Anderson v. City of New Orleans

38 F.4th 472

Kent ANDERSON; Steven Dominick ; Anthony Gioustavia; Jimmie Jenkins; Greg Journee; Richard Lanford; Leonard Lewis; Euell Sylvester; Lashawn Jones, Plaintiffs—Appellees,

United States of America, Intervenor Plaintiff—Appellee,

Susan Hutson, Sheriff, Orleans Parish, Defendant/Third Party Plaintiff—Appellee,

v.CITY OF NEW ORLEANS, Third Party Defendant—Appellant.

No. 21-30072

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

FILED June 30, 2022

Emily M. Washington, Roderick & Solange MacArthur Justice Center, New Orleans, LA, Elizabeth Cumming, Roderick & Solange MacArthur Justice Center, New Orleans, LA, for Plaintiffs—Appellees.

Elizabeth Parr Hecker, Thomas Evans Chandler, Trial Attorney, U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, Appellate Section, Washington, DC, Theodore R. Carter, III, Assistant U.S. Attorney, U.S. Attorney's Office, Eastern District of Louisiana, New Orleans, LA, for Intervenor Plaintiff—Appellee.

Joshua Simon Force, Curtis James Case, David A. Marcello, Sher Garner Cahill Richter Klein & Hilbert, L.L.C., New Orleans, LA, James McClendon Williams, Inemesit U. O'Boyle, Esq., Attorney, Walter Rimmer Woodruff, Jr., Chehardy Sherman Williams, L.L.P., Metairie, LA, Blake Joseph Arcuri, General Counsel, Laura Cannizzaro Rodrigue, Frosch Rodrigue Arcuri, L.L.C., New Orleans, LA, Patrick R. Follette, Chehardy Sherman Ellis Murray Recile Gri, Metairie, LA, Freeman R. Matthews, Esq., Metairie, LA, for Defendant/Third Party Plaintiff—Appellee.

Sunni LeBeouf, Assistant U.S. Attorney, Churita H. Hansell, Esq., Donesia D. Turner, Attorney, City Attorney's Office for the City of New Orleans, New Orleans, LA, Stephanie Michelle Poucher, Esq., Harry A. Rosenberg, Esq., Senior Attorney, Phelps Dunbar, L.L.P., New Orleans, LA, for Third Party Defendant—Appellant.

Before Barksdale, Stewart, and Dennis, Circuit Judges.

Rhesa Hawkins Barksdale, Circuit Judge:

This appeal continues ten years of litigation, beginning with this action's being filed in New Orleans, Louisiana, in April 2012 against, inter alia , then Sheriff Gusman of the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office for claimed constitutional violations at the Orleans Parish Prison, including inadequate housing for detainees with mental-health needs. The United States intervened that September, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1997c (intervention in actions by institutionalized persons). That same month, the sheriff brought in the city as a third-party defendant. The following are among the items which have been issued: June 2013 consent judgment; 2016 stipulated order; 2017 supplemental compliance action plan, pursuant to the 2016 stipulated order; January 2019 order; March 2019 order; and 2021 denial of the city's Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 60(b) motion, seeking relief from the January and March 2019 orders, with the district court's, inter alia , adopting the magistrate judge's 2020 report and recommendation.

At issue is whether the district court abused its discretion in denying the city's motion for relief from the January and March 2019 orders, pursuant to Rule 60(b)(5) (allowing relief when, inter alia , changed circumstances render judgment or order "no longer equitable"). A Rule 60(b) motion, of course, is not a substitute for a timely appeal from the judgment or order from which relief is requested. Therefore, we have jurisdiction to review the denial of the Rule 60(b) motion, but not the underlying January and March 2019 orders. AFFIRMED.

I.

Because the city asserts relief is appropriate under Rule 60(b)(5) due to changed conditions, the following detailed recitation of the facts and ten years of proceedings is necessary.

Detainees at the Orleans Parish Prison (OPP) filed this action in April 2012 against the sheriff and other prison officials, claiming the following unconstitutional conditions of confinement: deliberate indifference to serious mental-health needs; and failure to protect from dangerously unsafe conditions of confinement, often resulting in violence. Pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1997c, the United States intervened in September 2012. The sheriff brought in the city as a third-party defendant that same month, claiming it failed to honor its obligation to provide adequate funding for a jail that met constitutional standards.

