Justia Civil Rights Opinion Summaries

A prominent civil rights activist, known for protesting police practices, died in custody about 27 hours after being arrested on drug charges. She was disabled, obese, and took daily medications for ailments, including diabetes, a thyroid condition, hypertension, and asthma. Pursuant to a department policy that prohibits arrestees from taking medications in lockup unless they are taken to a hospital, she had no access to her medications while in custody. When she met with her lawyer about 16 hours into her detention, she could hardly speak, walk, or stand. He told the guards to get her to a hospital; none responded. The district court entered summary judgment for defendants on 42 U.S.C. 1983 claims for denial of medical care and based on holding decedent in custody for 27 hours without a probable cause hearing. The Seventh Circuit affirmed as to the delayed hearing claim, but reversed on the medical care claim. The court erred in excluding expert testimony on causation; there was sufficient notice that decedent needed medical care ,that it would not have been difficult to transport her to the hospital, and no police interests stood in the way of that treatment.

A prisoner filed a pro se lawsuit under 42 U.S.C. 1983, alleging violations of civil rights by interfering with delivery of legal mail and failing to provide a sufficient law library. The district court denied his request to proceed as a pauper on the ground that he had accumulated three strikes. The Prison Litigation Reform Act precludes an inmate from bringing a civil action or appealing a civil judgment in forma pauperis if at least three of the inmateâs prior lawsuits have been dismissed as frivolous, malicious, or for failing to state a claim, 28 U.S.C. 1915(g), excepts when a prisoner is in danger of serious injury. The Seventh Circuit reversed, rejecting the "third strike," dismissal of a 1991 case for lack of jurisdiction. A determination that a case cannot proceed in a particular forum or at a particular time is not a determination that the case is frivolous.

Petitioner, convicted of causing great bodily harm by operating a motor vehicle while under the influence of cocaine (Wis. Stat. 940.25(1)(am) exhausted state appeals and filed an unsuccessful petition for writ of habeas corpus. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. The Wisconsin Court of Appeals reasonably concluded that the state did not violate petitioner's right to due process when it destroyed the vehicle, which possessed no apparent exculpatory value, in good faith.

An inmate sued, claiming that the prison medical director was deliberately indifferent to his need for eye surgery. He was diagnosed in 2001, with pterygia, a thin film covering the eye, which significantly obstructs his vision and apparently causes itching and irritation. The prison denied requests for surgery. The inmate alleged that there was an unofficial policy of denying off-site care to death row inmates. Medical recommendations were mixed; several doctors recommended the surgery. Following a remand of dismissal of his suit, the inmate got surgery in 2008, and filed a second suit, based on the delay The district court entered summary judgment, in favor of the doctor. The Seventh Circuit vacated, finding that the evidence remains insufficient to eliminate fact disputes. The medical recommendations are enough to create genuine fact disputes that the pterygia had become objectively serious and that the doctor intentionally or with deliberate indifference ignored the condition.

Plaintiff began working as a dentist at a facility for jail detainees in 1982. By 2006, Cook County had a budget shortfall of 500 million dollars. It was determined that the facility could provide sufficient care with only one of its five dentists and that the remaining dentist had to have some management experience, and a history of flexibility, productivity, emergent clinical skill, and responsiveness to other physicians' needs. Plaintiff was not selected. Provided with an explanation of the decision, a hearing officer denied an appeal. Plaintiff filed suit, claiming that political considerations infected the decision, in violation of the Shakman decree and 42 U.S.C. 1983 and that the choice to lay her off was predicated on her Caucasian ethnicity and female gender, in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the county. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. Plaintiff failed to meet her prima facia burden. The claim did not explain what evidence shows background circumstances of discriminatory conduct. If she had satisfied her prima facie case, the claim would fail because she did not establish that the reasons for the decision were pretextual.

