Jerger v. Blaize

41 F.4th 910

Lelah JERGER, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants,

v.Shannon BLAIZE, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 21-3011

United States Court of Appeals, Seventh Circuit.

Argued June 1, 2022

Decided July 26, 2022

Gavin M. Rose, Attorney, American Civil Liberties Union of Indiana, Indianapolis, IN, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

Aaron T. Craft, Benjamin M. L. Jones, Diana L. Moers, Justin F. Roebel, Attorneys, Office of the Attorney General, Indianapolis, IN, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before Easterbrook, Wood, and Scudder, Circuit Judges.

Scudder, Circuit Judge.

Before us is a messy set of facts arising out of a child welfare investigation. The Indiana Department of Child Services learned from a social worker that Lelah and Jade Jerger may not have been providing their infant daughter, J.J., medication prescribed to control epileptic seizures. A blood draw, the DCS case workers knew, would clarify whether that was so, and a series of urgent back-and-forths with the Jergers resulted in their taking J.J. to the hospital for the test. The results showed that J.J. had started the prescription a few days earlier. But that was not the end of it. Litigation ensued, with the Jergers alleging violations of J.J.'s Fourth Amendment rights and their own Fourteenth Amendment due process rights to make medical decisions for their child. The district court decided that qualified immunity protected the DCS case workers and entered summary judgment in their favor. We vacate and remand, as the facts are too murky and contested to allow us to reach any legal conclusions with confidence.

I

A

Drawing on the summary judgment record, we set forth the facts in the light most favorable to the Jergers. See Turner v. City of Champaign , 979 F.3d 563, 565 (7th Cir. 2020). At just 15 months old, J.J. had experienced many seizures. After a series of tests in early 2017, doctors at Riley Hospital in Indianapolis diagnosed her with epilepsy. To help control the seizures—at least one of which resulted in J.J. turning blue and losing consciousness for about 15 seconds—doctors prescribed Keppra, an anticonvulsant. Lelah and Jade, however, worried about Keppra's side effects. So they delayed filling the prescription until they could get a second opinion. In the meantime, they treated J.J.'s seizures with CBD oil prescribed by a chiropractic neurologist.

Months later, the Jergers remained at a standstill over whether J.J. should take Keppra. On September 20, 2017, a concerned social worker at Riley Hospital, aware of the Jergers' decisions, called the Indiana Department of Child Services to report medical neglect of J.J. by Lelah and Jade. The social worker described not only how several doctors had recommended Keppra to manage J.J.'s seizures, but also how the Jergers refused to give their daughter the medication because of its potential side effects. The social worker expressed concern that J.J. not taking the prescribed Keppra risked recurring seizures, long-term disability, and even death.

Allicyn Garrett was the DCS case worker assigned to learn more about the situation. On September 21, the day after receiving the report of parental neglect, she visited the Jergers' home to conduct a preliminary investigation. During that visit, Lelah acknowledged her initial reservations with putting J.J. on Keppra but also explained that only a few days earlier, after receiving a second medical opinion, she and her husband began giving their daughter the medication. But despite hearing this account, and after speaking with her supervisor Shannon Blaize, Garrett told the Jergers that they must sign a form agreeing to take certain actions. The form was a "Family Support/Community Services/Safety Plan," which required the Jergers, among other things, to agree to administer the prescribed Keppra to J.J. and to take the child that same day for a blood test to confirm the medication was in her system.

The Jergers declined to sign the Safety Plan but did take J.J. for the blood draw the next day, September 22. The results confirmed that J.J. had started taking Keppra, and so DCS dropped its investigation into Lelah and Jade. But what happened in between Garrett's presentation of the Safety Plan and the eventual blood test gave rise to this litigation and remains the subject of serious debate.

From the Jergers' perspective—the view we must credit at this stage of the proceedings—Lelah and Jade submitted J.J. to the blood draw only because of a threat leveled by Garrett. From Lelah and Jade's understanding, noncompliance with the case workers' demand would lead to J.J. becoming a "Child in Need of Services" (or CHINS for short) and them losing the right to make medical decisions on her behalf. This threat, they thought, amounted to coercion and left them no choice but to take J.J. for the blood draw.

