Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca9-12-56829/USCOURTS-ca9-12-56829-0/pdf.json

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

---

FOR PUBLICATION

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

JONATHAN MICHAEL CASTRO,

Plaintiff-Appellee,

v.

COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES; LOS

ANGELES SHERIFF’S DEPARTMENT;

CHRISTOPHER SOLOMON; DAVID

VALENTINE, Sergeant, aka

Valentine,

Defendants-Appellants.

No. 12-56829

D.C. No.

2:10-05425-DSF

OPINION

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Central District of California

Dale S. Fischer, District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted

December 11, 2014—Pasadena, California

Filed May 1, 2015

Before: Ronald Lee Gilman,* Susan P. Graber,

and Consuelo M. Callahan, Circuit Judges.

Opinion by Judge Gilman;

Concurrence by Judge Callahan;

Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge Graber

* The Honorable Ronald Lee Gilman, Senior United States Circuit Judge

for the Sixth Circuit, sitting by designation.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 1 of 38
2 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

SUMMARY**

Civil Rights

The panel affirmed in part and reversed in part the district

court’s judgment, entered following a jury trial, in an action

brought under federal and state law by a pretrial detainee who

was attacked by another arrestee and suffered serious harm.

Affirming the judgment in favor of plaintiff against the

individual defendants, the panel held that defendants were not

entitled to qualified immunity because the right to be free

from violence at the hands of other inmates was well

established and there was sufficient evidence for a jury to find

that the officials were deliberately indifferent to a substantial

risk of harm to plaintiff. The panel further found that there

was sufficient evidence for the punitive damages award. 

Reversing the judgment in favor of plaintiff against the

County of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles Sheriff’s

Department, the panel held that plaintiff’s claim under Monell

v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 690–71 (1978), was

legally viable but insufficiently proven. The panel held that

although the entity defendants instituted a formal policy

under Monell with regard to designing the jail’s sobering cell,

there was insufficient evidence that they had actual

knowledge of the risk to plaintiff’s safety.

The panel affirmed the jury’s future-damages award,

determining that plaintiff presented sufficient evidence

** This summary constitutes no part of the opinion of the court. It has

been prepared by court staff for the convenience of the reader.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 2 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 3

regarding the amount of his past damages from which a jury

could reasonably calculate the amount of future damages.

Concurring, Judge Callahan agreed that the judgment of

the district court against the individual defendants should be

affirmed and the judgment against the entity defendants

should be reversed. She wrote separately to explain that she

did not think that plaintiff had shown that the design of the

West Hollywood Station constituted a policy for purposes of

liability under Monell.

Concurring in part and dissenting in part, Judge Graber

joined the majority opinion as to the liability of the individual

defendants. She dissented from the holding that there was

insufficient evidence from which the jury could have

concluded that the entity defendants were deliberately

indifferent to the risk that plaintiff would be harmed by a

fellow inmate. 

COUNSEL

Melinda Cantrall (argued) and Thomas C. Hurrell, Hurrell

Cantrall LLP, Los Angeles, California, for DefendantsAppellants.

John Burton (argued), Law Offices of John Burton, Pasadena,

California; Maria Cavalluzzi, Cavalluzzi & Cavalluzzi, Los

Angeles, California; and Lawrence Lallande, Lallande Law

PLC, Long Beach, California, for Plaintiff-Appellee.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 3 of 38
4 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

OPINION

GILMAN, Senior Circuit Judge:

In October 2009, Jonathan Castro was arrested for being

drunk in public. He was housed in a “sobering cell” at the

Los Angeles Sheriff’s West Hollywood Station where, a few

hours after his arrest, he was savagely attacked by another

intoxicated arrestee who had been placed in the cell with him.

The officer on duty at the jail failed to respond to Castro’s

pounding on the cell door despite evidence that the officer

was well within range to hear the pounding. Castro suffered

serious harm, including a broken jaw and traumatic brain

injury.

This lawsuit was filed by Castro in the United States

District Court for the Central District of California in July

2010. He brought both federal- and state-law claims against

the County of Los Angeles, the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s

Department, and a number of John Doe defendants who were

later identified as two of his jailers. After a six-day trial, the

jury returned a verdict for Castro against both the individual

and entity defendants, awarding him over $2.6 million in past

and future damages.

The defendants then renewed their joint motion for

judgment as a matter of law, arguing that there was

insufficient evidence to support the verdict, that the

individual defendants were entitled to qualified immunity,

and that Castro’s theory of liability against the County and

the Sheriff’s Department (these two entities being hereinafter

collectively referred to as the County) was simply untenable.

The district court denied the defendants’ motion without a

written opinion. They now appeal. For the reasons set forth

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 4 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 5

below, we AFFIRM the judgment of the district court against

the individual defendants but REVERSE the judgment

against the County.

I. BACKGROUND

A. Assault on Castro

Castro was arrested late in the evening of October 2, 

2009 for public drunkenness. The arresting officers reported

that Castro was staggering, bumping into pedestrians, and

speaking unintelligibly, so they arrested him “for his safety.”

He was transported to the West Hollywood Station and

placed in a fully walled sobering cell that was stripped of

objects with hard edges on which an inmate could hurt

himself if he lost his balance. The cell contained only a toilet

and a series of mattress pads on the floor. A short time later,

Jonathan Gonzalez was arrested after punching out a window

at a nightclub. The officers brought Gonzalez to the West

Hollywood Station, where he was placed in the same sobering

cell that housed Castro. Gonzalez’s intake forms indicated

that he was “combative” at the time he was placed in the cell.

Shortly after Gonzalez was placed in the cell, Castro

approached the door and pounded on the window in the door

for a full minute, attempting to attract an officer’s attention. 

No one responded. A community volunteer at the jail, Gene

Schiff, came by approximately 20 minutes later. He noted

that Castro appeared to be asleep and that Gonzalez was

“inappropriately” touching Castro’s thigh, the latter

circumstance being in violation of jail policy. Schiff did not

enter the cell to investigate. Instead, he reported the contact

to the supervising officer, Christopher Solomon. Solomon

took no action until he heard loud sounds six minutes later.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 5 of 38
6 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

He rushed to the sobering cell and saw Gonzalez making a

violent stomping motion. Solomon immediately opened the

door and discovered that Gonzalez was stomping on Castro’s

head. Solomon ordered Gonzalez to step away from Castro.

Seeing that Castro was by then lying unconscious in a pool of

blood, Solomon called for medical assistance.

When the paramedics arrived, Castro was still

unconscious, in respiratory distress, and turning blue. He was

hospitalized for almost a month, then transferred to a

long-term care facility, where he remained for four years. He

currently suffers from severe memory loss and permanent

cognitive impairments. Even after his release from the

long-term care facility, Castro remains incapable of

performing simple life functions, such as cooking and

maintaining hygiene. His family is responsible for his basic

care to this day.

B. District court proceedings

After his complaint was filed, Castro substituted Solomon

and Solomon’s supervisor, Sergeant David Valentine, for the

John Doe defendants named in the original complaint.

