Ortega v. Reyes, et al.,
Filing
77
ORDER DENYING MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT signed by District Judge Susan Oki Mollway on 8/25/11. (Kaminski, H)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA
)
)
Plaintiff,
)
)
vs.
)
)
)
CSP-SACRAMENTO PRISON
OFFICIALS HUTCHINGS AND
)
WILLIAMSON,
)
)
)
Defendants.
____________________________ )
LAZARUS ORTEGA,
2: 08-CV-00588 SOM
ORDER DENYING MOTION FOR
SUMMARY JUDGMENT
ORDER DENYING MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT
I.
INTRODUCTION.
Plaintiff Lazarus Ortega is a prisoner proceeding pro
se.
On June 6, 2008, Ortega filed the First Amended Complaint in
this matter, asserting that various prison officials had violated
his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual
punishment.
Ortega asserts that Defendants failed to respond to
his multiple requests to be assigned to a different cell because
Ortega considered his cellmate to be dangerous.
Ortega seeks to
hold Defendants liable under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for the assault
that he subsequently suffered at the hands of his cellmate.
On February 22, 2011, Ortega stipulated to the
dismissal with prejudice of Defendants Reyes and Walker.
No. 50.
See ECF
At a telephone hearing on July 25, 2011, Ortega
dismissed with prejudice Defendants Costa and Deason.
At that
same hearing, the court clarified with Ortega that he is only
proceeding with claims against Defendants Hutchings and
Williamson.
At the July 25, 2011, telephone hearing, the court
discussed the scheduling of the present motion, telling Ortega
that any written opposition to the motion for summary judgment
was due on August 9, 2011, but that Ortega could oppose the
motion orally if he was unable to submit a timely opposition.
No
written opposition has been filed.
II.
STANDARD.
Summary judgment shall be granted when “the pleadings,
the discovery and disclosure materials on file, and any
affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as to any material
fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of
law.”
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56©.
One of the principal purposes of
summary judgment is to identify and dispose of factually
unsupported claims and defenses.
U.S. 317, 323-24 (1986).
Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477
Accordingly, “[o]nly admissible
evidence may be considered in deciding a motion for summary
judgment.”
Miller v. Glenn Miller Prods., Inc., 454 F.3d 975,
988 (9th Cir. 2006).
Summary judgment must be granted against a
party that fails to demonstrate facts to establish what will be
an essential element at trial.
See Celotex, 477 U.S. at 323.
A
moving party has both the initial burden of production and the
ultimate burden of persuasion on a motion for summary judgment.
Nissan Fire & Marine Ins. Co. v. Fritz Cos., 210 F.3d 1099, 1102
2
(9th Cir. 2000).
The burden initially falls on the moving party
to identify for the court “those portions of the materials on
file that it believes demonstrate the absence of any genuine
issue of material fact.”
T.W. Elec. Serv., Inc. v. Pac. Elec.
Contractors Ass’n, 809 F.2d 626, 630 (9th Cir. 1987) (citing
Celotex Corp., 477 U.S. at 323); accord Miller, 454 F.3d at 987.
“A fact is material if it could affect the outcome of the suit
under the governing substantive law.”
Miller, 454 F.3d at 987.
When the moving party fails to carry its initial burden
of production, “the nonmoving party has no obligation to produce
anything.”
In such a case, the nonmoving party may defeat the
motion for summary judgment without producing anything.
Fire, 210 F.3d at 1102-03.
Nissan
On the other hand, when the moving
party meets its initial burden on a summary judgment motion, the
“burden then shifts to the nonmoving party to establish, beyond
the pleadings, that there is a genuine issue for trial.”
454 F.3d at 987.
Miller,
This means that the nonmoving party “must do
more than simply show that there is some metaphysical doubt as to
the material facts.”
Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio
Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 586 (1986) (footnote omitted).
The
nonmoving party may not rely on the mere allegations in the
pleadings and instead “must set forth specific facts showing that
there is a genuine issue for trial.”
Porter v. Cal. Dep’t of
Corr., 419 F.3d 885, 891 (9th Cir. 2005) (quoting Anderson v.
Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 256 (1986)).
3
“A genuine
dispute arises if the evidence is such that a reasonable jury
could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.”
California v.
Campbell, 319 F.3d 1161, 1166 (9th Cir. 2003); Addisu v. Fred
Meyer, Inc., 198 F.3d 1130, 1134 (9th Cir. 2000) (“There must be
enough doubt for a ‘reasonable trier of fact’ to find for
plaintiffs in order to defeat the summary judgment motion.”).
