Satterly v. Robert Land

Filing 8

OPINION AND ORDER granting Satterly leave to proceed on a Fourteenth Amendment Claim, dismisses Robert Land (Sheriff of Wabash County) and directs USM to effect service on Tari Wolfe. Signed by Judge Rudy Lozano on 7/21/2014. (kds)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE NORTHERN DISTRICT OF INDIANA
SOUTH BEND DIVISION
STEVEN SHANE SATTERLY,
Plaintiff,
vs.
ROBERT LAND, and TARI WOLFE,
Defendants.

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CAUSE NO. 3:14-CV-1588

OPINION AND ORDER
This matter is before the court on the amended complaint filed
by Steven Shane Satterly, a pro se prisoner, on July 10, 2014. For
the reasons set forth below, the Court: (1) GRANTS Steven Shane
Satterly leave to proceed on a Fourteenth Amendment claim for a
denial of dental care from May until September 2012, by Nurse Tari
Wolfe in her individual capacity for compensatory damages; (2)
DISMISSES Sheriff Robert Land; (3) DISMISSES all other claims; (4)
DIRECTS the Clerk to transmit the summons and USM-285 for Nurse
Tari Wolfe to the United States Marshals Service along with a copy
of the complaint and this order; (4) DIRECTS the United States
Marshals Service, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d), to effect
service of process on Nurse Tari Wolfe; and (5) ORDERS, pursuant to
42 U.S.C. § 1997e(g)(2), that Nurse Tari Wolfe respond, as provided
for in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and N.D. Ind. L.R.
10-1(b), only to the claim for which the Plaintiff has been granted
leave to proceed in this screening order.

BACKGROUND
On May 29, 2012, Steven Shane Satterly was a pre-trial
detainee at the Wabash County Jail when he notified Nurse Tari
Wolfe that he had a painful, broken molar and cavities. DE 7-1 at
1. In response, she told him that the jail did not have a dentist.
Id. Satterly alleges that for months she never provided him with
any medical treatment for his teeth. Satterly sent grievances and
other documents (including a tort claim notice) to Sheriff Robert
Land, but never received a response. Nevertheless, Sheriff Land
sent

him

to

a

dentist

on

August

16,

2012,

who

prescribed

antibiotics. However, Satterly alleges that Nurse Wolfe prevented
him from obtaining any antibiotics. On September 25, 2012, Sheriff
Land sent him to another dentist who pulled his teeth.

DISCUSSION
“A document filed pro se is to be liberally construed, and a
pro se complaint, however inartfully pleaded, must be held to less
stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers.”
Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 94 (2007) (quotation marks and
citations omitted). Nevertheless, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915A,
the court must review the merits of a prisoner complaint and
dismiss it if the action is frivolous or malicious, fails to state
a claim upon which relief may be granted, or seeks monetary relief
against a defendant who is immune from such relief. “A claim has

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facial plausibility when the pleaded factual content allows the
court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable
for the misconduct alleged.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678
(2009) (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). “Factual allegations must
be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level,
on the assumption that all the allegations in the complaint are
true

(even

if

doubtful

in

fact).”

Twombly,

550

U.S.

at

555

(quotation marks, citations and footnote omitted). “[W]here the
well-pleaded facts do not permit the court to infer more than the
mere possibility of misconduct, the complaint has alleged—but it
has not shown—that the pleader is entitled to relief.” Iqbal, 556
U.S. at 679 (quotation marks and brackets omitted). Thus, “a
plaintiff must do better than putting a few words on paper that, in
the hands of an imaginative reader, might suggest that something
has happened to her that might be redressed by the law.” Swanson v.
Citibank, N.A., 614 F.3d 400, 403 (7th Cir. 2010) (emphasis in
original). “In order to state a claim under § 1983 a plaintiff must
allege:

(1)

that

defendants

deprived

him

of

a

federal

constitutional right; and (2) that the defendants acted under color
of state law.” Savory v. Lyons, 469 F.3d 667, 670 (7th Cir. 2006).
Satterly

was

a

pretrial

detainee.

“Although

the

Eighth

Amendment applies only to convicted persons, pretrial detainees .
. . are entitled to the same basic protections under the Fourteenth
Amendment’s due process clause. Accordingly, [courts] apply the

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same legal standards to deliberate indifference claims brought
under

either

the

Eighth

or

Fourteenth

Amendment.”

Minix

v.

