Opinion ID: 3162202
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Defining the Right at Issue

Text: The District Court defined the right at issue as either the Eighth Amendment right to treatment of serious medical needs or the fundamental right to procreate, but both of those definitions are too broad. “In determining whether a right has been clearly established, the court must define the right allegedly violated at the appropriate level of specificity.” Sharp v. Johnson, 669 F.3d 144, 159 (3d Cir. 2012); see also al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. at 2084 (“We have repeatedly told courts . . . not to define clearly established law at a high level of generality. The general proposition, for example, that an unreasonable search 2 We have jurisdiction over this interlocutory appeal because “a district court’s denial of a claim of qualified immunity, to the extent that it turns on an issue of law, is an appealable ‘final decision’ within the meaning of 28 U.S.C. § 1291 notwithstanding the absence of a final judgment.” Mitchell v. Forsyth, 472 U.S. 511, 530 (1985). 6 or seizure violates the Fourth Amendment is of little help in determining whether the violative nature of particular conduct is clearly established.”) (citations omitted). “The dispositive question is ‘whether the violative nature of particular conduct is clearly established.’” Mullenix v. Luna, 136 S. Ct. 305, 308 (2015) (per curiam) (emphasis original to Mullenix) (quoting al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. at 2084). In Mullenix, the Supreme Court reiterated that courts are to look to the specific conduct at issue to determine whether such conduct is clearly established as violative of a plaintiff’s constitutional or statutory rights. Mullenix concerned the qualified immunity defense of a police officer who had shot and killed a suspect in a highspeed chase after that suspect had threatened to shoot the police officers pursuing him. See id. at 306-07. The Fifth Circuit had defined the conduct at issue as the legality of “us[ing] deadly force against a fleeing felon who does not pose a sufficient threat of harm to the officer or others.” Id. at 308-09 (quoting Luna v. Mullenix, 773 F.3d 712, 725 (5th Cir. 2014)). The Supreme Court rejected this definition, noting that the particular circumstances of the case warranted a more specific definition of the right at issue. See id. at 309 (“The general principle that deadly force requires a sufficient threat hardly settles this matter.”). Here, the District Court defined the right at issue as either the Eighth Amendment right to treatment of serious medical needs or the fundamental right to procreate. We find both of these definitions of the right to be too broad, as neither focuses on the conduct at issue. That is, neither definition allowed the District Court to examine whether the “violative nature of [the] particular conduct” at issue in this case was clearly established. Cf. id. at 308 (emphasis in original). The particular conduct at issue in this case is the 7 failure to treat retrograde ejaculation which could lead to impotence and infertility. A properly tailored definition of the right at issue here, thus, is whether the BOP is obligated to treat conditions resulting in impotence and/or infertility, such as retrograde ejaculation and erectile dysfunction. B. Determining Whether the Right at Issue is Clearly Established In determining whether a properly tailored definition of the right at issue is clearly established, the Court must consider whether “existing precedent [has] placed the statutory or constitutional question beyond debate.” Id. (quoting al-Kidd, 131 S. Ct. at 2084). In Taylor v. Barkes, 135 S. Ct. 2042, 2044 (2015) (per curiam), the Supreme Court held that there was no clearly established right to suicide prevention measures in prisons and emphasized the importance of the “clearly established” prong of qualified immunity. The Supreme Court explained that, “[n]o decision of this Court establishes a right to the proper implementation of adequate suicide prevention protocols. No decision of this Court even discusses suicide screening or prevention protocols.” Id. at 2044. It also noted that, “‘to the extent that a robust consensus of cases of persuasive authority’ in the Courts of Appeals ‘could itself clearly establish the federal right respondent alleges,’ the weight of that authority at the time of Barkes’s death suggested that such a right did not exist.” Id. at 2044 (quoting City & Cnty. of S.F., Cal. v. Sheehan, 135 S. Ct. 1765, 1778 (2015)). Thus, Barkes makes clear that there must be precedent indicating that the specific right at issue is clearly established. 8 There is no Supreme Court or appellate precedent holding that prison officials must treat retrograde ejaculation, infertility, or erectile dysfunction; in fact, the weight of authority is to the contrary. The Magistrate Judge relied on Skinner, but Skinner establishes only that states may not sterilize prisoners; it does not hold that prisoners are entitled to treatment for infertility or sexual problems. The Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit has held that a prisoner is not entitled to treatment for erectile dysfunction. It upheld a district court’s grant of summary judgment to prison officials who failed to treat an inmate’s erectile dysfunction because “erectile dysfunction cannot be said to be a serious medical condition, given that no physician indicated its treatment was mandatory, it was not causing . . . pain, and it was not lifethreatening.” Lyons v. Brandly, 430 F. App’x 377, 381 (6th Cir. 2011). And, in Goodwin v. Turner, 908 F.2d 1395 (8th Cir. 1990), the Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit upheld the BOP’s policy against permitting prisoners to procreate. The BOP had denied a prisoner’s request for “a clean container in which to deposit his ejaculate, and a means of swiftly transporting the ejaculate outside the prison” to his wife, who could inject herself with a syringe. Id. at 1398. The Goodwin court held that, even though procreation is a fundamental right, “the restriction imposed by the Bureau is reasonably related to achieving its legitimate penological interest.” Id. While Goodwin did not involve a medical condition, it did hold that the BOP is not required to help a prisoner procreate. Because there is no authority establishing—let alone “clearly” establishing—a right for prisoners to receive treatment for conditions resulting in impotence and/or infertility, such as retrograde ejaculation or erectile dysfunction, Appellants are entitled to qualified immunity. 9