Eddrell D. Scott v. ARYANA M. MOSS and AKILAH LAMAR

United States Court of Appeals
For the Seventh Circuit
Chicago, Illinois 60604
Submitted January 7, 2025*
Decided January 8, 2025
Before
AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge
JOHN Z. LEE, Circuit Judge
JOSHUA P. KOLAR, Circuit Judge
No. 24-1479
EDDRELL D. SCOTT,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
ARYANA M. MOSS and AKILAH
LAMAR,
Defendants-Appellees.
Appeal from the United States District
Court for the Southern District of
Indiana, Indianapolis Division.
No. 1:22-cv-01324-RLY-TAB
Richard L. Young,
Judge.
O R D E R
Eddrell Scott, a former Indiana prisoner, sued two mental-health professionals
who treated him while he was incarcerated. He alleged that they violated his Eighth
Amendment rights by failing to place him on suicide watch before he attempted
suicide. See 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The district court entered summary judgment for the
defendants, concluding that no evidence shows that the mental-health professionals
* We have agreed to decide the case without oral argument because the briefs and record
adequately present the facts and legal arguments, and oral argument would not significantly aid the
court. F ED . R. A PP. P. 34(a)(2)(C).
NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION
To be cited only in accordance with FED. R. A PP. P. 32.1

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No. 24-1479 Page 2
acted with deliberate indifference by deciding not to place Scott on suicide watch. We
agree with the district court and affirm.
Because the case was resolved on cross-motions for summary judgment, we
recount the facts in the light most favorable to Scott, the losing party. See Holcomb v.
Freedman Anselmo Lindberg, LLC, 900 F.3d 990, 992 (7th Cir. 2018). Scott was charged
with armed robbery and adjudicated guilty but mentally ill. He was placed in
Pendleton Correctional Facility’s intensive residential treatment unit, but officials later
moved him to the restrictive housing unit for using drugs, selling drugs to other
prisoners, and being aggressive.
While in the restrictive housing unit, Scott repeatedly threatened suicide in
response to circumstances that upset him. In May 2017, for instance, Scott threatened
suicide after he received a write-up for inappropriate conduct. At this time, he was
placed on suicide watch. In July 2020, he threatened to harm himself unless he was
permitted to speak with Pendleton’s lead psychologist. Scott repeated this behavior in
October, November, and December, threatening to hang himself during the latter two
occasions. After a mental-health evaluation in December 2020, a psychologist noted that
Scott’s “suicide attempts do not appear to be serious attempts as they appear to be
staged when officers are around and the cuts are not deep and usually are just washed
off and not bandaged.” Nevertheless, Scott’s reports of suicidal ideation continued. For
example, in August 2021, Scott submitted a healthcare request, stating that he was
hearing voices urging him to commit suicide. But during his monthly visit with
Dr. Akilah Lamar, a psychologist, Scott denied thoughts of self-harm and suicidal
ideation. So, Dr. Lamar ordered that mental-health staff continue to monitor Scott to
“determine necessary treatment and level of care.”
On January 11, 2022, Scott demanded to be removed from the restrictive housing
unit and placed in general population (a transfer that had been scheduled but then
delayed), stating that he felt suicidal and that he would commit suicide if he returned to
his cell. When notified of Scott’s suicidal ideation, Dr. Lamar stated that Scott “has [a]
history of making statements of suicidality as a means of secondary gain [and] his
current behavior displays an attempt to threaten self-harm as a means of being moved
out of [the restrictive housing unit] when he demands.” A few hours later, Aryana
Moss, a mental-health professional, observed Scott and decided not to place him on
suicide watch because his threat appeared to be “driven by not being placed in general
population in the time frame [Scott] would like.” Later that night, Scott attempted to
hang himself in his cell and was taken to the hospital. (Scott says that he had to be “cut
down,” but nothing in the record substantiates this assertion.) Scott received an x-ray,

