Reynolds v. Wood County ( 2023 )

Case: 22-40381 Document: 00516733497 Page: 1 Date Filed: 05/01/2023
United States Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
FILED
May 1, 2023
No. 22-40381 Lyle W. Cayce
Clerk
Dustin Reynolds,
Plaintiff—Appellant,
versus
Wood County, Texas; Angela Speakman; Bradley Cox;
Chelsea Fuller; Mark Taylor; Logan Miller,
Defendants—Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Eastern District of Texas
USDC No. 6:20-CV-271
Before Higginbotham, Southwick, and Willett, Circuit Judges.
Per Curiam:*
This case involves alleged constitutional violations committed by
officers when they placed a detainee in a restraint chair for approximately 14
hours and allowed him to urinate on himself. We AFFIRM the district
court’s grant of summary judgment as to the individual officer-defendants’
qualified immunity and as to municipal liability against Wood County.
*
This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
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FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
On the evening of July 3, 2018, Wood County Deputy William Burge
observed Plaintiff Dustin Reynolds consuming a beer and possessing a dog in
the water of Lake Holbrook, which were both violations of the lake’s govern-
ing rules. When Burge approached Reynolds and asked for his identification,
Reynolds became angry and began to yell and use profanity. As Burge at-
tempted to run Reynolds’s driver’s license number, Reynolds continued yell-
ing profane language. Burge then activated his body camera.
As Burge arrested Reynolds, Reynolds continued to yell obscenities
and resist arrest. During transport to the Wood County Jail, Reynolds re-
peatedly kicked and used his hands to hit the back seat of Burge’s patrol ve-
hicle, yelling profanities at Burge. Reynolds hit his own head against the par-
tition in the patrol vehicle several times.
Upon arrival at the jail around 7:00 p.m., Reynolds exited the vehicle
yelling and resisting escort into the jail. As he was escorted into the jail,
Reynolds attempted to kick and spit at officers as he continued to shout pro-
fanities, and he refused to answer intake questions.
To protect Reynolds and the jail staff, the officers then strapped Reyn-
olds into a restraint chair and placed a spit mask over his mouth. Officers
tried to complete the booking process with Reynolds multiple times, but he
remained combative and refused to answer all questions. Promptly after be-
ing strapped into the restraint chair, a nurse tended to Reynolds’s superficial
wounds, then checked on him again later.
Reynolds remained in the restraint chair until his hearing before a
magistrate judge the following morning on July 4. He stayed in the restraint
chair for a total of 14 hours, during which time he was offered water and limb
exercises. Throughout the night, officers checked on Reynolds every 15
minutes.
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On the morning of July 4, while in the restraint chair, Reynolds uri-
nated on himself. About one hour later, officers released Reynolds from the
restraint chair and provided him clean clothes. Following his hearing, he was
permitted to shower.
Reynolds later filed suit against Wood County, Texas, and jail officers
Mark Taylor, Angela Speakman, Logan Miller, Chelsea Fuller, and Bradley
Cox in their individual capacities. Reynolds alleged the following claims un-
der 42 U.S.C. § 1983: (1) excessive force against Speakman, Taylor, Fuller,
Miller, and Cox; (2) deliberate indifference against Speakman, Taylor,
Fuller, Miller, and Cox; (3) deliberate indifference against Cox; (4) bystander
liability against Speakman, Taylor, Fuller, Miller, and Cox; and (5) deliberate
indifference against Wood County.
The district court granted the defendants’ motions for summary judg-
ment, finding that the individual officer-defendants were entitled to qualified
immunity and that Reynolds could not establish liability against Wood
County. Reynolds timely appealed.
DISCUSSION
This court reviews a grant of summary judgment de novo, applying
the same standard the district court applied. Austin v. Kroger Tex., L.P., 864
F.3d 326, 328 (5th Cir. 2017). Summary judgment is appropriate if “the mo-
vant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the
movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” FED. R. CIV. P. 56(a).
Factual disputes are material if they “might affect the outcome of the suit
under the governing law,” and they are genuine “if the evidence is such that
a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.” Anderson
v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986). Where, as here, an individual
defendant asserts qualified immunity, plaintiffs “must rebut the defense by
establishing a genuine fact issue as to whether the official’s allegedly
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wrongful conduct violated clearly established law.” Vann v. City of
Southaven, 884 F.3d 307, 309 (5th Cir. 2018) (quotation marks and citation
omitted).
On appeal, Reynolds challenges the district court’s grant of summary
judgment on all claims. We consider the claims separately.