Solomon was the jail’s officer on duty on the evening in

question and Valentine was the watch sergeant in charge of

the jail as a whole. Castro’s basic theory of liability under

42 U.S.C. § 1983 was that both the County and the individual

defendants were deliberatelyindifferent to the substantial risk

of harm created by housing him in the same sobering cell as

Gonzalez and by failing to maintain appropriate supervision

of the cell. The complaint also set forth a variety of state-law

claims, not one of which is raised by any party to this appeal.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 6 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 7

The individual defendants moved to dismiss the claims

against them on the ground of qualified immunity, but the

district court rejected their arguments. It concluded that a

jury could find that placing an actively belligerent inmate in

an unmonitored cell with Castro constituted deliberate

indifference to a substantial risk of harm, in violation of

Castro’s constitutional rights.

The case proceeded to trial. After Castro rested his case,

the defendants moved for judgment as a matter of law on

three grounds: (1) insufficient evidence that the design of a

jail cell constitutes a policy, practice, or custom by the

County that resulted in a constitutional violation;

(2) insufficient evidence that a reasonable officer would have

known that housing Castro and Gonzalez together was a

violation of Castro’s constitutional rights; and (3) insufficient

evidence for the jury to award punitive damages. The district

court denied the motion in its entirety. Five days later, the

jury returned a verdict for Castro on all counts and awarded

him $2,605,632.02 in damages. Based on the jury’s findings,

the parties later stipulated to $840,000 in attorney fees,

$12,000 in punitive damages against Valentine, and $6,000 in

punitive damages against Solomon.

After trial, the defendants timely filed a renewed motion

for judgment as a matter of law. The trial court denied the

renewed motion without issuing a written opinion. This

timely appeal followed.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 7 of 38
8 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

II. ANALYSIS

A. Standard of review

We review de novo the district court’s denial of a motion

for judgment as a matter of law. Hangarter v. Provident Life

& Accident Ins. Co., 373 F.3d 998, 1005 (9th Cir. 2004). A

renewed motion for judgment as a matter of law is properly

granted only “if the evidence, construed in the light most

favorable to the nonmoving party, permits only one

reasonable conclusion, and that conclusion is contrary to the

jury’s verdict.” Pavao v. Pagay, 307 F.3d 915, 918 (9th Cir.

2002). “A jury’s verdict must be upheld if it is supported by

substantial evidence, which is evidence adequate to support

the jury’s conclusion, even if it is also possible to draw a

contrary conclusion.” Id.

In making this determination, the court must not weigh

the evidence, but should simply ask whether the plaintiff has

presented sufficient evidence to support the jury’s conclusion.

Johnson v. Paradise Valley Unified Sch. Dist., 251 F.3d 1222,

1227–28 (9th Cir. 2001). Although the court must review the

entire evidentiary record, it must view all the evidence in the

light most favorable to the nonmoving party, draw all

reasonable inferences in the favor of the nonmover, and

disregard all evidence favorable to the moving party that the

jury is not required to believe. Id. at 1227.

The defendants raise a number of issues on appeal,

ranging from discrete legal questions to disputed matters of

evidence. We first address the arguments raised by the

individual defendants, then move on to those presented by

the County.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 8 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 9

B. Neither Solomon nor Valentine is entitled to qualified

immunity

Both individual defendants—Solomon and Valentine—

argue that the judgment against them should be reversed

because they are entitled to qualified immunity. The doctrine

of qualified immunity shields government officials from civil

liability under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 if “their conduct does not

violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of

which a reasonable person would have known.” Harlow v.

Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). “Qualified immunity

balances two important interests—the need to hold public

officials accountable when they exercise power irresponsibly

and the need to shield officials from harassment, distraction,

and liability when they perform their duties reasonably.”

Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 231 (2009).

To determine whether an officer is entitled to qualified

immunity, a court must evaluate two independent prongs:

(1) whether the officer’s conduct violated a constitutional

right, and (2) whether that right was clearly established at the

time of the incident. Id. at 232. These prongs may be

addressed in either order. Id. at 236.

The constitutional right at issue in this case is the right to

be free from violence at the hands of other inmates. This

right was first recognized by the Supreme Court in Farmer v.

Brennan, 511 U.S. 825 (1994). In Farmer, a male-tofemale

transgender person was placed in male housing in the federal

prison system, where she was beaten and raped by another

inmate. Id. at 830. She brought a civil rights action for

damages and an injunction, alleging that the corrections

officers had acted with deliberate indifference to her safety,

in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Id. at 830–31. The

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 9 of 38
10 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

Supreme Court agreed with her, holding that “prison officials

have a duty . . . to protect prisoners from violence at the

hands of other prisoners” because corrections officers have

“stripped [the inmates] of virtually every means of

self-protection and foreclosed their access to outside aid.” Id.

at 833 (internal quotation marks omitted). This court has

since clarified that the right to be free from violence at the

hands of other inmates extends to inmates housed in state or

local custody. See Cortez v. Skol, 776 F.3d 1046, 1049–50

(9th Cir. 2015) (recognizing a claim based on Farmer brought

by a state prisoner).

Both Solomon and Valentine acknowledge that the duty

to protect Castro from violence was clearly established at the

time of the incident. But they argue that such a broad

definition of that duty is too general to guide this court’s

analysis. Moreover, they contend that Castro failed to present

substantial evidence to establish that they violated their duty

to protect him.

“To determine that the law was clearly established, we

need not look to a case with identical or even ‘materially

similar’ facts.” Serrano v. Francis, 345 F.3d 1071, 1077 (9th

Cir. 2003) (quoting Hope v. Pelzer, 536 U.S. 730, 739–41

(2002)). The question instead is whether the contours of the

right were sufficiently clear that a reasonable official would

understand that his actions violated that right. Id.; see also

Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 202 (2001).

Following the Supreme Court’s 1994 decision in Farmer,

this court has considered over 15 different failure-to-protect

claims stemming from inmate-on-inmate violence. In each

case, the court has recited the standard established by

Farmer, then proceeded to apply that standard to the facts of

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 10 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 11

the case before the court. The similarity of the facts—or the

lack thereof—to other post-Farmer cases has rarely entered

the discussion. See, e.g., Robinson v. Prunty, 249 F.3d 862,

866–67 (9th Cir. 2001).

Instead, the right at issue is construed simply as the right

to be protected from attacks by other inmates. This is in stark

contrast with the qualified-immunity analysis for other types

of claims, such as excessive force, in which analogies to prior

cases play a much stronger role. See Maxwell v. Cnty. of San

Diego, 708 F.3d 1075, 1082–83 (9th Cir. 2013); Winterrowd

v. Nelson, 480 F.3d 1181, 1185–86 (9th Cir. 2007);

Drummond ex rel. Drummond v. City of Anaheim, 343 F.3d

1052, 1056–61 (9th Cir. 2003). In sum, Farmer sets forth the

contours of the right to be free from violence at the hands of

other inmates with sufficient clarity to guide a reasonable

officer. Solomon and Valentine’s argument on this point is

therefore without merit.