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No. 24-1479 Page 3
which did not show an injury, but he was prescribed a muscle relaxer and physical
therapy to treat his reported neck pain.
Believing that the mental-health staff ignored his risk of suicide, Scott sued
Dr. Lamar and Moss for deliberate indifference to his medical needs in violation of the
Eighth Amendment. See 42 U.S.C. § 1983. He alleged that they should have placed him
on suicide watch to prevent him from attempting to hang himself.
Multiple times during discovery, Scott asked the district court to order the
defendants to produce discovery about the January 11 incident, including video footage
and incident reports. Ultimately, the magistrate judge overseeing discovery denied
Scott’s motions, explaining that only the Indiana Department of Correction (IDOC) had
custody and control of the requested evidence, and the defendants were not employees
of IDOC, a non-party; therefore, the magistrate judge could not order IDOC to produce
anything. And although Scott had been informed that he could request a subpoena to
obtain evidence, he never did.
The parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment, and the district court
denied Scott’s motion while granting the defendants’ motion. It ruled that the
undisputed evidence showed that Dr. Lamar and Moss reasonably responded to Scott’s
behavior and used their medical judgment when they decided not to place him on
suicide watch. In the same decision, the district court overruled Scott’s objections to the
magistrate judge’s discovery decisions and concluded that Scott should have requested
a subpoena to obtain materials from IDOC that the defendants (who were employed by
Centurion Health) did not have.
On appeal, Scott primarily challenges the summary judgment ruling, which we
review de novo. See Johnson v. Dominguez, 5 F.4th 818, 824 (7th Cir. 2021). To establish a
violation of the Eighth Amendment through deliberate indifference, Scott must show
that he suffered from an objectively serious medical condition and that the defendants
knew of and consciously disregarded an excessive risk to his health or safety. See Farmer
v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 837 (1994); Petties v. Carter, 836 F.3d 722, 728 (7th Cir. 2016)
(en banc). We assume that Scott had an objectively serious mental-health condition, and
so Scott needed to submit evidence that the defendants acted with conscious disregard
to a substantial risk of serious harm. See Farmer, 511 U.S. at 837. This can be shown with
evidence that their treatment decisions departed so substantially from accepted
professional standards as to demonstrate that they did not exercise medical judgment at
all. See Brown v. Osmundson, 38 F.4th 545, 551 (7th Cir. 2022).

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No. 24-1479 Page 4
Scott’s Eighth Amendment claim falls short because he failed to present evidence
that Dr. Lamar or Moss were deliberately indifferent to his medical needs. Dr. Lamar’s
and Moss’s professional judgment is entitled to deference unless no minimally
competent professional would have responded similarly under those circumstances.
Pyles v. Fahim, 771 F.3d 403, 409 (7th Cir. 2014); see Dean v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc.,
18 F.4th 214, 241 (7th Cir. 2021). Scott points to no evidence that calls into question the
defendants’ decision not to place him on suicide watch because of his history of
threatening suicide to protest circumstances that upset him. Dr. Lamar and Moss did
not have to take Scott’s statements at face value given his history—which included no
serious acts of self-harm (just superficial scratches) despite frequent threats—if his
threats were inconsistent with their professional assessments of the risk level. See Lord v.
Beahm, 952 F.3d 902, 904–05 (7th Cir. 2020) (distinguishing “an inmate’s insincere
suicide threat”). Scott’s disagreement with Dr. Larmar’s and Moss’s decisions is not
evidence of deliberate indifference. See Johnson, 5 F.4th at 826.
Similarly, Scott’s argument that the simple fact that, in this instance, he nearly
hanged himself created a jury question about the defendants’ deliberate indifference is
unavailing. A defendant is not liable under the Eighth Amendment if she responds
reasonably to the risk, even if the harm was not ultimately avoided. See id. at 825. And
as previously explained, Dr. Lamar and Moss reasonably responded to Scott’s threats of
self-harm. Their decisions not to place Scott on suicide watch did not come out of
nowhere, given the undisputed evidence that Scott had a history of threatening
self-harm for secondary gain. Simply put, no reasonable jury could find that Dr. Lamar
and Moss ignored a substantial risk of death by suicide. See Quinn v. Wexford Health
Sources, Inc., 8 F.4th 557, 566 (7th Cir. 2021).
Finally, Scott challenges the district court’s decision denying his request for
discovery. But the district court reasonably ruled that Scott showed no reason to doubt
the medical defendants’ representations that the video footage and other requested
evidence was in the custody and control of IDOC. Scott’s disbelief that the defendants
lacked access to these materials was not a ground for ordering the defendants to
produce them. Scott needed to serve a subpoena because he sought materials from a
non-party. FED. R. C IV. P. 34(a), (c), 45; see Gotham Holdings, LP v. Health Grades, Inc.,
580 F.3d 664, 665 (7th Cir. 2009).
AFFIRMED

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