The district court in June 2013 approved a consent judgment, proposed by plaintiffs, the sheriff, and the United States, and opposed by the city. The consent judgment provided an operating plan for OPP to address the constitutional violations.

One year later, the court ordered the sheriff and the city to appoint members to a mental-health working group (MHWG). In August 2014, the court approved, in part, Sheriff Gusman's motion to implement a proposal for short-term housing of acute and subacute mental-health populations. The male detainees would be held at the Elayn Hunt Correctional Center (Hunt); the female detainees, at the Temporary Detention Center (TDC), after modifications were made. The next month, MHWG recommended adoption of the sheriff's proposal to construct a 380-bed facility. Unlike the city's opposition to the June 2013 consent judgment, the city's representative on the MHWG voted in favor of the 380-bed-facility proposal.

The TDC was closed in February 2016; as a result, female detainees with mental-health needs were moved to the newly constructed Orleans Justice Center (OJC; also referred to by the parties as phase II), which, according to an independent monitor, was not adequate for detainees with mental-health needs or who were suicidal. (Male detainees with acute mental-health needs were still housed at Hunt.) After the sheriff's continued failure to provide safe housing and treatment, plaintiffs and the United States moved for a show-cause order and for appointment of a receiver to implement the 2013 consent judgment.

This was resolved by the parties, including the city, in a June 2016 stipulated order to appoint an independent jail compliance director (the compliance director). The 2016 stipulated order required the city, the sheriff, and the compliance director to develop a plan for housing detainees with mental-health issues and medical needs within 60 days of the compliance director's appointment. Sheriff Gusman also agreed to relinquish his control over FEMA funding to replace the Templeman II jail destroyed by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 in exchange for the city's having agreed to use those funds to implement the plan.

Gary Maynard began as compliance director in September 2016. In January 2017, he submitted a supplemental compliance action plan, recommending construction of an 89-bed special-needs facility (phase III). (The recommended facility was reduced from MHWG's 380-bed proposal to 89 due to inmate population estimates in the supplemental compliance action plan.)

The city attorney (a signatory for the city to the 2016 stipulated order) in May 2017 presented the phase III plan to the New Orleans city council, which approved it by a five-one vote. (The dissenting vote was by then councilmember LaToya Cantrell, the city's mayor since 2018.)

Over the next few months, the city attorney updated the court on the phase III progress, including: capital-improvement projects; selection of a project manager; selection of an architectural firm; and a projection that phase III would be completed within 24 to 40 months.

Cantrell was elected mayor in November 2017. Effective January 2018, the city entered into an amendment to its professional-services agreement with JFA Institute (a non-profit organization that partners with governmental agencies and philanthropic foundations to evaluate criminal-justice practices), providing for 400 hours of work on phase III.

The Louisiana Department of Public Safety and Corrections advised the sheriff in January 2019 that, as of October 2019, Hunt would no longer be available as short-term housing for Orleans Parish male detainees with acute mental-health needs. In response, the court held a status conference and, in a January 2019 order (the first of two from which the city seeks relief through the Rule 60(b) motion), directed the city to: submit a written proposal for "a short-term solution to the mental-health related issues"; "direct the architect ... to design the permanent facility described in the [January 2017] Supplemental Compliance Action Plan"; "begin the programming phase of the Phase III facility as soon as possible"; and "update the Court on the progress of those efforts at the next scheduled status conference".

In its ordered response, the city in February 2019 reconfirmed it was dedicating $36.1 million for the facility. It also proposed a plan to renovate the TDC to house detainees with medical and mental-health needs while phase III was being constructed (the short-term plan).

The court in a March 2019 order (the second of the two targeted by the Rule 60(b) motion) adopted the short-term plan and again ordered, inter alia , continuation of the programming phase and collaboration by the parties on the phase III facility. Two months later, an executive group was formed to assist in phase III's development. The group included representatives from the city, the architect, the project manager, the monitoring team, the Orleans Parish Sheriff's Office, medical providers Tulane University Medical Center and Wellpath (a company which had contracted with the city and specialized in medical and behavioral healthcare in jails), plaintiffs, and the United States. The group met regularly until August 2020.

In June 2020, however, and only five days after a status report by the city, which stated "work remains ongoing", the city suspended the work of the architect, thereby halting the project. At a status conference on 10 June, the city confirmed it had unilaterally suspended work, despite the court's January and March 2019 orders.

The city on 29 June 2020 filed the Rule 60(b) motion for relief from those two orders. Following submission of briefs in response to the...