They next question the sufficiency of the evidence

supportingCastro’s claim of deliberate indifference. Because

Castro was a pretrial detainee, his right to be free from

violence at the hands of other inmates arises from the Fourth

Amendment rather than the Eighth Amendment. Pierce v.

Multnomah County, 76 F.3d 1032, 1042–43 (9th Cir. 1996).

Despite those different constitutional sources, the “deliberate

indifference” test is the same for pretrial detainees and for

convicted prisoners. Clouthier v. County of Contra Costa,

591 F.3d 1232, 1242–43 (9th Cir. 2010). Thus, in order to

prove that his right to be free from violence at the hands of

another inmate was violated, Castro was required to show by

a preponderance of the evidence that (1) he faced a

substantial risk of serious harm, (2) the defendants were

deliberately indifferent to that risk, and (3) the defendants’

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 11 of 38
12 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

failure to act was a proximate cause of the harm that he

suffered. See Farmer, 511 U.S. at 847. A defendant is

deemed “deliberately indifferent” to a substantial risk of

serious harm when he knew of the risk but disregarded it by

failing to take reasonable measures to address the danger. Id. 

On the verdict form, the jury specifically found that both

Solomon and Valentine were deliberately indifferent to

Castro’s plight.

Castro noted several different ways in which Solomon

and Valentine were deliberately indifferent to his risk of

harm: both decided to house him in a fully walled sobering

cell with a “combative” inmate; Solomon failed to respond to

Castro’s banging on the window in the door of the cell;

Solomon failed to respond fast enough to Gonzalez’s

inappropriate touching; and Solomon erred in delegating the

safety checks to a volunteer. We conclude that the jury could

have found Solomon and Valentine liable based on the

substantial evidence presented in support of one or more of

these theories.

1. The jury could have found that Solomon was

deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk of harm

to Castro because he disregarded Castro’s pounding

on the cell door

Castro’s most persuasive theoryof deliberate indifference

with respect to Solomon stems from Solomon’s failure to

respond when Castro pounded on the door after Gonzalez was

placed in the cell. Video footage presented at trial established

that Castro pounded on the door for a full minute after

Gonzalez entered the cell. Solomon was near the cell at the

time, but testified that he did not hear the pounding. Solomon

also contends that the video footage of the event shows that

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 12 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 13

he “did not appear to hear any banging on the door by

plaintiff.” Three other witnesses, however, including two jail

employees, testified that one could hear simple talking from

inside the sobering cell, such that pounding would have been

easy to hear from where Solomon was standing.

Faced with this evidence, the jury could have reasonably

concluded that Solomon heard the pounding and elected not

to respond. “[A] jury may properly refuse to credit even

uncontradicted testimony.” Guy v. City of San Diego,

608 F.3d 582, 588 (9th Cir. 2010) (citing Quock Ting v.

United States, 140 U.S. 417, 420–21 (1891)). Here, the jury

was presented with circumstantial evidence that undermined

Solomon’s assertion that he did not hear the pounding.

But Solomon contends in his brief that we are free to

“disregard inferences in favor of the prevailing party where

they are belied by a video account in the record,” citing Scott

v. Harris, 550 U.S. 372, 380–81 (2007). In this case,

however, the video footage neither confirms nor refutes

Solomon’s account. The jury had the opportunity to review

both the footage and the testimony in context, and to perform

a full assessment of each witness’s credibility. Given the

testimony of three other witnesses, the jury had sufficient

evidence to conclude that Solomon heard but ignored

Castro’s attempts to attract attention. On appeal, we “may

not substitute [our] view of the evidence for that of the jury.”

Johnson v. Paradise Valley Unified Sch. Dist., 251 F.3d 1222,

1227 (9th Cir. 2001).

We thus reach the question of whether Solomon’s failure

to respond to Castro’s banging constituted deliberate

indifference. The jury determined that it did. This court has

long held that whether or not a prison official’s actions

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 13 of 38
14 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

constitute deliberate indifference is a subjective inquiry and

a question of fact. Grenning v. Miller-Stout, 739 F.3d 1235,

1239 (9th Cir. 2014) (citing Johnson v. Lewis, 217 F.3d 726,

734 (9th Cir. 2000)). Because questions of fact are uniquely

the province of the jury, see Santos v. Gates, 287 F.3d 846,

852 (9th Cir. 2002), its determination must stand when

supported by substantial evidence, see Pavao v. Pagay,

307 F.3d 915, 918 (9th Cir. 2002).

This leads to the issue of whether Solomon’s deliberate

indifference was both an actual and a proximate cause of

Castro’s harm. See Lemire v. Cal. Dep’t of Corr. & Rehab.,

726 F.3d 1062, 1074 (9th Cir. 2013) (holding that “plaintiffs

alleging deliberate indifference must also demonstrate that

the defendants’ actions were both an actual and proximate

cause of their injuries”). Actual causation is “purely a

question of fact,” Robinson v. York, 566 F.3d 817, 825 (9th

Cir. 2009), and the jury determined that Solomon’s deliberate

indifference was in fact one of the causes of Castro’s harm.

But Solomon argues that this finding is unsupported by

the evidence because Castro did not appear to be injured

during a safety check performed 22 minutes after the

pounding stopped. His proposed restriction on the relevant

timeline for causation, however, does not comport with this

court’s prior rulings. See, e.g., Conn v. City of Reno,

591 F.3d 1081, 1098–1101 (9th Cir. 2010)) (holding that a

corrections officer’s failure to respond to warnings of harm

could be an actual cause of that inmate’s suicide 48 hours

later), vacated, 131 S. Ct. 1812 (2011), reinstated in relevant

part, 658 F.3d 897 (9th Cir. 2011). Because Solomon has

presented no compelling reason to adopt his proposed

arbitrary time limitation, we decline to do so. The jury’s

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 14 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 15

verdict on actual causation is supported bysufficient evidence

to remain undisturbed.

“‘Once it is established that the defendant’s conduct has

in fact been one of the causes of the plaintiff’s injury, there

remains the question whether the defendant should be legally

responsible for the injury.’” Id. at 1100 (quoting White v.

Roper, 901 F.2d 1501, 1506 (9th Cir. 1990)). A corrections

officer will be held legally responsible for an inmate’s

injuries if the officer’s actions are a “moving force” behind a

series of events that ultimately lead to a foreseeable harm,

even if other intervening causes contributed to the harm. Id.

at 1101. If reasonable persons could differ over the question

of foreseeability, that issue should be left to the jury. Id.

This court’s prior cases are instructive. In Conn, for

example, this court found that a corrections officer’s failure

to respond to an inmate’s attempt to choke herself and to her

subsequent threats of suicide could be considered a proximate

cause of her suicide two days after the threats, even though

she was subjected to several medical examinations between

the time of the threats and the time of her death. Id. at

1101–02. The question of foreseeability was left to the jury. 

