Scruggs v. West et al

Filing 335

OPINION AND ORDER DENYING 331 MOTION for a New Trial filed by Christopher L Scruggs.. Signed by Judge Robert L Miller, Jr on 12/13/19. (Copy mailed to pro se party)(kjp)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
NORTHERN DISTRICT OF INDIANA
SOUTH BEND DIVISION
CHRISTOPHER L. SCRUGGS,
Plaintiff,
v.

CAUSE NO.: 3:16-CV-33-RLM-MGG

NURSE WEST,
Defendant.
OPINION AND ORDER
Christopher L. Scruggs, a prisoner without a lawyer, filed a motion for a
new trial and to alter or amend judgment. “The court may, on motion, grant a
new trial on all or some of the issues–and to any party– . . . after a jury trial, for
any reason for which a new trial has heretofore been granted in an action at law
in federal court.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 59(a)(1)(A). A new trial may be granted when (1)
a verdict is against the weight of the evidence, (2) damages are excessive, or (3)
other reasons made the trial unfair to the moving party. Pickett v. Sheridan
Health Care Ctr., 610 F.3d 434, 440 (7th Cir. 2010). In considering a motion for
a new trial, the trial court must view the evidence in the light most favorable to
the prevailing party, and issues of credibility and weight of the evidence are
within the jury’s purview. Carter v. Chicago Police Officers, 165 F.3d 1071, 1079
(7th Cir. 1998).
A motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 59(e) “must clearly
establish either a manifest error of law or fact or must present newly discovered
evidence.” LB Credit Corp. v. Resolution Trust Corp., 49 F.3d 1263, 1267 (7th

Cir. 1995). Rule 59(e) motions don’t give a party the opportunity to rehash old
arguments or to present new arguments “that could and should have been
presented to the district court prior to the judgment.” Moro v. Shell Oil Co., 91
F.3d 872, 876 (7th Cir. 1996). Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60 authorizes the
court to relieve a party from a final judgment based on: “(1) mistake,
inadvertence, surprise, or excusable neglect; (2) newly discovered evidence that,
with reasonable diligence, could not have been discovered in time to move for a
new trial under Rule 59(b); (3) fraud (whether previously called intrinsic or
extrinsic), misrepresentation, or misconduct by an opposing party; or . . . (6) any
other reason that justifies relief.”
Mr. Scruggs asserted an Eighth Amendment claim of excessive force
against Nurse West for closing his hand in the cuff port in October 2015 and
against Officer Miller for failing to intervene. ECF 1. On October 16, 2019, the
court held the final pretrial conference and heard oral arguments on pretrial
motions. ECF 309. On October 21, the court entered its order on the pretrial
motions. ECF 310. The court conducted the jury trial from October 23 to October
25. At trial, Mr. Scruggs called himself, Officer Miller, and Nurse West as
witnesses. At end of Mr. Scruggs’s case, the court entered a directed verdict in
favor of Officer Miller and against Mr. Scruggs on the basis that Mr. Scruggs had
presented no evidence to support his claims against Officer Miller. Nurse West
called Corey McKinney, DeAngela Lewis, and Dr. Andrew Liaw as witnesses. After
the close of evidence, the jury returned a verdict in favor of Nurse West and
against Mr. Scruggs.

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Mr. Scruggs argues that the jury verdict was against the weight of the
evidence. To prevail on this argument, he “must demonstrate that no rational
jury could have rendered a verdict against him.” Galvan v. Norberg, 678 F.3d
581, 589 (7th Cir. 2012) “[N]ew trials granted because the verdict is against the
weight of the evidence are proper only when the record shows that the jury’s
verdict resulted in a miscarriage of justice or where the verdict, on the record,
cries out to be overturned or shocks our conscience.” Latino v. Kaizer, 58 F.3d
310, 315 (7th Cir. 1995). Mr. Scruggs called Officer Miller and Nurse West as
witnesses. During their testimony, the defendants characterized the physical
interactions during the cuff port incident as minimal contact rather than
excessive force. They presented a surveillance video recording of the incident,
which was consistent with their testimony. They also presented evidence,
including medical records and X-rays, to discredit Mr. Scruggs’s allegation that
Nurse West had broken his hand. The evidence against the jury verdict consisted
solely of Mr. Scruggs’s testimony and his own recorded statements. The jury was
free to disbelieve Mr. Scruggs. On this evidentiary record, the court concludes
that jury’s verdict in favor of Nurse West and against Mr. Scruggs was rational,
and Mr. Scruggs will not be granted a new trial on this basis.
Mr. Scruggs argues that the court shouldn’t have granted the motion for
directed verdict in favor of Officer Miller. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 50(a)
allows the court to grant such motions “[i]f a party has been fully heard on an
issue during a jury trial and the court finds that a reasonable jury would not
have a legally sufficient evidentiary basis to find for the party on that issue.” In

