Prisoner Rights and Suicide

Facts of the Case

On January 22, 2000, Officer Paul Simpson of the Ferndale Police Department arrested the decedent, Dark Bradley, on an outstanding bench warrant from Oakland County. As Mr. Bradley was being processed at the Ferndale Police Station, he remarked to Officer Simpson that Simpson should give him his gun so that he (Bradley) could shoot himself. Officer Simpson thought that Mr. Bradley made the remark in jest; however, he reported the remark to his duty command officer, Lieutenant Thomas J. Thomson. Mr. Bradley's jail card was marked with a red sticker indicating the need to apply universal and suicide precautions. Lt. Thomson contacted the Oakland County Sheriff's Department and requested that Mr. Bradley be transferred to the Oakland County Jail that night because of a personnel shortage at Ferndale.

At 8:40 p.m., Mr. Bradley was placed in a cell. Officer Simpson removed Mr. Bradley's personal belongings. He provided Mr. Bradley with two blankets. Dispatcher Jason White performed a cell check at 9:16 p.m. and found Mr. Bradley unconscious with a blanket tied around his neck. Mr. Bradley was eventually pronounced dead of self‐asphyxiation.

Stephanie Bradley, representative of the Bradley estate, filed suit in district court alleging that the defendants (City of Ferndale and several police personnel) acted with deliberate indifference to Mr. Bradley's known suicidal tendencies, in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. Plaintiff further alleged that defendants' actions constituted gross negligence, which was the proximate cause of Dark Bradley's death. The defendants filed motions for summary judgment asserting immunity. The district court denied the motions and the defendants appealed.

Ruling and Reasoning

The Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the decision of the district court denying defendants' motions for summary judgment. To state a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a “plaintiff must allege the violation of a right secured by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, and must show that the alleged deprivation was committed by a person acting under color of state law” (West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 48 (1988)). A government official performing discretionary functions is entitled to qualified immunity (“entitlement not to stand trial or face other burdens of litigation,” Mitchelle v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526 (1985)) in his individual capacity if his conduct does not violate constitutional standards in light of clearly established law at the time of the alleged violation (Barber v. Salem, 953 F.2d 232, 236 (6th Cir. 1992)). If there was a constitutional violation, it must be determined “whether the right was clearly established” (Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201 (2001)) so that a reasonable official in the defendant's position knows that his actions violate that right.

The Sixth Circuit analyzed whether the City of Ferndale and the specific officers named in the suit violated a substantive right of Mr. Bradley, protected under the Fourteenth amendment. The case of Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97 (1976) stated that when prison officials act with deliberate indifference to the serious medical needs of prisoners so that they inflict unnecessary pain or suffering, their actions violate the Eighth Amendment. In Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825 (1994), the Supreme Court adopted a subjective standard for determining whether an official had shown deliberate indifference: “the official must both be aware of the facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of serous harm exists, and he must also draw the inference.” Case law within the Sixth Circuit has established that suicidal tendencies are serious medical needs for the purposes of due process analysis and that failure to take adequate precautions to prevent suicide may constitute deliberate indifference to the decedent's serious medical needs.

The Sixth Circuit determined that the actions of police personnel did not evidence a conscious disregard of Mr. Bradley's suicidal tendencies. According to the appellate court, as the duty command officer, it was Lt. Thomson's responsibility alone to decide whether to remove the blankets from Mr. Bradley's cell and whether to institute 15‐minute checks. Therefore, the appellate court did not find fault with the junior officers. These officers received no orders from Lt. Thomson to remove the blankets or to do 15‐minute checks. With regard to Lt. Thomson, the Sixth Circuit pointed out that Article 7 of the Ferndale Policies and Procedures does not specifically require removal of blankets or 15‐minute checks of suicidal inmates. As further evidence that Lt. Thomson did not show conscious disregard for Mr. Bradley's safety, the appellate court indicated that Lt. Thomson recognized Mr. Bradley's condition and made provisions to expedite Mr. Bradley's transfer to the Oakland County Jail, a facility better equipped to provide for Mr. Bradley's needs. The Sixth Circuit stated that plaintiff did not establish a violation of Bradley's constitutional rights.

Under Michigan law, government employees are not immune from tort liability if the employee's conduct constitutes gross negligence that is the proximate cause of injury or damage. The Sixth Circuit stated that the immediate, efficient, and direct cause of Mr. Bradley's death was not the actions of the defendants, but rather, Mr. Bradley's own act of hanging himself. The Sixth Circuit concluded that the defendants were entitled to qualified immunity.

Dissent

Circuit Judge Damon J. Keith held that Bradley stated a viable claim of deliberate indifference against Officer Simpson and Lt. Thomson. They both knew that Mr. Bradley had made a suicidal statement, yet they had provided him with blankets and did not closely monitor him. Justice Keith also thought that a jury could reasonably conclude that Officer Simpson's and Lt. Thomson's actions were the proximate cause of Mr. Bradley's death. Justice Keith indicated that under the holding of the majority, a detainee's suicide could never be the result of the gross negligence of police officers because, by their definition, every successful suicidal detainee will have died from self‐inflicted acts.

Discussion

According to a 1993 report from the U.S. Department of Justice (NCJ‐143284), suicide is the most common cause of death of inmates. The rate of suicide is higher in lock‐ups (local confinement facilities) than it is in jails or prison settings. Detainees in lock‐ups have a high rate of substance intoxication and withdrawal. Over half of suicides in lock‐ups occur within the first 24 hours. Hanging is the most common method of suicide in all correctional settings.

The Sixth Circuit stated that the right at issue in this case is the detainee's right to reasonable protection against taking his own life if that detainee has demonstrated a strong likelihood that he will commit suicide. The appellate court was also clear that there is no general right of pretrial detainees to be correctly screened for suicidality or to be protected against committing suicide. Whether the defendants in Bradley acted with deliberate indifference to the serious medical needs of Mr. Bradley is a mixed question of fact and law, which the Sixth Circuit reviewed de novo.

This decision of the Sixth Circuit applies the reasoning of the Supreme Court's Farmer v. Brennan decision to a mental health case. Farmer dealt with a postconviction, transsexual inmate housed in the general prison population. In that case, the mens rea for “deliberate indifference” was analyzed with regard to Dee Farmer's Eighth Amendment rights. The Court concluded that a prison official would be liable under the Eighth Amendment for acting with deliberate indifference to inmate safety only if the official actually knew (subjective standard) that the inmate faced a substantial risk of serious harm and then disregarded that risk. As in Farmer, the Bradley appellate court used a subjective standard to determine whether the City of Ferndale and the police officer defendants showed conscious disregard for a substantial risk of serious harm. Unlike Farmer, Bradley focused on the Fourteenth Amendment rights of a pretrial, suicidal detainee.