Source: https://casetext.com/case/bucklew-v-lombardi-3
Timestamp: 2020-07-11 04:48:39
Document Index: 47166510

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 1983', '§ 14', '§ 24']

Bucklew v. Lombardi, 783 F.3d 1120 | Casetext Search + Citator
Glossip, 135 S. Ct. at 2737. A prisoner may challenge an execution protocol as applied to just him. Bucklew…
This Court recognizes, however, that the Eighth Circuit may confine that determination to the facial…
Full title:Russell BUCKLEW, Plaintiff–Appellant v. George A. LOMBARDI, et al.…
783 F.3d 1120 (8th Cir. 2015)
affirming the dismissal of a complaint which supposed the state's legal injection drugs could be contaminated or improperly prepared and thus cause the plaintiffs pain, because those potential flaws were hypothetical and thus not "sure or very likely" to occur
Summary of this case from Johnson v. Lombardi
Cheryl A. Pilate, Morgan Pilate LLC, Kansas City, MO, argued (Lindsay J. Runnels, Kristen E. Swann, on the brief), for appellant. James B. Farnsworth, Asst. Atty. Gen., Jefferson City, MO, argued (Chris Koster, Atty. Gen., Michael J. Spillane, Asst. Atty. Gen., on the brief), for appellees.
Cheryl A. Pilate, Morgan Pilate LLC, Kansas City, MO, argued (Lindsay J. Runnels, Kristen E. Swann, on the brief), for appellant.
James B. Farnsworth, Asst. Atty. Gen., Jefferson City, MO, argued (Chris Koster, Atty. Gen., Michael J. Spillane, Asst. Atty. Gen., on the brief), for appellees.
On May 16, the district court entered a final order dismissing the complaint in Zink. Plaintiffs including Bucklew appealed. On May 19, the district court entered the Order being appealed in this action, denying Bucklew's motion for a stay of execution and an injunction and dismissing the Eighth Amendment claim, sua sponte. Bucklew v. Lombardi, No. 14–8000, 2014 WL 2736014 (W.D.Mo. May 19, 2014). Bucklew appealed, raising Eighth Amendment and due process issues, and sought a stay of the May 21 execution. A divided panel of this court granted a stay. Bucklew v. Lombardi, 565 Fed.Appx. 562 (8th Cir.2014). The court en banc vacated the panel's stay and denied a stay of execution. Bucklew then applied to the Supreme Court for a stay of execution. On May 21, the Supreme Court issued an amended order:
Appellees argue on appeal that Bucklew's claims are barred by the claim and issue preclusion effect of the district court's final judgment in Zink. Bucklew, an original plaintiff in the Zink action, filed this separate as-applied action on May 9, 2014, long after he joined the facial attack on Missouri's execution protocol in Zink. The district court entered its final judgment in Zink on May 16. Appellees argue that Bucklew's as-applied challenge is precluded by the final judgment in Zink because it could have been raised in Zink. “The preclusive effect of a federal-court judgment is determined by federal common law.” Taylor v. Sturgell, 553 U.S. 880, 891, 128 S.Ct. 2161, 171 L.Ed.2d 155 (2008). The general rule is that, as between actions pending at the same time, the first judgment to become final is conclusive in the other action as res judicata, even if the first judgment was not final when the second action was filed. See
The application for stay of execution of sentence of death ... is treated as an application for stay pending appeal in the Eighth Circuit. The application is granted pending the disposition of petitioner's appeal. We leave for further
consideration in the lower courts whether an evidentiary hearing is necessary.
In resolving an earlier appeal in Zink, we applied the Supreme Court's plurality opinion in Baze v. Rees, 553 U.S. 35, 50, 128 S.Ct. 1520, 170 L.Ed.2d 420 (2008), and ruled that, to state an Eighth Amendment method-of-execution claim, a plaintiff must plausibly allege a substantial risk of severe pain, and “a feasible and more humane alternative method of execution, or a purposeful design by the State to inflict unnecessary pain.”In re Lombardi, 741 F.3d 888, 895–96 (8th Cir.) (en banc), reh'g denied, 741 F.3d 903 (8th Cir.), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 1790, 188 L.Ed.2d 760 (2014). When the Zink plaintiffs subsequently declined to amend their complaint to allege a more humane alternative, the district court dismissed their facial Eighth Amendment challenge to Missouri's lethal injection protocol. That was the primary focus of plaintiffs' Eighth Amendment appeal in Zink.