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other words, Mr. Scruggs had to present evidence to support his claim against
Officer Miller to avoid a direct verdict. Mr. Scruggs maintains that “the defense
already told the jury that Scruggs claimed his hand was pinned in the cuff port
for the better part of a minute, thus there was no need to repeat it himself.” To
the extent Mr. Scruggs is referring to defense counsel, opening statements are
not evidence. To the extent he refers to the defendants’ testimony, the defendants
may have acknowledged their general awareness of Mr. Scruggs’s allegations,
but expressly denied that they were true. Mr. Scruggs hasn’t pointed to any
evidence introduced at trial to support his claim against Officer Miller, so the
court can’t grant him relief on this basis.
Mr. Scruggs argues that the court let the defendants to commit perjury as
they testified on the stand. Perjury is defined as “[t]he act or an instance of a
person’s deliberately making material false or misleading statements while under
oath.” BLACK’S LAW DICTIONARY (11th ed. 2019). To support his contention that
their testimony was false, Mr. Scruggs offers only his own statements as
evidence, but he makes no effort to explain why he believes the court should
credit his uncorroborated statements against the decision of the jury and over
the defendants’ statements, which were consistent with other evidence,
including a video recording and medical records. Moreover, even if the court
believed that the defendants offered false testimony, Mr. Scruggs offers no reason
to believe that they did so intentionally. The court can’t find that the defendants
committed perjury at trial.

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Mr. Scruggs argues that the court shouldn’t have allowed the defendants
to introduce the video recording because it was edited to remove the portions
showing excessive force. He argues that Corey McKinney offered false testimony
about the video surveillance system and the authenticity of the video recording
admitted at trial. He argues that Troy Cambe should have been called to testify
on these issues instead, but Mr. Scruggs made no effort to arrange for his
appearance at trial. To support the contention that McKinney’s testimony was
false and that the video recording was altered, he offers his statements that the
recording does not match his recollection, but, again, he offers no explanation
as to why the court should credit his statements and memory over the
defendants’ contrary testimony (which has the virtue of being entirely consistent
with the video recording). He also maintains that he showed the court that he
was prevented from accessing a hidden video recording, but he didn’t make such
a showing. Rather, the court observed that the courtroom computer did not allow
Mr. Scruggs to select the option in the Windows Explorer window to show hidden
files on the disk containing the video recording. This could be explained by any
number of technological considerations, and that Windows Explorer provides the
option to display any file folders that might be concealed doesn’t by itself suggest
the existence of any hidden files on the disk, much less evidence of concealed
evidence or tampering.
Relatedly, Mr. Scruggs argues that he wasn’t allowed to complete discovery
to obtain the unedited video recording. He argues that he should have been
appointed counsel and an expert to assist him in obtaining the unedited video

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recording and in showing that the defendants had tampered with it. He also
argues that he should have been appointed counsel because he was mentally
incompetent to represent himself at trial. He argues that he should have been
allowed to present evidence that the Department of Correction, medical staff, and
their counsel maintain an unwritten policy of conspiring to cover up violations
of inmates’ constitutional rights. The court has already addressed these issues
at length (ECF 238, ECF 244, ECF 310) and needn’t revisit them here.
Mr. Scruggs argues that he should be granted a new trial because
correctional staff deprived him of sleep during the trial. Because Mr. Scruggs did
not raise this issue at trial, the court will not further consider it here, except to
note that, during trial, it did not observe any signs that Mr. Scruggs had been
deprived of sleep.
Finally, Mr. Scruggs argues that he should be granted a new trial because
he didn’t receive the court’s order on pretrial motions until the day of trial, which
prohibited him from presenting evidence on the unwritten cover up policy as he
had planned. It’s unfortunate that Mr. Scruggs did not receive this order sooner,
the court accommodated the need for Mr. Scruggs to revise his trial strategy by
granting him the time he requested -- an additional ninety minutes -- to prepare
after an hour long lunch break. Further, even if Mr. Scruggs was allowed to
present evidence of the unwritten policy, he should have also been prepared to
prove that the cuff port incident occurred as he had alleged. Indeed, his trial
brief suggests that he had been prepared to do just that. ECF 288 at 4.

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Mr. Scruggs had ample reason to suspect that he would not be allowed to
present evidence based on his cover up theory even before he got the order. To
start, in the order denying the motions for summary judgment, the court
informed Mr. Scruggs the factual issues to be resolved at trial were related to
Nurse West’s conduct during the cuff port incident. ECF 177. In denying Mr.
Scruggs’ motion for sanctions, the court found that Mr. Scruggs’s allegations of
tampering and edited video were unpersuasive and had little evidentiary support.
ECF 244. The court also provided Mr. Scruggs with an explanation of trial
procedures, which outlined the court’s expectations for trial and included the
Federal Rules of Evidence that formed the legal basis for the exclusion. ECF 239.
Additionally, the defendants moved for the exclusion of the evidence Mr. Scruggs
intended to offer in support of this theory and engaged in oral argument on these
issues at the final pretrial conference (ECF 301, ECF 304, ECF 309).
Consequently, Mr. Scruggs had notice long before trial that there was a
reasonable likelihood that the court would prohibit him from proceeding on the
trial strategy presented in his pretrial filings. Mr. Scruggs could hope for a more
favorable ruling, but couldn’t reasonably be surprised by the ruling he got.
For these reasons, the court DENIES the motion for a new trial (ECF 331).
SO ORDERED on December 13, 2019
s/ Robert L. Miller, Jr.
JUDGE
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

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