Court Opinion

ID: 9838910
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-08 18:00:42.578203+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:06:51.924016
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-40579        Document: 00516888417             Page: 1      Date Filed: 09/08/2023

             United States Court of Appeals
                  for the Fifth Circuit                                              United States Court of Appeals
                                                                                              Fifth Circuit
                                     ____________                                           FILED
                                                                                     September 8, 2023
                                      No. 22-40579
                                     ____________                                      Lyle W. Cayce
                                                                                            Clerk
   Delores Looper,

                                                                    Plaintiff—Appellant,

                                            versus

   Dallas B. Jones; Federal Bureau of Prisons; 6 Unknown
   Employees,

                                              Defendants—Appellees.
                     ______________________________

                     Appeal from the United States District Court
                          for the Eastern District of Texas
                               USDC No. 1:19-CV-377
                     ______________________________

   Before Willett, Engelhardt, and Oldham, Circuit Judges.
   Per Curiam:*
         Delores Looper, proceeding pro se and in forma pauperis, sued the
   Federal Bureau of Prisons and several prison officials pursuant to Bivens v.
   Six Unknown Named Agents of Federal Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388
   (1971). ROA.132–36, 163–76. She alleged that the defendants violated the
   Eighth Amendment rights of her son, Joseph Looper, by failing to protect

         _____________________
         *
             This opinion is not designated for publication. See 5th Cir. R. 47.5.
Case: 22-40579         Document: 00516888417                Page: 2       Date Filed: 09/08/2023

                                           No. 22-40579

   him from the lethal attack of his cellmate. ROA.135, 163–74, 179. The dis-
   trict court dismissed Looper’s complaint for failure to state a claim under 28
   U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii). We AFFIRM.
           First, the district court correctly dismissed the suit against the Federal
   Bureau of Prisons. The law is clear that a plaintiff cannot bring a Bivens claim
   against a federal agency. See FDIC v. Meyer, 510 U.S. 471, 486 (1994).
           Second, the district court correctly dismissed the suit against the fed-
   eral officers. Looper alleges that the officers violated her son’s Eighth
   Amendment rights when they transferred him to a cell where another inmate
   killed him. ROA.172–74. She also alleges that the officers knew or should
   have known that her son was likely to suffer severe injury or death at the
   hands of the other inmate. ROA.172–74. She claims that the officers’ failure
   to protect her son and intervene on his behalf amounted to deliberate indif-
   ference. ROA.172–74.†
           Bivens created a cause of action for money damages under the Fourth
   Amendment for Webster Bivens to sue federal agents who allegedly “mana-
   cled” him “in front of his wife and children, and threatened to arrest the en-
   tire family,” “searched the apartment from stem to stem,” and took him to
   a federal courthouse where he was “interrogated, booked, and subjected to a
   visual strip search.” 403 U.S. at 389. In the next decade, the Supreme Court
   recognized two other causes of action against federal officers: first, for sex

           _____________________
           †
              Looper tried to amend her complaint to include additional Eighth Amendment
   claims, alleging that prison officials failed to adequately staff the prison and provide her son
   with timely emergency medical care. The district court denied her request because she had
   not sought leave; these new claims were time-barred by the applicable limitations period;
   and the new claims were, in any event, supported only by conclusory allegations.
   ROA.587–88. Even if Looper had properly presented these claims, they would fail to state
   a claim for Bivens relief for the same reasons that her other claims fail to do so: they present
   a new context and the Bivens remedy is not appropriate.

                                                  2
Case: 22-40579      Document: 00516888417           Page: 3    Date Filed: 09/08/2023

                                     No. 22-40579

   discrimination against a former congressional staffer in violation of the Fifth
   Amendment, see Davis v. Passman, 442 U.S. 228 (1979); and second, for a
   failure to provide an asthmatic prisoner with adequate medical care in viola-
   tion of the Eighth Amendment, see Carlson v. Green, 446 U.S. 14 (1980). But
   since then, the Supreme Court has not once extended the Bivens remedy, and
   it has declined to do so at least a dozen times. See Egbert v. Boule, 142 S. Ct.
   1793, 1799–1800 (2022). The Supreme Court has repeatedly “emphasized
   that recognizing a cause of action under Bivens is ‘a disfavored judicial activ-
   ity.’” Id. at 1803 (quoting Hernandez v. Mesa, 140 S. Ct. 735, 742 (2020) and
   Ziglar v. Abbasi, 582 U.S. 120, 135 (2017)). That is because “creating a cause
   of action is a legislative endeavor.” Ibid. So today, “Bivens claims generally
   are limited to the circumstances” of Bivens, Davis, and Carlson. Oliva v.
   Nivar, 973 F.3d 438, 442 (5th Cir. 2020).
          When analyzing Bivens claims, we have traditionally asked two ques-
   tion—(1) whether this case presents a new context and (2) if so, whether
   there are any alternative remedies or special factors indicating that judges are
   “at least arguably less equipped than Congress” to create a damages remedy.
   Egbert, 142 S. Ct. at 1803. But as a practical matter, this inquiry reduces to “a
   single question: whether there is any reason to think that Congress might be
   better equipped to create a damages remedy.” Ibid. And as the Supreme
   Court has instructed, this question creates an extremely high barrier:
          If there are sound reasons to think Congress might doubt the
          efficacy or necessity of a damages remedy, the courts must re-
          frain from creating it. Even a single sound reason to defer to
          Congress is enough to require a court to refrain from creating
          such a remedy. Put another way, the most important question
          is who should decide whether to provide for a damages remedy,
          Congress or the courts? If there is a rational reason to think that
          the answer is “Congress”—as it will be in most every case—
          no Bivens action may lie.