Id. Similarly, the court in White concluded that a corrections

officer’s decision to forcibly place an inmate (the plaintiff)

into a cell with another, violent inmate could be considered

a “moving force” behind the injury that the plaintiff suffered

when he attempted to run, such that the question should have

been sent to a jury. White, 901 F.2d. at 1506. Here, the jury

found that Solomon’s deliberate indifference was one of the

causes of Castro’s harm. Leaving that decision to the jury is

in concert with this court’s prior opinions.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 15 of 38
16 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

Farmer clearly established that a corrections officer has

a duty to act to protect one inmate from violence at the hands

of another. The jury was presented with sufficient evidence

to find that Solomon was aware of but disregarded Castro’s

attempts to alert Solomon to the danger faced byCastro. And

the jury determined that Solomon’s deliberate indifference

was both an actual and a proximate cause of Castro’s harm. 

Even if we might have reached a different conclusion when

considering the totality of the circumstances, there is

sufficient evidence to support the jury’s verdict on this issue.

2. The jury could have found that Valentine was

deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk of harm

to Castro when he placed Gonzalez in Castro’s cell

We next turn to Sergeant Valentine. The parties agree

that Valentine may be held liable only for his own actions.

Vicarious liability does not apply to claims brought under

§ 1983, so Valentine may not be held independently

responsible for the actions of his subordinates. See Ashcroft

v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 676 (2009). Valentine was not in the

immediate vicinity of the sobering cell for most of the events

at issue in this case. The only relevant event for which he

was present was the initial decision to house Gonzalez in the

sobering cell with Castro, so we will focus our analysis on

that decision.

Valentine argues that he is entitled to qualified immunity

because a reasonable officer at the time of the incident would

not have known that housing Gonzalez in the same cell as

Castro would violate Castro’s constitutional rights. He relies

heavily on Estate of Ford v. Ramirez-Palmer, 301 F.3d 1043

(9th Cir. 2002), to support this argument. In Ford, a group of

prison officials decided to house the plaintiff with another

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 16 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 17

inmate who had been classified as a “predator” after several

past incidents of assault on his cellmates. Id. at 1046–47. 

Two days later, the “predator” inmate attacked and killed the

plaintiff. Id. at 1047.

The predatory inmate in Ford, however, “had been

successfully double-celled for years with other inmates” and

had not been recommended for “single-celling” by the prison

staff. Id. at 1051. Moreover, the plaintiff and the predator in

Ford consented to be housed together. Id. at 1047. They had

previously been housed together without incident, and there

was no history of violence between them. Id. Based on that

history, this court found that “it would not be clear to a

reasonable prison official when the risk of harm from

double-celling . . . changes from being a risk of some harm to

a substantial risk of serious harm.” Id. at 1051. (emphases in

original). The court therefore held that the official was

entitled to qualified immunity. Id. at 1053.

Ford’s central holding is that an officer is entitled to

qualified immunity when the transition from a risk of some

harm to a substantial risk of serious harm would not have

been clear to a reasonable prison official. “[T]he qualitative

difference between the degree of risk that will result in

liability under the Eighth Amendment’s standard, and that

which will not, is a fact-bound inquiry,” requiring deference

to the trier of fact. A.D. v. Cal. Highway Patrol, 712 F.3d

446, 455 n.4 (9th Cir. 2013). Here, a jury has already

weighed in and found that Valentine was aware of and

disregarded not merely a risk of some harm, but a substantial

risk of serious harm to Castro.

Ford was not a case of two intoxicated strangers being

thrown together in the middle of the night, but rather a calm,

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 17 of 38
18 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

reasoned decision made with the input of all the affected

parties. Faulting a prison official for disregarding some risk

of harm is difficult when the victim himself consented to the

risk. Castro, on the other hand, did not consent to being

housed with Gonzalez. Gonzalez and Castro had no history

together, so Valentine had no basis to conclude that the risk

of an altercation was minimal. Although Gonzalez had a

lesser history of violence in general than the predator inmate

in Ford, Gonzalez’s combative nature when placed in the cell

was in no way mitigated by any prior interaction with Castro.

At the end of the day, this is a fact-specific inquiry. The

jury heard evidence that Gonzalez presented a sufficient

threat to cause him to be supervised by two officers at all

times following his arrest, one of whom was consistently in

contact with him. They also heard that, pursuant to jail policy,

combative inmates such as Gonzalez were to be housed

separately from inmates like Castro, specifically to avoid this

type of altercation. The jury was further informed that

separate cells were available but left unused that evening.

This evidence was sufficient to allow the jury to find that

Valentine knew of but disregarded a substantial risk of

serious harm to Castro, and we find no reason to disturb that

finding. See id. at 459 (“[P]ost-verdict, a court must apply the

qualified immunity framework to the facts that the jury found

(including the defendant’s subjective intent).”). Such a

conclusion does not run afoul of this court’s holding in Ford

because of the key factual differences between the two cases.

As with Solomon, the final question then becomes

whether Valentine’s actions were both an actual and a

proximate cause of Castro’s harm. The jury determined that

they were and, for the reasons discussed above, we will not

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 18 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 19

set aside that determination. Valentine is therefore not

entitled to qualified immunity and may be subjected to

liability for his personal involvement in the decision to house

Gonzalez and Castro together.

C. For the purpose of awarding punitive damages, no

additional evidence is required to make a finding of

“reckless disregard” when a finding of “deliberate

indifference” has been made

The individual defendants cursorily argue that the district

court’s award of punitive damages must be reversed because

the evidence does not support such an award. Although the

parties stipulated to the eventual amount of the punitive

damages entered ($12,000 against Valentine and $6,000

against Solomon), the defendants argued in both their preand post-verdict motions for judgment as a matter of law that

there was insufficient evidence to support a punitive-damages

award. Castro counters that, after hearing the officers testify,

the jury might have determined that they demonstrated

callousness by their lack of remorse.

Punitive damages may be assessed in § 1983 actions

“when the defendant’s conduct is shown to be motivated by

evil motive or intent, or when it involves reckless or callous

indifference to the federally protected rights of others.” 

Smith v. Wade, 461 U.S. 30, 56 (1983). “[T]his threshold

applies even when the underlying standard of liability for

compensatory damages is one of recklessness,” id., because

to award punitive damages, the jurymust make both a factual

determination that the threshold was met and “a moral

judgment” that further punishment was warranted, id. at

52–53 (recognizing that where the underlying standard of

liability is recklessness, a tortfeasor may be subject to both

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 19 of 38
20 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

compensatory and punitive damages without any additional

culpable conduct). The decision to impose such sanctions is

“within the exclusive province of the jury.” Runge v. Lee,

441 F.2d 579, 584 (9th Cir. 1971).

The precise distinction between “deliberate indifference”

and “reckless or callous indifference” remains an open

question. As discussed above, “deliberate indifference” is

defined in this circuit as “the conscious choice to disregard

the consequences of one’s acts or omissions.” See 9th Cir.

