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Nature of Suit Code: 440
Nature of Suit: Other Civil Rights
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued April 16, 2004 Decided July 20, 2004

No. 03-7076

FRATERNAL ORDER OF POLICE DEPARTMENT OF

CORRECTIONS LABOR COMMITTEE, ET AL.,

APPELLANTS

v.

ANTHONY A. WILLIAMS, MAYOR,

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, ET AL.,

APPELLEES

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the District of Columbia

(No. 02cv00461)

Joshua D. McInerney argued the cause for the appellants.

James F. Wallington was on brief.

William J. Earl, Assistant Attorney General, District of

Columbia argued the cause for the appellees. Robert J.

 Bills of costs must be filed within 14 days after entry of judgment.

The court looks with disfavor upon motions to file bills of costs out

of time.

USCA Case #03-7076 Document #837264 Filed: 07/20/2004 Page 1 of 11
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Spagnoletti, Attorney General, District of Columba, and Edward E. Schwab, Assistant Attorney General, were on brief.

Before: HENDERSON, ROGERS and GARLAND, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the court filed by Circuit Judge HENDERSON.

KAREN LECRAFT HENDERSON, Circuit Judge: The Fraternal

Order of Police/Department of Corrections Labor Committee,

its chairman and two member correctional officers (collectively the Union) appeal the district court’s dismissal of their

complaint brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the District of Columbia (District) and two District officials, Mayor

Anthony J. Williams (Mayor) and District of Columbia Director of Corrections Odie Washington (DOC Director). The

Union claims that the two officials acted with deliberate

indifference to the safety of District correctional officers

when they laid off several hundred of them at the same time

they added to the number of inmates housed at the District’s

Central Detention Facility (D.C. Jail or Jail). The Union

contends that its claim arises under the ‘‘State endangerment

concept’’ recognized by this court in Butera v. District of

Columbia, 235 F.3d 637, 651 (D.C. Cir. 2001). We disagree

and affirm the district court’s judgment albeit in a different

procedural form.

I.

In 1997, the Congress passed the National Capital Revitalization and Self–Government Improvement Act, which called

for, among other things, closure of the District’s Lorton

Correction Complex by December 31, 2001. Pub. L. No. 105–

33, § 11201(b), 111 Stat. 251, 734; see D.C. Code Ann. § 24–

101(b). Pursuant to that statute, District officials in late 2001

notified the Union that it intended to transfer a significant

number of inmates from Lorton to the D.C. Jail. At roughly

the same time, in December 2001 and February 2002, and in

response to both fiscal year 2002 congressional appropriations

for the DOC and the ‘‘surplus’’ of correctional officers following Lorton’s closing, the Mayor approved a series of reducUSCA Case #03-7076 Document #837264 Filed: 07/20/2004 Page 2 of 11
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tions-in-force (RIFs) decreasing the total number of correctional officers in the District’s employ.

The Union opposed the RIFs and also claimed that the

District, by transferring Lorton prisoners to the D.C. Jail,

was violating a court-ordered ceiling on the number of inmates who could be housed at the Jail, see Campbell v.

McGruder, 416 F. Supp. 111, 117 (D.D.C. 1976), aff’d, 580

F.2d 521 (D.C. Cir. 1978) – an order that was lifted by the

time of the district court’s decision here, see Campbell v.

McGruder, 86 Fed. Appx. 426, 2004 WL 180423 (D.C. Cir.

Jan. 23, 2004). – and adding to ongoing unhealthy and dangerous working conditions at the Jail. It filed an administrative

complaint with the District’s Public Employee Relations

Board and in March 2002 filed suit in federal court pursuant

to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. It claimed that the Mayor and the DOC

Director, by increasing the number of inmates at the Jail

while decreasing the number of correctional officers there,

affirmatively subjected correctional officers to an increased

likelihood of inmate assaults in violation of their Fifth Amendment right to Due Process and their entitlement to a safe and

sanitary work environment as recognized in D.C. Code Ann.

§ 32–1103(a).1

 The Union sought injunctive relief: namely

an order prohibiting the RIFs and requiring the District to

improve the showers and ventilation system at the Jail.