The inmate attended services until the prison cancelled African Hebrew Israelite services. The prison denied his grievance, blaming budget cuts. The Grievance Officer and Department Director upheld the denial on the merits. The inmate filed a pro se 42 U.S.C.1983 complaint against the chaplain and wardens, alleging violations of the First and Fourteenth Amendments, the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act, 42 U.S.C. 2000cc, and the Illinois Constitution. The district court dismissed restructured Counts 2 and 3 (discrimination in allocation of religious budget)and entered summary judgment for defendants on Counts 1 and 4 (failure to provide reasonable access to religious materials and to provide group worship services). The Seventh Circuit vacated in part. The grievance gave officials fair notice and an opportunity to address the complaint, so Count 4 should not have been dismissed for failure to exhaust administrative remedies. The courtâs characterization of Counts 2 and 3 was too narrow a reading of the complaint and led to premature dismissal at the screening stage. Dismissal of Count 1 was appropriate because the inmate only complained of a failure to provide religious services in his grievance, not a failure to provide religious materials, and did not properly exhaust that claim.

A jury, composed entirely of women, acquitted petitioner on state law charges of second-degree sexual assault by sexual intercourse but found him guilty of unlawful sexual contact with a 15-year-old girl. After exhausting state remedies, he unsuccessfully petitioned for habeas corpus. The Seventh Circuit affirmed. On petitions for habeas corpus claiming ineffective assistance, federal courts defer to counsel's reasonable choices and to the state court's evaluation of that issue 28 U.S.C. 2254(d)(1). The state court found that the acquittal on one count demonstrated that defendant was not prejudiced by his lawyer's striking of male jurors and assumed that, because the lawyer had a strategic reason for his actions, his performance was not constitutionally inadequate. The Seventh Circuit disagreed, stating that "Intentionally violating the Constitution by discriminating against jurors on account of their sex is not consistent with, or reasonable under, prevailing professional norms," but concluded that the error did not merit reversal. It was not outside the boundaries of reasonable differences of opinion, given the state of the law at the time, for those courts to predict that the Supreme Court would apply a harmless-error standard even to intentional Batson violations like the one in this case.

Plaintiff filed suit (42 U.S.C. 1983) based on three arrests: one for disorderly conduct for his attempts to dissuade a city employee from towing his car; a second, months later, for theft of lost or mislaid property after he got into another spat with a city employee, who was trying to tow his vehicles; a third arrest, more than a year later, was for criminal trespass to state-supported land, and followed his release from police custody after another arrest, not challenged in this case. None of the challenged arrests resulted in prosecution. The district court rejected the claims on summary judgment. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, concluding that there was probable cause for the arrests, but stated that the Chicago police did not emerge "untarnished."

Plaintiff suffered a heart attack when police searched her apartment and arrested her during a drug raid. She claims that police unreasonably seized her by denying a request for aspirin and refusing to call an ambulance and conducted an unreasonable search by not giving her sufficient time to respond when they knocked and announced, but used a battering ram after 15 seconds. The district court granted summary judgment on the aspirin claim, citing qualified immunity, reasoning that there was no clearly established right to over-the-counter drugs during arrest. After trial on the ambulance and entry claims, the court entered directed verdict for the village; the jury delivered a verdict for the officer. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, noting that the aspirin and ambulance issues should have been treated as a single claim, but that the error was harmless. The request for aspirin was inconsequential, given that police called an ambulance promptly when notified that plaintiff was suffering chest pains. Without the aspirin claim, plaintiff had no evidence linking a municipal policy or custom to any constitutional violation. The judge acted within her discretion in barring expert testimony about the 15-second wait and testimony that a reasonable police officer would call an ambulance.

A special education support teacher sued the school district and administrators under 42 U.S.C. 1983, asserting that her constitutional rights were violated because she was ordered to a room with an autistic fourth-grade student even though he was known to be violent and should have been previously transferred to an alternative school. The district court granted summary judgment for defendants. The Seventh Circuit affirmed, stating that the district's actions were flawed and short-sighted, but do not "shock the conscience" as required to maintain a substantive due process claim.