Canarecci, 597 F.3d 824, 831 (7th Cir. 2010). In medical cases, the
Constitution is violated only when a defendant was deliberately
indifferent to an inmate’s serious medical needs. Gutierrez v.
Peters, 111 F.3d 1364, 1369 (7th Cir. 1997). A medical need is
serious if it is one that a physician has diagnosed as mandating
treatment, or one that is so obvious that even a layperson would
easily recognize the necessity for a doctor’s attention, and if
untreated could result in further significant injury or unnecessary
pain, and that significantly affects the person’s daily activities
or features chronic and substantial pain. Gutierrez v. Peters, 111
F.3d 1364, 1373 (7th Cir. 1997). Here, Satterly has plausibly
alleged that his dental problems were a serious medical need.
“[C]onduct is deliberately indifferent when the official has
acted in an intentional or criminally reckless manner, i.e., the
defendant must have known that the plaintiff was at serious risk of
being harmed and decided not to do anything to prevent that harm
from occurring even though he could have easily done so.” Board v.
Farnham, 394 F.3d 469, 478 (7th Cir. 2005) (quotation marks,
brackets, and citation omitted).
Negligence on the part of an official does not violate
the Constitution, and it is not enough that he or she
should have known of a risk. Instead, deliberate
indifference requires evidence that an official actually
knew of a substantial risk of serious harm and
consciously disregarded it nonetheless.
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Pierson v. Hartley, 391 F.3d 898, 902 (7th Cir. 2004) (citations
omitted). It is not enough to show that a defendant merely failed
to act reasonably. Gibbs v. Franklin, 49 F.3d 1206, 1208 (7th Cir.
1995). Moreover, “public employees are responsible for their own
misdeeds but not for anyone else’s." Burks v. Raemisch, 555 F.3d
592, 596 (7th Cir. 2009). There is no general respondeat superior
liability under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. “Only persons who cause or
participate in the violations are responsible.” George v. Smith,
507 F.3d 605, 609 (7th Cir. 2007).
Here, Satterly has not plausibly alleged that Sheriff Robert
Land was deliberately indifferent. “If a prisoner is under the care
of medical experts a non-medical prison official will generally be
justified in believing that the prisoner is in capable hands.”
Greeno v. Daley, 414 F.3d 645, 656 (7th Cir. 2005) (ellipsis
omitted) quoting Spruill v. Gillis, 372 F.3d 218, 236 (3rd Cir.
2004). Satterly was under the medical care of Nurse Wolfe. Though
Satterly wrote to Sheriff Land to complain about the nurse, that
alone is insufficient to make him financially liable.
Bureaucracies divide tasks; no prisoner is entitled to
insist that one employee do another’s job. The division
of labor is important not only to bureaucratic
organization but also to efficient performance of tasks;
people who stay within their roles can get more work
done, more effectively, and cannot be hit with damages
under §1983 for not being ombudsmen. Burks’s view that
everyone who knows about a prisoner’s problem must pay
damages implies that he could write letters to the
Governor of Wisconsin and 999 other public officials,
demand that every one of those 1,000 officials drop
everything he or she is doing in order to investigate a
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single prisoner’s claims, and then collect damages from
all 1,000 recipients if the letter-writing campaign does
not lead to better medical care. That can’t be right. The
Governor, and for that matter the Superintendent of
Prisons and the Warden of each prison, is entitled to
relegate to the prison’s medical staff the provision of
good medical care. That is equally true for an inmate
complaint examiner.
Burks v. Raemisch, 555 F.3d 592, 595 (7th Cir. 2009) (citation
omitted). “A layperson’s failure to tell the medical staff how to
do its job cannot be called deliberate indifference . . ..” Id. at
596. Moreover, though Sheriff Land did not provide a written
response to Satterly, he did not sit idly by and ignore his
complaints

either.

Rather,

he

twice

sent

him

to

a

dentist.

Therefore Satterly has not stated a claim against Sheriff Land.
However, Nurse Wolfe is different. Satterly alleges that from
May until September 2012, she never provided him with any medical
treatment and that she prevented him from obtaining antibiotics
that were prescribed by a dentist. Based on these allegations, he
has stated a claim against Nurse Wolfe. “For a medical professional
to be liable for deliberate indifference to an inmate’s medical
needs, he must make a decision that represents such a substantial
departure

from

accepted

professional

judgment,

practice,

or

standards, as to demonstrate that the person responsible actually
did not base the decision on such a judgment.” Jackson v. Kotter,
541 F.3d 688, 697 (7th Cir. 2008) (quotation marks and citations
omitted).

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Nevertheless, deliberate indifference is a high standard and
though

Satterly

has

plausibly

alleged

that

Nurse

Wolfe

was

deliberately indifferent, there are many factual details he has not
provided. Even medical malpractice and incompetence do not state a
claim of deliberate indifference. Walker v. Peters, 233 F.3d 494
(7th Cir. 2000). “Under the Eighth Amendment, [a prisoner] is not
entitled to demand specific care. She is not entitled to the best
care possible.” Forbes v. Edgar, 112 F.3d 262, 267 (7th Cir.1997).
A “disagreement with medical professionals [does not] state a
cognizable Eighth Amendment Claim under the deliberate indifference
standard of Estelle v. Gamble [429 U.S. 97 (1976)].” Ciarpaglini v.
Saini,

352

F.3d

328,

331

(7th

Cir.

2003).

Furthermore,

the

Constitution does not require free medical care. Poole v. Isaacs,
703 F.3d 1024, 1027 (7th Cir. 2012). Thus if Satterly refused to be
seen by Nurse Wolfe or if he refused to pay (or incur the
obligation to pay in the future) for the treatment provided, then
he was not being denied medical care. Rather, he was refusing it
and she was not deliberately indifferent. Cf. Freeman v. Berge, 441
F.3d 543 (7th Cir. 2006) (An inmate cannot create a Constitutional
violation by refusing to comply with reasonable conditions for
receiving food.)

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CONCLUSION
For the reasons set forth above, the Court: (1) GRANTS Steven
Shane Satterly leave to proceed on a Fourteenth Amendment claim for
a denial of dental care from May until September 2012, by Nurse
Tari Wolfe in her individual capacity for compensatory damages; (2)
DISMISSES Sheriff Robert Land; (3) DISMISSES all other claims; (4)
DIRECTS the Clerk to transmit the summons and USM-285 for Nurse
Tari Wolfe to the United States Marshals Service along with a copy
of the complaint and this order; (4) DIRECTS the United States
Marshals Service, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d), to effect
service of process on Nurse Tari Wolfe; and (5) ORDERS, pursuant to
42 U.S.C. § 1997e(g)(2), that Nurse Tari Wolfe respond, as provided
for in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure and N.D. Ind. L.R.
10-1(b), only to the claim for which the Plaintiff has been granted
leave to proceed in this screening order.

DATED: July 21, 2014

/s/RUDY LOZANO, Judge
United State District Court

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