In 1990, Congress passed the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), an optimistic and comprehensive civil rights law intended to provide equal opportunity in employment and public life to individuals living with physical and mental disabilities. Title I addresses discrimination in employment; Title II guarantees disabled persons equal access to state services and programs, an assurance that the rights these programs fulfill will be protected; and Title III mandates “reasonable accommodation” to the needs of the disabled in public facilities. The federal statute includes both a prohibition against discrimination against disabled persons and a provision for redress. Legislators recognized that without the prospect of “effective enforcement provisions,” the states would be unlikely to move into compliance with the new legislation.
The ADA began with the principle that its purpose is enforcement of the Fourteenth Amendment’s command that “all persons similarly situated should be treated alike.” The Supreme Court observed that classifications based on disability violate that constitutional command if they lack a rational relationship to a legitimate governmental purpose. If an entity’s policies and practices discriminate against a plaintiff because he or she was mentally or physically disabled and in need of services and programs which are available, then the policies of the entity treat the plaintiff differently.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Americans with Disabilities Act, ch. 126, 42 U.S.C. §12101.
42 U.S.C. §§12111–12117.
42 U.S.C. §12131 et seq.
42 U.S.C. §12181 et seq.
Board of Trustees v. Garrett, 531 U.S. 356, 365 (2001).
Id., 366.
42 United States Code Section 1983, which applies to state and local government and officials, includes claims alleged against the federal government and its officials through what is known as a “Bivens action”. See Bivens v. Six Unknown Agents, 403 U.S. 388 (1971) (federal government may be sued for actions of its agents conducted under governmental authority for violations of constitutional protections found in the Bill of Rights). Federal courts have consistently extended rulings under section 1983 to Bivens actions.
See James C. Harrington, The ADA and Section 1983: Walking Hand in Hand, 19 Rev. Litig. 43, U. Texas, 2000 and James C. Harrington, Section 1983: Civil Rights Litigation 2007 (April 9, 2007), Georgetown U. Law Center.
Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 50 L. Ed. 2d 251 (1976) (denial of medical care).
See Justice Scalia’s discussion in County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 849 (1998), describing the range of “deliberate indifference” standards to evaluate an officer’s culpability under the Fourteenth Amendment “shock the conscious” test.
See Michael Avery, David Rodovsky, & Karen Blum, Police Misconduct: Law and Litigation, 3d ed. 2004, for a comprehensive discussion of the myriad areas of federal law under Section 1983 that have developed to address individual and repetitive violations of the rights of persons in custody and at liberty, discussing the doctrines of qualified (“good faith”) immunity, interlocutory appeals from the denial of qualified immunity, municipal immunity, and sovereign immunity.
James C. Harrington, The ADA and Section 1983: Walking Hand in Hand, 19 Rev. Litig. 43, U. Texas, 2000, discussing the increasing difficulties in protecting rights under Section 1983 and contrasting the ADA as an alternative vehicle for vindicating the rights of people with physical, developmental, and mental disabilities.
42 U.S.C. §12102 (2).
“More Than 50 Million Americans Report Some Level of Disability”, Census Bureau News Release, May 12, 2006 <http://www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/aging population/006809.html>.
Doris L. James, Profile of Jail Inmates, 2002 (Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2005) <http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/pji02.pdf>.
Paula M. Dixon, Mental Health and Treatment of Inmates and Probationers (Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics Special Report, 1999) <http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/mhtip.pdf>.
D.L. James & L.E. Glaze, Mental Health Problems of Prison and Jail Inmates (Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2006).
Department of Health and Human Services, The Surgeon General’s Call to Action to Improve the Health and Wellness of Persons with Disabilities (Rockville, MD: Public Health Service, 2005) <http://www.Surgeongeneral.gov/library/disabilities/calltoaction/calltoaction.pdf>.
See, e.g., U.S. Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, 1997 CRIPA investigation into the conditions at Los Angeles County Jail established that mental health care at the jail violated the inmates’ constitutional rights. It found “unconstitutional conditions exist at the Los Angeles County Jail, including deliberate indifference to inmates’ serious mental health needs”. They found “abuse of mentally ill inmates by sheriff’s deputies working in the jail; some have their illnesses misdiagnosed and their medications improperly administered. … they have been abused by correctional staff; the jail does not adequately prevent abuse of mentally ill inmates and does not adequately investigate allegations of such abuse when it occurs”.
Madrid v. Gomez, 190 F.3d 990 (9th Cir.1999).
Harrison & Beck, Prisoners in 2003, Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice 2004: NCJ 205335.
Weinreich v. Los Angeles County Metro. Transp. Auth., 114 F.3d 976, 978–79 (9th Cir. 1997).
Id. (cites omitted).
