PHYLLIS WHITE, acting as Administrator for the Estate of Jean Danison, WILLIAM ROSTAD, acting as Administrator for the Estate of Jean Danison, Plaintiffs-Appellants, versus BILL LEMACKS, individually and in his official capacity as former Sheriff of Clayton County, Georgia, STANLEY TUGGLE, individually and in his official capacities as Sheriff and Deputy Sheriff of Clayton County, Georgia, CLAYTON COUNTY, GEORGIA, Defendants-Appellees.
No. 98-9513
United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit
August 10, 1999
D.C. Docket No. 1:98-cv-2063-CAM. [PUBLISH]
(August 10, 1999)
CARNES, Circuit Judge:
Plaintiffs William Rostad, acting as administrator for the estate of Jean Danison, and Phyllis White appeal the district court‘s dismissal of their
I. BACKGROUND
A. FACTS
According to the amended complaint, White and Danison were nurses in the employ of Prison Health Services, Inc., which was under contract to provide medical services to the inmate population at the Clayton County Jail. As a condition of their job, and while performing their nursing duties at the jail, they were required to be in close contact with inmates and their freedom of movement and ability to flee or otherwise protect themselves were limited. Although they had
On July 23, 1996, while carrying out their nursing duties in the jail infirmary, White and Danison were attacked and brutally beaten by an inmate who was being held on aggravated assault charges. During the attack, White‘s head was slammed repeatedly against the floor while the inmate threatened to kill her. She was physically beaten about the head and body. Danison, too, was physically beaten by the inmate. At the time of the attack, one deputy sheriff had been assigned for White and Danison‘s protection, but that deputy was easily subdued. The attack continued until additional law enforcement personnel responded and the inmate was restrained.
B. PROCEDURAL HISTORY
In their initial complaint, plaintiffs brought claims against Sheriff Lemacks and Deputy Sheriff Tuggle in their individual and official capacities, and against Clayton County, Georgia, for substantive due process violations under both the
Defendants responded with a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim
II. DISCUSSION
We review de novo the district court‘s dismissal of a complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief could be granted. See Republic of Panama v. BCCI Holdings (Luxembourg) S.A., 119 F.3d 935, 948 (11th Cir. 1997). When considering a
We are bound to follow prior panel decisions, except where they have been overruled either by an en banc decision of this Court or a decision of the Supreme Court. See, e.g., United States v. Steele, 147 F.3d 1316, 1317-18 (11th Cir. 1998) (en banc); United States v. Hogan, 986 F.2d 1364, 1369 (11th Cir. 1993). This case involves the second part of that exception.
In Cornelius v. Town of Highland Lake, 880 F.2d 348 (11th Cir. 1989), we said that state and local government entities could be held liable for substantive due process violations for their failure to protect victims from harm caused by third parties where the state had a “special relationship” with the victim, or where the state, through its affirmative acts, put the victim in “special danger” of harm. Our holding in Cornelius is best described against the specific facts of that case. Plaintiff Harriet Cornelius was working at the Highland Lake town hall as the Town Clerk when she was abducted at knife point by two prison inmates and forced to accompany them for three days, during which time they terrorized her with threats of physical violence. The inmates were in the vicinity of town hall
Cornelius brought a suit under
In the special relationship analysis, we noted that “if Mrs. Cornelius wished to continue serving as the town clerk, she had to work in the environment created by the town officials; one that included routine exposure to prison inmates around the town hall.” Id. at 355. We viewed the employment relationship between Cornelius and the town as a special relationship giving rise to a substantive due process duty on the part of the state to protect her from harm.
Under the special danger portion of the analysis, we observed “that the town and prison officials affirmatively acted together in bringing the inmates into the community of Highland Lake via the work squad program.” Id. at 357. Moreover, there was evidence indicating that: (1) the town officials assigned to supervise the
Likewise, in this case, working around inmates was a necessary part of the plaintiffs’ job,1 and they have alleged that these governmental defendants failed to take adequate measures to protect them from the inmates and were deliberately indifferent to their safety. Accordingly, if Cornelius is still good law, these plaintiffs probably have pleaded a valid substantive due process claim. But Cornelius is not the last word on the subject.
Less than three years after our Cornelius decision, the Supreme Court in Collins v. City of Harker Heights, 503 U.S. 115, 127 (1992), unanimously rejected as “unprecedented” a claim that a government employer had a federal constitutional obligation to provide its employees (as distinguished from individuals such as prisoners whom it had deprived of their
The Supreme Court read Collins’ claim as advancing two theories. First, that “the Federal Constitution imposes a duty on the city to provide its employees with minimal levels of safety and security in the workplace[.]” Id. at 126. Second, that “the city‘s ‘deliberate indifference’ to [her husband‘s] safety was arbitrary government action that must ‘shock the conscience’ of federal judges.” Id.
