PATRICIA POLANCO, ET AL V. RALPH DIAZ, ET AL, No. 22-15496 (9th Cir. 2023)
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High-level officials in the California prison system transferred 122 inmates from the California Institution for Men, where there was a widespread COVID-19 outbreak, to San Quentin State Prison, where there were no known cases of the virus. The transfer sparked an outbreak of COVID-19 at San Quentin that ultimately killed one prison guard and over twenty-five inmates. The guard’s family members sued the prison officials, claiming that the officials violated the guard’s due process rights. The officials moved to dismiss, arguing that they were entitled to qualified immunity. The district court denied the motion with respect to some of the officials, who then filed an interlocutory appeal.
The Ninth Circuit affirmed the district court’s denial of Defendants’ motion to dismiss. The panel held that based on the allegations in the complaint, Defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity. Plaintiffs sufficiently alleged a violation of the guard’s substantive due process right to be free from a state-created danger, under which state actors may be liable for their roles in creating or exposing individuals to danger they otherwise would not have faced. The panel held that the unlawfulness of defendants’ alleged actions was clearly established by the combination of two precedents: L.W. v. Grubbs, 974 F.2d 119 (9th Cir. 1992), which recognized a claim under the state-created danger doctrine arising out of a prison’s disregard for the safety of a female employee who was raped after being required to work alone with an inmate known to be likely to commit a violent crime if placed alone with a woman; and Pauluk v. Savage, 836 F.3d 1117 (9th Cir. 2016).
Court Description: Civil Rights/State-Created Danger/COVID-19 The panel affirmed the district court’s denial of defendants’ motion to dismiss a complaint on the basis of qualified immunity in an action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 by the family of San Quentin Prison guard Gilbert Polanco, who died from complications caused by COVID-19. * The Honorable Kathleen Cardone, United States District Judge for the Western District of Texas, sitting by designation. A few months into the COVID-19 pandemic, high-level officials in the California prison system transferred 122 inmates from the California Institution for Men, where there was a widespread COVID-19 outbreak, to San Quentin State Prison, where there were no known cases of the virus. The transfer sparked an outbreak of COVID-19 at San Quentin that ultimately killed Polanco and over twenty-five inmates.
The panel held that based on the allegations in the complaint, defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity. Plaintiffs sufficiently alleged a violation of Polanco’s substantive due process right to be free from a state-created danger, under which state actors may be liable for their roles in creating or exposing individuals to danger they otherwise would not have faced.
Taking the allegations in the complaint as true, the failure to adequately test or screen inmates prior to the transfer, the transfer itself, and the decision to house the inmates in open-aired cells upon arriving at San Quentin, among other things, placed Polanco in a much more dangerous position than he was in before, the danger was particularized and sufficiently severe to raise constitutional concerns, and defendants were aware of the danger that transferring potentially COVID-positive inmates to San Quentin would pose to employees.
The panel held that the unlawfulness of defendants’ alleged actions was clearly established by the combination of two precedents: L.W. v. Grubbs, 974 F.2d 119 (9th Cir.
1992), which recognized a claim under the state-created danger doctrine arising out of a prison’s disregard for the safety of a female employee who was raped after being required to work alone with an inmate known to be likely to commit a violent crime if placed alone with a woman; and Pauluk v. Savage, 836 F.3d 1117 (9th Cir. 2016), which recognized a claim under the state-created danger doctrine arising from an employer’s deliberate indifference to workplace conditions that exposed an employee to dangerous airborne mold. Accordingly, defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity.
Dissenting, Judge R. Nelson would hold that defendants were entitled to qualified immunity because no clearly established law placed defendants on notice that their alleged mismanagement of the COVID-19 pandemic at San Quentin prison was unconstitutional. Contrary to Supreme Court guidance, the majority employed a high level of generality to determine that the law was clearly established.
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