Crawford v. Indiana Dept. of Corrections, 115 F.3d 481, 22 A.D.D. 22, 6 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 1416 (7th Cir. 1997) (rev’d on other grounds by Erickson v. Board of Governors of State Colleges and Universities for Northeastern Illinois University, 2000 WL 307121 (7th Cir. 2000) ).
See, e.g., Peacock v. Terhune, 2002 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 1136, *2 (E.D. Cal. 2002) (holding plaintiff’s claim valid where he alleged that the state defendants discriminated against him and other disabled inmates by “requiring them to go on a daily basis to health care providers for medical supplies based on the allegation that “the prison changed its policy on providing medical care and supplies so that paralyzed inmates were required to go on a daily basis to another location to get their supplies”, and this policy change “treated non-disabled inmates differently from disabled persons”. Id. at *7–8.
See Harris v. Oregon Health Sciences University, 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 16231, *10 (D.C. Oreg. 1999) (plaintiff was mentally ill. She was expelled from a mental services program because her medical needs were too complex for a resident to handle. However, she could not show that without her handicap—her mental disability—she would have been eligible for treatment in the program. Id. In fact, without her disability the plaintiff clearly would not have been eligible for treatment since the entire reason for entering the program was her mental disability. Id. “Without a showing that the non-handicapped received the treatment denied to the ‘otherwise qualified’ handicapped, the appellants cannot assert that a violation of section 504 [and the ADA] has occurred”. Id. at *13.
See Martin v. PGA Tour, Inc., 994 F. Supp. 1242, 1247–48 (D. Oreg. 1998) (aff’d Martin, 204 F.3d 994 (9th Cir. 1999)) (“Congress intended to protect disabled persons not just from intentional discrimination but also from ‘thoughtlessness’, ‘indifference’, and ‘benign neglect’. ”). See also Tyler v. City of Manhattan, 857 F. Supp. 800, 818–819 (D. Kan. 1994) (finding discrimination based on disability despite defendant’s good faith effort to remove particular barriers).
42 U.S.C. §12131(1).
ADA’s broad language brings within its scope “ ‘anything a public entity does’. ” Pennsylvania Dep’t of Corr. v. Yeskey, 118 F.3d 168, 171 & n.5 (3d Cir. 1997), aff’d 524 U.S. 206 (1998) This includes programs or services provided at jails, prisons, and any other “ ‘custodial or correctional institution’. ” Id. “Although ‘incarceration itself is hardly a “program” or “activity” to which a disabled person might wish access’, ” mental health services and other activities or services undertaken by law enforcement and provided by correctional facilities to those incarcerated are “services, programs, or activities of a public entity” within the meaning of the ADA.
Pennsylvania Dep’t of Corr. v. Yeskey, 524 U.S. 206, 209 (1998); Bogovich v. Sandoval, 189 F.3d 999, 1002 (9th Cir. 1999).
Hurtado v. Reno, 34 F. Supp. 2d 1261 (D. Colo. 1999) (deaf alien awaiting deportation as an aggravated felon at an INS detention facility).
P. M. Harrison & A. J. Beck, Prisoners in 2003 (Washington, DC: Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Department of Justice, 2004).
482 U.S. 78, 107 S. Ct. 2254, 96 L. Ed. 2d 64 (1987).
929 F. Supp. 1299, 18 A.D.D. 542, 6 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 1275 (C.D. Cal. 1996).
Roop v. Squadrito, 70 F. Supp. 2d 868 (N.D. Ind. 1999).
See, e.g., Coleman v. Wilson, 912 F. Supp. 1282 (E.D. Cal. 1995) (requiring reforms in conditions for mentally ill prisoners in California prisons); Plata v. Schwarzenegger, 01–1351 (N.D. Cal., filed April 5, 2001) (massive restructuring of California’s prison health care system); Armstrong v. Wilson, 942 F.Supp. 1252 (N.D. Cal. 1996) aff’d, 124 F.3d 1019 (9th Cir. 1997) (finding that the Cal. Department of Corrections was violating the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act and issuing an injunction to improve access to prison programs for prisoners with physical disabilities at all of California’s prisons and parole facilities); and VonColln v. County of Ventura, 189 F.R.D. 583 (C.D. Cal.) 1999 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20956 (preventing torture by use of a restraint chair in pretrial booking).
922 F. Supp. 1208, 6 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 335 (E.D. Mich. 1996).
Id. In holding that, the court noted that “otherwise qualified” means a person who meets the eligibility requirements for the receipt of services provided by a public entity, with or without the provision of auxiliary aids. Observing that most courts have construed the term “service” very broadly, the court concluded that prisons supply a service to persons, not inmates, by allowing them to be called by inmates and allowing them to visit inmates in prison.
