Poynter v. Bennett, 2025 FED. App. 0345P (6th Cir. 2025)

The 6th Circuit Court of Appeals reversed the district court’s summary judgment order, finding sufficient evidence for constitutional harm where a jail fails to classify or reclassify individuals who are detained based on their histories, leading to multiple assault incidents in the jail. The court stated in relevant part:

“A municipality can be held liable for a constitutional violation under § 1983 if the plaintiff demonstrates that the violation occurred “because of a municipal policy or custom. . . . we have held that a municipality can be liable for a constitutional violation “even in the absence of a showing of a constitutional violation by any one individual.” Grote v. Kenton County, 85 F.4th 397, 414 (6th Cir. 2023). In many cases the lack of a constitutional violation committed by an individual will mean there was in fact no constitutional violation. But if a “constitutional harm” was nevertheless “inflicted” on the victim, for example, through the collective actions of several individuals, the municipality can still be held liable. Id. (citation modified). Therefore, Poynter was not required to establish that a specific individual violated his rights. Instead, he was required to demonstrate only that he suffered a constitutional harm.

Poynter has presented evidence that would allow a trier of fact to find his constitutional rights were violated. We begin the analysis of his claim with some necessary background on its constitutional basis. The Eighth Amendment protects incarcerated persons from “cruel and unusual punishments.” U.S. Const. amend. VIII. Prisons have “a duty . . . to protect [incarcerated persons] from violence at the hands of other [incarcerated persons].” Westmoreland, 29 F.4th at 726 (first alteration in original) (quoting Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 833, 114 S. Ct. 1970, 128 L. Ed. 2d 811 (1994)). An incarcerated person’s constitutional rights are violated if the prison is “deliberate[ly] indifferen[t] to [their] health or safety.” Id. (first two alterations in original) (quoting Farmer, 511 U.S. at 833). Pretrial and civil detainees’ claims for deliberate indifference, however, “derive . . . from the Fourteenth Amendment,” and “not from the Eighth Amendment, with its focus on punishment.” Grote, 85 F.4th at 405; see also Hopper v. Plummer, 887 F.3d 744, 755 (6th Cir. 2018) (“[T]he Supreme Court long ago ‘t[ook] the position that the Eighth Amendment is inapplicable to [a civil contempt] sentence.'” (second and third alteration in original) (quoting United States v. Dien, 598 F.2d 743, 745 (2d Cir. 1979) (per curiam))). “The Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment provides the same protections” as the Eighth Amendment. Westmoreland, 29 F.4th at 727.

Claims for deliberate indifference under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments are similar in many respects, and “‘historically [we] analyzed'” them entirely “‘under the same rubric.'” Brawner v. Scott County, 14 F.4th 585, 591 (6th Cir. 2021) (quoting Richmond v. Huq, 885 F.3d 928, 937 (6th Cir. 2018), abrogated on other grounds by, Brawner, 14 F.4th at 591-96). Recently, however, we held in Brawner that there is an important difference between the two—plaintiffs bringing a Fourteenth Amendment claim are not required to show subjective knowledge, while plaintiffs bringing an Eighth Amendment claim are. Id. at 591-96; Westmoreland, 29 F.4th at 726. Under Brawner, a plaintiff asserting a Fourteenth Amendment claim must establish only that the defendant “acted deliberately (not accidentally), but also recklessly ‘in the face of an unjustifiably high risk of harm that is either known or so obvious that it should be known.'” Brawner, 14 F.4th at 596 (quoting Farmer, 511 U.S. at 836).

. . . .

In the end, there is a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether Poynter’s Fourteenth Amendment rights were violated by BCDC’s deliberate indifference to his safety. The district court erred in holding otherwise.”