                                          3
Case: 22-40579      Document: 00516888417           Page: 4   Date Filed: 09/08/2023

                                     No. 22-40579

   Ibid. (cleaned up).

          Looper cannot make the required showing because this case presents
   a new context, and Congress is far more equipped to create a damages rem-
   edy.

          First, this is a new Bivens context. As the Supreme Court has empha-
   sized, our “understanding of a ‘new context’ is broad.” Hernandez v. Mesa,
   140 S. Ct. 735, 743 (2020). That is because “even a modest extension” of
   Bivens outside the circumstances of Bivens, Davis, and Carlson “is still an ex-
   tension.” Ziglar, 582 U.S. at 147; see also Watkins v. Three Admin. Remedy
   Coordinators of Bureau of Prisons, 998 F.3d 682, 685 (5th Cir. 2021). And it is
   not enough for a plaintiff to identify “parallel circumstances with Bivens,
   [Davis], or Carlson”; he must also satisfy “the analytic framework prescribed
   by the last four decades of intervening case law.” Egbert, 142 S. Ct. at 1809
   (quoting Ziglar, 582 U.S. at 139) (internal quotation marks omitted).

          Even though Carlson created a cause of action for an asthmatic pris-
   oner’s Eighth Amendment failure to medicate claim, it did not create a cause
   of action for a prisoner’s Eighth Amendment failure to protect or intervene
   claim. In that regard, Correctional Services Corp. v. Malesko, 534 U.S. 61
   (2001), is instructive. There a prisoner alleged that officials violated his
   Eighth Amendment rights by failing to provide him with necessary medica-
   tion and accommodations for his heart condition. Id. at 64–65. He sought to
   vindicate these rights through Bivens and Carlson. But the Supreme Court
   held that this was a new context—even though the Court in Carlson had cre-
   ated a Bivens remedy “in almost parallel circumstances.” Ziglar, 582 U.S. at
   139. The Court later explained:

          In both cases [Carlson and Malesko], the right at issue was the
          same: the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and

                                          4
Case: 22-40579      Document: 00516888417             Page: 5   Date Filed: 09/08/2023

                                       No. 22-40579

          unusual punishment. And in both cases, the mechanism of in-
          jury was the same: failure to provide adequate medical treat-
          ment. . . . Even though the right and the mechanism of injury
          [in Malesko] were the same as they were in Carlson, the Court
          held that the contexts were different. The Court explained that
          special factors counseled hesitation and that the Bivens remedy
          was therefore unavailable.
   Ibid. (citation omitted).

          So too here. Looper’s Eighth Amendment claim is different “in a
   meaningful way,” from the Eighth Amendment claim in Carlson. Ibid. So this
   case presents a new context.

          Second, special factors counsel against creating a new remedy. Con-
   gress has created a comprehensive scheme to govern suits brought by prison-
   ers against federal jailers in the Prison Litigation Reform Act (“PLRA”), 42
   U.S.C. § 1997e, enacted fifteen years after Carlson. See Ziglar, 582 U.S. at
   148–49; Watkins, 998 F.3d at 685. When enacting this legislation, “Congress
   had specific occasion to consider the matter of prisoner abuse and to consider
   the proper way to remedy those wrongs.” Ziglar, 582 U.S. at 148. But Con-
   gress chose not to “provide for a standalone damages remedy against federal
   jailers” and arguably “chose not to extend the Carlson damages remedy to
   cases involving other types of prisoner mistreatment.” Id. at 149; see also
   Schweiker v. Chilicky, 487 U.S. 412, 423 (1988). Since “Congress has repeat-
   edly declined to authorize the award of damages,” we may not do so, Mesa,
   140 S. Ct. at 747, even if we thought the PLRA remedy was “inadequate”
   here, Egbert, 142 S. Ct. at 1806.

          Finally, to the extent Looper tries to hold officers vicariously liable for
   the actions of subordinates, she cannot. Vicarious liability does not apply to
   Bivens claims. See Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 676 (2009) (holding

                                            5
Case: 22-40579     Document: 00516888417           Page: 6   Date Filed: 09/08/2023

                                    No. 22-40579

   “vicarious liability is inapplicable to Bivens and § 1983 suits”); accord Wat-
   kins, 998 F.3d at 686.

          The district court’s judgment is AFFIRMED. Looper’s motion to
   supplement the record is DENIED.

                                         6