On a summary judgment motion, “the nonmoving party’s
evidence is to be believed, and all justifiable inferences are to
be drawn in that party’s favor.”
Miller, 454 F.3d at 988
(quotations and brackets omitted).
III.
BACKGROUND FACTS.
A.
Allegations in First Amended Complaint.
In relevant part, the First Amended Complaint alleges
that California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation
(“CDCR”) officials Hutchings and Williamson were deliberately
indifferent to Ortega’s safety when they failed to respond to
Ortega’s multiple requests to change cells, which Ortega says
flowed from his cellmate’s threats to harm and/or kill him.
See
(Verified) First Amended Complaint, Preliminary Statement, ECF
No. 7.
Ortega says that, on or about November 8, 2006, he
asked CDCR correctional officer Hutchings to move him to a new
cell because his cellmate had threatened him.
According to
Ortega, Hutchings responded that there were no vacant cells that
Ortega could be moved to.
Ortega alleges that he informed
4
Hutchings that cell #232 was vacant, but that Hutchings responded
that cell #232 was out of order because of a plumbing problem.
Ortega says he was willing to move into the cell with the
plumbing problem “just to get away from the imminent threat made
by Williams.”
See (Verified) First Amended Complaint ¶ 15.
Hutchings allegedly then told Ortega that a cell change was not
going to happen and that Ortega would just have to wait for a
cell to open up.
See id. ¶¶ 14-16.
Defendant in his individual capacity.
Hutchings is named as a
Id. ¶ 4.
Ortega alleges that the following day, November 9,
2006, he once again asked Hutchings for a cell change out of
concern for his safety.
act.
Ortega alleges that Hutchings refused to
See (Verified) First Amended Complaint ¶ 18.
Ortega alleges that, a little later that day, he orally
complained to Deason and Hutchings’s supervisor, CDCR Lieutenant
Williamson, that safety concerns made a cell change imperative
telling Williamson that “he was in fear for his safety and his
life.”
See (Verified) First Amended Complaint ¶ 20.
Ortega says
that he told Williamson that he had tried to get Hutchings and
others to move his cell, but that none of them had acted.
alleges that Williamson also did nothing.
Ortega
See id. ¶¶ 19-21.
Williamson is named as a Defendant in his individual capacity.
Id. ¶ 6.
According to Ortega, when he returned to his cell that
day, his cellmate “slammed” a 13-inch television set into his
5
head, knocking him unconscious.
Complaint ¶ 23.
See (Verified) First Amended
Ortega says that he was taken to the emergency
room at the University of California Davis Hospital and was
treated for severe head, neck, spine, and nerve damage, as well
as breathing problems.
B.
Id. ¶ 24.
Facts Submitted With the Motion.
Attached to the motion were Ortega’s deposition
transcript and declarations by both Hutchings and Williamson.
Notwithstanding the allegation in the First Amended
Complaint concerning an “imminent threat made by Williamson,” see
(Verified) First Amended Complaint ¶ 15, Ortega testified in his
deposition that, before the assault, his cellmate, Williams, had
not expressly threatened him.
Ortega said that they “were just
not getting along, and the vibe was really bad and it was high
tense.”
See Deposition of Lazarus Ortega at 17, Feb. 18, 2011,
ECF No. 65-4.
Taking into account Ortega’s status as a pro se
party, the court does not construe Ortega’s deposition testimony
as an attempt to retract the prior verified statement in his
pleading.
The reference in the First Amended Complaint to an
“imminent threat” may have been intended to suggest that the
making of a threat appeared imminent (even if no threat had
actually been made), not that a threat of imminent harm had been
voiced.
In any event, the deposition testimony is more favorable
to Defendants than a reading of the First Amended Complaint as
6
suggesting that an actual threat was made before the attack
occurred.
Ortega testified that, on November 8, 2006, he asked
Hutchings to move his cell, telling Hutchings that Ortega and
Williams “were having serious discrepancies and, you know, I
didn’t feel safe and I wanted to move up out of the cell ASAP.”
Id. at 15, 20.
Ortega testified that he did not tell Hutchings
that Williams had threatened him, only that he “didn’t feel safe
with him.”
Id. at 21.
Ortega testified that Hutchings told him
that he was not going to be able to move his cell.
Id. at 22.
In his deposition, Ortega testified that the following
day he asked Hutchings to move him into an open cell that Ortega
knew about, noting that his arguments with Williams “were
increasingly getting frequent and we really needed to be moved
immediately before it escalated into a physical altercation.”
Id. at 31.
Ortega says that Hutchings told him that Hutchings
knew of the open cell, but that it had some sort of plumbing
problem that made a move impracticable.
Id. at 32-33.