In connection with the Union’s requests for a temporary

restraining order (granted) and a preliminary injunction (denied), the parties submitted numerous affidavits, declarations

and exhibits. The District then moved to dismiss the complaint in its entirety pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1) on

the ground that the district court lacked subject matter

1 Section 32–1103(a) provides that an ‘‘employer shall: (1) furnish

employees with a place and conditions of employment that are free

from recognized hazards that may cause or are likely to cause death

or serious physical harm or illness to the employees; and (2) comply

with all occupational safety and health rules.’’ D.C. Code Ann.

§ 32–1103(a). Section 32–1101(6) provides that ‘‘[t]he term ‘employer’ shall include a District government or quasi-governmental

agency.’’ D.C. Code § 32–1101(6).

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jurisdiction. Joint Appendix (JA) 142. The Union countered

with additional evidence of the allegedly dangerous conditions

at the Jail, relying on Butera and the right to be provided

with a safe workplace and conditions of employment. The

District responded that, even under Butera, the Union failed

to assert an injury in fact or a constitutional claim because its

member correctional officers had voluntarily exposed themselves to any alleged endangerment by accepting employment

with the District.

In May 2003, the district court granted the District’s

motion. Fraternal Order of Police, Dep’t of Corrections

Labor Comm. v. Williams, 263 F. Supp. 2d 45 (D.D.C. 2003).2

Assuming that District officials could be held liable either for

staffing policies in response to shortfalls in congressional

appropriations or for the Congress’s decision to close Lorton,

the court found that ‘‘[n]othing presented by the [Union] is so

egregious that, as a matter of law, it shocks the conscience.’’

Id. at 47. The court further noted that the United States

Supreme Court in Collins v. City of Harker Heights, 503 U.S.

115, 128–29 (1992), expressly rejected the notion that the Due

Process Clause protects a municipal employee’s interest in a

safe work environment and that this court in Washington v.

District of Columbia, 802 F.2d 1478, 1482 (D.C. Cir. 1986),

rejected a prison guard’s similar claim. See Fraternal Order

of Police, 263 F. Supp. 2d at 48. The court then declined to

exercise supplemental jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1367

over the Union’s remaining state law claims. Id. The Union

appeals the dismissal.

2 The district court order does not make explicit the basis of the

dismissal. See Fraternal Order of Police, 263 F. Supp. 2d at 46–48.

Nonetheless, it alludes to the District’s argument that it ‘‘lack[ed]

subject matter jurisdiction over [the Union’s] alleged federal claim

because there is no government duty protected by substantive due

process to provide its employees minimal levels of safety and

security in the workplace.’’ Id., at 47. Moreover, as noted, the

District moved to dismiss ‘‘pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil

Procedure 12(b)(1).’’ JA 142. We therefore view the district

court’s judgment as a dismissal pursuant to Rule 12(b)(1).

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II.

The District moved to dismiss the Union’s complaint for

lack of subject matter jurisdiction pursuant to Federal Rule

of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and the district court granted the

motion. In so concluding, the court erred. The district court

had jurisdiction to hear the Union’s complaint brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 because, as the Supreme Court

explained in Bell v. Hood, 327 U.S. 678, 681 (1946), the

complaint sought ‘‘recovery directly under the Constitution or

laws of the United States.’’ See 28 U.S.C. § 1343; Yates v.

Dist. of Columbia, 324 F.3d 724, 725 (D.C. Cir. 2003) (per

curiam); Best v. Kelly, 39 F.3d 328, 330 (D.C. Cir. 1994).

Having sought such recovery, the Union’s complaint could be

dismissed under Rule 12(b)(1) only if it was ‘‘wholly insubstantial and frivolous’’ or ‘‘so patently without merit as to

justify TTT the court’s dismissal for want of jurisdiction.’’

Bell, 327 U.S. at 682-83; see Best, 39 F.3d at 330. We do not

believe the Union’s claim can be so viewed. Instead, the

complaint was subject to dismissal for failure to state a claim

upon which relief can be granted pursuant to Federal Rule of

Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). See Bell, 327 U.S. at 682; Yates,

324 F.3d at 725. The substance of the District’s motion was

that the Union had failed to state a claim actionable under

section 1983.3

 Because both parties submitted materials outside the pleadings and the court relied on those materials in

concluding that the Union had failed to state a claim, the

motion to dismiss should have been converted to a summary

judgment motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56.

See Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b) (‘‘If TTT matters outside the pleading

are presented to and not excluded by the court, the motion

3 Indeed, District counsel at one point so characterized the motion

before the district court: ‘‘[T]he case is before the [c]ourt on

basically a 12(b)(6) motion.’’ JA at 236; see also Reply to Plaintiffs’ Supplemental Response to Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss, JA

at 193 (‘‘The thrust of [the District’s] motion to dismiss is that the

[Union] and its members do not have a substantive due process

right that would compel the District TTT to hire additional employees to staff the [D.C.] Jail in order to address what, they assert, is

an unreasonably dangerous workplace.’’)

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shall be treated as one for summary judgment.’’); Yates, 324

F.3d at 725 (parties’ submissions and court’s consideration of

matters outside pleadings ‘‘had the effect of converting the

Rule 12 motion TTT into a motion for summary judgment’’).

We may, however, ‘‘characterize[ ]’’ the district court’s dismissal as a grant of summary judgment under Rule 56(c) and

affirm. Mazaleski v. Treusdell, 562 F.2d 701, 708 (D.C. Cir.

1977) (treating district court’s dismissal ‘‘for failure to state a

claim over which it had jurisdiction’’ as ‘‘a summary judgment

[when] both parties had presented affidavits and other materials ‘outside the pleading’, these were expressly considered

by the court, and it is clear from the [court’s decision] that an

intended, albeit unarticulated, ground for dismissal was Rule

12(b)(6)’’ (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b))); see Yates, 324 F.3d

at 726 (‘‘resulting order’’ from motion to dismiss ‘‘must be

treated [on appeal] as a grant of summary judgment under

Rule 56’’ because ‘‘parties submitted, and [court] considered,

matters outside the pleadings’’). We may do so, however,

only if the ‘‘pleadings and record ‘show that there is no

genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving

party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.’ ’’ Kingman

Park Civic Ass’n v. Williams, 348 F.3d 1033, 1041 (D.C. Cir.

2003) (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c)). We conclude that there

is no genuine issue of material fact and that the District

defendants are entitled to judgment as a matter of law.

On appeal the Union focuses on Butera’s ‘‘State endangerment concept.’’ 235 F.3d at 651. In Butera we declared that

‘‘an individual can assert a substantive due process right to

protection by the District of Columbia from third-party violence when District of Columbia officials affirmatively act to

increase the danger that ultimately results in the individual’s

harm.’’ Id. But Butera cautioned that ‘‘[t]o assert a substantive due process violation, the plaintiff must also show

that the District of Columbia’s conduct was ‘so egregious, so

outrageous, that it may fairly be said to shock the contemporary conscience.’ ’’ Id. (quoting County of Sacramento v.

Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 847 n.8 (1998)). The Union contends

that it demonstrated sufficiently conscience-shocking action

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by District officials in alleging that the Mayor and the DOC

Director failed to heed not only the now-vacated, courtordered inmate population ceiling but also a November 2001

internal DOC staffing memorandum allegedly indicating a

need for more correctional officers, a September 2000 National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health report identifying health hazards at the Jail, and an alleged rise in the

number of inmate assaults on correctional officers. We disagree and decline to extend Butera – a case involving the

death of a police informant turned undercover operative – to

the Union’s challenge to the inmate/guard ratio at the D.C.

Jail. 235 F.3d at 641-43.

The challenged acts of the Mayor and the DOC Director –

implementing RIFs and relocating prisoners to another detention facility in response to congressional appropriations

and mandates – in no way approach the ‘‘cognizable level of

executive abuse of power as that which shocks the conscience.’’ Lewis, 523 U.S. at 846. The conscience-shock

inquiry is a ‘‘threshold question’’ ‘‘in a due process challenge

to executive action.’’ Id. at 847 n.8; see id. at 846 (‘‘[O]nly the

most egregious official conduct can be said to be ‘arbitrary in

the constitutional sense.’ ’’ (quoting Collins, 503 U.S. at 129)).

It is a ‘‘stringent requirement’’ that ‘‘exists to differentiate

substantive due process TTT from local tort law,’’ Butera, 235

F.3d at 651; see Uhlrig v. Harder, 64 F.3d 567, 572 (10th Cir.

