Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-2_90-cv-00520/USCOURTS-caed-2_90-cv-00520-671/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 550
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Civil Rights (U.S. defendant)
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT 

EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

RALPH COLEMAN, et al., 

Plaintiffs, 

v. 

EDMUND G. BROWN, JR., et al.,

Defendants. 

No. CIV. S-90-520 LKK/DAD (PC) 

ORDER 

Defendants have filed a request for reconsideration of this 

court’s January 30, 2014 order reopening discovery; they also 

seek to stay the magistrate judge’s February 5, 2014 order 

concerning said discovery (ECF No. 5055).1

 Plaintiffs oppose the 

request (ECF No. 5056), and defendants have filed a reply (ECF 

No. 5057). 

Defendants seek reconsideration of that part of the court’s 

January 30, 2014 order that opened discovery as to whether 

relevant information concerning the September 7, 2013 death of a 

 

1 Defendants request a hearing on their request for 

reconsideration. The request for reconsideration is resolved 

herein without oral argument. 

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Coleman class member was withheld from plaintiffs or the court 

during the course of the evidentiary hearing which commenced on 

October 1, 2013. The crux of the relevant2 disagreement between 

the parties centers on whether defendants had any duty to produce 

a suicide report by November 7, 2013. Defendants contend that 

under both the Program Guide and paragraph 7 of a June 13, 2002 

order of this court (ECF No. 1384), where there is a genuine 

issue about whether a death is a suicide no suicide report is 

required until after the death is determined to be a suicide. 

Defs. Req. for Recon. (ECF No. 5055) at 3 n.2. Plaintiffs 

disagree. Pls. Resp. (ECF No. 5056) at 1-2. 

Paragraph 7 of the court’s June 13, 2002 order has been 

superseded by the court’s March 3, 2006 order (ECF No. 1773) 

 

2 Defendants also contend (i) that discovery was opened based on 

“false” assertions by plaintiffs’ counsel that certain documents 

related to this class member’s death had not been downloaded or 

reviewed; (ii) that those documents were uploaded in September 

2013 and were sufficient to give plaintiffs fair notice of the 

facts and circumstances of this class member’s death; and (iii) 

that plaintiffs should not be permitted to reopen discovery where 

they failed to timely review these documents. Plaintiffs have 

filed declarations of counsel correcting what they assert was a 

“mistake” concerning the time when certain documents were 

downloaded by a paralegal employed by plaintiffs’ counsel. See 

Suppl. Decl of Bien, filed February 3, 2014 (ECF No. 5014); Decl. 

of Kahn, filed February 3, 2014 (ECF No. 5042). The court 

accepts these corrected representations. Defendants’ contentions 

concerning whether plaintiffs were on inquiry notice sufficient 

to obviate whatever duties defendants may have had are 

insufficient to justify closing discovery on the question of 

whether relevant information concerning this class member’s death 

was withheld from plaintiffs or the court during the course of 

the evidentiary hearing which commenced on October 1, 2013. 

Those contentions may be renewed, as appropriate, at a later 

stage of these proceedings should the court be required to decide 

what information should have been advanced when and by whom. 

 

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approving all undisputed provisions of that Revised Program Guide 

and ordering their immediate implementation.3 Specific 

requirements for reporting on inmate suicides were included in 

the undisputed provisions of the Revised Program Guide approved 

and required to be implemented by that order, see January 2006 

Revised Program Guide (ECF No. 1753-10) at 12-10-23 through 12-

10-29, and are controlling as to the matters covered therein.4 

The June 13, 2002 order required production of a final 

suicide report to the special master’s experts “within ninety 

days after any suicide or, if there is a genuine issue whether 

the death is a suicide, ninety days from the date on which said 

death is determined to be a suicide.” (ECF No. 1384 at 2.) The 

Program Guide has changed the timeline for production of suicide 

reports to sixty days. Pl. Ex. 1200 at 12-10-24 to 12-10-26. 

