Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca5-18-40825/USCOURTS-ca5-18-40825-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Jacinta Assava
Appellee
Jeffrey Catoe
Appellee
Jane and John Doe
Appellee
Pamela Pace
Appellee
Paul W. Shrode
Appellee
William Wheat
Appellee
Vicki White
Appellee
Elliott Williams
Appellant

Document Text:

IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 18-40825

ELLIOTT WILLIAMS, 

Plaintiff–Appellant,

versus

JEFFREY CATOE, Senior Warden, Coffield Unit;

WILLIAM WHEAT, Major of Security, Coffield Unit;

PAMELA PACE, Practice Manager, UTMB, Coffield Unit;

JACINTA ASSAVA, Nurse Practitioner, UTMB, Coffield Unit;

JANE AND JOHN DOE; DOCTOR PAUL W. SHRODE; VICKI WHITE,

Defendants–Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Eastern District of Texas

Before OWEN, Chief Judge, JONES, SMITH, STEWART, DENNIS, ELROD, 

SOUTHWICK, HAYNES, GRAVES, HIGGINSON, COSTA, WILLETT, HO, 

DUNCAN, ENGELHARDT, and OLDHAM, Circuit Judges.

JERRY E. SMITH, Circuit Judge:

We hold that in an action brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a district 

court’s interlocutory order denying a motion for appointment of counsel is not 

immediately appealable under the collateral-order doctrine. The panel opinion 

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

January 7, 2020

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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No. 18-40825

2

in Robbins v. Maggio, 750 F.2d 405 (5th Cir. 1985), is overruled. This appeal 

is dismissed for want of jurisdiction.

I.

Elliott Williams, as a state prisoner, sued prison personnel (the “state”)

in forma pauperis via § 1983, claiming deliberate indifference to his serious 

medical needs in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Williams filed a notice 

of interlocutory appeal from the district court’s denial of his motion to appoint 

counsel. The appeal was briefed on whether Williams satisfies the steep requirements for appointment of counsel in § 1983 cases.1

In its brief, the state acknowledged that any panel would be bound, per

the rule of orderliness, to recognize appellate jurisdiction under Robbins.2 This 

court granted the state’s petition for initial en banc hearing as an efficient 

means of revisiting the issue of immediate appealability without requiring the 

matter to percolate uselessly through a panel. We appointed counsel for briefing and oral argument on Williams’s behalf.3

 

1 “The trial court is not required to appoint counsel for an indigent plaintiff asserting 

a claim under . . . § 1983 . . . unless the case presents exceptional circumstances.” Ulmer v. 

Chancellor, 691 F.2d 209, 212 (5th Cir. 1982) (Rubin, J.) (citing Branch v. Cole, 686 F.2d 264, 

266 (5th Cir. 1982) (per curiam)). “In considering motions for appointment of counsel in 

section 1983 cases, district courts should make specific findings on each on the Ulmer factors 

rather than deciding the motion in a conclusory manner” (citing Ulmer, 691 F.2d at 213). 

Jackson v. Dall. Police Dep’t, 811 F.2d 260, 262 (5th Cir. 1986) (per curiam).

This appeal involves nothing more than the jurisdictional question of when a § 1983 

plaintiff can appeal the denial of counsel. We do not speak to the general standard under 

which a district court determines whether to appoint counsel, to whether that standard is 

satisfied in this or any other case, or to attorneys’ ethical obligation to provide pro bono

assistance. 

2 See, e.g., Leachman v. Harris County, 779 F. App’x 234, 238 (5th Cir. 2019) (per 

curiam). 

3 There is irony in the fact that we appointed counsel to assist the court in deciding 

whether Williams can immediately appeal the denial of counsel. The court thanks counsel 

for her thorough and professional advocacy.

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II.

“While the collateral-order doctrine will necessarily allow some appeals, 

otherwise impermissible under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, the doctrine is a ‘narrow 

exception,’ Dig. Equip. Corp. v. Desktop Direct, Inc., 511 U.S. 863, 868 . . . 

(1994) . . ., ‘selective in its membership,’ Will v. Hallock, 546 U.S. 345, 350 . . . 

(2006).”4 In Cohen v. Beneficial Industrial Loan Corp., 337 U.S. 541, 546 

(1949), the Court carved out an exception to the final-judgment rule. All agree 

that the collateral-order doctrine has three essential requirements: “[T]he 

order must [1] conclusively determine the disputed question, [2] resolve an important issue completely separate from the merits of the action, and [3] be effectively unreviewable on appeal from a final judgment.” Coopers & Lybrand 

v. Livesay, 437 U.S. 463, 468 (1978).