On appeal, Bucklew argues, like appellants in Zink, that our decision in Lombardi misinterpreted the Supreme Court's decision in Baze. We will resolve that issue in our separate en banc opinion in Zink. But Bucklew primarily argues that our rule in Lombardi does not apply to his separate § 1983 action, or alternatively that he meets the requirements of that rule, because he has adequately alleged that Missouri's method of execution if applied to him would, because of his unique medical condition, violate the Eighth Amendment standard—a “substantial risk of serious harm,” Baze, 553 U.S. at 50, 128 S.Ct. 1520 (plurality opinion)—and a readily available alternative that would significantly reduce the risk.
27. The hemangiomas —which are clumps of weak, malformed vessels—fill Mr. Bucklew's face, head, neck and throat, displacing healthy tissue and stealing blood flow from normal adjacent tissues, depriving those tissues of necessary oxygen.
33. Throughout the records, doctors employed or contracted with by the
State of Missouri repeatedly warn of the expansion of the vascular tumor, stating in September 2011 “this has been present for 20 plus years, but has increasingly grown larger and larger.”
34. The possibility of another attempt at treatment was dismissed in April 2011, when Mr. Bucklew's doctor observed “there was minimal benefit from the previous sclerotherapy ” and the “large size” of the hemangioma precluded effective treatment with sclerotherapy.
There is also a very substantial risk that, because of Mr. Bucklew's vascular malformation, the lethal drug will not circulate as intended. The presence of cavernous hemangiomas creates an alternative low-resistance pathways to injected drugs. It is very likely that this abnormal circulation will inhibit the effectiveness of the pentobarbital, thereby delaying the depression of Mr. Bucklew's central nervous system. The reduced effectiveness of the pentobarbital and the delayed depression of the central
nervous system will create a substantial risk of a prolonged and extremely painful execution for Mr. Bucklew.
Mr. Bucklew's medications may interact with the pentobarbital —an antalgesic—in a manner that increases pain, causing a substantial risk that Mr. Bucklew will experience an extremely painful death.
Moreover, the passage of time suggests that Mr. Bucklew's hemangiomas may pose significantly greater risk at this time, as it is the nature of hemangiomas to continuously expand. For this reason, a comprehensive examination of Mr. Bucklew is vital to developing a thorough understanding of the substantial risks posed to Mr. Bucklew by lethal injection[.] ...”
On May 16, Bucklew filed ... a supplemental affidavit from Dr. Zivot .... [which] stated ... that Bucklew suffered from hypertension and had a “very large vascular mass” inside his mouth and throat. Dr. Zivot stated, “The mass arises through the hard palate, extends into the upper maxilla on the right, and fully encompasses the uvula and distorts the anatomy of Mr. Bucklew's airway.” He continued, “Mr. Bucklew's airway is ... friable, meaning it is weak and could tear or rupture. If you touch it, it bleeds.... During an execution, Mr. Bucklew will be at great risk of choking and suffocating because of his partially obstructed airway and complications caused by his hemangiomas.” Dr. Zivot concluded Bucklew's execution would carry “substantial risk to Mr. Bucklew of suffering grave adverse events during the execution, including hemorrhaging, suffocating, and experiencing excruciating pain.” 565 Fed.Appx. at 565–68.
After Bucklew finally presented the Department of Corrections with his reports ... the Department, as a courtesy, explored with Bucklew the option of paying for tests the parties could agree upon before the scheduled execution
date. The Department did that in order to make the extremely high probability of a rapid and painless execution even higher than it already is, not as Bucklew indicates because the Department is less than confident Bucklew's execution, like other Missouri executions, will be rapid and painless.... It is not the Department's fault Bucklew.... waited until shortly before his scheduled execution to pursue his current course and created an alleged shortness of time that need not have occurred.
On Tuesday, May 13, 2014, Defendants informed Mr. Bucklew's counsel that they would not use methylene blue in Mr. Bucklew's execution because of the blood pressure risks Dr. Zivot identified and that they would instead use the substance indigo carmine with the saline solution in the IV line instead.... Counsel immediately informed Defendants of the problems with their hastily chosen substitute indigo carmine.... On May 16, 2014—just five days before the scheduled execution—Defendants revealed in their Response another hastily made change—indicating that they will not use indigo carmine because of the risks posed to Mr. Bucklew....
