Wyatt v. Hanan

170 F.R.D. 189, 1995 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21395
CourtDistrict Court, M.D. Alabama
DecidedFebruary 15, 1995
DocketCivil Action No. 3195-N
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 170 F.R.D. 189 (Wyatt v. Hanan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, M.D. Alabama primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Wyatt v. Hanan, 170 F.R.D. 189, 1995 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21395 (M.D. Ala. 1995).

Opinion

ORDER

MYRON H. THOMPSON, Chief Judge.

This lawsuit is before the court on a motion to intervene filed by William Edward Haas, as next friend and legal guardian of his daughter, a mentally incompetent woman who is now a resident of one of the State of Alabama’s institutions for the mentally retarded and mentally ill. For the reasons that follow, the court concludes that Haas’s motion should be denied.

I. BACKGROUND

The plaintiffs filed this class-action lawsuit in 1970 claiming that conditions in Alabama’s institutions for the mentally ill and the mentally retarded violated the patients’ constitutional rights. In 1972, the court found in favor of plaintiffs and entered injunctions requiring officials of the Alabama Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation to bring their facilities into compliance with certain minimal constitutional standards. Wyatt v. Stickney, 344 F.Supp. 373 (M.D.Ala.1972) (standards for mentally ill), ajfd in relevant part, 503 F.2d 1305 (5th Cir.1974); Wyatt v. Stickney, 344 F.Supp. 387 (M.D.Ala.1972) (standards for mentally retarded), ajfd in relevant part, 503 F.2d 1305 (5th Cir.1974). Fourteen years later, on September 22, 1986, the court approved a consent decree that resolved the plaintiffs’ and the defendants’ continued conflicts over the adequacy of the state’s funding and administration of facilities under the court-ordered standards.1 In 1991, a new round of litigation began. On January 18, 1991, the defendants filed a motion for a finding that they have met their obligations under the 1986 consent decree and for an order terminating this lawsuit. On January 22,1993, the plaintiffs responded by filing a motion to enforce the 1986 consent decree and for further relief based on the consent decree and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, 42 U.S.C.A. §§ 12101-12213. The motions are set for trial in March 1995.2

It is within this context, after 24 years of litigation and court involvement with the Alabama Mental Health and Mental Retardation System, that Haas seeks to intervene on behalf of his daughter.3

[192]*192II. DISCUSSION

A.

Haas seeks to intervene as a matter of right and, alternatively, as a matter of discretion, based on Rule 24 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Under subsection (a)(2) to Rule 24, a party seeking to intervene as a matter of right must meet the following requirements: (1) the application must be timely; (2) the interest asserted must relate to the property or transaction that is the subject of the action; (3) the applicant must be situated such that disposition of the action may impede or impair the applicant’s ability to protect that interest; and (4) the interest asserted must be represented inadequately by the existing parties to the lawsuit.4 Chiles v. Thornburgh, 865 F.2d 1197, 1213 (11th Cir.1989). If these four requirements are all met, intervention must be granted. Id. at 1213. If any of these requirements is not met, the intervention as of right is not proper. Bush v. Viterna, 740 F.2d 350, 354 (5th Cir.1984). Because Haas has failed to satisfy the fourth requirement — that is, he has not proved that the interests he seeks to assert are not already adequately represented — the court discusses only this requirement and does hot reach whether the other requirements are satisfied.

The requirement that an intervenor not be adequately represented by existing parties “is satisfied if the applicant shows that representation of his interest ‘may be’ inadequate; and the burden of making that showing should be treated as minimal.” Trbovich v. United Mine Workers, 404 U.S. 528, 538 n. 10, 92 S.Ct. 630, 636 n. 10, 30 L.Ed.2d 686 (1972). “However ‘minimal’ this burden may be, it cannot be treated as so minimal as to write the requirement completely out of the rule.” Bush, 740 F.2d at 355. “ ‘When the party seeking intervention has the same ultimate objective as a party to the suit, a presumption arises that its interests are adequately represented, against which the petitioner must demonstrate adversity of interest, collusion, or nonfea-sance.’ ” Id. (quoting Commonwealth of Virginia v. Westinghouse Electric Corp., 542 F.2d 214, 216 (4th Cir.1976)) (intervening citations omitted). The party seeking intervention must “contribute” something to the “lawsuit beyond underlining the positions already taken” by the current parties. Bush, 740 F.2d at 357.

Haas’s daughter is a profoundly mentally retarded resident of the William D. Partlow Developmental Center in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. She is 30-years old and has the mental ability of an 18-month-old child. Haas asserts in his proposed complaint-in-intervention that, under both federal and state law, his daughter is entitled “to continue to receive, at Partlow, care of the type currently provided by Partlow,”5 “subject to reasonable improvements as indicated by medical science.”6 He concludes his eomplaint-in-intervention with the allegation that “certain organizations and entities styled as parties-plaintiffs have urged this court to decrease the services offered at Partlow or to close Partlow.”7 Haas is essentially asking that the defendants be enjoined (1) to keep Part-low open and to continue to provide needed individual care to his daughter at that facility and (2) to continue to make the necessary improvements of the facility and programs at Partlow as long as she is a resident there.8

The court acknowledges and the parties do not challenge that Haas’s daughter has a “direct, substantial, legally protectible interest” in this litigation, Chiles, 865 F.2d at 1214, as do all residents of the Alabama [193]*193Mental Health and Mental Retardation System. The critical question instead is whether this interest is not being already adequately pursued and litigated by the current parties to this lawsuit. Haas divides his interest— which, of course, he asserts on behalf of his daughter — into the following three parts: (1) his daughter’s interest in remaining a resident at the Partlow facility, because only Partlow can provide effective and adequate habilitation for her and similarly situated profoundly retarded and mentally incompetent persons; (2) her interest in having the defendants maintain and improve the Part-low facility and habilitation programs; and (3) her right to participate directly in the decision-making process that materially affects her own future.

It is apparent from Haas’s brief in support of his motion to intervene that his principal concern is that the defendants not be allowed to close Partlow and that his daughter be allowed to remain a patient there indefinitely.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
170 F.R.D. 189, 1995 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21395, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/wyatt-v-hanan-almd-1995.