Spann v. Roper, 05-2721.

• Decision Date: 13 July 2006
• Docket Number: No. 05-2721.,05-2721.
• Citation: 453 F.3d 1007
• Parties: James L. SPANN, Appellant, v. Sharon ROPER; Lorna Bell, assistant nurse, Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

453 F.3d 1007

James L. SPANN, Appellant, v. Sharon ROPER; Lorna Bell, assistant nurse, Appellees.

No. 05-2721.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

Submitted: July 6, 2006.

Filed: July 13, 2006.

Appellant James L. Spann represented himself pro se.

Counsel who represented the appellees were Peter J. Dunne and Jessica L. Liss of St. Louis, MO.

Before MELLOY, FAGG, and BENTON, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM.

Missouri inmate James Spann appeals the district court's adverse grant of summary judgment in his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 suit alleging deliberate indifference and violation of the Due Process Clause. The following is a summary of the relevant facts in a light most favorable to Spann. See Anderson v. Larson, 327 F.3d 762, 767 (8th Cir.2003) (standard of review). On January 26, 2004, at 7:30 p.m., Nurse Assistant Lorna Bell mistakenly required Spann to take certain psychotropic medication—about seven to ten pills—that had been prescribed for another inmate, even though Spann protested that the pills were not his. Upon realizing her mistake moments later, Bell rushed back to Spann and ordered him to return the pills, which he could not do since he had already swallowed them. Bell did not immediately take Spann for medical attention, however, or tell her supervisors of the incident. Some minutes after taking the medication, Spann felt his legs collapse and the room spin. He pushed the emergency button in his cell, hit his head on the toilet, and fainted. He awoke in pain in another room with a sore throat and dried blood on the back of his head. A doctor told him that he had been lying unconscious in his cell for three hours. Spann complained that he could barely talk or see, and that there was a knot on the back of his head; the doctor told Spann to sleep. The next day, Spann was returned to his cell, even though he was still in pain. Following the incident he suffered from cold sweats, severe headaches, vision problems, and shaking. Sharon Roper headed the prison's medical unit, and her duties included supervising Bell and preparing medication to be dispensed to the inmates.

Spann's medical records show that on January 26, 2004, Spann arrived at the Transitional Care Unit at 10:30 p.m. for observation following ingestion of the wrong medication; the on-call physician ordered overnight observation. On January 27, the doctor saw Spann at 7:30 a.m., diagnosed Spann as having overdosed on mental health medication, and instructed that Spann should be discharged when alert. Later that day, Spann was returned to his housing unit. Over the following months, Spann was seen by medical staff numerous times for reasons related and unrelated to his complaint allegations.

The district court granted defendants' motion for summary judgment. Upon de novo review, see Anderson, 327 F.3d at 767, we affirm in part and reverse in part. We agree with the district court that Nurse Bell did not exhibit deliberate indifference by forcing Spann to take another inmate's medication because it is undisputed that this was a mistake. See Jolly v. Knudsen, 205 F.3d 1094, 1096 (8th Cir.2000) (to succeed on deliberate-indifference claim, plaintiff must show more than negligence or gross negligence); cf. Givens v. Jones, 900 F.2d 1229, 1232 (8th Cir.1990) (physicians need not accept as true medical judgments offered by their patients but must make treatment decisions on basis of many factors, only one of which is patient's input).

However, we believe a jury could conclude that Bell was deliberately indifferent to Spann's serious medical needs when she left him in his cell for three hours after she was aware that he had taken a large dose of mental-health medications prescribed for another inmate. See Roberson v. Bradshaw, 198 F.3d 645, 647 (8th Cir.1999) (to prevail on deliberate-indifference claim plaintiff must show he suffered from serious medical need that defendants knew of but ignored). First, a jury could find that the medical condition Bell created was a serious one that Bell knew of but ignored: Spann lay unconscious in his cell for three hours, and a prison doctor diagnosed Spann as having overdosed on mental-health medication; and further, even a lay person would know that taking a large dose of mental-health medication prescribed for another person is potentially dangerous. See Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 842, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994) (Eighth Amendment claimant need not show prison official acted or failed to act...