Wayne v. Jarvis

• Decision Date: 08 December 1999
• Docket Number: No. 97-9152,97-9152
• Citation: 197 F.3d 1098
• Parties: (11th Cir. 1999) Frank WAYNE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Pat JARVIS, Sheriff, DeKalb County Sheriff Department, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 1098

197 F.3d 1098 (11th Cir. 1999)

Frank WAYNE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Pat JARVIS, Sheriff, DeKalb County Sheriff Department, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 97-9152.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

Dec. 8, 1999.

[Copyrighted Material Omitted] Appeal from the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia. (No. 1:95-CV-1323-ODE), Orinda D. Evans, Judge.

Before CARNES, Circuit Judge, HILL, Senior Circuit Judge, and HOEVELER^* Senior District Judge.

CARNES, Circuit Judge:

After being beaten by his fellow inmates at the DeKalb County Jail, Frank Wayne filed suit against: DeKalb County Sheriff Pat Jarvis in both his individual and official capacities; the DeKalb County Sheriff's Department (the "Sheriff's Department"); and seven "John Doe" deputy sheriffs in both their individual and official capacities. Pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983, Wayne alleged violations of his Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights, as well as state law violations.

By the time Wayne discovered the identity of the deputy sheriffs he wanted to sue, the statute of limitations had run. The district court granted Wayne's motion to amend his complaint to add those deputies' names in place of the "John Doe" defendants, but thereafter granted the named deputies' motion to dismiss on statute of limitations grounds. Wayne contends that ruling was error, a contention that raises issues involving the use of "John Doe" defendants to stave off the statute of limitations and also involving the relation back doctrine of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c).

The district court also entered summary judgment for the Sheriff's Department and the Sheriff in his official capacity based upon its conclusion that Wayne had failed to bring forward sufficient evidence to create a genuine issue of material fact concerning his theory of liability that there was a custom or practice of housing professed homosexual, bisexual, HIV-positive, and AIDS-positive inmates in the same dormitory regardless of their violent propensities.¹ Wayne contends that he proffered sufficient evidence to survive summary judgment on this issue.

Finally, the district court denied Wayne's motion for leave of court to depose the classification officer who completed the form which resulted in Wayne being placed in the dormitory in question. Wayne contends that the testimony of that officer might have helped him establish the existence of a custom or policy.

For reasons we will discuss, we affirm all three of the district court's challenged rulings.

I. BACKGROUND

A. FACTS

Wayne was incarcerated at the DeKalb County Jail in 1993. While he was in a holding cell awaiting his housing assignment, another inmate told him that he would be placed in Dormitory E-2-A ("E-2-A"), a medium-security dorm, if he said he was homosexual. On May 19, 1993, Officer L.J. Roscoe, a classification officer, interviewed Wayne to determine his housing assignment. Desiring to be placed in the E-2-A dorm, Wayne told Officer Roscoe (falsely, he now says) that he was bisexual, and Officer Roscoe indicated on the inmate classification form that Wayne required special housing "due to sexual preference." Wayne was placed in E- 2-A, where he wanted to be.

On June 8, 1993, Wayne was attacked by Corey Baker while both were housed in E-2- A. Wayne was taken to the staff nurse, who found no injuries, and was returned to E-2-A. Upon his return, Wayne was attacked by four other inmates, including Nick Tanner and Thomas Loyal but not including Corey Baker. Eventually, seven deputy sheriffs arrived to break up the fight and defuse the situation by removing Wayne from E-2-A. When the deputy sheriffs led Wayne back into E-2-A to identify his attackers, Loyal began beating on Wayne again; the deputy sheriffs eventually regained control of the situation. Wayne alleges that these attacks caused continuing back and neck pain, limited his ability to work and function physically, and resulted in mental and emotional trauma.

B. PROCEDURAL HISTORY

On May 23, 1995, Wayne filed a pro se complaint against Sheriff Pat Jarvis in both his individual and official capacities, the DeKalb County Sheriff's Department, and "Seven Unknown Deputy Sheriffs"² in both their individual and official capacities, alleging that they had violated his Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. 1983, and that they had violated state law. Because the assaults took place on June 8, 1993, the two-year statute of limitations for this 1983 claim expired on June 8, 1995. See Williams v. City of Atlanta, 794 F.2d 624, 626 (11th Cir.1986) (two-year statute of limitations for 1983 actions originating in Georgia). Wayne moved to proceed in forma pauperis, which delayed service of process on the specifically identified defendants-Sheriff Jarvis and the Sheriff's Department-until July 6, 1995. Wayne did not serve process on the unidentified deputy sheriffs at the same time because he did not know their identities.

