Deliberate Indifference

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7^th Circuit court of Appeals

Case Name: Ashoor Rasho v. Willard O. Elyea, et al

Case No.: 14-1902

Officials: POSNER and WILLIAMS, Circuit Judges, and WOOD, District Judge

Focus: Deliberate Indifference

Ashoor Rasho arrived at the Pontiac Correctional Center (“Pontiac”), an Illinois prison, in 2003. Rasho has a history of mental illness and, after he stopped taking his medication and began showing escalating symptoms, he was transferred into Pontiac’s Mental Health Unit. He remained in the Mental Health Unit until 2006, when he was transferred to the North Segregation Unit. Rasho believes that he was transferred out of the Mental Health Unit not because he no longer required the specialized treatment offered there but instead in retaliation for complaints he had lodged against various prison staff. According to Rasho, after he was transferred, he was denied even minimally adequate mental health care for more than 20 months. Rasho subsequently filed a lawsuit pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the Pontiac staff psychiatrist and psychology services administrator who recommended his transfer out of the Mental Health Unit, as well as the warden, medical director, and director of mental health, alleging that each acted with deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution.1 The district court granted summary judgment in favor of all of the defendants. Rasho now appeals.

Affirmed in part

Reversed and remanded in part

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Attorney Derek A. Hawkins is the managing partner at Hawkins Law Offices LLC, where he heads up the firm’s startup law practice. He specializes in business formation, corporate governance, intellectual property protection, private equity and venture capital funding and mergers & acquisitions. Check out the website at www.hawkins-lawoffices.com or contact them at 262-737-8825.