William A. Bown v. Brent D. Reinke;

NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
WILLIAM A. BOWN,
Plaintiff-Appellee,
v.
BRENT D. REINKE; et al.,
Defendants-Appellants.
No. 16-35573
D.C. No. 1:12-cv-00262-BLW
MEMORANDUM*
Appeal from the United States District Court
for the District of Idaho
B. Lynn Winmill, Chief Judge, Presiding
Argued and Submitted April 12, 2018
Seattle, Washington
Before: TASHIMA and GRABER, Circuit Judges, and MIHM,** District Judge.
Plaintiff William Bown was an inmate at the Idaho Maximum Security
Institution when he suffered a heart attack. Plaintiff filed a 42 U.S.C. § 1983
action alleging deliberate indifference to his medical needs. The district court
* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.
** The Honorable Michael M. Mihm, United States District Judge for the
Central District of Illinois, sitting by designation.
FILED
MAY 8 2018
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

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denied Defendants’ motion for summary judgment requesting protection under
qualified immunity.
1. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. See Mitchell v. Forsyth,
472 U.S. 511, 530 (1985). “On an interlocutory appeal of a denial of qualified
immunity[,] . . . [t]he issue for decision is . . . whether the [defendants] are eligible
for qualified immunity under the [plaintiffs’] version of the disputed facts.”
Wilkins v. City of Oakland, 350 F.3d 949, 952 (9th Cir. 2003).
2. Prison medical staff must provide competent medical care. Hoptowit v.
Ray, 682 F.2d 1237, 1253 (9th Cir. 1982), overruled on other grounds by Sandin v.
Conner, 515 U.S. 472 (1995). Viewing all disputed facts in the light most
favorable to Plaintiff, he has established a constitutional violation due to a failure
to provide competent medical care.
3. Defendants were not medical providers but were administrators for the
Idaho Department of Correction and the prison. Supervisors can be individually
liable under § 1983. Larez v. City of Los Angeles, 946 F.2d 630, 646 (9th Cir.
1991). An individual in a position of authority may commit constitutional
violations through his “own culpable action or inaction in the training, supervision,
or control of his subordinates, his acquiescence in the constitutional deprivations of
which the complaint is made, or conduct that showed a reckless or callous

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indifference to the rights of others.” Starr v. Baca, 652 F.3d 1202, 1205-06 (9th
Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks omitted).
4. We affirm the denial of qualified immunity as to Defendant Rona Seigert.
Seigert’s affidavit states she was responsible for “overseeing [Corizon’s] provision
of medical services at various IDOC facilities.” More specifically, she was tasked
with “review[ing] protocols created by Corizon” and “monitoring [Corizon] for
compliance with NCCHC standards, IDOC policy and procedures.” The policies
and protocols at issue are within the scope of her responsibilities, making her
potentially culpable by her supervision and control of her subordinates. See id.
Therefore, Seigert is not protected by qualified immunity.
5. We reverse the denial of qualified immunity as to Defendants Brent
Reinke, the Director of the Idaho Department of Correction; Randy Blades, the
Warden of the prison, and Jimmie Crosby, the Deputy Warden. This record
contains no evidence upon which these Defendants could be held liable for any
constitutional violations. Supervisory liability can be found only when a
supervisor “acted, or failed to act, in a manner that was deliberately indifferent to
an inmate’s Eighth Amendment rights.” Id. at 1206-07. The record is devoid of
any evidence that any of these Defendants adopted, enforced, or were aware of the
policies that led to the alleged constitutional violations. Therefore, these
Defendants are protected by qualified immunity. The district court is instructed on

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remand to grant these Defendants’ motion for summary judgment and to enter
judgment in their favor.
AFFIRM as to Defendant Siegert; REVERSED and REMANDED as to
Defendants Reinke, Blades, and Crosby with directions to enter judgment in favor
of said defendants. Each party shall bear his or her own costs on appeal.1
1 The notice of appeal lists four additional individuals as appellants, but those
individuals were not aggrieved by the district court's order denying summary
judgment and are not entitled to appeal from that order. Bryant v. Tech. Research
Co., 654 F.2d 1337, 1343 (9th Cir. 1981). Accordingly, they are not properly
joined with Siegert, Reinke, Blades, and Crosby on appeal. See Fed. R. App. P.
3(b)(1) ("When two or more parties are entitled to appeal from a district-court
judgment or order, . . . they may file a joint notice of appeal."). We exercise our
discretion to drop the four additional individuals under Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 21. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 21 ("[O]n its own, the court may at any time, on
just terms, add or drop a party.").

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