Civ. Jury Instr. 9.7 (2007). Furthermore, when the Supreme

Court articulated the deliberate-indifference standard for

failure-to-protect claims in Farmer, it defined the standard as

one of criminal recklessness. See Farmer, 511 U.S. at

837–39. The circular nature of these definitions gives rise to

the inference that the terms are synonymous. Juries in these

cases thus have the discretion to impose punitive damages if

they believe further punishment above and beyond

compensatory damages is appropriate, without having to

make any additional factual findings. See Smith, 461 U.S. at

56.

As described above, the jury heard sufficient evidence

here to find that both individual defendants were deliberately

indifferent. Accordingly, it was also free to find that the

individual defendants’ actions constituted reckless or callous

indifference, opening up the possibility of punitive damages.

The jury rendered such a judgment here. Because this

decision is “within the exclusive province of the jury” so long

as the legal prerequisites are met, we will allow the lower

court’s punitive-damage award to stand. See Runge, 441 F.2d

at 584.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 20 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 21

D. Castro’s Monell claim is legally viable but

insufficiently proven

We turn next to the issues raised by the County in this

appeal. The County argues that the verdict against it should

be reversed for the following three reasons: (1) the Eleventh

Amendment bars a finding of liability; (2) if Castro’s theory

of liability is based on the County’s having an informal policy

that violated his constitutional rights, then his theory fails

because there was no evidence presented of any similar prior

incidents; and (3) if Castro’s theory of liability is based on the

County’s having a formal policy that violated his

constitutional rights, then his theory is legally untenable.

We begin our analysis by addressing a few fundamental

points regarding municipal liability under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. 

The first point is that although § 1983 imposes liability only

on “persons” who, under color of law, deprive others of their

constitutional rights, the Supreme Court has construed the

term “persons” to include municipalities such as the County. 

See Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 690–91

(1978). A municipality is responsible for a constitutional

violation, however, only when an “action [taken] pursuant to

[an] official municipal policy of some nature” caused the

violation. Id. at 691. This means that a municipality is not

liable under § 1983 based on the common-law tort theory of

respondeat superior. Id. On the other hand, the official

municipal policy in question may be either formal or

informal. City of St. Louis v. Praprotnik, 485 U.S. 112, 131

(1989) (plurality opinion) (acknowledging that a plaintiff

could show that “a municipality’s actual policies were

different from the ones that had been announced”); id. at 138

(Brennan, J., concurring) (stating that municipal policies may

be formal or informal).

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 21 of 38
22 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

A formal policy exists when “a deliberate choice to

follow a course of action is made from among various

alternatives by the official or officials responsible for

establishing final policy with respect to the subject matter in

question.” Pembaur v. City of Cincinnati, 475 U.S. 469, 483

(1986) (plurality opinion). When pursuing a Monell claim

stemming from a formal policy, a plaintiff must prove that the

municipality “acted with the state of mind required to prove

the underlying violation.” Tsao v. Desert Palace, Inc.,

698 F.3d 1128, 1143–44 (9th Cir. 2012) (internal quotation

marks omitted) (explaining that the plaintiff must prove that

the municipal defendants acted with deliberate indifference,

the same standard that a plaintiff has to establish in a § 1983

claim against an individual defendant).

An informal policy, on the other hand, exists when a

plaintiff can prove the existence of a widespread practice that,

although not authorized by an ordinance or an express

municipal policy, is “so permanent and well settled as to

constitute a custom or usage with the force of law.”

Praprotnik, 485 U.S. at 127 (internal quotation marks

omitted). Such a practice, however, cannot ordinarily be

established by a single constitutional deprivation, a random

act, or an isolated event. Christie v. Iopa, 176 F.3d 1231,

1235 (9th Cir. 1999). Instead, a plaintiff such as Castro must

show a pattern of similar incidents in order for the factfinder

to conclude that the alleged informal policy was “so

permanent and well settled” as to carry the force of law. See

Praprotnik, 485 U.S. at 127.

The County’s first two arguments can be quickly and

easily addressed. First, the claim that the County is protected

from suit by the Eleventh Amendment was squarely

considered and rejected by this court in Jackson v. Barnes,

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 22 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 23

749 F.3d 755, 764–65 (9th Cir. 2014), cert. denied, 135 S. Ct.

980 (2015) (holding that a sheriff’s department is a county

actor when it investigates crime and supervises a jail, and

thus is not protected by the Eleventh Amendment’s blanket

of immunity for state officials). The County therefore cannot

seek refuge behind the Eleventh Amendment. Second, and in

the County’s favor, the record is devoid of any similar

incident to that suffered byCastro. He thus failed to establish

that the County had an informal policy in relation to the

sobering cell that caused him harm. The County’s liability

thus hinges on its final argument, which boils down to

(1) whether the design of the sobering cell constitutes a

formal County policy and, if so, (2) whether the County was

deliberately indifferent to the harm that befell Castro as a

result of that formal policy.

1. The jail’s design was a deliberate choice by the

County and thus a formal policy

We cannot envision how a municipality can design a jail

without making “a deliberate choice . . . from among various

alternatives.” See Pembaur, 475 U.S. at 483. Construction

projects of any variety involve a series of such choices based

on aesthetics, functionality, budget, and other factors. One

would assume that for any given construction project,

including jails, the municipality’s governing body—or a

committee that it appoints to act in its stead—reviews bids,

considers designs, and ultimately approves a plan for the

facility and allocates funds for its construction. These

choices are sufficient, in our opinion, to meet the definition

of a formal municipal policy as set forth in Pembaur.

We are unpersuaded by the cases cited by the County in

support of its argument to the contrary. See Molton v. City of

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 23 of 38
24 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

Cleveland, 839 F.2d 240, 246 (6th Cir. 1988); Elliott v.

Cheshire Cnty., 750 F. Supp. 1146, 1156 (D. N.H. 1990),

aff’d in part and vacated in part, 940 F.2d 7 (1st Cir. 1991);

Shouse v. Daviess Cnty., No. 4:06-cv-144-M, 2009 WL

424978, at *8 (W.D. Ky. Feb. 19, 2009) (unpublished);

Richardson v. Dailey, No. 925996, 1994 WL 879483, at *3

(Mass. Super. Ct. Sept. 29, 1994) (unpublished), aff’d,

424 Mass. 258 (1997). Of these cases, Molton is the only one

to provide more than a cursory analysis of the jaildesign-as-policy issue.

In Molton, an inmate hung himself by his shirt in his cell

while his fellow inmates screamed for help. 839 F.2d at

242–43. The administrator of the decedent’s estate sued the

city under § 1983, alleging that the jail was defectively

designed, creating a substantial risk of suicides. Id. at 243.

The jury returned a verdict in favor of the estate. Id. On

appeal, the city argued that the estate had failed to prove the

existence of a municipal policy that caused the suicide. Id. at

247. The estate responded by pointing out several factors

contributing to his injury that were “inherentlymatters of city

policy,” including the operation of a jail with a cell block that

was too remote for easy supervision, the failure to install an

audio communication system between the cell block and the

office area, and the failure to modify cell architecture to make

suicides less likely. Molton, 839 F.2d at 246.