On August 8, 1995, Sheriff Jarvis timely filed his answer to Wayne's first set of mandatory interrogatories, and that answer identified eight individual deputies as potential witnesses: Ricky L. Long, Shanton Benjamin Hines, Charlton L. Bivins, Darryl L. Tutt, Timothy F. Melton, William Winston, Jr., Kenneth Demetrius Allen, and Darren W. Benedict. On September 5, 1995, Wayne moved to amend his complaint by adding those eight specific deputies as parties in place of the seven "John Doe" deputy sheriffs referred to in the original complaint. On October 27, 1995, the district court granted that motion. By December 8, 1995, Wayne had served all eight of the individual deputy sheriffs with the amended complaint.

All of the defendants moved for summary judgment. On April 12, 1996, the district court denied summary judgment for the deputy sheriff defendants on Wayne's 1983 claim that they failed to protect him from injury in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. In addition, the court denied the deputy sheriffs' claim that they were entitled to qualified immunity on Wayne's 1983 claims against them in their individual capacities. The court did grant summary judgment for all of the defendants on Wayne's claims of: (1) inadequate medical treatment; (2) failure to maintain an adequate racial balance in the prison; and (3) violations of state law.³

On June 14, 1996, the individual deputy sheriff defendants moved to dismiss all of Wayne's remaining claims against them because he had failed to serve them with the complaint or amended complaint before the statute of limitations ran. On December 17, 1996, the district court granted their motion to dismiss.

The remaining defendants-Sheriff Jarvis in both his individual and official capacities and the Sheriff's Department-then filed their second motion for summary judgment. Before the district court ruled on that motion, Wayne filed a motion for leave of court to depose Officer L.J. Roscoe, arguing that Roscoe, who had completed Wayne's Inmate Classification Screening Form, could testify about inmate classification policies and procedures. On September 16, 1997, the district court granted summary judgment in favor of the Sheriff's Department and Sheriff Jarvis in his official capacity on Wayne's 1983 claim, ruling that Wayne "ha[d] not presented sufficient evidence to establish that Defendants employed a practice or custom of housing professed homosexual, bisexual, and HIV and AIDS positive inmates in dormitory E-2-A regardless of the violent propensities of such inmates." The district court also denied Wayne's motion for leave to depose Officer Roscoe.⁴

II. DISCUSSION

Wayne puts forward three main contentions in this appeal. First, he contends that the district court erred in granting the deputy sheriffs' motion to dismiss, because under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c) his amended complaint should be held to relate back to his original complaint, which had been filed within the statute of limitations. Second, Wayne contends that the district court erred in granting summary judgment in favor of Sheriff Jarvis in his official capacity and in favor of the Sheriff's Department, because he raised a genuine issue of material fact as to whether they had a practice or custom of housing professed homosexual, bisexual, HIV-positive, and AIDS-positive inmates in the same dormitory regardless of their propensity for violence. Third, Wayne contends that the district court erred in denying him leave to depose Officer Roscoe on the custom or policy issue before it ruled on the summary judgment motion. We address each contention in turn.

A. DID THE DISTRICT COURT ERR IN GRANTING THE MOTION TO DISMISS FILED BY THE DEPUTY SHERIFFS?

The district court dismissed Wayne's claims against the individual deputy sheriffs because it concluded that his amended complaint, which he filed after the statute of limitations had expired, did not relate back to his original complaint under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15(c). We review the district court's application of Rule 15(c) for an abuse of discretion. See Andrews v. Lakeshore Rehabilitation Hosp., 140 F.3d 1405, 1409 n. 6 (11th Cir.1998). We find none here.

More than three months after filing his initial complaint, and almost three months after the expiration of the statute of limitations, Wayne filed a motion to amend his initial complaint by replacing the seven "John Doe" deputy sheriffs with the eight specifically-named deputy sheriffs. We agree with the district court's conclusion that Wayne's amendment to replace the "John Does" with specifically-named defendants constitutes a change in the parties sued. See Barrow v. Wethersfield Police Dep't, 66 F.3d 466, 468 (2d Cir.1995) ("We have stated that it is familiar law that 'John Doe' pleadings cannot be used to circumvent statutes of limitations because replacing a 'John Doe' with a named party in effect constitutes a change in the party sued.") (...