Hutchings confirms that, on November 9, 2006, Ortega
asked to move to Cell 232, an open cell.
See Declaration of
Officer R. Hutchings ¶ 2, June 13, 2011, ECF No. 65-6.
Hutchings
says that he told Ortega that that cell was unavailable because
it needed plumbing repairs.
Id.
Hutchings says that he told
Ortega to look at the “Picture Board” to see if there were any
other inmates Ortega wanted to room with.
7
Hutchings says that
Ortega looked at the “Picture Board” and then told Hutchings that
Ortega did not see anyone he wanted to room with and that he
“chose to stay with his current cellmate, Williams.”
Id. ¶ 3.
Hutchings denies having been told by Ortega that Ortega and
Williams were not getting along or that Ortega feared Williams.
Id. ¶ 5.
Hutchings says that the first he knew of any problem
between Ortega and Williams was when Hutchings was told that they
were actually fighting.
Id. ¶ 7.
Hutchings says that, when
inmates tell him that they feel threatened or believe that their
safety is in danger, prison policy dictates that he “separate the
cell mates, place them in handcuffs and/or immediately place them
into a holding cell[] for further investigations into the
matter.”
Id. ¶ 6.
Ortega testified at his deposition that, after he
talked with Hutchings, he talked with Williamson in the “B
facility yard.”
Id. at 33.
Ortega says that he told Williamson
that his request to move his cell was being denied and that he
needed to move out of his cell because he and Williams were
incompatible and were “getting into some very serious arguments.”
Id. at 34.
Ortega says that he told Williamson that he thought
“it was going to get physical if we weren’t moved.”
Id.
Ortega
says that Williamson told him that Williamson could not do
anything about it because Williamson was assigned to another
“block.”
Id. at 35-36.
8
Williamson says he does not remember talking with
Ortega about a cell move in November 2006.
See Declaration of
Lt. M. Williamson ¶ 3, June 14, 2011, ECF No. 66.
Williamson
denies having been told by Ortega that Ortega had any concern for
his safety or had felt threatened in any way.
Id. ¶ 3.
Like
Hutchings, Williamson says that, when an inmate tells him about
feeling threatened by another inmate, it is his practice to
separate the inmates until further information is gathered.
Id.
¶ 5.
Later on November 9, 2006, Ortega was allegedly in his
cell, but remembers nothing else until he woke up at the
hospital.
See Ortega Depo. at 38.
Ortega says that he was told
that Williams had hit him over the head with a 13-inch television
that had been in their cell.
IV.
Id. at 40.
ANALYSIS.
A.
There Are Questions of Fact As To Whether
Hutchings And Williamson Were Deliberately
Indifferent to Ortega’s Safety.
Ortega’s § 1983 claims against Hutchings and Williamson
implicate the Eighth Amendment, which requires that prison
officials take reasonable steps to ensure the safety of inmates.
See Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 833 (1994).
Specifically,
prison officials have a duty to protect inmates from violence at
the hands of other inmates.
Id.
However, not every injury
suffered by one prisoner at the hands of another “translates into
9
constitutional liability for prison officials responsible for the
victim’s safety.”
Id. at 834.
A prison official violates the Eighth Amendment only
when two requirements are met:
First, the deprivation alleged must be,
objectively, “sufficiently serious”; a prison
official’s act or omission must result in the
denial of “the minimal civilized measure of
life’s necessities . . . .” For a claim
(like the one here) based on a failure to
prevent harm, the inmate must show that he is
incarcerated under conditions posing a
substantial risk of serious harm. The second
requirement follows from the principle that
“only the unnecessary and wanton infliction
of pain implicates the Eighth Amendment.” To
violate the Cruel and Unusual Punishments
Clause, a prison official must have a
“sufficiently culpable state of mind.” In
prison-conditions cases that state of mind is
one of “deliberate indifference” to inmate
health or safety.
Id. (citations and footnote omitted).
The Supreme Court noted in Farmer:
[A] prison official cannot be found liable
under the Eighth Amendment for denying an
inmate humane conditions of confinement
unless the official knows of and disregards
an excessive risk to inmate health or safety;
the official must both be aware of facts from
which the inference could be drawn that a
substantial risk of serious harm exists, and
he must also draw the inference.
Id. at 837.
This standard does not require the official to
“believe to a moral certainty that one inmate intends to attack
another at a given place at a time certain before that officer is
obligated to take steps to prevent such an assault.
10
But, on the
other hand, he must have more than a mere suspicion that an
attack will occur.”
Berg v. Kincheloe, 794 F.2d 457, 459 (9th
Cir. 1986).