I. Qualified immunity for the individual officer-defendants
Reynolds contends the district court erred in granting the individual
officer-defendants qualified immunity as to his Section 1983 claims for
excessive force, bystander liability, and deliberate indifference.
“Qualified immunity protects officers from suit unless their conduct
violates a clearly established constitutional right.” Mace v. City of Palestine,
333 F.3d 621, 623 (5th Cir. 2003). The test for qualified immunity involves
two steps: “first we ask whether the officer’s alleged conduct has violated a
federal right”; “second we ask whether the right in question was clearly
established at the time of the alleged violation, such that the officer was on
notice of the unlawfulness of his or her conduct.” Solis v. Serrett, 31 F.4th
975, 981 (5th Cir. 2022) (quotation marks and citation omitted).
“To be clearly established, a legal principle must have a sufficiently
clear foundation in then-existing precedent. The rule must be settled law,
which means it is dictated by controlling authority or a robust consensus of
cases of persuasive authority.” District of Columbia v. Wesby, 138 S. Ct. 577,
589–90 (2018) (quotations marks and citations omitted). “It is not enough
that the rule is suggested by then-existing precedent. The precedent must be
clear enough that every reasonable official would interpret it to establish the
particular rule the plaintiff seeks to apply.” Id. at 590. The Supreme Court
has explained that its “‘clearly established’ standard also requires that the
legal principle clearly prohibit the officer’s conduct in the particular
circumstances before him.” Id. (emphasis added).
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The Court has also stated, though, that cases involving
“fundamentally similar” facts are not always necessary to provide the “fair
warning” that officers require. Hope v. Pelzer, 536 U.S. 730, 740–41 (2002).
“[A] general constitutional rule already identified in the decisional law may
apply with obvious clarity to the specific conduct in question.” Taylor v.
Riojas, 141 S. Ct. 52, 53–54 (2020) (quoting Hope, 536 U.S. at 741).
a. Excessive force
Reynolds argues the district court improperly granted the individual
officer-defendants qualified immunity on Reynolds’s excessive force claim.
Reynolds concedes it was reasonable for the officers to place him in a restraint
chair while he was initially combative, but he argues it was objectively unrea-
sonable in light of clearly established law to keep him in the restraint chair for
an additional 12 to 13 hours after he calmed down and was compliant.
“A pretrial detainee receives the protection of the Due Process Clause
of the Fourteenth Amendment.” Brothers v. Klevenhagen, 28 F.3d 452, 455–
56 (5th Cir. 1994). Force against a pretrial detainee is “excessive” and a vi-
olation of the Fourteenth Amendment when the force is objectively unrea-
sonable. Kingsley v. Hendrickson, 576 U.S. 389, 396–97 (2015). Courts weigh
the following factors to determine reasonableness:
the relationship between the need for the use of force and the
amount of force used; the extent of the plaintiff’s injury; any
effort made by the officer to temper or to limit the amount of
force; the severity of the security problem at issue; the threat
reasonably perceived by the officer; and whether the plaintiff
was actively resisting.
Id. at 397.
“The ‘reasonableness’ of a particular use of force must be judged
from the perspective of a reasonable officer on the scene, rather than with the
20/20 vision of hindsight.” Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386, 396 (1989).
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“The calculus of reasonableness must embody allowance for the fact that po-
lice officers are often forced to make split-second judgments — in circum-
stances that are tense, uncertain, and rapidly evolving — about the amount
of force that is necessary in a particular situation.” Id. at 396–97. “If an of-
ficer reasonably, but mistakenly, believed that a suspect was likely to fight
back, for instance, the officer would be justified in using more force than in
fact was needed.” Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 205 (2001).
We agree with the district court that genuine fact disputes exist as to
whether the officers’ conduct violated Reynolds’s constitutional rights as a
pretrial detainee. As the district court found, “the facts about whether Reyn-
olds presented a continued threat — the justification for the restraint chair
— are disputed.” We therefore focus our analysis on whether the alleged
violated right was clearly established. The district court determined there
was insufficient clarity to deny qualified immunity.
Reynolds relies primarily on the 2002 Supreme Court decision Hope
v. Pelzer, 536 U.S. 730. There, prison guards forced plaintiff Hope to stand
with his arms over his shoulders and handcuffed to a hitching post, shirtless,
in the sun for seven hours, while giving him water only once or twice and
denying him access to the restroom. Id. at 734–35. The guards taunted Hope
about his thirst by giving water to dogs and spilling water from a cooler on the
ground in front of him. Id. at 735. Finding that the actions were punitive and
served no penological purpose, the Supreme Court concluded the guards had
violated Hope’s Eighth Amendment rights. Id. at 737–38. Hope stands for
the proposition that a violation can be so blatant or egregious that officers
need no on-point precedent to know their conduct is illegal because of the
“obvious cruelty inherent” in handcuffing a prisoner to a post for seven
hours. Id. at 745.
