Opinion ID: 2773216
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Serious Risk

Text: Viewed in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, there is sufficient evidence that Skol’s escort posed a substantial risk of serious harm. 3 It is undisputed that the detention unit housed a volatile mix of prisoners—including inmates who had committed assaults and inmates who were targets for possible assault. An investigator for the Arizona Department of Corrections testified after the incident about why an officer would not want to escort three detention unit inmates by himself: “It’s 3 Defendants assert that they objected below to various pieces of evidence. With one exception (regarding Officer Smith’s alleged hearsay statement to a state investigator, which we discuss below), Defendants waived these objections by failing to request a ruling on them in the district court. See Fenton v. Freedman, 748 F.2d 1358, 1360 (9th Cir. 1984) (“The failure of a litigant to request a ruling is a waiver of the right to raise any issue before this Court concerning admissibility.”). Defendants also fail to explain the grounds for their objections in their brief to this court, which is a further basis for waiver. See Am. Int’l Enters. v. FDIC, 3 F.3d 1263, 1266 n.5 (9th Cir. 1993) (“Issues raised in the brief that are not supported by argument are deemed abandoned.”). In a similar vein, Defendants contend that Plaintiff cannot establish any disputed facts because she failed to comply with a local rule governing the formatting of her statement of facts. The district court rejected this argument, and we defer to that conclusion. See Qualls ex rel. Qualls v. Blue Cross of Cal., Inc., 22 F.3d 839, 842 n.2 (9th Cir. 1994) (“District courts have broad discretion to interpret their local rules. Only in rare cases will we question the exercise of discretion in connection with the application of the local rules.” (citation and internal quotation marks omitted)). Defendants also object to Plaintiff’s expert report, but we need not resolve that objection because we do not rely on the expert report for any purpose. CORTEZ V. SKOL 9 common sense. Detention inmates are inmates that don’t go along with either the programs in regular prison or there’s other issues, whether they’re in protective custody or they’re gang members or what . . . they could have just assaulted somebody. I certainly will not transport three inmates by myself.” Testimony by Skol’s colleagues similarly indicated that one-on-three escorts were dangerous, particularly in no man’s land. Officer Smith stated in his declaration that, according to the training he received directly from Skol, having one officer escort three inmates was not recommended. 4 Another officer testified that, although escorts in other areas can be viewed by staff or cameras, no man’s land is out of view. That officer further explained that he would not escort three inmates alone in no man’s land because he would be outnumbered and it would create a safety issue. In addition to the general risks of undermanned escorts of detention unit inmates through no man’s land, the record contains evidence of dangers specific to Cruz, Lavender, and Cortez. Skol told Officer Smith after the incident that “there was a lot [of] talk and harassing words between the three inmates in the back cage.” Cruz also told an investigator that he had attacked Cortez for calling him and Lavender “clowns” and for “running his mouth” about being a protective custody inmate who did not have to answer to anyone. One of Skol’s colleagues, Sergeant Brian Hawthorne, testified that Cortez was a protective custody inmate and that it was common knowledge among 4 Skol stated in his declaration that he had previously escorted three inmates by himself without problems. This is something for the jury to consider at trial. 10 CORTEZ V. SKOL prison guards that such inmates are targeted for attack by other prisoners. According to Hawthorne, it was a “rule within the prison” that protective custody inmates had a “green light,” meaning “any race, at any time, [other inmates are] supposed to attack them and take them out.” Cortez’s status as a protective custody inmate is in dispute, but between Sergeant Hawthorne’s testimony and Cortez’s own statement to his attackers that he was a protective custody inmate, a reasonable jury could find that Cortez was at least perceived among guards and prisoners as being in protective custody. This perception of Cortez’s protective custody status, combined with the animosity between the inmates arising out of the harassing talk, would have heightened the risk of Skol’s escort. 5 It is also relevant that the inmates were without leg restraints. The deputy warden of the Morey Unit testified at his deposition that, at the time of the attack, a written prison policy required both upper and lower restraints and that the inmates involved in the incident “should have been in both upper and lower restraints.” The prison’s chief of security at the time of the incident said the same. Skol and other officers dispute this, saying that, by the time of the attack, the prison had been safely operating under a newer directive that instructed against using leg restraints, issued after an inmate had tripped and injured himself in no man’s land. But the record provides reason to doubt that such a directive ever issued. The deputy warden testified that he tried to locate something about the supposed change, including the grievance by the injured inmate that purportedly motivated it, but was unable to find anything. 5 Defendants point to an inmate database record to show that Cortez was not a protective custody inmate. However, a perception of Cortez’s protective custody status is relevant to the risk of the transport, even if not reflected in the prison’s formal records. CORTEZ V. SKOL 11 Even if Defendants could produce such evidence, however, the fact that there was a written policy requiring leg irons supports the notion that there were risks to moving inmates without them. Finally, Skol’s unwillingness to physically intervene once the attack began could demonstrate that he took a substantial risk. A jury could reasonably conclude that, by putting himself in a situation in which he was outnumbered, out of view, and away from backup—and thus uncomfortable intervening when two inmates attacked a third—Skol exposed Cortez to a substantial risk of serious injury.