In rejecting those two theories, the Court emphasized that consensual
Our refusal to characterize the city‘s alleged omission in this case as arbitrary in a constitutional sense rests on the presumption that the administration of government programs is based on a rational decisionmaking process that takes account of competing social, political, and economic forces. Decisions concerning the allocation of resources to individual programs, such as sewer maintenance, and to particular aspects of those programs, such as the training and compensation of employees, involve a host of policy choices that must be made by locally elected representatives, rather than by federal judges interpreting the basic charter of Government for the entire country. The Due Process Clause is not a guarantee against incorrect or ill-advised personnel decisions. Nor does it guarantee municipal employees a workplace that is free of unreasonable risks of harm.
Id. (internal quotations and citations omitted).
After Collins, it appears the only relationships that automatically give rise to
Thus, Collins directly conflicts with and overrules the part of Cornelius holding that a government employment relationship, in and of itself, is a “special relationship” giving rise to a constitutional duty to protect individuals from harm by third parties. As a result, the part of Cornelius adopting, or perpetuating, a “special relationship” doctrine that guarantees government employees constitutional protection from unreasonable risks of harm in the workplace is no longer good law.
The opinion reminds us, for example, that the Supreme Court has been “reluctant to expand the concept of substantive due process,” and that judicial self-restraint requires courts to exercise the utmost care in this area. See Collins, 503 U.S. at 125. More specifically, we are told in the Collins opinion that when governmental action or inaction reflects policy decisions about resource allocation (as is often the case), those decisions are better made “by locally elected representatives, rather than by federal judges interpreting the basic charter of Government for the entire country.” Id. at 128-29. In other words, when someone not in custody is harmed because not enough resources were devoted to their safety and protection, that harm will seldom, if ever, be cognizable under the Due Process Clause. Finally, we have the reasoning
In determining whether the conduct alleged in Cornelius or in this case was “arbitrary or conscience shocking” under Collins, it is important to note that none of the plaintiffs in Collins, Cornelius, or this case alleged that the state intended to harm them or their relatives, but only that the state had been, at most, deliberately indifferent to their safety. Although Lewis leaves open the possibility that deliberate indifference on the part of the state will “shock the conscience” in some circumstances, see 523 U.S. at 848-50, it is clear after Collins that such indifference in the context of routine decisions about employee or workplace safety cannot carry a plaintiff‘s case across that high threshold.
As it was in Collins, so it was in Cornelius, and so it is in this case. The decisions to be made by government and its officials were materially identical in all three cases. In Cornelius, the question was whether to provide additional supervision or other protection to employees when prison inmates are working around the job site; in Collins, the question was whether to provide better training and other safeguards to city employees working in hazardous conditions; and, in
To summarize, the “special relationship” and “special danger” doctrines applied in our decision in Cornelius are no longer good law, having been superseded by the standard employed by the Supreme Court in Collins. Under Collins, state and local government officials violate the substantive due process rights of individuals not in custody only when those officials cause harm by engaging in conduct that is “arbitrary, or conscience shocking, in a constitutional sense,” and that standard is to be narrowly interpreted and applied. While deliberate indifference to the safety of government employees in the workplace may constitute a tort under state law, it does not rise to the level of a substantive
One last item of business remains. In the seven years since Collins, we have questioned at least five times whether Cornelius retains any viability after Collins. See Mitchell v. Duval County Sch. Bd., 107 F.3d 837, 838-39 & n.3 (11th Cir. 1997) (“[T]here is some question whether Cornelius‘s special danger theory of liability remains good law” because “Cornelius may not have survived [Collins].“); Hamilton v. Cannon, 80 F.3d 1525, 1531 n.6 (11th Cir. 1996) (“‘Cornelius’ viability is questionable in light of the Supreme Court‘s subsequent decision in [Collins].“); Lovins v. Lee, 53 F.3d 1208, 1211 (11th Cir. 1995) (“[T]here is considerable doubt about whether [Cornelius] survives the Supreme Court‘s subsequent Collins decision.“); Wooten v. Campbell, 49 F.3d 696, 700 n.4 (11th Cir. 1995) (“There is some question whether this court‘s holding in Cornelius survive[s] the Supreme Court‘s decision in [Collins].“); Wright v. Lovin, 32 F.3d 538, 541 n.1 (11th Cir. 1994) (“[T]here is some doubt whether our holding in Cornelius has survived the Supreme Court‘s recent holding in [Collins].“). In the face of the obvious, it seems we have never quite been able to say goodbye to Cornelius, always avoiding the question of whether it has actually left the realm of living precedent in the wake of Collins. We avoided the question in each of the cited cases by factually distinguishing Cornelius in one way or another, and concluding that, even if
Enough is enough. Like a favorite uncle who has passed away in the parlor, Cornelius needs to be interred. We do so now. Recognizing that it was dealt a fatal blow by Collins, we pronounce Cornelius dead and buried. The law on substantive due process when a citizen who is not in custody claims that a governmental unit, agency, or official has caused her harm is supplied by the Collins decision, which occupies the field to the exclusion of anything we said about such cases in Cornelius. See also Lewis, 523 U.S. at 847.
III. CONCLUSION
The district court was correct in granting the defendants’ motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, because the plaintiffs failed to allege a violation of substantive due process.
AFFIRMED.