Justia U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

Plaintiff appealed the dismissal of his claims against various Arkansas Department of Corrections staff members for damages stemming from injuries that he received when he was beaten by another inmate. Plaintiff alleged that Defendants failed to protect him from the beating. The district court dismissed Plaintiff’s claim on summary judgment, finding that he had failed to exhaust his administrative remedies even though he remained hospitalized from his injuries until the time for filing expired. At issue is whether the district court erred in dismissing Plaintiff’s complaint for failure to exhaust administrative remedies.   The Eighth Circuit reversed and remanded. The court concluded that the district court’s rant of summary judgment was premature. The court explained that the district court legally erred in declining to decide whether administrative remedies were “unavailable” to Plaintiff. As the Supreme Court stressed in Ross, the PLRA “contains its own textual exception to mandatory exhaustion.” The court explained that under the PLRA, the exhaustion requirement hinges on the ‘availability’ of administrative remedies. The court reversed because the district court declined to decide whether the prison’s grievance procedure was unavailable to Plaintiff. View "John Smith v. Jeremy Andrews" on Justia Law

Plaintiff, for her son A.H., sued Defendant Officer under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, alleging he used excessive force by not giving a warning while searching with a canine trained to “bite and hold.” Trimble moved for summary judgment. The district court denied qualified immunity on the excessive force claim. Defendant appealed.   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that there is no dispute that Defendant did not provide a warning when he deployed Ace or when Ace alerted to fresh human odor during the search. The parties dispute whether A.H. heard the warnings from the other officers. A.H., lying underneath a trailer, testified he did not hear any warnings. The court wrote that assuming the facts most favorably to A.H., he did not hear the other officers’ warnings and did not have the opportunity to surrender. Defendant had fair notice from the court’s precedent that the failure to give a warning and an opportunity to surrender violated clearly established law. View "TonyaMarie Adams v. Nathan Trimble" on Justia Law

Plaintiff contracted to haul freight for CTW Transportation Services. Two weeks later, CTW terminated the contract. On October 7, 2020, Plaintiff filed an administrative complaint against CTW with the Department of Labor, alleging that his contract was terminated in violation of 49 U.S.C. Section 31105(a) for reporting safety violations. The administrative law judge (“ALJ”) ordered discovery to close on May 25 and set trial for July 27. At his deposition on March 30, Plaintiff testified that his attorney had not produced all the documents he had given him. Once in federal court, Plaintiff reasserted his Section 31105(a) retaliation claim. CTW moved to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction. The district court agreed that it lacked jurisdiction.   The Eighth Circuit vacated the dismissal. The court explained that in finding that it lacked jurisdiction, the district court did not find that pre-May 5 conduct alone caused the delay. Instead, it relied almost exclusively on Plaintiff’s conduct after May 5, 2011. For example, Plaintiff’s failure to prepare the case for trial and his “heaping personal insults on the ALJ” all occurred in August and September. Such conduct could not have caused the Secretary’s failure to meet the 210-day deadline. CTW argues that we can still affirm because Plaintiff engaged in bad-faith conduct before May 5. But because the district court did not specifically find that pre-May 5 conduct alone caused the Secretary to miss the deadline, its order dismissing the case must be vacated. View "Avery Wilson v. CTW Transportation Services" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs sued police officers under Sec. 1983 after the officers made warrantless entry into their apartment. The district court granted summary judgment to Plaintiffs and Defendants appealed.On appeal, the Eighth Circuit reversed. While warrantless searches are presumptively unreasonable, there is an exception when officers act with probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and an objectively reasonable basis to believe that exigent circumstances exist.Here, the officers were dispatched to the scene in response to a report of domestic violence. The report received by the officers explained that the 911 call came from a neighbor who thought “abuse” was occurring and heard a “verbal argument,” “someone being thrown around,” and “yelling and screaming” in the upstairs apartment. The neighbor stated that a woman, her boyfriend, and a child lived in the apartment. This created anm exigency, justifying warrantless entry. View "Benedda Cotten v. Ryan Miller" on Justia Law

The Eighth Circuit reversed the district court’s ruling denying the Deputy’s motion for qualified immunity in Plaintiff’s lawsuit, alleging that the Deputy’s conduct amounted to deliberate indifference to her seizure condition after she was arrested for driving while intoxicated. The Deputy asserted qualified immunity in his motion for summary judgment, which the district court denied.   The Eighth Circuit reversed. The court explained that the Deputy promptly attended to Plaintiff and asked her whether she was hurt or suffered from medical problems. She said no and did not advise him of her seizure disorder. Emergency medical personnel also observed Plaintiff and were content not to take her to the hospital, advising the Deputy that she had refused further treatment. He then took Plaintiff and her medications to jail. Barton I did not provide the Deputy with fair notice that his failure to seek further medical treatment for Plaintiff or to speak with the jailors about what Plaintiff’s boyfriend told him constituted deliberate indifference. Thus, Plaintiff failed to show that clearly established law prohibited the Deputy’s conduct, and the Deputy is entitled to qualified immunity. View "Kelly Martin v. Jordan Turner" on Justia Law

Respondent suffers from multiple mental disorders, including schizophrenia. In 2018, he was sentenced to 80 months imprisonment for being a felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition. He was due to be released on January 8, 2021. Prior to his release, the government filed a petition pursuant to 18 U.S.C. Section 4246, requesting that Respondent be committed to the custody of the Attorney General because, the government asserted, Respondent suffers from mental disorders that pose a significant danger to the public if he were released. The district court granted the government’s Section 4246 petition, of which Respondent appealed.   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that Respondent’s main assertion, that “the evidence presented at the Section 4246 hearing failed to demonstrate . . . that he is ‘presently’ suffering from a mental disease which now poses a substantial risk of bodily injury to others,” is belied by his own testimony. For example, at the Section 4246 hearing, he testified that he started the CIA and that he has “to get violent with some of these people, dangerous people in the community,” in order to protect the community. This, in combination with the evidence that he actually acted upon his delusions when he attacked other inmates and a prison official, shows that he is suffering from a mental disease that now poses a substantial risk of bodily injury to others. The district court’s findings, to that effect, were not clearly erroneous. View "United States v. Erik Becerra" on Justia Law