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The district court found that the facts in Hope are distinguishable from
those in this case. The overarching constitutional violation was the act of
handcuffing the inmate to a hitching post and taunting him. Id. at 745–46. In
Hope, there was no underlying security reason for the inmate’s treatment; it
was purely punitive and the guards purposely increased Hope’s pain and suf-
fering. Id. at 737–38.
In contrast, Reynolds was placed in a restraint chair in a climate-con-
trolled facility, was checked on every 15 minutes, and was offered necessities
such as water, limb exercises, and medical care. Additionally, detention in
the restraint chair resulted from his unsafe behavior and, though temporarily
uncomfortable, was not objectively severe enough to violate the Fourteenth
Amendment. Further, as the district court correctly noted, “nothing in Hope
indicates at what point a restraint would become unconstitutional once an
inmate quiets down.” Thus, Hope provides no support for Reynolds’s con-
tention that remaining in the restraint chair under these circumstances vio-
lated his clearly established constitutional rights.
Reynolds also relies on one of this court’s opinions that held, “an ex-
ercise of force that is reasonable at one moment can become unreasonable in
the next if the justification for the use of force has ceased.” See Lytle v. Bexar
Cnty., 560 F.3d 404, 413 (5th Cir. 2009). In that case, following a brief police
chase, the officer-defendant fired his sidearm twice in the rear of a vehicle,
striking and killing a passenger. Id. at 407–08. Firing a deadly weapon at a
fleeing vehicle containing passengers is not analogous to strapping a com-
bative detainee in a restraint chair and monitoring him throughout the night.
Reynolds’s burden was to identify caselaw that put the individual of-
ficer-defendants on notice that their alleged conduct was unlawful. Reynolds
has not met his burden. Reynolds therefore cannot demonstrate that all rea-
sonable officers would have believed it was a violation of a detainee’s
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constitutional rights to keep him in a restraint chair for 14 hours under these
circumstances. Qualified immunity as to the excessive force claims was
properly granted.
b. Bystander liability
As Reynolds acknowledges, “this Court’s resolution of the excessive
force claim will also resolve the bystander liability claim.” “An officer is lia-
ble for failure to intervene when that officer: (1) knew a fellow officer was
violating an individual’s constitutional rights, (2) was present at the scene of
the constitutional violation, (3) had a reasonable opportunity to prevent the
harm but nevertheless, (4) chose not to act.” Joseph ex rel. Est. of Joseph v.
Bartlett, 981 F.3d 319, 343 (5th Cir. 2020).
Thus, the individual officer-defendants are not liable on Reynolds’s
bystander liability claim because the underlying excessive force claim fails.
c. Deliberate indifference
Reynolds alleges all individual officer-defendants violated his Four-
teenth Amendment rights by subjecting him to a substantial risk of serious
bodily harm and responding with deliberate indifference. Specifically, Reyn-
olds opposes summary judgment on the ground that he was denied restroom
access and forced to remain in his urine for over an hour in the restraint chair.
The Fourteenth Amendment guarantees pretrial detainees a right
“not to have their serious medical needs met with deliberate indifference on
the part of the confining officials.” Thompson v. Upshur Cnty., 245 F.3d 447,
457 (5th Cir. 2001). Reynolds must demonstrate “(1) objectively, the de-
fendants exposed him to a substantial risk of serious harm and denied him the
minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities and (2) subjectively, the de-
fendants were deliberately indifferent to the risk.” Taylor v. Stevens, 946 F.3d
211, 224 (5th Cir. 2019). “Deliberate indifference is an extremely high
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standard to meet.” Domino v. Tex. Dep’t of Crim. Just., 239 F.3d 752, 756
(5th Cir. 2001).
Deliberate indifference may be established through inferences arising
from circumstantial evidence, and a factfinder may infer the requisite
knowledge from the fact that the risk of harm was “obvious.” See Farmer v.
Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 842 (1994); Dyer v. Houston, 964 F.3d 374, 385 (5th
Cir. 2020). A custodial officer acts with deliberate indifference to a de-
tainee’s serious medical needs if the officer “‘refuse[s] to treat him, ignore[s]
his complaints, intentionally treat[s] him incorrectly, or engage[s] in any sim-
ilar conduct that would clearly evince a wanton disregard for any serious
medical needs.’” Sims v. Griffin, 35 F.4th 945, 951 (5th Cir. 2022) (quoting
Easter v. Powell, 467 F.3d 459, 465 (5th Cir. 2006)).