In ruling against the estate, the Sixth Circuit found two

problems with the estate’s argument: (1) Supreme Court

caselaw requires a plaintiff to identify a “deliberate and

discernible city policy” rather than a series of vague issues

with the way the city runs its jail, and (2) the evidence

produced by the estate supported, at most, a finding that the

city acted negligently in designing the jail. Id. The court in

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 24 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 25

Molton concluded that the city’s “failure to build a

suicide-proof jail cell” did not constitute “a deliberate choice

to follow a course of action” that would be required to impose

Monell liability. Id. (internal quotation marks omitted).

Elliott, Shouse, and Richardson relied on Molton in reaching

similar conclusions.

Molton, however, did not address the series of deliberate

choices made by the city that went into the design of the jail

itself. See id. The Sixth Circuit instead considered the

“deliberate choice” question only with regard to whether the

design was deliberately indifferent to a risk to the inmates (as

opposed to whether the design was simply negligent). Id.

To the contrary, we conclude that the question of whether

the design of a jail can lead to a constitutional violation (i.e.,

whether it constituted deliberate indifference on the part of

the municipality) is a separate question from the issue of

whether the design can be considered a formal policy for

Monell purposes (i.e., whether the design was a deliberate

choice made by a policymaker among a series of

alternatives). With all due respect to our sister circuit, we

cannot ignore the plethora of deliberate choices that a

municipality makes in designing a jail, and we conclude that

those choices render the design a formal municipal policy for

the purpose of Monell liability.

The design of a jail, in sum, is the result of a series of

deliberate choices made by the municipality that built it. In

this case, the County does not contest that it was responsible

for the design and operation of the West Hollywood Station.

We therefore hold that the County instituted a formal policy

under Monell with regard to the jail’s sobering cell.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 25 of 38
26 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

2. To find that a municipality was deliberately

indifferent to a risk, a plaintiff must prove that the

municipality had actual knowledge of that risk

Having determined that the County’s design of the West

Hollywood Station’s sobering cell constituted a formal

municipal policy, we turn next to the issue of whether that

policy violated Castro’s constitutional rights. Castro alleged

that the County’s policy deprived him of the same

constitutional right that was violated by the individual

defendants—his right to be free from violence at the hands of

other inmates. As with the individual defendants, Castro

must demonstrate that (1) he faced a substantial risk of

serious harm, (2) the County, knowing of the risk, showed

deliberate indifference byfailing to take reasonable corrective

measures, and (3) the County’s failure to mitigate the risk

was a proximate cause of the harm that he suffered. See

Farmer, 511 U.S. at 828, 842.

The critical question in this case is whether the County

had knowledge of the risk. At trial, Castro presented

evidence establishing that the state of California had in place

a regulation aimed at preventing the very type of harm

suffered by Castro. Title 24 of California’s Minimum

Standards for Local Detention Facilities defines a “sobering

cell” as “an initial ‘sobering up’ place for arrestees who are

sufficiently intoxicated from any substance to require a

protected environment to prevent injury by falling or

victimization by other inmates.” Cal. Code Regs. tit. 15,

§ 1006 (emphasis added). In addition, California’s Minimum

Standards for Adult Detention Facilities provides that “there

shall be an inmate- or sound-actuated audio monitoring

system in . . . sobering cells . . . which is capable of alerting

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 26 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 27

personnel who can respond immediately.” Id. tit. 24,

§ 1231.2.22 (emphasis added).

The plain text of this regulation clearly indicates that the

state regulators were concerned about inmate-on-inmate

violence and required counties to install a compliant

audio-monitoring system in order to ensure that the inmates

could easily summon help. West Hollywood Station’s

sobering cell did not have such an audio-monitoring system

in place.

Castro argues that, because of the regulation, the County

knew of the risk that inmates in a sobering cell face from

other inmates but disregarded that risk by failing to take the

precautions required by the regulations. The County, on the

other hand, argues that there was no evidence presented at

trial establishing that it was aware of the regulation. In the

absence of such evidence, the County contends that no

reasonable jury could have concluded that it knew of the risk

to Castro.

Both sides have muddled the issue of knowledge by

failing to distinguish between actual and constructive

knowledge. The courts have long recognized a critical

distinction between the knowledge that a reasonable person

should have had in a given situation and the knowledge that

a particular defendant did in fact have in the same situation. 

See, e.g., Han v. United States, 944 F.2d 526, 530 (9th Cir.

1991) (reversing the grant of summary judgment in favor of

the IRS because the taxpayer had only constructive

knowledge rather than actual knowledge of a lien on his

property); McGinn v. City of Omaha, 352 N.W.2d 545, 547

(Neb. 1984) (per curiam) (holding that a city could be held

liable for personal injuries sustained as a result of its

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 27 of 38
28 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

negligence, even in the absence of actual knowledge, if it had

the knowledge that a reasonable person would have possessed

under the circumstances). Constructive knowledge is an

objective standard, see Rost v. United States, 803 F.2d 448,

451 (9th Cir. 1986), whereas actual knowledge is a subjective

standard, see Bus. Guides, Inc. v. Chromatic Commc’ns

Enterps., Inc., 892 F.2d 802, 810 (9th Cir. 1989), aff’d,

498 U.S. 533 (1991).

We fully agree with Castro that a municipality should be

aware of (and abide by) applicable state regulations

governing its conduct. Although the Supreme Court has

concluded that individual officers are not deemed to have

knowledge of the “voluminous, ambiguous, and

contradictory” regulations governing their on-the-job

conduct, Davis v. Scherer, 468 U.S. 183, 196 (1984), the

reasoning behind that conclusion does not apply to

municipalities with equal force. The Davis Court was

concerned with protecting officers who “must often act

swiftly and firmly,” without the time or luxury for “an

extensive inquiry into . . . the applicability and importance of

the rule at issue” and “the possible legal consequences of

their conduct.” Id. at 195–96.

A municipality’s decision-making process will, in

contrast, rarely if ever be so time-sensitive or pressured.

Expecting municipal entities to take the time to become

aware of applicable state regulations is essential to effective

governance. See Cannon v. Univ. of Chi., 441 U.S. 677,

696–97 (1979) (“It is always appropriate to assume that our

elected representatives, like other citizens, know the law[.]”). 

The County may therefore be deemed to have constructive

knowledge of the risk that Castro faced in this case because

there was a state regulation in effect that clearly identified the

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 28 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 29

risk and required certain steps to mitigate the potential for

danger.

Under Farmer, however, the constructive-knowledge

standard, based on an objective look at what a reasonable

person should have known, is insufficient to support a finding

of deliberate indifference. The Court specifically rejected

such a test for knowledge of a risk under the Eighth

Amendment, opting instead for an inquiry into the subjective

state of mind of the defendant. Farmer, 511 U.S. at 838.

In order to be deemed “deliberatelyindifferent,” the Court

concluded that an official “must both be aware of facts from

which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of

serious harm exists, and he must also draw the inference.” Id.

at 837. In other words, “an official’s failure to alleviate a

significant risk that he should have perceived but did not,

while no cause for commendation, cannot under our cases be

condemned as the infliction of punishment.” Id. at 838. The

same reasoning applies to a municipality.

