Stone v. Evangelidis

507 F.Supp.3d 366

Stephen STONE

v.Sheriff Lewis EVANGELIDIS, et al.

CIVIL ACTION NO. 18-10011-RGS

United States District Court, D. Massachusetts.

Filed December 17, 2020

Heather B. Repicky, Joseph T. Toomey, Patrick J. Maher, Nutter, McClennen & Fish, LLP, Boston, MA, Haley Grissom, Caldwell Cassady & Cury, Dallas, TX, for Stephen Stone.

Andrew J. Abdella, Worcester County Sheriff's Office, West Boylston, MA, for Sheriff Lewis Evangelidis, Kevin Barrett, Brian Ruggieri.

Jeffrey W. Colman, Timothy Vaughan Malley, Capplis, Connors & Carroll, P.C., Boston, MA, for Dr. Bernard Katz.

MEMORANDUM ON DEFENDANTS’ MOTIONS FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

STEARNS, D.J.

On October 19, 2016, plaintiff Stephen Stone, a former inmate at the Worcester County Jail and House of Correction (Jail), apparently attempted suicide in the back of a transportation van while being driven from Malden District Court to the Jail. This was the latest in a series of incidents in which Stone engaged in self-harming behaviors, whether real or feigned, while incarcerated at the Jail. Stone alleges that Worcester County Sheriff Lewis Evangelidis, Officers Kevin Barrett and Brian Ruggieri, and the Jail's Chief of Psychiatry, Bernard Katz, M.D., failed to provide him with the appropriate medication and safety protocols to address his suicidal tendencies in violation of the Eighth Amendment.

In this lawsuit (now in its third amended iteration), brought under the Federal Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Stone alleges two specific Eighth Amendment violations: first, that Dr. Katz refused to prescribe Klonopin, Stone's sedative of choice, because of a Jail policy implemented by Sheriff Evangelidis; second, that Barrett and Ruggieri, the transportation officers, failed to adequately respond to his suicide attempt on October 19, 2016. For the following reasons, defendants’ motions for summary judgment will be granted.¹

BACKGROUND

Stone was incarcerated at the Worcester County Jail on two separate occasions in 2009 and 2010, and then between 2015 and 2017.² Dr. Katz, a board-certified forensic psychiatrist, treated Stone for mental health issues during both incarcerations.

Stone has been variously diagnosed with the following conditions: anxiety, depression, obsessive compulsive disorder, bipolar disorder, mixed-psychotic disorder, intermittent explosive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, antisocial personality disorder, borderline personality disorder, sensory processing disorder, and panic disorder. Ex. E. to Katz SUMF (Dkt # 96); Resp. to Katz SUMF at 2.

Over time, Stone has been prescribed a cornucopia of psychotropic drugs, including Klonopin, a benzodiazepine. In 2010, Dr. Katz wrote a Klonopin prescription for Stone for outpatient treatment following his release from the Jail. Katz SUMF ¶ 14; Exs. O, P to Katz SUMF.³

Following his reincarceration in 2015, Stone repeatedly requested that Dr. Katz prescribe Klonopin. Dr. Katz refused. Exs. D, F to Katz SUMF. According to Stone, Dr. Katz stated that he could not prescribe Klonopin "because of a policy implemented by Sheriff Evangelidis prohibiting use of Klonopin and other similar drugs in [the] Worcester House of Corrections." Stone Decl. ¶ 2. However, the record indicates that in 2016, Dr. Katz wrote four prescriptions of Klonopin for other inmates at the Jail. Ex. 1 to Worcester Cty. Sheriff's Off. (WCSO) Defs.’ Mot. (Dkt # 89).

Dr. Katz states that there was no medical justification for prescribing Klonopin to Stone. Dr. Katz – as well as other mental health specialists who treated Stone in and out of incarceration – determined that Stone exhibited manipulative and goal-oriented drug-seeking behavior consistent with an "Axis II" pathology. Exs. D, I to Katz SUMF. Stone routinely undertook hunger strikes to protest the refusal of his treating doctors to provide him with Klonopin. Exs. D, F to Katz SUMF. Dr. Katz chose instead to treat Stone with a regimen of Seroquel, Chlopromazine, Wellbutrin, and Lithium, along with counseling and monitoring by other mental health professionals. Ex. O to Katz SUMF.

Treatment notwithstanding, Stone's attempts to inflict self-harm continued, including banging his head, cutting his arms with and swallowing razors, and punching at windows. Resp. to Katz SUMF ¶ 8. On October 19, 2016, the defendant transportation officers, Barrett and Ruggieri, struggled with Stone outside the Malden District Courthouse while escorting him back to the transportation van. After being placed in the van, Stone banged his head on the prisoner's cage. Barrett reported that Stone had told him that he had a weapon with him and that he intended to injure himself.⁴ Ex. 10 to Maher Decl. (Dkt # 109). Barrett called his supervisor for instructions and was told to return to the Jail immediately with the emergency lights turned on. Ex. 10 to WCSO Defs.’ Mot. During the ride to the Jail, Stone thrashed about on the van floor out of the full sight of the officers.⁵ Barrett again called his supervisor to report the situation and elected to continue to the Jail, then just a few minutes away. In the meantime, Stone tied a thermal shirt around his neck in what appeared to be a suicide attempt. Ex. F to Katz SUMF.