The district court found that “denying Reynolds restroom access un-
der the circumstances here did not create a substantial risk of serious harm.”
While we have held that denying inmates “a minimally sanitary way to relieve
themselves” may expose them to a substantial risk of serious harm, we cau-
tioned that such cases are “extraordinary” and explicitly warned that
“[n]othing in th[ese] opinion[s] requires prison officials to provide a prisoner
with a squeaky-clean toilet nor to escort him to the restroom whenever he
wishes.” Taylor, 946 F.3d at 225, 225 n.20 (citing Palmer v. Johnson, 193 F.3d
346, 352–53 (5th Cir. 1999)). We acknowledge the obvious — that Reynolds
is not complaining that the toilet provided was not squeaky-clean. The com-
plaint is that no access to a toilet, clean or not, was provided.
In our Taylor decision, prison officials ordered the plaintiff “to urinate
in the drain in his cell’s floor, even though it was already overflowing with
sewage.” Id. at 223. After more than 24 hours, the plaintiff’s bladder pain
was so great that he involuntarily urinated into the drain, which overflowed
and spilled sewage onto the floor, on which he was forced to sleep naked. Id.
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“Eventually, [the plaintiff] had to be treated for a distended bladder and was
catheterized.” Id. We held that a reasonable jury could find that in these
circumstances the plaintiff was exposed “to a substantial risk of serious harm
and deprived . . . of the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities.” Id.
at 224.
Similarly, Palmer v. Johnson dealt with a plaintiff and 48 other inmates
who were forced to sleep outdoors overnight; were confined to a 20-by-30-
foot area bounded by poles and lights for 17 hours; were denied shelter, jack-
ets, blankets, or other means of keeping warm in temperatures below 59 de-
grees; were exposed to noxious fumes; and were made to urinate and defecate
in the ground beneath themselves, right next to their fellow inmates. 193 F.3d
at 349–50.
We agree with the district court that both Taylor and Palmer are dis-
tinguishable from this case:
Reynolds’s deprivation here was very different. Reynolds was
not held in an unsanitary cell, was not exposed to sewage or the
waste of others, and was not forced to urinate and defecate in a
confined area shared with other detainees. Rather, Reynolds
was kept in a clean, climate-controlled cell by himself with De-
fendants checking on him regularly.
Reynolds sat in his urine for just “over an hour” before the officers
released him from the restraint chair, gave him a clean jail uniform, had the
floor mopped, and permitted Reynolds to take a shower. Reynolds’s alleged
injuries, at worst, amount to temporary sensations of discomfort, not serious
harm. As the district court stated, “Reynolds was not subjected to inhumane
conditions and was given an opportunity to clean himself after release.” Ac-
cordingly, Reynolds cannot show a substantial risk of serious harm.
Moreover, there is no evidence that the individual officer-defendants
acted with deliberate indifference to such alleged risk. Reynolds’s only
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allegation in support of his contention is that officers should have known he
would urinate on himself if kept in the restraint chair overnight, and that De-
fendant Cox allegedly told Reynolds he should urinate on himself. Neither
the refusal to release Reynolds from the chair nor Defendant Cox’s alleged
statement is evidence that any individual officer-defendant was actually
aware of a substantial risk of serious harm or subjectively intended that harm
occur.
In sum, Reynolds cannot show the individual officer-defendants pos-
sessed information that made them subjectively infer that a substantial risk of
serious harm existed and that they intended harm to occur. Qualified im-
munity for the individual officer-defendants was properly granted as to all of
Reynolds’s constitutional claims.
II. Monell liability against Wood County
Reynolds also asserts the district court erred in granting summary
judgment as to his deliberate indifference claim against Wood County. Reyn-
olds contends Wood County maintained a “custom and practice” of using
the restraint chair longer than necessary and as a form of punishment.
Local governments are liable for a policy or custom that causes a con-
stitutional injury under Section 1983. Monell v. Dept. of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S.
658, 690–91 (1978). To succeed on a municipal liability claim, plaintiffs must
show “(1) an official policy (or custom), (2) of which a policy maker can be
charged with actual or constructive knowledge, and (3) a constitutional vio-
lation whose ‘moving force’ is that policy (or custom).” Newbury v. City of
Windcrest, 991 F.3d 672, 680 (5th Cir. 2021) (quotations marks and citations
omitted).