Farmer recognized that “conceptual difficult[ies may]

attend any search for the subjective state of mind of a

governmental entity,” id. at 841, but these difficulties are not

insurmountable. A plaintiff could take any of several paths

to prove that a municipality had actual knowledge of a

substantial risk of serious harm to inmates. For example,

where, as here, there is an applicable regulation that should

have put the municipality on notice of the risk, a plaintiff

could offer evidence that the municipality had been notified

that it was out of compliance with the regulation. Other

evidence, such as meeting minutes or other records, that the

regulation was discussed at planning meetings would also

suffice, as would evidence that similar incidents had occurred

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 29 of 38
30 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

and been brought to the municipality’s attention. Regardless

of its form, however, some evidence of actual knowledge is

required to find that a municipality had the requisite

“consciousness of a risk” to be held deliberately indifferent. 

Id at 840.

No such evidence was presented in this case. As the

County points out, the only evidence proffered by Castro to

establish that the County knew of the risk to Castro’s safety

was the existence of the state regulation. But this evidence,

for the reasons discussed above, establishes only constructive

knowledge on the part of the County. Per Castro’s own brief,

he decided for “tactical reasons” not to present evidence of

similar incidents in the past, and he offered no evidence that

the regulation in question had ever been specifically brought

to the County’s attention.

Nor are we persuaded by our dissenting colleague’s

argument that the County Council’s wholesale adoption of

numerous chapters of the California Building Code, one of

which contains the state regulation in question, “provides

even more evidence that the county knew of that risk.”

Dissenting op. at 38. In the absence of any proof that this

particular regulation was ever brought to the attention of a

County policymaker with authority over the jail, the fact that

no one found this proverbial “needle in a haystack” simply

confirms our view that we are dealing with constructive

knowledge rather than actual knowledge on the part of the

County.

The question of what constitutes deliberate indifference

is one of fact, such that we generally owe the jury’s

conclusion substantial deference. Grenning v. Miller-Stout,

739 F.3d 1235, 1239 (9th Cir. 2014) (citing Johnson v. Lewis,

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 30 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 31

217 F.3d 726, 734 (9th Cir. 2000)). But without any evidence

whatsoever that the County had actual knowledge of the risk

to Castro’s safety, the verdict against the County cannot

stand.

E. Castro presented sufficient evidence regarding the

amount of his past damages from which the jury could

reasonably calculate the amount of future damages

The defendants’ final argument is that the jury’s

future-damages award of $600,000 should be reversed

because it was based on pure speculation as to the amount of

such damages. We find this argument to be without merit.

The parties agree that California law applies for purposes

of calculating damages in this case. See Sullivan v. Little

Hunting Park, Inc., 396 U.S. 229, 256 (1969) (directing lower

courts to “look to state law to find appropriate remedies when

the applicable federal civil rights law is ‘deficient in the

provisions necessary to furnish suitable remedies’” (quoting

42 U.S.C. § 1988(a))). Under California law, an award of

damages may include an amount to compensate for related

expenses that are “certain to result in the future.” Cal. Civ.

Code § 3283. “However, the ‘requirement of certainty . . .

cannot be strictly applied where prospective damages are

sought, because probabilities are really the basis for the

award.’” Behr v. Redmond, 123 Cal. Rptr. 3d 97, 111 (Cal.

Ct. App. 2011), as modified Mar. 25, 2011 (quoting 6 Witkin,

Summary of Cal. Law Torts, § 1552 (10th ed. 2005)).

The defendants’ repeated assertions that Castro has “set

forth no admissible evidence to establish any foundation

whatsoever for the amount of future expenses” are simply not

supported by the record. Castro submitted the billing records

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 31 of 38
32 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

from both his cognitive assistant and his treating

psychologist, and he also submitted a chart detailing the

charges for the almost $1 million in medical expenses that he

had already incurred. He also proffered several medical

experts who testified to his need for ongoingmedical care and

described the approximate scope of that care.

California courts have consistently approved damage

awards for future medical expenses based on this type of

evidence. See, e.g., id. at 113 (approving a future-damages

award based on the cost of a medication as established by

past records multiplied by the plaintiff’s estimated life span);

Cooper v. Chambi, No. G028318, 2002 WL 31086128, at *3

(Cal. Ct. App. Sept. 9, 2002) (unpublished) (finding that past

bills for psychological services totaling $125 per week could

provide a jury with reasonable certainty as to the future cost

of psychological services, but could not alone sustain a $1.5

million future-damages award).

The defendants also object to the future-damages award

because they argue that it was not reduced to present value.

They have a point to the extent that such an award is subject

to a present-value reduction. See Fox v. Pac. Sw. Airlines,

184 Cal. Rptr. 87, 89 (Cal. Ct. App. 1982) (holding that

“recovery for lost future benefits must be discounted to

present value”) (citing Bond v. United R.R.s of S.F., 113 P.

366, 372 (Cal. 1911)). But they overstate the role of experts

in establishing the appropriate discount. The California Civil

Jury Instruction that they cite simply states that expert

testimony is “usually” required to accuratelyestablish present

values, and Niles v. City of San Rafael, 116 Cal. Rptr. 733,

740 (Cal. Ct. App. 1974), on which they rely, similarly

observes that actuarial testimony is “frequently” used for this

purpose.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 32 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 33

However common the use of experts may be, no

California court has ever held that expert testimony is an

absolute requirement in order to establish the present value of

a future-damages award. The district court instructed the jury

to reduce its award of future damages to present value

according to the Ninth Circuit’s Model Civil Jury

Instructions, and we have no reason to believe that the jury

ignored that instruction, particularlybecause the juryawarded

only slightly more than half of the amount requested.

In sum, although no expert testified as to the precise rate

of reduction to be applied, the court instructed the jury to

reduce its award for future damages to present value, and “we

must assume that the jury followed the court’s instructions.”

See Gray v. Shell Oil Co., 469 F.2d 742, 752 (9th Cir. 1972). 

Our assumption seems fully justified by the fact that the

future damages awarded to Castro reflected a 42 percent

discount from the amount requested. Particularly in light of

this discount, we are not persuaded that this is the appropriate

case in which to make the use of experts to establish the

present value of future damages an absolute requirement

under California law. We therefore decline to disturb the

award for future damages.

III. CONCLUSION

For all the reasons set forth above, we AFFIRM the

judgment of the district court against the individual

defendants but REVERSE the judgment against the County.

Each party shall bear its own costs.

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 33 of 38
34 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

CALLAHAN, Circuit Judge, concurring:

I agree with the majority that the judgment of the district

court against the individual defendants should be affirmed

and the judgment against the County reversed. I write

separately to explain that I do not think that Castro has shown

that the design of the West Hollywood Station constitutes a

policy for purposes of liability under Monell v. Department

of Social Services of New York., 436 U.S. 658 (1978).

