Colorado Prisoner Forces Correctional Health Partners to Treat His Colon Disease
by Douglas Ankney
After winning a temporary restraining order (TRO) directing the medical contractor for the Colorado Department of Corrections (DOC) to treat his colon disease, state prisoner Arthur Burnham’s location was unknown on September 10, 2024. That was the date when the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado’s latest order was returned undeliverable in a habeas corpus petition that the prisoner also filed, after letting his earlier win languish.
The prisoner’s disappearance is troubling given his medical risk, which prompted the Court to issue its TRO on October 4, 2023. Burnham, 53, had filed suit pro se the previous July while incarcerated at Centennial Correctional Facility (CCF). He alleged that beginning in October 2022, he submitted multiple kites complaining of “severe intestinal pain and putrefaction of the colon,” which went unanswered by DOC healthcare contractor Correctional Health Partners (CHP).
Finally, in February 2023, Burnham was taken offsite for a colonoscopy, which revealed “inflammation of a diverticulum in the intestinal tract, causing fecal stagnation and pain,” as well as a colon hemorrhage and a potentially cancerous polyp. He had an emergency medical visit with CHP Nurse Practitioner Villani in February 2023 to address a “week-long bleeding out of his colon” with “severe putrefaction increase and pain.” Villani said that Burnham needed a C.T. scan, but that it was CHP policy not to authorize costly medical procedures for prisoners with imminent release dates like his, then scheduled for October 7, 2023.
“During the ensuing months, Burnham’s pain and colon disease continued unabated,” as the Court later recalled, and his condition worsened as he developed staph infections on his chest, arms and rectum. Another CHP Nurse Practitioner named Honea “expressed concern that Burnham had ‘life-threatening rectal sepsis’ and prescribed antibiotics.” Honea informed Burnham that his treatment would require surgery but there was “not enough time to do anything” before his release, then 100 days away. Burnham became so distressed by pain that he attempted suicide, cutting his neck open four inches. In July 2023, he “cut both his arms open in desperation to be taken to the hospital rather than suffering a lingering death or colostomy surgery,” the Court recalled.
After Burnham filed his TRO motion on August 4, 2023, the Court found that he satisfied the four factors in Petrella v. Brownback, 787 F.3d 1242 (10th Cir. 2015): a likelihood of (1) success on the merits and (2) irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief, as well as a finding that (3) the balance of equities tipped in his favor and (4) an injunction was in the public interest. Though an injunction was disfavored in the Tenth Circuit because it would both “alter the status quo” and “mandate an affirmative act on Defendants’ part,” the Court said that a TRO was “clearly warranted.”
That was because Burnham had demonstrated “a reasonable likelihood of success” on the merits of an Eighth Amendment claim for deliberate indifference, the Court said. First, he alleged “an objective, sufficiently serious medical need” and that Defendants “subjectively disregarded an excessive risk to his health or safety.” Beyond that, he demonstrated irreparable harm because his ailments would allegedly be fatal or, “at a minimum, result in permanent physical impairment.” The balance of equities also weighed heavily in Burnham’s favor because the “high risk of serious illness or death” that he faced “if he is not permitted to access treatment for his medical ailments” outweighed any harms that could befall Defendants.
Declaring that “it is always in the public interest to prevent the violation of a party’s constitutional rights,” the Court therefore granted Burnham’s motion for TRO. See: Burnham v. Villani, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 179328 (D. Colo. 2023). But 10 days later when the Court heard CHP’s response to the TRO on October 13, 2023, Burnham was a no-show, and the Court determined that he had been released from DOC. Defendants filed a motion to dismiss his claim, and he couldn’t be found to receive a copy. So the Court vacated the TRO on October 31, 2023, and dismissed the case on November 27, 2023. See: Burnham v. Villani, USDC (D. Colo.), Case No. 1:23-cv-01775.
Six months later, Burnham resurfaced at the Court on May 16, 2024, filing a habeas corpus petition after apparently being returned to DOC custody—though he gave a mailing address at St. Luke’s Medical Center in Denver. He mailed several letters to the Court, expressing mortal and supernatural fears that he acknowledged seemed paranoid. He also said that he had somehow become paralyzed from the waist down. When a magistrate judge recommended dismissal of his petition, the Court obliged on August 29, 2024. However, attempts to contact Burnham after that failed. See: Burnham v. Colo., USDC (D. Colo.), Case No. 1:24-cv-01397.
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