Despite this factual record, which went well beyond the four corners of Bucklew's complaint, the district court dismissed the complaint, sua sponte, because it did not contain the “plausible allegation of a feasible and more humane alternative method” that Lombardi required, and because plaintiffs' refusal to amend their complaint in Zink demonstrated that “affording Bucklew an opportunity to amend his pleading to state a known and feasible alternative would be futile.” Without question, a district court has the power to dismiss a complaint sua sponte, but only where plaintiff cannot possibly prevail and amendment would be futile. See Smith v. Boyd, 945 F.2d 1041, 1042–43 (8th Cir.1991). Here, we conclude the district court exercised this limited authority prematurely because it was not “patently obvious the plaintiff could not prevail.”Id. at 1043.
There is case law supporting Bucklew's assertion that his as-applied challenge to Missouri's method of execution distinguishes his claim from the facial challenge in Zink. See Siebert v. Allen, 506 F.3d 1047, 1050 (11th Cir.2007). Defendants in responding to Bucklew's motions acknowledged his serious medical condition and stated that the Department's lethal injection procedure would be changed on account of his condition by eliminating the use of methylene blue dye. This concession bolstered the detailed allegations in Bucklew's complaint of a substantial risk of serious and imminent harm that is sure or very likely to occur, allegations far more specific than the allegations addressing this part of the Baze standard in the second amended complaint in Zink. Defendants' concession also tended to support Bucklew's detailed allegations that the State had unreasonably refused to change its regular method of execution to a “feasible, readily implemented” alternative that would “significantly reduce” the substantial risk of pain. Baze, 553 U.S. at 52, 128 S.Ct. 1520. At a minimum, it should have warned the court not to assume that Bucklew would decline an invitation to amend the as-applied challenge in his complaint simply because the Zink plaintiffs had declined to amend the very different facial challenge in their complaint.
For these reasons, we conclude the district court erred in dismissing the complaint, sua sponte. In our view, the entire record before the district court resembled the facts before the Supreme Court in Nelson v. Campbell, 541 U.S. 637, 124 S.Ct. 2117, 158 L.Ed.2d 924 (2004) : Plaintiff alleged that the State would violate the Eighth Amendment by using a pre-execution “cut-down” procedure to reach his severely compromised peripheral veins. Defendants, while asserting that the purported § 1983 claim was barred by the successive habeas rule, acknowledged that plaintiff had proposed an alternative procedure that was a preferred method. After concluding that the case must be remanded because the claim was cognizable under § 1983, the Court noted: “An evidentiary hearing will in all likelihood be unnecessary, however, as the State now seems willing to implement petitioner's proposed alternatives.” Id. at 646, 124 S.Ct. 2117. The record in this case differs because Bucklew's attorneys have given no indication they would compromise any of their demands. Indeed, some of those demands appear to be “relief [that] would foreclose execution,” which would make his § 1983 claim non-cognizable. Hill, 547 U.S. at 582, 126 S.Ct. 2096 ; see Nelson, 541 U.S. at 648, 124 S.Ct. 2117. But the State's concession that it would alter its procedure by not using methylene blue dye brought Bucklew's claim at least potentially within the purview of Baze and therefore made pre-answer sua sponte dismissal of the complaint inappropriate.
On remand, the district court in addressing the merits of Bucklew's claim must proceed from the premise that “a State retains a significant interest in meting out a sentence of death in a timely fashion.” Nelson, 541 U.S. at 644, 124 S.Ct. 2117. Thus, further proceedings should be narrowly tailored and expeditiously conducted to address only those issues that are essential to resolving Bucklew's as-applied Eighth Amendment challenge. “The District Court will have the usual authority to control the order of proof, and if there is a failure of proof on the first element that it chooses to consider, it would not be an abuse of discretion to give judgment for [defendants] without taking further evidence.”Helling v. McKinney, 509 U.S. 25, 35, 113 S.Ct. 2475, 125 L.Ed.2d 22 (1993).
The first step should be a timely response by defendants to the complaint or any amended complaint. The parties' respective positions can then be clarified before determining whether discovery and an evidentiary hearing are needed. Bucklew's arguments on appeal raise an inference that he is impermissibly seeking merely to investigate the protocol without taking a position as to what is needed to fix it. He may not be “permitted to supervise every step of the execution process.” Whitaker v. Livingston, 732 F.3d 465, 468 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, ––– U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 417, 187 L.Ed.2d 274 (2013) ; see Lombardi, 741 F.3d at 895. Rather, at the earliest possible time, he must identify a feasible, readily implemented alternative procedure that will significantly reduce a substantial risk of severe pain and that the State refuses to adopt. “[C]apital punishment is constitutional. It necessarily follows that there must be a means of carrying it out.” Lombardi, 741 F.3d at 895, quoting Baze, 553 U.S. at 47, 128 S.Ct. 1520. Any assertion that all methods of execution are unconstitutional does not state a plausible claim under the Eighth Amendment or a cognizable claim under § 1983.
