Court Opinion

ID: 9635793
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 14:05:47.557931+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:09:36.274245
License: Public Domain

HUG, Circuit Judge,
concurring:
I add this concurrence to emphasize that model instruction 9.25, set forth in the 2007 edition of the Ninth Circuit’s Civil Model Jury Instructions, does not adequately state the law and should not be used by the district courts. The commentary to the instruction correctly notes that the Supreme Court clearly states in Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994), that the key inquiry in an Eighth Amendment conditions of confinement claim is whether the defendant acted with “deliberate indifference.” Yet the model instruction itself (like the jury instruction given in this case) never mentions or defines the term “deliberate indifference.”
The 2001 version of the Ninth Circuit’s Civil Model Jury Instructions correctly focuses on the term “deliberate indifference” and explains what constitutes “deliberate indifference.” Model instruction 11.10 states:
On the plaintiffs Eighth Amendment conditions of confinement claim, the plaintiff has the burden of proving each of the following elements by a preponderance of the evidence:
1. the defendant acted with deliberate indifference;
2. the defendant acted under color of law; and
3. the conduct of the defendant caused harm to the plaintiff.
To establish deliberate indifference, the plaintiff must prove that the defendant knew that the plaintiff faced a substantial risk of serious harm and disregarded that risk by failing to take reasonable measures to correct it.
9th Cir. Model Civ. Jury Instr. 11.10 (2001). This older model instruction makes clear that the appropriate inquiry focuses on the “conduct” of the defendant, which includes the defendant’s “failure to act.”
Had that instruction, or one that similarly explains the key term of “deliberate indifference,” been given in this case, then the interrogatory posed to the jury — “[B]y failing to remove him from Cell 115, was Defendant Lomeli deliberately indifferent to a serious risk of harm to the plaintiff?]” — and the jury’s response thereto would have been meaningful.
I can fully understand why the district judge in this case was misled by following our new model jury instruction. The purpose of this concurrence is to ensure that *1184others do not rely on this erroneous model instruction in the future.