I do not deny that pursuant to Pembaur v. City of

Cincinnati, 475 U.S. 469, 483 (1986), the design of a jail in

some circumstances, might be held to constitute a deliberate

choice or policy. However, I disagree with the suggestion

that the fact that the jail was constructed is sufficient in itself

to “meet the definition of a formal municipal policy.” Maj.

at 23. Rather, I agree with the Sixth Circuit’s approach in

Molton v. City of Cleveland, 839 F.2d 240, 246 (6th Cir.

1988), that “Pembaur[] require[s] proof of a deliberate and

discernible city policy to maintain . . . inadequately designed

and equipped jails; not mere speculation that such matters are

‘inherently matters of city policy.’”

Here, the record contains no evidence to suggest that the

design and construction of the West Hollywood Station

implicated a relevant policy choice. The record indicates that

the West Hollywood Station is many decades old. Municipal

facilities are built to suit the needs of their times, according

to the then existing applicable statutes and regulations. Other

than their mere existence, there is no evidence in this record

to indicate that the relevant design features of the West

Hollywood Station were policy choices of the County. 

Although both the County and Castro presented evidence of

measures that could be taken to increase supervision in the

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 34 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 35

sobering cell, no evidence was presented that the County

specifically considered these measures or made a deliberate

choice to reject them at the time of the facilities’ construction,

or even at any time thereafter. Nor was any evidence

presented, such as past instances of injury or modifications

made since the Station’s construction, that might support an

inference that the County considered but rejected such design

features.

Accordingly, I would hold that Castro has failed to show

that the design of the West Hollywood Station constituted a

formal policy under Monell, 436 U.S. 658. Nonetheless, I

concur in the opinion as I agree that even if there was a

formal policy, Castro has failed to show the requisite

deliberate indifference for Monell liability. See Maj. at

23–31.

GRABER, Circuit Judge, concurring in part and dissenting in

part:

I join the majority opinion, with the exception of Part

D.2. I respectfully dissent from the holding that there was

insufficient evidence from which the jury could have

concluded that the entity Defendants were deliberately

indifferent to the risk that Plaintiff would be harmed by a

fellow inmate.

In Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 841 (1994), the

Supreme Court acknowledged that “considerable conceptual

difficulty would attend any search for the subjective state of

mind of a governmental entity, as distinct from that of a

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 35 of 38
36 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

governmental official.” This case squarely presents that

considerable conceptual difficulty.

We previously have acknowledged that certain types of

evidence could show that an entity possesses subjective

knowledge:

First, it is certainly possible that

a municipality’s policies explicitly

acknowledge that substantial risks of serious

harm exist. Second, numerous cases have

held that municipalities act through their

policymakers who are, of course, natural

persons, whose state of mind can be

determined.

Gibson v. County of Washoe, 290 F.3d 1175, 1188 n.10 (9th

Cir. 2002). But those two types of evidence are not the only

kinds of evidence that can show such knowledge. Here, as

the majority explains, state regulations applicable to the

County identify the risk of the precise harm that befell

Plaintiff in this case and mandate a particular audiomonitoring system in order to prevent that harm. I would

hold, as a matter of law, that entities have actual knowledge

of state regulations governing their conduct.

The majority contends that such a holding impermissibly

equates actual knowledge with constructive knowledge. Maj.

op. at 27–28. It is true that the Supreme Court has written

that, in actions against individuals and entities alike, a

plaintiff must establish that the defendant possessed the “state

of mind required to prove the underlying violation.” Bd. of

Cnty. Comm’rs v. Brown, 520 U.S. 397, 405 (1997). But I do

not think that the Court meant that we must ignore salient

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 36 of 38
CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES 37

differences between individuals and entities. Because an

entity does not have an actual mind, the question of what the

entity “knows” is different from the question of what an

individual “knows.” Cf. United States v. 7326 Highway 45

N., 965 F.2d 311, 316 (7th Cir. 1992) (“As a legal fiction, a

corporation cannot ‘know’ like an individual ‘knows.’”).1

The majority persuasively explains why entities should be

held to a higher standard than individuals when it comes to

knowledge of the law governing their conduct. Maj. op. at

27–28. I would hold that where, as here, positive law

applicable to the entity speaks directly to the risk of harm that

befell a plaintiff, the entity defendant has the requisite

knowledge of that risk to disregard it deliberately.

At the time of the attack at issue in this case, the Los

Angeles County Code “adopted by reference and

incorporated into . . . the Los Angeles CountyCode as if fully

set forth below” certain chapters of the California Building

Code, including chapter 12, which includes the regulation

requiring that sobering cells be equipped with an audio1 Were we writing on a blank slate, one possible resolution of the

conceptual difficulty here would be to hold that entities cannot be held

liable for constitutional violations when the underlying violation requires

subjective intent. Indeed, the Supreme Court has taken that course in a

different context. See City of Newport v. Fact Concerts, Inc., 453 U.S.

247, 267 (1981) (holding that punitive damages cannot sensibly be

assessed against a governmental entity because the entity “can have no

malice independent of the malice of its officials”). But that option is not

open to us, because the Supreme Court clearly has stated that

municipalities can have subjective knowledge and intent for the purposes

of § 1983 liability. See Brown, 520 U.S. at 405 (holding that “proof that

a municipality’s legislative body or authorized decisionmaker has

intentionally deprived a plaintiff of a federally protected right necessarily

establishes that the municipality acted culpably”).

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 37 of 38
38 CASTRO V. COUNTY OF LOS ANGELES

monitoring system.2 L.A. County Code, tit. 26, ch. 1, § 100

(2007). That incorporation was an affirmative act by the

County’s legislative body. As explained above, I would not

require such an affirmative act to show that an entity

possesses the requisite knowledge to support a finding of

deliberate indifference; I would hold, as a matter of law, that

governmental entities, as distinct from individuals employed

by those entities, know the statutes and regulations governing

their conduct. But in this case, the County Council’s

affirmative adoption of a regulation aimed at mitigating the

risk to individuals housed in sobering cells provides even

more evidence that the County knew of that risk. See Brown,

520 U.S. at 405–06 (describing Owen v. City of

Independence, 445 U.S. 622 (1980), and Newport v. Fact

Concerts, Inc., 453 U.S. 247 (1981), as municipal liability

cases involving “no difficult questions of fault” because they

involved “formal decisions of municipal legislative bodies”).

For the foregoing reasons, I would affirm the jury’s

verdict against the entity defendants. I therefore dissent from

Part D.2.

2 Even though the county code provision was not in evidence in the

district court, we may take judicial notice of it because it is “not subject

to reasonable dispute” and “can be accurately and readily determined from

sources whose accuracy cannot reasonably be questioned.” Fed. R. Evid.

201(b)(2); Santa Monica Food Not Bombs v. City of Santa Monica,

450 F.3d 1022, 1025 (9thCir. 2006); see id. at 1026 n.2 (holding that local

ordinances are “proper subjects for judicial notice”).

 Case: 12-56829, 05/01/2015, ID: 9521608, DktEntry: 42-1, Page 38 of 38