1995) (noting that ‘‘many state activities have the potential for

creating some danger–as is true of most human endeavors –

but not all such activities constitute a ‘special’ danger giving

rise to § 1983 liability’’); see also Pinder v. Johnson, 54 F.3d

1169, 1178 (4th Cir. 1995) (declining to recognize ‘‘broad’’

substantive due process claim ‘‘to affirmative protection from

the state’’ because it ‘‘would be first step down the slippery

slope of liability’’); and recognizes the ‘‘presumption that the

administration of government programs’’ and ‘‘[d]ecisions concerning the allocation of resources’’ are ‘‘based on a rational

decisionmaking process that takes account of competing social, political, and economic forces.’’ Collins, 503 U.S. at 128.

It is ‘‘conduct intended to injure in some way unjustifiable by

any government interest’’ – and not such large-scale personUSCA Case #03-7076 Document #837264 Filed: 07/20/2004 Page 7 of 11
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nel and program decisions as relocation of inmates and reallocation of correctional officers resulting therefrom, made by

officials at the highest level of the District government in

response to congressional directives and appropriations – that

‘‘is the sort of official action most likely to rise to the

conscience-shocking level.’’ Lewis, 523 U.S. at 849 (citing

Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 327, 331 (1986)); see Collins,

503 U.S. at 129 (‘‘The Due Process Clause ‘is not a guarantee

against incorrect or ill-advised personnel decisions.’ ’’ (quoting

Bishop v. Wood, 426 U.S. 341, 350 (1976))); id. (‘‘The United

States Constitution cannot feasibly be construed to require

federal judicial review for every TTT error’’ involving ‘‘the

multitude of personnel decisions that are made daily by public

agencies.’’).

The Union contends that it meets the ‘‘shocks the conscience’’ test because it alleges that the Mayor and the DOC

Director ‘‘had the luxury to make unhurried judgments concerning the ratio of [c]orrectional [o]fficer staffing to inmate

population’’ and instead acted with ‘‘deliberate indifference’’

to the safety and security of the correctional officers. Appellants’ Br. at 24. As we explained in Butera, however, the

‘‘lower threshold’’ for meeting the shock the conscience test

by showing deliberately indifferent as opposed to intentional

conduct applies only in ‘‘circumstances where the State has a

heightened obligation toward the individual.’’ 235 F.3d at

651; see Lewis, 523 U.S. at 850 (‘‘Deliberate indifference that

shocks in one environment may not be so patently egregious

in another, and our concern with preserving the constitutional

proportions of substantive due process demands an exact

analysis of circumstances before any abuse of power is condemned as conscience shocking.’’); Daniels, 474 U.S. at 331

(‘‘Historically, this guarantee of due process has been applied

to deliberate decisions of government officials to deprive a

person of life, liberty or property.’’ (emphasis in original)

(citations omitted)). Such a circumstance occurs, for example, ‘‘when the State takes a person into its custody and holds

him there against his will’’ – ‘‘the Constitution imposes TTT a

corresponding duty [on the State] to assume some responsibility for his safety and general well-being’’ because ‘‘it renUSCA Case #03-7076 Document #837264 Filed: 07/20/2004 Page 8 of 11
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ders him unable to care for himself.’’ DeShaney v. Winnebago County Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 199-200 (1989).

The opportunity for deliberation alone is not sufficient to

apply the lower threshold to substantive due process claims.

Instead, it is ‘‘[b]ecause of TTT special circumstances’’ like

custody that ‘‘a State official’s deliberate indifference TTT can

be ‘truly shocking.’ ’’ Butera, 235 F.3d at 652; see Lewis, 523

U.S. at 853 (‘‘[L]iability for deliberate indifference to inmate

welfare rests upon the luxury enjoyed by prison officials of

having time to make unhurried judgments, upon the chance

for repeated reflection, largely uncomplicated by the pulls of

competing obligations.’’).

The Union does not argue that similar special circumstances exist with regard to correctional officers and our

precedent holds otherwise. As the district court observed,

Fraternal Order of Police, 263 F. Supp. 2d at 48, we have

previously rejected a prison guard’s substantive due process

claim based on the alleged danger resulting from overcrowding and a shortage of guards.4

 See Washington, 802 F.2d at

1480-81. In doing so, we noted the difference in circumstances between a prison inmate and a prison guard:

Prison guards, unlike the prisoners in their charge, are

not held in state custody. Their decision to work as

guards is voluntary. If they deem the terms of their

employment unsatisfactory, e.g., if salary, promotion

prospects, or safety are inadequate, they may seek employment elsewhere. The state did not force [the plain4 In Washington, the plaintiff guard had in fact been injured by

an inmate. 802 F.2d at 1479. Here the District argued that none

of the plaintiffs had suffered an injury in fact, see Reply to

Plaintiffs’ Opposition to Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss at JA 171,

but the court did not reach the issue. In Butera, we stated only

that ‘‘an individual can assert a substantive due process right to

protection by the District of Columbia from third-party violence

when District of Columbia officials affirmatively act to increase or

create the danger that ultimately results in the individual’s harm.’’