In February 2018 the Jergers filed a complaint under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that Garrett and Blaize's investigation and demand for a blood test amounted to constitutional violations of both their rights as parents under the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause and J.J.'s own rights under the Fourth Amendment.

Following discovery, each party moved for summary judgment. In framing their respective positions, both sides agreed that the Jergers' claims—the Fourth Amendment claim that Lelah and Jade brought on behalf of J.J. and their own Fourteenth Amendment claim as J.J.'s parents—turned on consent. If the Jergers agreed to submit J.J. to the blood draw, the DCS case workers would prevail, but if the opposite was true, and the decision was the product of coercion, then the district court should enter judgment in Lelah and Jade's favor. Overlaying the resolution of the consent issue was qualified immunity, to which Garrett and Blaize claimed they were entitled because they reasonably believed the Jergers agreed to the blood draw.

B

The district court entered summary judgment for the DCS defendants on the basis of qualified immunity. On the district court's view of the facts, Garrett and Blaize did not violate any constitutional rights in persuading the Jergers to take J.J. for the blood draw. The reports from Riley Hospital supplied Blaize and Garrett with reasonable suspicion of child neglect and therefore the requisite "lawful authority [under the Indiana law] to threaten filing a motion to compel and opening a CHINS proceeding." From there, the district court acknowledged Garrett's alleged statement to the Jergers that, unless they promptly agreed to the blood draw, "J.J. would become a Child in Need of Service[s]." But the court was quick to add that Garrett also told the Jergers there would be a court hearing at which they could present their own perspective. In the end, the district court saw the DCS case workers' degree of influence as "close to the line" of coercion but not stepping over it.

Regardless, even if the Jergers had demonstrated potential constitutional violations, the district court determined that Garrett and Blaize were entitled to qualified immunity. The Jergers, the court explained, could not point to any case that would have put the DCS case workers on notice that their conduct in procuring consent by threat was problematic when evaluated in the totality of the difficult circumstances they confronted. Instead, all the Jergers relied on were cases supporting general propositions relating to the constitutionality of searches in the child welfare context. Because that showing did not suffice, the district court concluded that qualified immunity protected both defendants from having to defend themselves at trial.

The Jergers now appeal.

II

To our eye, both the summary judgment briefs submitted in the district court and now the competing arguments pressed on appeal expose material disagreement on the issue of consent—whether the Jergers chose of their own volition to take J.J. for the blood draw or whether that decision was the product of coercion. The disagreement played out in oral argument too, with both parties urging us to accept inferences aligned with their perspective on that question.

As a court of review, however, our obligation is to take our own independent look at the record and ask whether the facts, when viewed in the light most favorable to the Jergers, permit judgment for the DCS defendants. See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. , 477 U.S. 242, 255, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). The same perspective on the facts must guide our review of the award of qualified immunity at summary judgment. If the facts, as represented by the Jergers, portray a clearly established constitutional violation, the district court's decision cannot stand. See Taylor v. City of Milford , 10 F.4th 800, 806, 812 (7th Cir. 2021) (reversing qualified immunity when the plaintiff's version of the facts, in contrast to those alleged by the defendant, "ma[d]e out a deprivation of a constitutional right").

We have hard time aligning the district court's conclusions with these principles. A few illustrations prove our point. Each of these examples comes from the summary judgment record and we set them forth, as we must, as the Jergers present them.

Example #1: Threat about CHINS Proceeding Outcome : According to Lelah Jerger's deposition testimony, during the September 21 investigatory visit, when she asked what would happen if her and her husband refused to sign the DCS Safety Plan, Garrett responded by saying that DCS "would file a motion to compel and that J.J. would become a Child in Need of Services." In that same testimony, Lelah explained that she understood this statement to mean DCS would be "able to make medical decisions for J.J., instead of us, through the court."

Example #2: No Time to Hire a Lawyer : Both Lelah and Jade testified that Garrett, after leaving their home the morning of September 21, called later in the day to say they had to take J.J. for a blood draw that same night. By Lelah's account, the Jergers asked if they could speak with an attorney first, but...