Recognizing that standard, the Robbins panel, 750 F.2d at 412−13, 

decided that all three prongs had been met. Because the test is conjunctive, 

we address only the third element. Robbins found it satisfied, explaining that 

the question “is not whether a claim becomes jurisdictionally unreviewable, 

but whether it becomes effectively unreviewable.” Id. at 413. “[T]here remains 

a great risk that a civil rights plaintiff may abandon a claim or accept an 

unreasonable settlement in light of his own perceived inability to proceed with 

the merits . . . .” Id. at 412. “[I]t is the likelihood that a litigant will not be 

able effectively to prosecute his claim or to appeal that determines the reviewability of that claim . . . .” Id. at 413.

That was error that we now correct. In vigorous dissent in Robbins, 

Judge Garwood pointed out that 

 

4 United States v. M/Y GALACTICA STAR, 784 F. App’x 268, 276 (5th Cir. 2019) (per 

curiam) (unpublished).

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[a] party capable of perfecting pro se an appeal from an order denying counsel is likewise capable of so perfecting an appeal after 

judgment . . . . [T]he large number of pro se tried cases where pro 

se appeals have been perfected in this Court should suffice to demonstrate that the denial of . . . counsel does not effectively prevent, 

or ultimately wholly discourage, such cases from being actually 

tried and appealed. 

Id. at 417 (Garwood, J., dissenting). 

Even in the small percentage of cases in which the lack of counsel in the 

district court may restrain a § 1983 plaintiff in the assertion of his rights,5 the 

fact “that a ruling ‘may burden litigants in ways that are only imperfectly reparable by appellate reversal of a final . . . judgment . . . has never sufficed’” to 

breach the collateral-order doctrine. Mohawk Indus., Inc. v. Carpenter, 

558 U.S. 100, 107 (2009) (quoting Dig. Equip., 511 U.S. at 872). As Judge 

Garwood explained, conferring appealability on interlocutory orders denying 

counsel

represents . . . a major and serious invasion of the values [of] the 

final judgment rule . . . . It makes highly probable multiple appeals 

in every in forma pauperis civil case in which counsel is requested 

and denied . . . . If counsel is requested . . . and then denied, there 

will be an appeal. Though there is an affirmance, if the request is 

renewed and again denied when an amended pleading is filed or 

following discovery or rulings on motions to dismiss or the like, 

then there will still be another appeal. Perhaps then we will decide 

to remand . . . because we regard the trial court’s order as insufficiently specific in its reasons for denial. If denial again follows, 

there is yet another appeal, the third prior to trial.

Robbins, 750 F.2d at 417−18 (Garwood, J., dissenting).

 

5 In its en banc brief, the state makes the unchallenged assertion that “in the past 

34 years, only four interlocutory appeals have resulted in reversal of an order denying appointed counsel in a section 1983 case and a remand with instructions either to appoint 

counsel or to reconsider.” 

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III.

Although adherence to Coopers & Lybrand, coupled with the practical 

considerations highlighted above, easily compels a reversal of Robbins, we take

additional comfort in the fact that nine federal circuits have held that orders 

denying counsel in § 1983 cases are not immediately appealable.6 Only one 

disagrees.7 And in the event that stare decisis is a concern, Williams’s counsel 

concedes that there is no reliance interest in maintaining Robbins.

Therefore, in an action brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a district court’s 

interlocutory order denying a motion for appointment of counsel is not immediately appealable under the collateral-order doctrine. Robbins v. Maggio, 

750 F.2d 405 (5th Cir. 1985), is OVERRULED.8 The appeal is DISMISSED for 

want of jurisdiction.

 

6 See Appleby v. Meachum, 696 F.2d 145, 146 (1st Cir. 1983) (per curiam); Welch v. 

Smith, 810 F.2d 40, 42 (2d Cir. 1987); Smith-Bey v. Petsock, 741 F.2d 22, 26 (3d Cir. 1984); 

Miller v. Simmons, 814 F.2d 962, 964 (4th Cir. 1987); Henry v. City of Detroit Manpower 

Dep’t, 763 F.2d 757, 759 (6th Cir. 1985) (en banc); Randle v. Victor Welding Supply Co., 

664 F.2d 1064, 1067 (7th Cir. 1981) (per curiam); Wilborn v. Escalderon, 789 F.2d 1328, 1330 

(9th Cir. 1986); Cotner v. Mason, 657 F.2d 1390, 1391−92 (10th Cir. 1981) (per curiam); Holt 

v. Ford, 862 F.2d 850, 851 (11th Cir. 1989) (en banc).

7 See Slaughter v. City of Maplewood, 731 F.2d 587, 588−89 (8th Cir. 1984). 

8 Avoiding the law of unintended consequences, we limit this holding to matters 

brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, though logically the same should apply to claims grounded 

in its federal-actor counterpart, Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of 

Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971).

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