As the Ninth Circuit has said:
When plaintiffs, such as the inmates, seek to
hold an individual defendant personally
liable for damages, the causation inquiry
between the deliberate indifference and the
eighth amendment deprivation must be more
refined. We must focus on whether the
individual defendant was in a position to
take steps to avert the stabbing incident,
but failed to do so intentionally or with
deliberate indifference. In order to resolve
this causation issue, we must take a very
individualized approach which accounts for
the duties, discretion, and means of each
defendant. Especially when, as in this case,
a prisoner seeks to hold a prison employee
individually liable because another prisoner
attacked him, the prisoner must establish
individual fault.
Leer v. Murphy, 844 F.2d 628, 633-34 (9th Cir. 1988) (citations
omitted).
In other words, to violate the Eighth Amendment, a
deprivation must be sufficiently serious from an objective
viewpoint, and the prison official must have a sufficiently
culpable state of mind from a subjective viewpoint.
Estate of
Ford v. Ramirez-Palmer, 301 F.3d 1043, 1049 (9th Cir. 2002).
On June 13, 2011, Hutchings and Williamson filed a
motion for summary judgment, claiming that they had not violated
Ortega’s Eighth Amendment rights and that, as a result, they had
qualified immunity with respect to Ortega’s claims.
Even though
Ortega filed no written opposition, questions of fact preclude
11
the motion for summary judgment.
In other words, Hutchings and
Williamson fail to meet their initial burden of demonstrating
that they are entitled to judgment as a matter of law, and Ortega
accordingly has no obligation to produce anything.
See Nissan
Fire, 210 F.3d at 1102-03 (“If a moving party fails to carry its
initial burden of production, the nonmoving party has no
obligation to produce anything, even if the nonmoving party would
have the ultimate burden of persuasion at trial.”).
When the evidence is viewed in the light most favorable
to Ortega, there is a dispute as to whether Hutchings and
Williamson were deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk of
serious harm to Ortega.
Ortega allegedly told Hutchings on
November 8, 2006, that Ortega and his cellmate “were having
serious discrepancies,” that Ortega did not feel safe, and that
Ortega wanted to move as soon as possible.
15, 20, 22.
See Ortega Depo. at
The following day, Ortega again allegedly told
Hutchings that Ortega needed to move cells because his arguments
with Williams were becoming more frequent.
Ortega says he told
Hutchings that he needed to be moved before those arguments
“escalated into a physical altercation.”
Id. at 31.
Although
Hutchings denies having had these conversations, the court must
assume the conversations took place for purposes of the present
motion for summary judgment.
See Miller, 454 F.3d at 988.
Ortega’s deposition testimony raises a question of fact as to
12
whether Hutchings was deliberately indifferent to a substantial
risk to Ortega’s safety.
For purposes of this motion, it is
immaterial whether Lonzell Green, another inmate, corroborates
the facts presented by Hutchings and Williamson.
Ortega’s
deposition testimony is sufficient to create a genuine issue of
fact that precludes summary judgment.
Citing Berg, 794 F.2d at 459, Hutchings argues for
summary judgment, saying that, even assuming the alleged
conversations he supposedly had with Ortega were as described by
Ortega, he would not have had “more than a mere suspicion that an
attack [would] occur.”
Whether Hutchings had “more than a mere
suspicion” that Williams would attack Ortega is a factual issue
for the jury to decide.
Although Ortega is not now claiming that
he told Hutchings that he had been actually threatened by
Williams, he does contend that he told him that he did not feel
safe with Williams as his cellmate, that they were increasingly
getting into arguments, and that he needed to be moved before the
arguments escalated into a physical altercation.
Because
Hutchings denies having been told of safety concerns by Ortega,
this is not a case involving Hutchings’s belief as to the
likelihood of such an attack or a case in which a prison official
is constrained by outside influences, concerns about safety of
other inmates, or the nature of prison life.
See Berg, 794 F.3d
at 462. Hutchings says that, had Ortega told him he had safety
13
concerns, Hutchings would have followed prison policy and
separated Ortega and Williams.
This causes this court to
conclude that the question of whether Hutchings was deliberately
indifferent to the risks Ortega faced turns on what, if anything,
Hutchings had reason to be concerned about.
A similar question of fact precludes summary judgment
with respect to Williamson.
Although Williamson denies having
had a conversation with Ortega about moving cells, Ortega says
that he told Williamson that Ortega and Williams were “getting
into some very serious arguments” and that he thought “it was
going to get physical if we weren’t moved.”
Id. at 33.