235 F.3d at 651 (emphasis added); see City of Los Angeles v. Lyons,

461 U.S. 95, 105, 111 (1983).

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tiff] to become a guard, and the state has no constitutional obligation to protect him from the hazards inherent in

that occupation.

Id. at 1482; see Randolph v. Cervantes, 130 F.3d 727, 730-31

(5th Cir. 1997) (rejecting substantive due process claim

brought by mother of injured resident of state mental health

center where state officials ‘‘allowed and encouraged [the

resident] to voluntarily reside at [the center] TTT having the

right to come and go from the premises at any time’’); see

also Butera, 235 F.3d at 651 n.16 (noting but not deciding

‘‘whether the possibly voluntary nature of [undercover police

operative’s] conduct would relieve or mitigate [sic] the District of Columbia of constitutional liability’’). Furthermore,

the Union has not demonstrated that an assault by an inmate

is an unforeseeable risk of its members’ employment. See

Uhlrig, 64 F.3d at 575 & n.13 (rejecting substantive due

process claim brought by widow of municipal therapist killed

by mental patient because therapist was aware of ‘‘potential

risk inherent in [her] job’’ and declining ‘‘on a more general

level’’ to hold ‘‘public employers liable under § 1983 for

dangers arising from [such] risk’’); see also Collins, 503 U.S.

at 128 (rejecting claim that municipal liability based on ‘‘alleged failure to train [municipal] employees, or to warn them

about known risks of harm’’ could ‘‘properly be characterized

as arbitrary, or conscience shocking, in a constitutional sense’’

(emphasis added)).

Instead, the Union contends that the rationale of our

Washington decision has been limited by the Supreme

Court’s decision in Collins. To be sure, Collins recognized

that the Constitution ‘‘afford[s] protection to employees who

serve the government as well as to those who are served by

them, and [section] 1983 provides a cause of action for all

citizens injured by an abridgement of those protections.’’ 503

U.S. at 120. It also noted that the ‘‘employment relationship

TTT is not of controlling significance’’ in a municipal employee’s substantive due process claim. Id. at 119. But Collins

rejected the claim, made by the widow of a city sanitation

worker killed in the performance of his duties, that the Due

Process Clause required the city to ‘‘provide its employees

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with certain minimal levels of safety and security’’ ‘‘when it

made, and [the worker] voluntarily accepted, an offer of

employment.’’ Id. at 127-28. Moreover, Collins expressly

cautioned against allowing a substantive due process claim

under section 1983 to ‘‘ ‘supplant traditional state-law tort’ ’’

and ‘‘employment’’ claims because, as noted above, ‘‘[d]ecisions concerning the allocation of resources to individual

programs TTT and to particular aspects of those programs,

TTT involve a host of policy choices that must be made by

locally elected representatives, rather than by federal judges

interpreting the basic charter of Government for the entire

country.’’ Id. at 128-29 (quoting Daniels, 474 U.S. at 332);

see Uhlrig, 64 F.3d at 576 (rejecting substantive due process

claim against officials who ‘‘faced difficult allocational decisions precipitated by budgetary constraints, and even if their

decisions created certain risks, TTT view[ing] them as within

the province of policymakers who must balance competing

concerns’’). For the same reasons, we decline to interfere

with the District’s decisionmaking here.5

III.

For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district

court is affirmed and summary judgment is granted to the

defendants pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56.

So ordered.

5 To the extent the Union asserts a substantive due process right

to a safe work environment, a claim it disavowed at oral argument

but pressed below and in its reply brief, such a claim was rejected

by the Supreme Court in Collins, 503 U.S. at 130 (‘‘In sum, we

conclude that the Due Process Clause does not impose an independent federal obligation upon municipalities to provide certain minimal levels of safety and security in the workplace.’’), and by our

court in Washington, 802 F.2d at 1482 (‘‘Whatever [a prison

guard]’s rights may be under state law, he has no constitutional

right to a safe working environment.’’).

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