual claim for damages. Under these circumstances, we are not persuaded that class counsel's involvement is necessary for us to consider whether an appeal may be had under the terms of the consent decree. Nor are we persuaded that Mr. Gordon was required to separately file an appeal from the district court's ruling on a legal issue that was remanded for consideration by the district court in the first instance while Mr. Gordon's appeal on the merits was properly filed and pending before this court.
Having held that we may properly consider the question of our appellate jurisdiction over the appeal, we now turn to the question of the appropriate standard of review for this question. Defendants argue the district court's ruling on appealability under the consent decree was premised on factual findings that we...
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