Mulvania v. Sheriff of Rock Island County

850 F.3d 849, 97 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 256, 2017 WL 935884, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 4210
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
DecidedMarch 9, 2017
DocketNo. 16-1711
StatusPublished
Cited by398 cases

This text of 850 F.3d 849 (Mulvania v. Sheriff of Rock Island County) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Mulvania v. Sheriff of Rock Island County, 850 F.3d 849, 97 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 256, 2017 WL 935884, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 4210 (7th Cir. 2017).

Opinion

HAMILTON, Circuit Judge.

This appeal presents two distinct claims. The first arises from plaintiff Joan Mulva-nia’s arrest and detention at the Rock Island County Jail in November 2010. Mul-vania claims the jail has a widespread practice of conducting strip searches with excessive force and without accommodating people who are experiencing mental distress. The second claim arises from ten other plaintiffs who joined the suit to challenge the Rock Island Sheriffs policy that requires female detainees to wear either white underwear or no underwear at all. They argue the policy is not rationally related to a legitimate governmental objective and that it impairs their dignity without sufficient justification. They also seek certification to pursue that claim as a class.

We affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment against Mulvania on both of her claims. We reverse the district court’s grant of summary judgment against the other plaintiffs on the underwear policy, but we affirm denial of class certification on that claim. We recount the facts as told in the parties’ undisputed statement of facts. Where a dispute exists, we note the dispute and resolve it in favor of plaintiffs for purposes of summary judgment, giving them the benefit of reasonable inferences. E.g., Zerante v. DeLuca, 555 F.3d 582, 584 (7th Cir. 2009).

I. Mulvania’s Claims

A. Undisputed Facts of Mulvania’s Arrest and Detention

On November 7, 2010, two police officers arrested Joan Mulvania for domestic battery. They brought her to the Rock Island County Jail, but upon arrival, Mulvania refused to exit the vehicle. Several corrections officers moved her from the car to a holding cell in the jail. Mulvania’s speech was slurred, and she screamed obscenities, refused to cooperate with the officers, and was physically combative. The officers testified that Mulvania appeared intoxicated and was acting erratically. Mulvania claims she was experiencing a “posh-traumatic stress disorder flashback.” She disputes that the officers smelled alcohol on her breath. Defendants acknowledge that they did not smell alcohol, but they rely on hospital laboratory results from that day in which Mulvania tested positive for cocaine and cannabinoids.

Once in the holding cell, Mulvania refused to change from her clothes into a jail uniform, which is part of the jail’s booking process for all detainees. The defendants claim that misdemeanor detainees are permitted to change in a private room when they are cooperative; however, the plaintiffs dispute this. When detainees are not cooperative, the Sheriff permits officers to use reasonable force to ensure compliance with the policy.

After Mulvania refused to change into the jail uniform, two female corrections officers and three or four male officers restrained her and removed her clothing. They placed Mulvania on her stomach, held her arms straight over her head, and then lifted her shirt off. During this process, Mulvania banged her head against the floor and yelled, “They’re going to rape me.” After they removed her clothing, the officers draped a jail uniform over her naked body and left the holding cell. Several minutes later, Mulvania had a seizure and was brought to the hospital. After she returned from the hospital, she was released from the jail without any charges.

[853]*853B. Procedural History

In November 2010 Mulvania filed this suit under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against Rock Island County and the Sheriff of Rock Island County. She alleged that the officers unlawfully arrested her, detained her without probable cause, conducted an unconstitutional strip search, used unreasonable force by shackling her, continued to detain her after she was informed that she would not be prosecuted, and sexually assaulted her because of her sexual orientation. Mulvania amended her complaint numerous times over the next several years, dropping most of her original claims and adding new ones, including the underwear claim.

On April 15, 2015, Mulvania sought to file a fourth amended complaint in which she intended to “delete all of the allegations pertaining to the individual defendants and to clarify plaintiffs official capacity claims against the Sheriff.” She also sought to add a new claim under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The district court denied her motion as it pertained to the Americans with Disabilities Act. The court said the new claim did not relate back to the third amended complaint and that it was not in the interest of justice to amend the complaint once again to add that new claim after so many years of litigation. The court permitted plaintiffs to file a fourth amended complaint “that includes only the allegations related to the underwear claim.”

When the plaintiffs filed their fourth amended complaint, however, they included not only the underwear claim but also Mulvania’s earlier excessive force claim. The Sheriff moved to strike those allegations because they exceeded the court’s order granting leave to amend the complaint. On March 31, 2016, the district court granted the motion to strike, but also proceeded to address the merits of the claim to avoid deciding the case on a “procedural technicality.”

C. Summary Judgment on Excessive Force Claim

Mulvania claims the Rock Island County Jail has a widespread custom or practice of using excessive force to require detainees to change into jail-issued uniforms. She acknowledges that the jail’s official policy authorizes a use-of-force continuum to ensure compliance with the uniform policy. She claims that in practice, however, excessive force is the norm. The district court Concluded that Mulvania put forward insufficient evidence of such a custom or practice of using excessive force. We agree.

We review de novo the district court’s decision granting the Sheriffs motion for summary judgment. Chaib v. Geo Group, Inc., 819 F.3d 337, 340 (7th Cir. 2016). We construe all facts in the light most favorable to Mulvania, who is the non-moving party. Id. Summary judgment is appropriate if there is no genuine dispute of material fact and the Sheriff is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).

Mulvania relies on two statements by corrections officers to support her claim of a widespread practice of using excessive force to ensure compliance with the jail’s uniform policy. Officer Bailey testified in his deposition, “When someone refuses to remove their clothes, we have to take their clothes away from them and give them a jumpsuit.” Officer Nesseler testified that if a detainee refuses to remove her clothing, ‘We just take ’em off.” Neither of these statements is evidence of the use of excessive force, let alone a widespread practice of it. The first statement is consistent with the Sheriffs stated use-of-force continuum policy. The second statement is quot[854]*854ed misleadingly by plaintiffs. Officer Nes-seler’s “We just take ’em off’ statement responded to the question: “how would you go about taking a detainee’s clothes off?” Her response is not evidence of any use of excessive force.

Mulvania argues, however, that the defendants did not challenge the sufficiency of the evidence in their motion for summary judgment.

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850 F.3d 849, 97 Fed. R. Serv. 3d 256, 2017 WL 935884, 2017 U.S. App. LEXIS 4210, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/mulvania-v-sheriff-of-rock-island-county-ca7-2017.