There appears to be no provision in the Program Guide comparable 

to the alternative described in the June 13, 2002 order extending 

that timeline “if there is a genuine issue whether the death is a 

suicide.”5

 As the Program Guide now stands,it outlines a Suicide 

Death Review process that commences with the completion of two 

 

3

 The Special Master’s Report and Recommendations on Defendants’ 

Revised Program Guide, filed February 3, 2006 (ECF No. 1749) 

describes the three-year process of “intense review, analysis and 

negotiation” that led to promulgation of the Revised Program 

Guide. (ECF No. 1749 at 2.) 

4 Those provisions remain in the current 2009 version of the 

Program Guide. See Pls. Ex. 1200, Program Guide 2009 Revision, 

at 12-10-23 through 12-10-29. 

5

 The omission may well have been inadvertent and may suggest a 

revision of the Program Guide may be appropriate. If the present 

controversy turns out to prove nothing else, it may nonetheless 

have proved to have value. 

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forms: a CDCR 7229A Initial Inmate Death Report, a CDCR 7229B 

Initial Inmate Suicide Report. See Pls. Ex. 1200 at 12-10-24. 

Both of those documents were completed in the case of this class 

member’s death and uploaded to the CDCR’s secure website in 

September 2013. See Ex. 2 to Confidential Kahn Decl (ECF No. 

5049 *SEALED*); see also Sealed Belavich Decl. (ECF No. 5046-1 

*SEALED*). Under the timelines contained in the Program Guide a 

suicide report by the Mental Health Suicide Reviewer was due 

within sixty days of the class member’s death. See Pls. Ex. 1200 

at 12-20-26. 

Here, defendants contend that the notice of death provided 

on September 16, 2013 “disclosed that CDCR was uncertain whether 

[the class member]’s death was a suicide or accidental death.” 

Defs. Req. for Recon. (ECF No. 5055) at 3 n.2. Defendants have 

also filed, under seal, a declaration from Dr. Tim Belavich, 

CDCR’s Deputy Director of the Statewide Mental Health Program and 

the Director (Acting) of the Division of Health Care Services for 

the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation 

(CDCR) (ECF No. 5046-1 *SEALED*). In that declaration, Dr. 

Belavich avers that on October 31, 2013, the Suicide Case Review 

Subcommittee considered the case, found it did not appear the 

class member had committed suicide, and decided to await the 

coroner’s report. Id. at ¶ 8. 

The issues raised by plaintiffs’ request to open discovery 

may, in the end, come down to nothing more than a disagreement 

about whether the Suicide Case Review Subcommittee could, 

consistent with the requirements of the Program Guide, under the 

circumstances of this class member’s death defer completion and 

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forwarding of a suicide report pending receipt of the coroner’s 

report.6 Defendants argue forcefully that nothing “in the 

Program Guide or elsewhere . . . requires a suicide report for 

deaths of undetermined or accidental causes.” Defs. Reply, filed 

February 7, 2014 (ECF No. 5057) at 2. The court need not resolve 

that question at this time. Here, a form CDCR 7229B Initial 

Inmate Suicide Report was completed three days after the class 

member’s death. The notice provided by Dr. Belavich on September 

16, 2013 described the class member’s death as “an apparent 

suicide/unknown death” and the record shows that several steps in 

the suicide review process were timely followed but the final 

report was not completed on the timeline set out in the Program 

Guide. Under the circumstances of this case, plaintiffs are 

entitled to conduct discovery into the reason(s) that timeline 

was not met. 

For all of the foregoing reasons, IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that 

defendants’ February 6, 2014 motion for reconsideration and to 

stay discovery (ECF No. 5055) is denied.7

DATED: February 7, 2014. 

 

6 The Program Guide provides that “[i]f, during the suicide review 

process, other death related information arrives, such as CDCR 

837 C, CDCR 7229 C, or Coroner’s report, the DNC [Death 

Notification Coordinator] will locate the death review folder and 

place these documents inside. The DNC shall update the routing 

sheet and notify the SPR FIT [Suicide Prevention and Response 

Focused Improvement Team] Coordinator of the new information.” 

Pls. Ex. 1200 at 12-10-28 

7 The court feels compelled to state to the parties that not every 

mistake is evidence of malicious intent.

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