Civil Rights — deliberate indifference

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U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit

Civil

Civil Rights — deliberate indifference

The fact that other inmates had committed suicide is insufficient to prove that a jail was deliberately indifferent to the plaintiff’s risk of suicide.

“Mr. Pittman submits that the jail’s suicide prevention policies and practices were so inadequate that they constitute a constitutional violation. In evaluating this claim, we begin by noting that we have recognized in earlier cases that the ‘existence or possibility of other better policies which might have been used does not necessarily mean that the defendant was being deliberately indifferent.’ Frake v. City of Chi., 210 F.3d 779, 782 (7th Cir. 2000); cf. Belbachir, 726 F.3d at 983. Here, the jail provided written suicide prevention policies to officers and those officers received annual training. Mr. Pittman points to no particular deficiency in those policies or in the training regime of the facility. Nor can the fact that the jail experienced thirty-six suicide attempts and three successful suicides—standing alone—evidence that the jail’s policies are inadequate. The bare fact that other inmates attempted suicide does not demonstrate that the jail’s policies were inadequate, that officials were aware of any suicide risk posed by the policies or that officials failed to take appropriate steps to protect Mr. Pittman. See Thomas v. Cook Cnty. Sheriff’s Dep’t, 604 F.3d 293, 303 (7th Cir. 2010) (refusing to adopt ‘bright-line rules defining a “widespread custom or practice”’ and emphasizing that the plaintiff must ‘demonstrate that there is a policy at issue rather than a random event’). Nor does the mere fact that the trained prison custodial personnel followed a widespread practice of exercising individual discretion in determining when and how to seek mental health services for inmates and detainees, standing alone, establish that such a practice was a clear constitutional violation. The record does not disclose that the number of attempted suicides and successful attempts required a reevaluation of existing policies or the retraining of jail personnel. Notably, the existing policies provided that jail officials were to respond to inmates’ and detainees’ signs of distress. Mr. Pittman certainly has not met his burden of showing that a failure to take remedial measures was necessary in order to meet constitutional standards. Mr. Pittman’s deliberate indifference claims against Madison County, Sheriff Hertz and Captain Gulash were properly dismissed at summary judgment.”

Affirmed in part, and Reversed in part.

12-3233 Pittman v. County of Madison, Illinois

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, Herndon, J., Ripple, J.