8th Amendment Violation

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7^th Circuit Court of Appeals

Case Name: Jon Giles v. Gabrielle Tobeck, et al.

Case No.: 17-1707

Officials: WOOD, Chief Judge, and KANNE and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges

Focus: 8th Amendment Violation

Jon Giles, an inmate at Jerome Combs Detention Center, was punched and bitten when he tried to protect his cellmate from a violent detainee’s assault. Giles sued several correctional officers, asserting that they failed to protect him from the attack in violation of the Eighth Amendment. The district court entered summary judgment for the defendants. Because a reasonable jury would be required to find from the undisputed evidence that the officers were not reckless, and that they responded reasonably both to the risk of an attack and the actual attack, we affirm the judgment.

As this is an appeal from the entry of summary judgment, we recount the facts in the light most favorable to Giles, the nonmovant. See Estate of Simpson v. Gorbett, 863 F.3d 740, 745 (7th Cir. 2017). Giles’s attacker, Kendrick Moore, had a history of violent interactions with inmates and correctional staff at the Center. Although Moore at one point was housed in segregation in a maximum‐security area, he had been placed on suicide watch shortly before the attack and moved to the first floor of a general‐population section of the prison called “E‐POD,” where he could more easily be monitored. While in E‐POD, Moore stayed alone in his cell and would be let out each day for only one hour, when no other detainees were to be released from their cells.

Given the preceding analysis, summary judgment was properly entered in the defendants’ favor. We therefore need not address the defendants’ remaining arguments. The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED.

Affirmed

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