Crawford v. Indiana Dept. of Corrections, 115 F.3d 481, 22 A.D.D. 22, 6 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 1416 (7th Cir. 1997) (rev’d on other grounds, Erickson v. Board of Governors of State Colleges and Universities for Northeastern Illinois University, 2000 WL 307121 (7th Cir. 2000)).
Kaufman v. Carter, 952 F. Supp. 520 (W.D. Mich. 1996).
Schmidt v. Odell, 64 F. Supp. 2d 1014 (D. Kan. 1999).
Outlaw v. City of Dothan, Ala., 8 A.D.D. 560, 3 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 939 (M.D. Ala. 1993).
Bonner v. Arizona Dept. of Corrections, 714 F. Supp. 420 (D. Ariz. 1989) (decided under §504 of the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C.A. §794).
Clarkson v. Coughlin, 898 F. Supp. 1019, 10 A.D.D. 642, 4 A.D. Cas. (BNA) 1056 (S.D. N.Y. 1995).
Walker v. Washington, 13 Nat’l Disability Law Rep. P 60, 1998 WL 30701 (N.D. Ill. 1998).
Lee v. City of Los Angeles, 250 F.3d 668 (9th Cir. 2001).
McNally v. Prison Health Services, 46 F. Supp. 2nd 49 (D. Me. 1999), reconsideration denied, 52 F. Supp. 2d 147 (D. Me. 1999).
Rouse v. Plantier, 997 F. Supp. 575 (N.J. 1998), vacated on other grounds, 182 F.3d 192 (3rd Cir. 1999).
Owens v. Chester County, 2000 WL 116069 (E.D. Pa. 2000).
See, e.g., Hare v. City of Corinth, 135 F.3d 320, 327 (5th Cir.1998) discussing a series of suicide cases and Flores v. County of Hardeman, 124 F.3d 736, 736–739 (5th Cir. 1997).
Cabrales v. County of Los Angeles, 864 F.2d 1454 (9th Cir.1988) (duty to provide medical care encompasses detainees’ psychiatric needs). Cabrales 864 F.2d 1461 (9th Cir. 1988), vac’d, 490 U.S. 1087, 104 L. Ed. 2d 982, 109 S. Ct. 2425 (1989), opinion reinstated, 886 F.2d 235 (9th Cir. 1989), cert. denied, 494 U.S. 1091, 108 L. Ed. 2d 966, 110 S. Ct. 1838 (1990); see also Wellman v. Faulkner, 715 F.2d 269, 272 (7th Cir. 1983) and Ramos v. Lamm, 639 F.2d 559, 574 (10th Cir. 1980).
The 7th Circuit also applies the medical deliberate indifference standard for pretrial detainee suicide cases. See Brandich v. City of Chicago, 413 F.3d 688, 690 (7th Cir. 2005) citing Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 535 n.16, 60 L. Ed. 2d 447, 99 S. Ct. 1861 (1979) and Matos v. O’Sullivan, 335 F.3d 553, 556–57 (7th Cir. 2003).
Cabrales established that the affidavits relied on by the district court adequately demonstrated that the medical understaffing at the jail directly contributed to the decedent’s suicide. The psychiatric staff could only spend minutes per month with disturbed inmates. The district court could conclude that lack of time and resources meant, in the decedent’s case, that any psychological illness he had would go undiagnosed and untreated. The omission by the County and its policymakers in providing adequate medical care at the Men’s Central Jail was the policy or custom that was the “moving force” behind the deprivation of the decedent’s constitutional rights without due process. Id., 1461.
Cabrales v. County of Los Angeles, 864 F.2d 1454 (9th Cir.1988) vacated 490 U.S. 1087, 109 S. Ct. 2425, 104 L. Ed. 2d 982 (1989).
489 U.S. 378 (1989).
Cabrales v. County of Los Angeles, 886 F.2d 235, 236 (9th Cir. 1989) (“We conclude that Harris does not alter our previous opinion on either of these points. In Harris, the Supreme Court determined that a municipality can be held liable for a constitutional policy if it is culpable for an unconstitutional application of its policy. Because the policy of understaffing was considered unconstitutional, there was no need for us to determine separately whether the County could be held culpable for an unconstitutional application of its policy”.).
Collins v. Seeman, 2006 U.S. App. LEXIS 23092, *7–8 (7th Cir. 2006) (citing Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 832, 128 L. Ed. 2d 811 (1994)).
Sanville v. McCaughtry, 266 F.3d 724, 733 (7th Cir. 2001).
Matos ex. rel. Matos v. O’Sullivan, 335 F.3d 553, 557 (7th Cir. 2003). See also Estate of Novack ex rel. Turbin v. County of Wood, 226 F.3d 525, 529 (7th Cir. 2000) (defendant must be aware of the significant likelihood that an inmate may imminently seek to take his own life and must fail to take reasonable steps to prevent the inmate from performing the act).
