Vela v. Cnty. of Monterey

ESTATE OF SANDRA VELA, et al., Plaintiffs, v. COUNTY OF MONTEREY, et al., Defendants.

Case No. 16-cv-02375-BLF

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN JOSE DIVISION

September 7, 2016

ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND DENYING IN PART CFMG DEFENDANTS' MOTION TO DISMISS WITH LEAVE TO AMEND; GRANTING DEFENDANT MILLER'S MOTION TO DISMISS WITH LEAVE TO AMEND; AND GRANTING IN PART AND DENYING IN PART DEFENDANT BERNAL'S MOTION TO DISMISS WITH LEAVE TO AMEND

[Re: ECF 22, 23]

This case arises out of yet another in a series of tragic inmate deaths at the Monterey County Jail. Two weeks after fifty-two year old Sandra Vela was booked into the jail on a fifteen-year-old warrant, she was found dead in her cell, having hanged herself with a bed sheet. Vela's daughters bring suit individually and on behalf of Vela's estate, asserting that jail personnel were deliberately indifferent to Vela's serious medical needs in violation of her federal constitutional rights and breached duties owed to her under state law.

Before the Court at this time are two motions to dismiss pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6): the first by the doctors responsible for providing medical care to inmates, and the second by the former and current Monterey County Sheriffs. For the reasons discussed below, the doctors' motion is GRANTED IN PART AND DENIED IN PART WITH LEAVE TO AMEND; former Sheriff Scott Miller's motion is GRANTED WITH LEAVE TO AMEND; and current Sheriff Steve Bernal's motion GRANTED IN PART AND DENIED IN PART WITH LEAVE TO AMEND.

I. BACKGROUND

Plaintiffs allege the following facts¹: Vela was arrested on March 11, 2015 pursuant to a fifteen-year-old warrant for forgery and embezzlement. Compl. ¶ 27, ECF 1. Vela was not aware of the warrant and the arresting officers were not actively looking for her. Id. ¶¶ 1, 27. The officers ran Vela's identification because she was present at a location where officers responded to a call, and they arrested her after the outstanding warrant was discovered. Id. ¶ 27. Vela had been diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor approximately seven years earlier, had a shunt inserted into her brain to relieve pressure, and since then had suffered chronic pain, seizures, and psychiatric symptoms including auditory hallucinations. Id. ¶ 2. Vela informed the jail intake staff about her medical conditions, that she was under a doctor's care, and that she needed medical treatment for symptoms including chronic pain and diabetes. Id. ¶ 29. Vela was not provided with medical or mental health treatment for her brain cancer and related conditions. Id. ¶ 32. During almost daily conversations with her daughter, Annamarie Moreno, Vela stated that she had not seen a doctor, had seen a nurse practitioner only once, and had not received her medications. Id. ¶ 33. Moreno contacted the jail and informed staff that Vela needed urgent medical attention. Id. ¶ 34. Vela was provided with Tylenol rather than the pain medication necessary to manage her chronic pain. Id. ¶ 35.

Vela was housed in a single cell in R-pod, a lockdown unit for female inmates. Compl. ¶ 30. Except when attending court or medical appointments, inmates housed in R-pod generally are permitted to leave their cells for only one hour a day, for showers or time in the dayroom. Id. ¶ 31. Other R-pod inmates observed that while Vela had seemed normal when she came in, she became delusional toward the end of her first week of incarceration. Compl. ¶ 36. Vela often yelled and screamed delusional statements, for example, that the Sheriff had killed her husband and stolen her cellular phone and credit cards. Id. Vela appeared to believe that other inmates had keys to her cell and she begged them to let her out. Id. She also cried in her sleep and said she needed to see her deceased husband. Id. Vela told another inmate in R-pod that she wanted Godto take her because she was in pain, and she refused to eat at times. Id. ¶ 37.

On March 20, 2015, jail staff transferred Vela to a safety cell and placed her on suicide watch. Compl. ¶ 38. Approximately one hour later, Vela was discharged from suicide watch by Dr. Taylor Fithian, who is the jail psychiatrist as well as the co-founder and president of California Forensic Medical Group ("CFMG"), the private corporation hired by Monterey County to provide medical, mental health, and dental services to jail inmates. Id. ¶¶ 22-23, 38. Vela was transferred back to R-pod. Id. ¶ 38. Because March 20, 2015 was a Friday, Vela was not expected to (and did not) see any mental health staff for several days, as the County and CFMG did not schedule mental health staff to work at the jail on weekends. Id. ¶ 39.

