COVID-19 Summary: This putative class-action lawsuit, brought by inmates in Orange County Jail, argued that county and the sheriff violated the U.S. Constitution, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act in failing to provide adequate care amidst the 2020 coronavirus pandemic. The court granted the motion for provisional class-certification and partially granted a temporary restraining order, but the defendants appealed and the Supreme Court stayed the injunctive relief while the appeals to the Ninth Circuit proceeded.
This putative class-action lawsuit was filed on April 30, 2020 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The lawsuit was filed by several inmates in Orange County Jail. The suit arose out of the COVID-19 pandemic that swept the world in early 2020. As the virus raged throughout the country, it became particularly problematic in jails and prison systems. This lawsuit alleged that Orange County Jail's management of the virus was wholly inadequate and in violation of the U.S. Constitution, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. The suit alleged that requisite social distancing was not possible due to the high density of inmates in the jail, that the masks were simply pieces of fabric (and were not always used by guards), and that isolation policies were ineffective. The plaintiffs were medically vulnerable inmates in Orange County Jail and they were represented by ACLU National, ACLU Fund of Southern California, and ACLU Disabilities Rights Program attorneys, the UC Irvine Civil Rights Litigation Clinic, and private counsel. They sued Orange County and the Sheriff of Orange County.
The complaint alleged that defendants' failure to adequately mitigate the spread of COVID-19 in the jail system represented violations of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution. They argued that the conditions represented an unconstitutional punishment and unconstitutional confinement in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment, which guarantees that the state provide for reasonable health and safety of inmates. As for the Eighth Amendment, they argued that the lack of precautions constituted deliberate indifference to the health of the inmates as to be cruel and unusual punishment. The plaintiffs also argued that the failure to protect medically vulnerable inmates (particularly those with co-morbidities), constituted discrimination on the basis of disability in violation of the ADA and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. Plaintiffs sought class certification, a writ of habeas corpus to identify all members of a Medically-Vulnerable Subclass and Disability Subclass and grant them release, injunctive relief in the form of a temporary restraining order, preliminary injunction, permanent injunction, or habeas corpus that would mitigate the spread of COVID-19, declaratory relief, and attorneys' fees and costs.
On May 11, the plaintiffs submitted an application for a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction and a motion for provisional class certification. On May 26, the court granted the motion for provisional class-certification and granted in part and denied in part the application for a temporary restraining order. The grant of provisional class status created two classes, a Pre-Trial Class and a Post-Conviction Class. Under each of those were Disability Subclasses and Medically-Vulnerable Subclasses. The partial grant of the TRO mandated defendants to follow CDC social distancing guidelines, expand testing, and enhance sanitation efforts in the jails. It did not grant release to any prisoners, though. 2020 WL 2754938.
Defendants appealed this decision two days later and applied to stay the case pending a decision from the 9th Circuit (docket #: 20-55568). In both the district court and the 9th Circuit, the defendants filed emergency motions to stay the lower court decision, but the district court denied this motion on June 2. 2020 WL 4039073. The 9th Circuit then denied this motion on June 17. However, they remanded the case to the district court to gauge whether any changed circumstances might require alterations to the TRO. 2020 WL 3547960.
The defendants then filed an ex parte application with the district court to dissolve the TRO, which the district court denied yet again in late June. The defendants tried to argue that the declining rate of COVID-19 in the Orange County Jail represented a significant enough change to warrant dissolution of the preliminary injunction. On July 1, the defendants appealed once more to the 9th Circuit (docket #: 20-55668). And, once again, the 9th Circuit denied the motion on July 3.
Then on July 21, the defendants brought the case to the Supreme Court, submitting an emergency application for stay of injunctive relief. In a 5-4 decision, the Court granted the stay on August 5. There was no majority, opinion, but Justice Sotomayor wrote a dissent arguing that, even if the majority would have granted the stay at the district court, it was not so clearly wrong as to warrant granting certiorari. 2020 WL 4499350.
On August 25, the plaintiffs filed motions to dismiss as moot each of the pending appeals in the 9th Circuit. They argued that the preliminary injunction had expired and therefore the appeals were moot. The defendants sought to continue litigating the appeals and alleged that without review by the appellate court, there was nothing to stop the district court from entering preliminary injunctions every 90 days throughout the life of the case. On October 15, 2020, the two appeals were consolidated.
The case is ongoing as of February 17, 2021.
Jack Hibbard - 08/07/2020
Emily Kempa - 11/01/2020
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