Rogers v. Jarrett

63 F.4th 971
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedMarch 30, 2023
Docket21-20200
StatusPublished
Cited by31 cases

This text of 63 F.4th 971 (Rogers v. Jarrett) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Rogers v. Jarrett, 63 F.4th 971 (5th Cir. 2023).

Opinion

Case: 21-20200 Document: 00516695420 Page: 1 Date Filed: 03/30/2023

United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit United States Court of Appeals Fifth Circuit

FILED March 30, 2023 No. 21-20200 Lyle W. Cayce Clerk Kevion Rogers,

Plaintiff—Appellant,

versus

Jeffrey Jarrett; Jeremy Bridges; Texas Department of Criminal Justice,

Defendants—Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas USDC No. 4:19-CV-2330

Before Richman, Chief Judge, and Wiener and Willett, Circuit Judges. Don R. Willett, Circuit Judge: A trusted prison inmate was working unsupervised in a hog barn when the ceiling collapsed, striking him in the head. He told the prison agricultural specialist that he needed medical attention. But the specialist thought the inmate looked no worse for wear and ordered him back to work. A short while later, the inmate asked another prison staffer for medical attention. The staffer radioed a supervisor. Based on the staffer’s report, the supervisor, too, thought nothing serious had happened and did not immediately grant the Case: 21-20200 Document: 00516695420 Page: 2 Date Filed: 03/30/2023

No. 21-20200

request. The inmate’s condition later worsened. He was sent to the hospital and diagnosed with a traumatic brain injury. The district court granted summary judgment to Defendants based on qualified immunity. For the reasons below, we AFFIRM. I Kevion Rogers was a trusted inmate. Prison staff let Rogers work unsupervised and outside the prison’s security fence. Rogers’s daily job was to help take care of the prison’s hogs. One day Rogers went into one of the prison’s hog barns looking for a powder used to keep baby hogs healthy. As he was leaving, part of the barn’s ceiling collapsed and hit him on the head. Rogers blacked out. After he came to, another inmate took Rogers to see the prison’s staff agricultural specialist, Jeffrey Jarrett. Rogers walked normally into Jarrett’s office. And though Rogers “had dust on him,” his only visible injury was a scraped knee. An agitated Rogers demanded “to go to the infirmary.” But from Jarrett’s perspective, Rogers “looked fine.” Rogers didn’t “look hurt,” and spoke without a slur. Jarrett told Rogers to keep looking for the powder. Rogers walked normally out of the office. He did not see Jarrett again that morning. Jarrett’s job responsibilities took him away from the prison to another unit. Rogers tried to go on about his business. But he was “lightheaded” and had to sit down. Other inmates tried to keep him awake as he drifted “in and out of consciousness.” Soon after another prison staffer arrived to get the inmates ready for lunch. Rogers told the staffer that “the ceiling collapsed on [his] head” and showed the staffer the “debris.” Rogers again asked for medical attention. The staffer radioed Jarrett’s supervisor, Jeremy Bridges, and informed him “that the ceiling had fallen on [Rogers’s] head and that [Rogers] had sustained a head injury.” Bridges radioed back to take Rogers

2 Case: 21-20200 Document: 00516695420 Page: 3 Date Filed: 03/30/2023

“back to [his] bunk” so Bridges could “take a look at [him] later.” But Rogers objected—he still wanted “to go eat lunch.” Rogers’s objection made Bridges think whatever injuries Rogers had were not “serious.” Bridges radioed back that going to lunch was fine. He’d be out to check on Rogers “soon.” For whatever reason though, Rogers was still brought back to his bunk. By the time he reached his dormitory his condition had begun to deteriorate. His head and eyes had begun to swell, his face was bruising, and he was showing signs of respiratory distress. Prison staff at the dormitory thought this was “abnormal,” and so Rogers was redirected to the prison’s administrative building. He collapsed on the way there, began to “seize violently,” and started “vomiting.” Rogers “lost consciousness.” Within minutes prison staff at the administrative building summoned medical assistance. Emergency medical services evacuated Rogers to a nearby hospital by helicopter. Hospital staff diagnosed Rogers with a “traumatic brain injury; no hemorrhage.”1 Rogers sued Jarrett, Bridges, and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice in Texas state court. Under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, Rogers alleged that prison staff violated his Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights by acting with deliberate indifference towards him. Under the Texas Tort Claims Act, Rogers alleged premises-liability claims. Defendants removed the case to federal court and moved for summary judgment on all claims. The district court granted summary judgment to Defendants on Rogers’s § 1983 claims, declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over his TTCA claims, and remanded the case to state court. Rogers timely appealed. He argues that

1 Hospital staff released Rogers back to the prison the next day with prescriptions for pain and anti-nausea medication. The district court found “no evidence in the record of subsequent problems or complications.”

3 Case: 21-20200 Document: 00516695420 Page: 4 Date Filed: 03/30/2023

Jarrett and Bridges were deliberately indifferent towards his serious medical needs and thus not entitled to qualified immunity.2 II We review summary judgment de novo.3 Courts may grant summary judgment on an issue only when “no genuine dispute as to any material fact” exists “and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.”4 A fact dispute is “genuine” if “a reasonable jury could return a verdict for [the nonmovant] based on the evidence.”5 “[W]e must view all evidence and draw all justifiable inferences in favor of [Rogers], the nonmovant.”6 Still, “[c]onclusional allegations and denials, speculation, improbable inferences, unsubstantiated assertions, and legalistic argumentation” do not count for raising a genuine fact dispute.7

2 Rogers was represented by counsel in the district court and here. He also argued in the district court that Defendants were deliberately indifferent towards his safety by having him work in the hog barn. He did not raise that theory in his opening brief. Likewise, Rogers raised no claims against TDCJ in his opening brief. He also did not raise the district court’s refusal to exercise supplemental jurisdiction. It is not our role to “raise and discuss legal issues that [a party] has failed to assert” on appeal. Brinkmann v. Dall. Cnty. Deputy Sheriff Abner, 813 F.2d 744, 748 (5th Cir. 1987). So Rogers has abandoned those issues and arguments. Id. 3 Batiste v. Lewis, 976 F.3d 493, 500 (5th Cir. 2020). 4 Id. (quoting Rogers v. Bromac Title Servs., L.L.C., 755 F.3d 347, 350 (5th Cir. 2014)). 5 Coleman v. BP Expl. & Prod., Inc., 19 F.4th 720, 726 (5th Cir. 2021). 6 Id. 7 Id. (quoting TIG Ins. Co. v. Sedgwick James of Wash., 276 F.3d 754, 759 (5th Cir. 2002)).

4 Case: 21-20200 Document: 00516695420 Page: 5 Date Filed: 03/30/2023

III Rogers contends that the district court improperly granted Jarrett and Bridges qualified immunity. We have explained before that plaintiffs bear the “burden” to “demonstrate the inapplicability of the defense.”8 And Rogers had to meet that burden for each defendant.9 That means Rogers had to (1) raise a fact dispute on whether his constitutional rights were violated by the defendants’ individual conduct, and (2) show those rights were “clearly established at the time of the violation.”10 On this record, Rogers failed to meet either prong. A Rogers contends that he raised a fact dispute on a constitutional violation. He argues that both Jarrett and Bridges acted with deliberate indifference towards his serious medical needs, violating his Eighth Amendment rights in the process.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
63 F.4th 971, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/rogers-v-jarrett-ca5-2023.