Magistrate Denies Summary Judgement on Qualified Immunity Claim in Case in Which a Sergeant Confiscated Glasses From a Legally Blind Inmate Who Subsequently Fell Down Stairs
The qualified immunity doctrine insulates governmental agents from liability for unconstitutional acts as long “as their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known.” Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). The primary purpose of the doctrine “is to protect them ‘from undue interference with their duties and from potentially disabling threats of liability.’” Elder v. Holloway, 510 U.S. 510, 514 (1994) (quoting Harlow, 457 U.S. at 806).
Defendants typically try to invoke the qualified immunity defense by doing one or two things: (1) claiming that there is no prior case involving the exact same facts in which the court found a constitutional violation; and/or (2) claiming that there was a case involving similar, but less egregious conduct in which the court found that there was not a constitutional violation. As I argue in my new essay “The End of Comparative Qualified Immunity,” both of these lines of defense are now in doubt after the Supreme Court’s recent opinion in Taylor v. Riojas and summary disposition in McCoy v. Alamu. Instead, if no reasonable defendant could have concluded that his behavior was constitutionally permissible, the qualified immunity defense is unavailable.
This theory finds purchase in the recent opinion of the United States District Court for the District of Nevada in Villatoro v. Preston, 2021 WL 624611 (D. Nev. 2021). In Villatoro, plaintiff Balmore Villatoro alleged that he
is blind in his left eye, and has decreased visual acuity in his right eye….Plaintiff claims that upon entering NDOC he told unidentified medical and custodial staff of his vision issues….It appears he was issued glasses on August 11, 2013….
Plaintiff sent a kite on August 10, 2014, stating that he is legally blind in both eyes, and the lenses he had were not correct and were not protecting what vision he had left. He indicated that he needed a transitional lens that was extra dark. Poag responded on August 13, 2014: “We do not issue transition lenses. Your current sunglasses are adequate.”…Plaintiff asserts he purchased clip-on tinted lenses that were once sold in the NDOC store for use with his glasses….According to Plaintiff, on February 21, 2015, when he was standing in line for pill call, [LCC Nursing Director Don] Poag directed [Sergeant Bobby] Preston to confiscate Plaintiff’s state-issued prescription glasses because he had attached the clip-on sunglasses to them, claiming they were altered and unauthorized property….It is undisputed that Preston deemed Plaintiff’s eyeglasses as altered and unauthorized property on February 21, 2015….Plaintiff asserts that Preston told him that Poag asked Preston to confiscate the glasses. Plaintiff begged Preston not to take the glasses because he is blind without his glasses. Plaintiff then asked Preston to just take off the clip-on portion and leave him with his glasses, but Preston said no….According to Plaintiff, around 8:15 p.m. that night, he left his cell with a bowl of food in his hand to go downstairs to heat it in the microwave, and as he was descending the stairs he slipped and fell and rolled down some of the stairs. An officer responded, and Plaintiff told the officer that his glasses had been taken from him, and he could not see the stairs to tell where to place his feet….
Plaintiff submitted an emergency grievance that same day stating that a correctional officer took his glasses that he needs to see, and he fell down the stairs because he cannot see without his glasses. He asked that they be returned for his safety. The emergency grievance was denied, stating that the glasses were taken because they were altered.
In response to Villatoro’s Eighth Amendment action against them, Poag and Preston moved for summary judgment, but Magistrate Judge William G. Cobb denied the motion, ruling as follows:
Defendants contend they are entitled to qualified immunity because even if Plaintiff’s glasses were confiscated and he fell down the stairs, case law did not indicate the actions of the Defendants violated the constitution. The case law was clear, however, that if a defendant knew of and disregarded a serious risk to an inmate’s safety, he violated the Eighth Amendment. In addition, the risk of taking away the glasses from an inmate who would be blind without them seems to be so obvious that no reasonable officer would have concluded it was constitutionally permissible. See e.g. Taylor v. Riojas, 141 S.Ct. 52 (2020); see also Williams v. ICC Comm., 812 F. Supp. 1029, 1032 (N.D. Cal. 1992) (allegation that inmate was deliberately deprived of eyeglasses when he was legally blind stated a cognizable Eighth Amendment claim) (emphasis added.
-CM