Pennsylvania Jail Guards Accused of Ripping Surgical Pin from Detainee’s Shoulder
On August 27, 2024, the federal court for the Western District of Pennsylvania closed a suit against Fayette County Prison (FCP) officials after they reported reaching a resolution with former detainee Chad St. Clair. That followed a year after the Court adopted a magistrate’s report and recommendation (R&R) on August 9, 2023, denying Defendants’ motion to dismiss the suit.
Prior to arrest, St. Clair suffered a shoulder injury and had a surgical screw implanted to reattach his clavicle to his collarbone. Arriving at FCP with his arm in a brace on February 24, 2021, he was placed in medical segregation to protect his shoulder while it healed. But 10 days later, in response to an unspecified “medical issue,” a guard named Akerman allegedly dragged St. Clair from his cell “face down by his feet, catching [his] right arm in the door,” before “yanking [his] feet until the arm broke free.” A nurse employed by the jail’s private healthcare contractor, PrimeCare Medical, ordered St. Clair returned to his cell because it was close to her shift change. Ackerman and a fellow guard named Rutherford allegedly “yanked him from the floor” and “tossed” him back in his cell while he screamed in pain.
Though the surgical screw in his shoulder was visibly pushing through the skin, St. Clair’s pain medication was discontinued the next day. He alerted guards and medical staff, but he was not seen by a doctor for four days. An appointment then scheduled with an orthopedic surgeon did not occur for six weeks. St. Clair filed grievances, which were denied, and he was placed on grievance restriction. Meanwhile, the one hour out-of-cell he was allowed happened so late that the phones were cut off, so he couldn’t contact his family.
When finally seen by an outside doctor on April 29, 2021, St. Clair was told “too much time had elapsed since the injury,” his complaint recalled, therefore “the damage to his shoulder could not be corrected with surgery.” He began physical therapy but obtained only a 118-degree range of motion in his shoulder, well shy of the normal 180 degrees.
St. Clair filed suit pro se against FCP, PrimeCare Medical and various staffers, raising Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment claims, plus claims for negligence and failure to train or supervise against Warden John Lenkey. Defendants moved to dismiss under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6), resulting in the magistrate’s R&R on June 15, 2023.
The magistrate first determined that St. Clair met both elements necessary for a medical deliberate indifference claim: 1) He had a serious medical need, and 2) Defendants were allegedly deliberately indifferent to that need. Even though “non-medical prison officials cannot be deliberately indifferent for failing to intervene” in the provision of medical care, guards Akerman and Rutherford could be held liable for not taking action when the nurse ordered St. Clair returned to his cell without treating him. Also, Warden Lenkey was aware—through grievances—of the lengthy delay in St. Clair’s medical treatment, so he could be found deliberately indifferent, too.
St. Clair made an equal protection/class-of-one claim against Lenkey, which was allowed to proceed because unlike other FCP detainees his out-of-cell time was changed to a period when he could not use the phones, meaning he may have been singled out for disparate treatment. Dismissal of the failure-to-train-or-supervise claim was also denied, since St. Clair had alleged “a pattern of similar violations by FCP employees that would have placed Warden Lenkey on notice that the current employee training program at FCP was deficient.”
State-law negligence claims against Akerman and Rutherford could also proceed, the R&R continued, based on the Pennsylvania Political Subdivision Tort Claims Act because dragging St. Clair out of his cell and injuring his arm constituted “willful misconduct.” As there is no constitutional right to a grievance procedure, however, St. Clair’s claim regarding his grievance restriction should be dismissed. Additionally, FCP should be dismissed as a defendant since it was not a proper party. Lastly, St. Clair’s request for injunctive relief should be denied as moot since he had been moved to a state prison. The R&R was then adopted in full by the Court. See: St. Clair v. Fayette Cty. Prison, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104254 (W.D. Pa. June 15, 2023); and Chad E. St. Clair v. Fayette Cty. Prison, 2023 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 138533 (W.D. Pa.).
The Court provided St. Clair a chance to amend his complaint to flesh out his negligence claim against the warden with more factual detail. But he declined, so the claim was dismissed on October 25, 2023. The parties went to mediation, reporting the case resolved on May 13, 2024. However, no further information was docketed, and multiple requests by PLN for any agreement or other resolution documentation were ignored. See: St. Clair v. Fayette Cty. Prison, USDC (W.D. Pa.), Case No. 2:22-cv-00049.
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