As with
Hutchings, this, together with what Williamson says was a policy
of promptly separating cellmates where safety concerns were
raised, is sufficient to raise a genuine issue of fact as to
whether Williamson was deliberately indifferent to a substantial
risk to Ortega’s safety.
B.
Questions of Fact Preclude Summary Judgment Based
on Qualified Immunity.
Hutchings and Williamson contend they have qualified
immunity with respect to Ortega’s § 1983 claim.
“Qualified
immunity is ‘an entitlement not to stand trial or face the other
burdens of litigation.’”
Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 200
(2001) (quoting Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 526 (1985)).
The goal of qualified immunity is to “avoid excessive disruption
of government and permit the resolution of many insubstantial
14
claims on summary judgment.”
Saucier, 533 U.S. at 202 (quoting
Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982)).
“Government
officials enjoy qualified immunity from civil damages unless
their conduct violates ‘clearly established statutory or
constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have
known.’” Jeffers v. Gomez, 267 F.3d 895, 910 (9th Cir. 2001)
(quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 818).
Qualified immunity protects
government officials from their exercise of poor judgment, and
fails to protect only those who are “plainly incompetent or those
who knowingly violate the law.”
341 (1986).
Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335,
Because the entitlement is an immunity from suit,
the court should determine “at the earliest possible stage in
litigation” whether a defendant has qualified immunity.
Hunter
v. Bryant, 502 U.S. 224, 227 (1991).
The court’s qualified immunity analysis has two prongs.
In one prong, the court examines whether the facts alleged, taken
in the light most favorable to the party asserting the injury,
show that the officer’s conduct violated a constitutional right.
Saucier, 533 U.S. at 201.
If no constitutional right would have
been violated were the allegations established, the court need
not inquire further and the official has qualified immunity.
In
the other prong, the court evaluates whether the right was
clearly established.
Id.
“The relevant, dispositive inquiry in
determining whether a right is clearly established is whether it
15
would be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was
unlawful in the situation he confronted.”
Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 615 (1999)).
Id. (citing Wilson v.
Qualified immunity is
appropriate “[i]f the law did not put the officer on notice that
his conduct would be clearly unlawful.”
202.
Saucier, 533 U.S. at
Courts have discretion to decide which of the two prongs of
the qualified immunity test to examine first.
See Pearson v.
Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 236 (2009).
The Ninth Circuit, noting that Saucier undermined prior
Ninth Circuit law, now directs district courts to determine
whether qualified immunity was available, not to conclude that a
question of fact as to deliberate indifference requires a denial
of qualified immunity.
See Estate of Ford, 301 F.3d at 1048-50.
Even if there are questions of fact as to whether a prison
official was deliberately indifferent, a court may determine that
qualified immunity is available because the alleged
constitutional violation was not clearly established.
Id.
The
Ninth Circuit reasons that, because qualified immunity
acknowledges that reasonable mistakes can be made and protects
“all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate
the law,” prison officials may be qualifiedly immune even if they
mistakenly, but reasonably, perceive the risk of serious harm to
be low.
Id.
Courts must examine whether it would have been
clear to a reasonable prison official that he or she would have
16
violated the law by disregarding a substantial risk of serious
harm where the official inferred that risk from the facts he had.
Id. at 1050.
Both Hutchings and Williamson say that, had they known
of an inmate’s safety concerns, they would have separated the
inmates until further information could be gathered.
Although
both Hutchings and Williamson deny having been told by Ortega
that he had safety concerns arising out of being housed with
Williams, the court must assume for purposes of this motion that
such conversations took place.
Given Hutchings and Williamson’s
implied statements that they would have separated Ortega and
Williams had they known of Ortega’s safety concerns, questions of
fact exist as to whether a reasonable prison official knowing
what Hutchings and Williamson allegedly knew would have inferred
that there was a substantial risk of serious harm to Ortega if
Hutchings and/or Williamson ignored Ortega’s concerns.
Accordingly, Hutchings and Williamson fail to show an entitlement
to qualified immunity on the present motion.
V.
CONCLUSION.
For the foregoing reasons, the court denies the motion
for summary judgment.
17
IT IS SO ORDERED.
DATED: Honolulu, Hawaii, August 25, 2011.
/s/ Susan Oki Mollway
Susan Oki Mollway
Chief United States District Judge
Lawrence Ortega v. CSP-Sacramento Prison Officials Hutchings and
Williamson; Civil No. 2: 08-00588 SOM; Order Denying Motion for
Summary Judgment
18
Disclaimer: Justia Dockets & Filings provides public litigation records from the federal appellate and district courts. These filings and docket sheets should not be considered findings of fact or liability, nor do they necessarily reflect the view of Justia.
Why Is My Information Online?