Now that the claim is being addressed on the merits, past delays bring to the forefront the question of the applicable statute of limitations governing method-of-execution Eighth Amendment claims, a question this court has not addressed. See
Wellons v. Comm'r, Ga. Dep't of Corr., 754 F.3d 1260, 1263–64 (11th Cir.2014) ; Walker v. Epps, 550 F.3d 407 (5th Cir.2008), cert. denied, 558 U.S. 829, 130 S.Ct. 57, 175 L.Ed.2d 45 (2009) ; Cooey v. Strickland, 479 F.3d 412, 416–24 (6th Cir.2007), cert. denied, 553 U.S. 1014, 1006, 128 S.Ct. 2047, 170 L.Ed.2d 811, 796 (2008). A motion Bucklew filed in camera with this court more than eight years ago may suggest that his as-applied Eighth Amendment claim could have been asserted against any lethal injection protocol, not just the modified protocol adopted in October 2013.
Because this decision, when final, terminates Bucklew's appeal to this court, the Supreme Court's stay pending the appeal will expire of its own terms. The writ of execution has also expired, though of course a new writ may issue. Thus, we leave to the discretion of the district court whether a temporary stay pendente lite may be needed. See Hill, 547 U.S. at 584, 126 S.Ct. 2096 ; Cooey v. Strickland, 604 F.3d 939, 946 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 559 U.S. 1118, 130 S.Ct. 3272, 176 L.Ed.2d 945 (2010).
BYE, Circuit Judge, with whom MURPHY and KELLY, Circuit Judges, join, concurring in the result.
Third, the Court asserts, without support, the proposition that no physical disability or illness could ever foreclose execution. While the Supreme Court has been clear on the general proposition that, so long as a state-imposed death penalty is constitutional, there must be some way for states to carry out executions, the Supreme Court has also been clear that some individuals cannot be executed. See Hall v. Florida, ––– U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 1986, 1992, 188 L.Ed.2d 1007 (2014) (“[P]ersons with intellectual disability may not be executed.”); Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551, 575, 125 S.Ct. 1183, 161 L.Ed.2d 1 (2005) (“[T]he death penalty cannot be imposed upon juvenile offenders....”); Ford v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 399, 410, 106 S.Ct. 2595, 91 L.Ed.2d 335 (1986) (“The Eighth Amendment prohibits the State from inflicting the penalty of death upon a prisoner who is insane.”). The Supreme Court has not addressed the open question of whether there are some physical disabilities or health conditions which would prevent a state from executing an individual because any execution would be unconstitutionally cruel and unusual based on that individual's particular disability or health condition. This question is not before the Court and the Court's opinion should not be read to answer this question.
SHEPHERD, Circuit Judge, with whom MURPHY and BYE, Circuit Judges, join, concurring.
Chicago, R.I. & P.R.R. v. Schendel, 270 U.S. 611, 616–17, 46 S.Ct. 420, 70 L.Ed. 757 (1926) ; Bell v. Sellevold, 713 F.2d 1396, 1404 (8th Cir.1983) ; Restatement (Second) of Judgments § 14 cmt. a.
Appellees did not raise this issue in the district court, and the court did not address it. As the court dismissed Bucklew's complaint prior to answer, appellees were not required to raise this affirmative defense before the court ruled. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b). It is by no means certain how the principle that applies claim preclusion to claims that could have been filed in the earlier action—part of the rule against “claim splitting”—would be applied in this unusual situation. See Restatement (Second) of Judgments §§ 24 –26, 33. Therefore, we decline to affirm the district court on this alternative ground, which was neither presented to nor decided by that court. Instead, we leave it to the district court to consider on remand “the question whether and to what extent the bars of res judicata and collateral estoppel apply,” as we did in Occhino v. United States, 686 F.2d 1302, 1312 (8th Cir.1982).
reversing a district court's dismissal of an Eighth Amendment execution complaint, because the defendants had offered to tweak their lethal injection protocol to accommodate the plaintiff's disability, thereby conceding that alternative measures were feasible and readily implemented
allowing as-applied challenge to execution method to proceed notwithstanding prior facial challenge
In Bucklew v. Lombardi, 783 F.3d 1120, 1127 (8th Cir. 2015), we recognized that, in an as-applied challenge, evidence that the State unreasonably refused to change its regular method of execution to a feasible, readily implemented alternative that would significantly reduce the substantial risk of pain caused by a prisoner's unique medical condition could satisfy the Glossip standard in an unusual case.
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