DISCUSSION

Summary judgment is appropriate when, based upon the pleadings, affidavits, and depositions, "there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). "[T]he mere existence of some alleged factual dispute between the parties will not defeat an otherwise properly supported motion for summary judgment; the requirement is that there be no genuine issue of material fact." Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. , 477 U.S. 242, 247-248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986). "A fact is material if it has the potential of determining the outcome of the litigation." Maymí v. P.R. Ports Auth. , 515 F.3d 20, 25 (1st Cir. 2008).

"[I]n ruling on a motion for summary judgment, ‘[t]he evidence of the nonmovant is to be believed, and all justifiable inferences are to be drawn in his favor.’ " Tolan v. Cotton , 572 U.S. 650, 651, 134 S.Ct. 1861, 188 L.Ed.2d 895 (2014), quoting Anderson , 477 U.S. at 255, 106 S.Ct. 2505. However, the court cannot "draw unreasonable inferences or credit bald assertions, empty conclusions, rank conjecture, or vitriolic invective." Pina v. Children's Place , 740 F.3d 785, 795 (1st Cir. 2014), quoting Cabán Hernández v. Philip Morris USA, Inc. , 486 F.3d 1, 8 (1st Cir. 2007). Rather, a genuine issue of material fact "must be built on a solid foundation – a foundation constructed from materials of evidentiary quality." García-González v. Puig-Morales , 761 F.3d 81, 87 (1st Cir. 2014), quoting Nieves-Romero v. United States , 715 F.3d 375, 378 (1st Cir. 2013).

Dr. Bernard Katz

Stone alleges that Dr. Katz's refusal to prescribe Klonopin pursuant to a Jail policy prohibiting administration of the drug amounts to a failure to provide adequate medical care in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Whether or not the Jail enforced such a policy (the existence of such a policy is a matter of dispute),⁶ the issue is not one of constitutional significance.

To prove an Eighth Amendment violation of inadequate medical care,⁷ a prisoner must satisfy two elements – one objective, the other subjective. First, "the alleged deprivation must be, objectively, ‘sufficiently serious,’ ... [it] must result in the denial of ‘the minimally civilized measure of life's necessities.’ " Farmer v. Brennan , 511 U.S. 825, 834, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994), quoting Wilson v. Seiter , 501 U.S. 294, 298, 111 S.Ct. 2321, 115 L.Ed.2d 271 (1991). In the context of a claim of deficient medical care, this harm must take the form of a failure to address a "serious medical need." See Feeney v. Corr. Med. Servs., Inc. , 464 F.3d 158, 161-162 (1st Cir. 2006). Second, a plaintiff must prove that the prison officials, subjectively, were deliberately indifferent to that need. Wilson , 501 U.S. at 302-303, 111 S.Ct. 2321.

1. Serious Medical Need

On the objective element, the parties do not dispute Stone's serious mental health issues and his need for treatment; rather they disagree about whether he has a serious medical need for Klonopin specifically. Drawing a distinction between the "need for treatment and the need for a specific course of treatment," Dr. Katz contends that Stone received the former but that he was not medically entitled to the latter. Katz Mot. (Dkt # 95) at 8 (emphasis added). Stone responds that he had an "obvious need" for Klonopin, as evidenced by the prior prescriptions he had been given for the drug. Opp'n to Katz Mot. at 5; see, e.g., id. at 6 ("By prescribing Mr. Stone Klonopin in 2010, Dr. Katz joined the array of providers who recognize that Mr. Stone has a serious medical need for Klonopin.").

A serious medical need is one "that has been diagnosed by a physician as mandating treatment, or one that is so obvious that even a lay person would easily recognize the necessity for a doctor's attention." Zingg v. Groblewski , 907 F.3d 630, 635 (1st Cir. 2018), quoting Kosilek v. Spencer , 774 F.3d 63, 82 (1st Cir. 2014) ; see also Gaudreault v. Mun. of Salem, Mass. , 923 F.2d 203, 208 (1st Cir. 1990).⁸ To establish a serious medical need, "[e]ven a significant risk of future harm may suffice." Perry v. Roy , 782 F.3d 73, 78-79 (1st Cir. 2015).

There is no medical support for Stone's argument that he had a serious need for Klonopin. In Cardona-Santiago v. Corr. Health Servs. Corp. , 2015 WL 1417425 (D.P.R. Mar. 27, 2015), the case on which Stone relies, the court concluded that "a jury reasonably could infer that ... treating [the plaintiff] with Neurontin [ ] ... recognized the severity of his medical need" for pain management even though Neurontin "barely had any effect on [that] severe pain." Id. at *2, *9. Put differently, past treatment of a condition suggests that adequate treatment of the condition – not necessarily the s...