ST. LOUIS – A federal appellate court has reversed a lower court decision that certified classes of pre-trial and post-conviction detainees at St. Louis’ now-closed Medium Security Institution who challenged what they believe are the facility’s “inhumane” conditions.
In a June 3 ruling, U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit judges Lavenski Smith, Raymond Gruender and Bobby Shepherd opted to overturn the decision of the St. Louis federal court to certify classes that included plaintiffs James Cody, Vincent Grover, Michael Mosley, Callion Barnes, Eddie Williams, Jasmine Borden and Diedre Wortham.
Shepherd authored the court’s ruling in this matter. He noted the facility's "checkered past," which includes its closing in 2021 following action by St. Louis political leaders.
"Plaintiffs asserted that both categories of detainees were subjected to unconstitutionally poor physical conditions in the form of extreme temperatures, mold, faulty plumbing, and pest infestations, and unconstitutionally inadequate operations in the form of understaffing, inadequate recreation time and the excessive use of force,” Shepherd said.
The trial denied the first motion for class certification, but the plaintiffs came back with a more narrowly defined set of potential classes. There were two conditions classes and two heat classes. The latter referred to those detained when the ambient air temperature in St. Louis hit at least 88 degrees Fahrenheit.
The plaintiffs’ narrowed class definitions also set end dates: July 1, 2018 for the pre-trial and post-conviction conditions classes, and July 24, 2017 for the heat subclasses.
Subsequently, the trial court granted the plaintiffs’ class certification motion, leading the defendant to appeal this decision to the Eighth Circuit.
Shepherd began by examining the “conditions” subclass.
“In certifying the conditions classes, the District Court concluded: ‘Liability for all class members will depend on proof that the City had a policy or custom of detaining inmates in cells plagued with pest infestations, plumbing problems, and mold; that these conditions posed a substantial risk of serious harm to inmates; and that the City was deliberately indifferent to that risk,'" he wrote.
"The District Court reasoned that, because plaintiffs’ renewed motion alleged that these conditions applied to them in substantially uniform ways, class proceedings would generate common answers to the elements of their claims. When describing this standard for liability, the district court relied on only one binding decision, Beaulieu v. Ludeman,” Shepherd said.
But Shepherd called this reliance short of a "rigorous analysis" because it referenced only "isolated language from a singular binding authority."
"Moreover, the sole defendant in this matter is the city, and the District Court’s order certifying the classes failed to analyze any theories of liability under Monell," he wrote.
"A District Court that fails to conduct the requisite rigorous analysis when certifying a class under Rule 23(b)(3) abuses its discretion. As an initial matter, we note that ‘nothing so amorphous as ‘overall conditions’ can rise to the level of cruel and unusual punishment when no specific deprivation of a single human need exists.’
"Here, the certified class definitions referred to no specific conditions, let alone any mutually reinforcing combination of conditions: they were simply labeled ‘conditions’ classes and defined membership with reference to dates of incarceration. The city’s liability for plaintiffs’ conditions claims – concerning plumbing, mold and pests – will turn on both the severity of the conditions each plaintiff faced, and the length of exposure to those conditions.”
Shepherd found lack of commonality among the “heat” subclass.
“The District Court acknowledged that plaintiffs alleged that different mitigation measures were provided to some of them. This did not defeat predominance, the District Court reasoned, because it spoke to the ‘uniform allegation that the City’s mitigation measures were, at best, haphazard and insufficient to reduce the danger posed by excessive heat,” Shepherd stated.
“The lone citation the District Court offered to support this reasoning was Yates v. Collier. There, the Fifth Circuit held that ‘it is well-established in our circuit ‘that the Eighth Amendment guarantees inmates a right to be free from exposure to extremely dangerous temperatures without adequate remedial measures.’
"We do not agree with the district court that Yates established a clear rule within our circuit, and plaintiffs point us to no other authorities on appeal. And as with the conditions classes, we note that the District Court conducted no analysis of the Monell theory underlying the heat subclass’s claims."
However, Shepherd and his colleagues rejected the City’s additional contentions that the class representatives were not adequate or that the District Court erred procedurally in its handling of related Daubert motions. Ultimately, the Eighth Circuit ruled to reverse the certification of the four classes and remand so that the plaintiffs can likely try again.
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit case 22-2348
U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri – St. Louis case 4:17-cv-02707
From the St. Louis Record: Reach Courts Reporter Nicholas Malfitano at nick.malfitano@therecordinc.com