Estate of Novack, 226 F.3d at 529 (emphasis added).
See also Sanville, supra, 266 F.3d at 737 (the issue is whether the defendant was subjectively “aware of the substantial risk that [the deceased prisoner] might take his own life”). Liability cannot attach where “the defendants simply were not alerted to the likelihood that [the prisoner] was a genuine suicide risk”. Boncher ex rel. Boncher v. Brown County, 272 F.3d 484, 488 (7th Cir. 2001).
See, e.g., Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194 (2001) (sets forth a two-prong inquiry to resolve all qualified immunity claims. First, “taken in the light most favorable to the party asserting the injury, do the facts alleged show the officers’ conduct violated a constitutional right?” Id., 201. Second, if so, was that right clearly established? Id. “The relevant, dispositive inquiry in determining whether a right is clearly established is whether it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted”. Id., 202. This inquiry is wholly objective and is undertaken in light of the specific factual circumstances of the case. Id., 201 emphasis added.
Sites v. McKenzie, 423 F. Supp. 1190 (N.D W.Va. 1976) (denial of access to vocational rehabilitation programs violated Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act), and D.M v. Terhune, 67 F. Supp.2d 402, 412 (D.C. N.J. 1999) (class action settlement of claims by inmates with mental disorders alleging denial of appropriate treatment and medications).
42 U.S.C.A. §12132. Lee v. City of Los Angeles, 250 F.3d 668 (9th Cir. 2001).
Wilson v. Woodford, 2006 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12330, *10 (E.D. Cal. 2006). See also Burger v. Bloomberg, 418 F.3d 882, 882 (8th Cir. 2005) (medical treatment decisions are not a basis for Rehabilitation Act or ADA claims); Fitzgerald v. Corr. Corp. of America, 403 F.3d 1134, 1144 (10th Cir. 2005), and Schiavo ex rel. Schindler v. Schiavo, 403 F.3d 1289, 1294 (11th Cir. 2005).
See McNally v. Prison Health Services, 46 F. Supp. 2d 49, 58 (D. Me. 1999), reconsideration denied, 52 F. Supp. 2d 147 (D. Me. 1999) (discussing the distinction between the claims).
Moore v. Prison Health Services, 201 F.3d 448 (10th Cir. 1999).
Garrett v. Angelone, 940 F. Supp. 933 (W.D. Va. 1996), aff’d, 107 F.3d 865 (4th Cir. 1997).
C.A. Hornung, R.B. Greifinger, & S.Gadre, A Projection Model of the Prevalence of Selected Chronic Diseases in the Inmate Population. National Commission on Correctional Healthcare, The Health Status of Soon-to-Be-Released Inmates, Report to Congress (August 2002) <http://www.ncchc.org/stbr/Volume2/ Report3_Hornung.pdf>.
R.H. Aday, Aging Prisoners: Crisis in American Corrections (Westport, CT: Praeger, 2003).
National Commission on Correctional Healthcare, The Health Status of Soon-to-Be-Released Inmates, Report to Congress (August 2002) <http://www.ncchc.org/pubs_stbr.html>.
Arthur L. Kellerman & Knox H. Todd, “Killing Heat”, New England Journal of Medicine 335 (1996): 126–27; E.M. Kilburne, K. Choi, T.S. Jones, & S.B. Thacker, “Risk Factors for Heatstroke: A Case-Control Study”, Journal of the American Medical Association 247 (1982): 3332–36; “Heat-Related Mortality—Chicago, July 1995”, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 44 (1995): 577–79.
Brie A. Williams, Karla Lindquist, Rebecca L. Sudore, Heidi M. Strupp, Donna J. Willmott, & Louise C. Walter, “Being Old and Doing Time: Functional Impairment and Adverse Experiences of Geriatric Female Prisoners”, Journal of the American Geriatric Society 54, no. 4 (April 2006): 702–07.
C. Seth Landefeld, Robert Palmer, Mary Anne Johnson, & Catherine Bree Johnston, Current Geriatric Diagnosis and Treatment (New York: McGraw–Hill, 2004); <http://www.ahrq.gov/clinic/uspstfix.htm> U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.
United States v. Georgia, Goodman v. Georgia, 126 S.Ct. 877, 163 L.Ed.2d 650 (2006). Brief of Amici Curiae Tennessee, Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Idaho, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Washington, Wyoming in Support of Respondent, US v. Georgia.
Michael Waterstone, “The Untold Story of the Rest of the Americans with Disabilities Act”, Vanderbilt Law Review 55 (2002):1807.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2007 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Paz, R.S. (2007). Accommodating Disabilities in Jails and Prisons. In: Greifinger, R.B. (eds) Public Health Behind Bars. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-71695-4_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-71695-4_4
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-71694-7
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-71695-4
eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)