Deputy N. Quintero found Vela unresponsive in her cell at approximately 2:04 a.m. on Tuesday, March 24, 2015. Compl. ¶ 40. Vela was in a semi-seated position against her bunk with one end of a bedsheet wrapped around her neck and the other end tied to the upper railing of the bunk bed. Id. Quintero did not have a cut-down tool to sever the noose around Vela's neck and was not able to untie the noose. Id. ¶ 41-43. Quintero untied the bedsheet from the bunk bed railing, pulled Vela outside the cell, and performed CPR. Id. ¶ 41. Deputy Barbara Fulkerson arrived at the scene, followed by emergency responders. Id. ¶¶ 44, 45. Vela was pronounced dead at 2:28 a.m. A note was found in her cell stating that Vela intended to complain about the jail facility and that she was not getting the medication she needed for her cancer. Id. ¶ 46.

The welfare and safety check log for R-pod bore Deputy Fulkerson's initials indicating that she had performed a safety check at 1:06 a.m. Compl. ¶ 47. However, Fulkerson did not actually perform the 1:00 a.m. safety check. Id. After Vela's death, control room staff informed supervisory jail personnel that they had not opened the door for Fulkerson to perform a 1:00 a.m. check and that they had opened the door around that time only for the medical deputy who was escorting medical staff to provide medication. Id. ¶ 50.

Vela's daughters, Annamarie Moreno and Bernadette Alverado, filed this action on May 2, 2016. Moreno sues individually and on behalf of Vela's estate, and Alverado sues individually. Plaintiffs sue the County of Monterey, former Sheriff Scott Miller, current Sheriff Steve Bernal, Deputy Quintero, Deputy Fulkerson, other jail personnel, CFMG, Dr. Fithian, and Dr. EliudGarcia, who was CFMG's on-site medical director at the time of Vela's death. The complaint asserts the following claims: (1) a § 1983² claim for deliberate indifference to serious medical and mental health needs in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment ; (2) a § 1983 claim for failure to protect from harm in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment; (3) a § 1983 claim for deprivation of substantive due process in violation of the First and Fourteenth Amendments, causing loss of parent/child relationship; (4) a state law claim for failure to furnish medical care; (5) a state law claim for negligent supervision, training, hiring, and retention; (6) a state law claim for wrongful death; and (7) a state law claim for negligence.

CFMG and Drs. Fithian and Garcia (collectively, "CFMG Defendants") have filed a Rule 12(b)(6) motion seeking dismissal of all claims against them. Former Sheriff Miller and current Sheriff Bernal have filed a Rule 12(b)(6) motion seeking dismissal of all claims against them.

II. LEGAL STANDARD

"A motion to dismiss under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted 'tests the legal sufficiency of a claim.'" Conservation Force v. Salazar, 646 F.3d 1240, 1241-42 (9th Cir. 2011) (quoting Navarro v. Block, 250 F.3d 729, 732 (9th Cir. 2001)). When determining whether a claim has been stated, the Court accepts as true all well-pled factual allegations and construes them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Reese v. BP Exploration (Alaska) Inc., 643 F.3d 681, 690 (9th Cir. 2011). However, the Court need not "accept as true allegations that contradict matters properly subject to judicial notice" or "allegations that are merely conclusory, unwarranted deductions of fact, or unreasonable inferences." In re Gilead Scis. Sec. Litig., 536 F.3d 1049, 1055 (9th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). While a complaint need not contain detailed factual allegations, it "must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to 'state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'" Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). A claim is facially plausible when it "allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged." Id.

III. CFMG Defendants' Motion to Dismiss

Plaintiffs assert claims against the CFMG Defendants for deliberate indifference (Claims 1 and 2); deprivation of substantive due process (Claim 3); negligent supervision, training, hiring, and retention (Claim 5); wrongful death (Claim 6); and negligence (Claim 7). Defendants' arguments with respect to those claims are addressed in turn below.

A. Deliberate Indifference (Claims 1 and 2)

Claims 1 and 2, asserted under § 1983, allege that the CFMG Defendants were deliberately indifferent to Vela's serious medical and mental health needs and failed to protect her from harm in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment.

"To succeed on a § 1983 claim, a plaintiff must show that (1) the conduct complained of was committed by a person acting under color of state law; and (2) the conduct deprived the plaintiff of a federal constitutional or statutory right." Patel v. Kent School Dist., 648 F.3d 965, 971 (9th Cir. 2011). Private physicians employed to provide medical care to inmates are state actors for purposes of § 1983. See West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 54-55 (1988). Courts also have treated medical groups employed to provide prison medical services as...