Plaintiff brought a 42 U.S.C. Section 1983 action after her son was shot and killed by a City of Minneapolis Police Officer. The district court found Defendant was entitled to qualified immunity as to his initial use of deadly force but not the continued use of force after Jordan dropped his knife and had fallen to the ground. In this interlocutory appeal, Defendant asserted he is entitled to qualified immunity as to the entire encounter, which lasted a total of about two seconds.   The Eighth Circuit reversed the denial of qualified immunity. The court explained that its review of the videos of the incident establishes that Defendant never paused during the shooting, which lasted less than two seconds, and he continued shooting for only approximately one second after Plaintiff’s son fell to the ground, dropping the knife. Given the swift and continuous progression of the incident and Defendant’s limited time to observe and process the circumstances, a jury could not find Defendant had sufficient time to reassess the threat presented before he stopped firing. Further, the court explained that even if Plaintiff’s son’s emotional condition perhaps mitigated the threat he posed to the responding officers, a question we need not reach, this detail does not sufficiently distinguish this case from Cook such that Defendant would have had “fair warning” that his conduct violated a constitutional right. View "Florine Ching v. Ofc. Neal Walsh" on Justia Law

This case was brought by a class of sex offenders (Appellants) civilly committed to the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP) pursuant to the Minnesota Civil Commitment and Treatment Act: Sexually Dangerous Persons and Sexual Psychopathic Personalities, codified at Minnesota Statute Section 253D (MCTA). Appellants filed this action against various MSOP managers and officials, as well as the Commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Human Services (collectively, Appellees). On remand after a second appeal to this Court, the district court granted judgment in favor of Appellees on all of Appellants’ claims. Appellants appeal, challenging the district court’s judgment.   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that Appellants contend that the district court erred by declining to address their treatment-related claims, alleging that the district court found them to be duplicative of previously decided counts. The court wrote that in making this finding, the district court did not dismiss or otherwise ignore any of the counts before it, which were all conditions-of-confinement and inadequate medical care claims. While Appellants attempted to “reanimate” these claims in a Fourth Amended Complaint, the district court denied the amendment, and Appellants do not challenge that decision on appeal. Accordingly, the court perceived no error in the district court’s treatment of Appellants’ treatment-related claims. Appellants additionally attacked the district court’s conclusion that the MSOP’s Behavioral Expectation Report policy is constitutional. But Appellants focused only on the impact of the policy on their treatment and fail to address the other legitimate government objectives it addresses—such as preserving institutional order at the MSOP. View "Kevin Karsjens v. Jodi Harpstead" on Justia Law

Plaintiff alleged was assaulted by his daughter’s ex-boyfriend and the ex-boyfriend’s cousin outside his house in Camden County, Missouri, in December 2011. He reported the assault to the Camden County Sheriff’s Department the following May. After no charges were brought, Plaintiff filed a civil suit against the alleged assailants. While pursuing his civil suit, Plaintiff claimed he discovered that the sheriff’s department refused to investigate the assault because the assailants were related to the county’s clerk of court. This refusal meant that Plaintiff could obtain very little evidence of the assault. Plaintiff then filed an action against officials in the sheriff’s department for claims under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983 and the Missouri Constitution. He claimed that Defendants’ inadequate investigation deprived him of his equal protection and due process rights. Defendants moved to dismiss Plaintiff’s complaint for lack of standing. They also moved for summary judgment. The district court granted summary judgment to the Defendants and denied their motion to dismiss as moot. Plaintiff appealed.   The Eighth Circuit vacated the district court’s grant of summary judgment as to Plaintiff’s federal claims and remanded with instructions to dismiss these claims for lack of standing. The court affirmed to Plaintiff’s state law claims.  The court explained that it has not yet addressed whether a crime victim has standing to sue a government official for an inadequate investigation. However, the court has held that a crime victim cannot sue a government official for failing to prosecute his assailant. View "Jeffery Pratt v. Tony Helms" on Justia Law

After Plaintiff twice lost out on a promotion, she sued Union Pacific for discrimination. The question is whether a dispute over the interpretation of a collective-bargaining agreement required dismissal. Union Pacific to sought dismissal under the Railway Labor Act, see 45 U.S.C. Section 151, et seq., which requires disputes over the interpretation of a collective-bargaining agreement to go to arbitration. The district court granted the motion to dismiss.   The Eighth Circuit affirmed. The court explained that the parties agree that this case does not involve an attempt to “form” or “secure” a collective-bargaining agreement, so it does not fall into the major-dispute category. In a failure-to-promote case like this one, Plaintiff must establish that (1) she “was a member of a protected group; (2) she was qualified and applied for a promotion to a position for which the employer was seeking applicants; (3) she was not promoted; and (4) similarly situated employees, not part of the protected group, were promoted instead.” The sticking point is whether she actually applied for either promotion: she says she did, but Union Pacific disagreed. Whether faxed resumes count as applications under the collective-bargaining agreement is something she will have to prove to establish her prima-facie case. Perhaps the best evidence of its importance was the prominent role it played at trial, especially in the questioning by Plaintiff’s attorney. In these circumstances, the issue is one for the National Railroad Adjustment Board to decide. View "Nancy Avina v. Union Pacific Railroad Co." on Justia Law