An official policy is “[a] policy statement, ordinance, regulation, or
decision that is officially adopted and promulgated by the municipality’s law-
making officers or by an official to whom the lawmakers have delegated
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policy-making authority.” Bennett v. City of Slidell, 735 F.2d 861, 862 (5th
Cir. 1984). An official policy can also be
[a] persistent, widespread practice of city officials or employ-
ees, which, although not authorized by officially adopted and
promulgated policy, is so common and well settled as to consti-
tute a custom that fairly represents municipal policy. Actual or
constructive knowledge of such custom must be attributable to
the governing body of the municipality or to an official to whom
that body had delegated policy-making authority.
Id.Proving a custom or practice “requires sufficiently numerous prior in-
cidents, as opposed to isolated instances.” Peterson v. City of Fort Worth, 588
F.3d 838, 851 (5th Cir. 2009) (quotations marks and citations omitted). Prior
incidents must be similar and specific: “prior indications cannot simply be
for any and all bad or unwise acts, but rather must point to the specific viola-
tion in question.” Id. (quotation marks and citation omitted). Isolated inci-
dents of official misconduct by a governmental entity’s non-policymaking
employees are inadequate to prove knowledge and acquiescence by the en-
tity’s policymakers. See Fraire v. City of Arlington, 957 F.2d 1268, 1278 (5th
Cir. 1992).
The district court here held that Reynolds cannot establish municipal
liability against Wood County because there was no evidence of a policy or
custom, and Reynolds failed to show a policymaker had knowledge of the al-
leged unconstitutional policy. Reynolds’s only evidence of an allegedly un-
constitutional “custom and practice” are over 50 “15 Minute Check Sheets”
showing the instances in which the restraint chair was used in the Wood
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County Jail between February 19, 2018, and July 26, 2019.2 The district court
found two problems with Reynolds’s summary judgment evidence. First,
the logs fail to provide enough detail for the court or any rea-
sonable juror to determine whether using the restraint chair in
the prior instances was improper. Each of the fifty-three check
sheets identifies only the detainee’s name, the date, and the
times a jailer checked on the detainee in the chair.
Reynolds admits, “the use of a restraint chair is not ipso facto unconstitu-
tional.” Reynolds argues, though, the district court should have inferred —
from the face of the Check Sheets only — that inmates without a “4” nota-
tion for “combative” were not combative. The district court addressed why
it could not make such an assumption:
Reynolds offers no evidence corroborating his claim that every
time an officer failed to mark “combative” on a log the de-
tainee had ceased to pose a threat. The logs therefore show
nothing more than Defendants using a restraint chair on other
detainees.
As the district court stated, using a restraint chair, even for extended
periods, is not inherently unconstitutional. For example, a panel once held
that restraining a pretrial detainee for up to 20 hours was not unconstitu-
tional, because the restraint was necessary to prevent the detainee’s disrup-
tive behavior. Blakeney v. Rusk Cnty. Sheriff, 89 F. App’x 897, 899 (5th Cir.
2004). We agree that the length of time for the restraint will not generally be
enough to show a constitutional violation. The Check Sheets merely show
2
Wood County objected to the admissibility of the “15 Minute Check Sheets.”
The district court determined that it “need not decide the objection because even assuming
the logs are admissible, the Court concludes that they are insufficient to raise a genuine
issue of material fact to defeat summary judgment.” We agree with the district court and
therefore do not revisit Wood County’s renewed objection on appeal.
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use of the restraint chair for various amounts of time, not whether the use
was improper.
Second, the district court cited some Fifth Circuit caselaw disfavoring
finding an unconstitutional custom or practice based upon “historical rec-
ords lacking contemporaneous allegations of misconduct.” See Davidson v.
City of Stafford, 848 F.3d 384, 396 & n.6 (5th Cir. 2017), as revised (Mar. 31,
2017); Pineda v. City of Houston, 291 F.3d 325, 329 (5th Cir. 2002). Reynolds
has produced no prior lawsuits or complaints involving use of the restraint
chair in the Wood County Jail. In fact, insofar as this record shows, Reyn-
olds’s complaint is the first.
The Check Sheets, therefore, cannot establish a custom or practice of
improperly using the restraint chair. “Mere ‘improbable inferences’ and
‘unsupported speculation’ are not proper summary judgment evidence.”
Zarnow v. City of Wichita Falls, 614 F.3d 161, 169 (5th Cir. 2010).
The district court properly granted summary judgment on the Monell
claim.
AFFIRMED.
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