Jones v. Armor Healthcare

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

MIDDLE DISTRICT OF FLORIDA

JACKSONVILLE DIVISION

RONNIE JEROME JONES,

Plaintiff,

v. Case No. 3:24-cv-350-MMH-LLL

ARMOR HEALTHCARE and

LINDA HEILMAN,

Defendants.

_________________________________

ORDER

Plaintiff Ronnie Jerome Jones, a detainee at the Baker County Detention

Center, initiated this action on April 8, 2024, by filing a pro se Complaint for

Violation of Civil Rights (Docs. 1, 1-1 through 1-3) under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In

the Complaint, Jones names Armor Healthcare and ARNP Linda Heilman as

Defendants. Doc. 1 at 2. Jones alleges that on January 25, 2023, he injured his

leg while playing basketball at Baker County Detention Center. Docs. 1 at 5;

1-1 at 1. He asserts that an officer took him, by wheelchair, to medical where

staff performed an x-ray of his leg. Doc. 1-1 at 1. According to Jones, Nurse

Craven then informed him that medical records showed he had fibrodysplasia

and as a result “the provider” would not transport him to the hospital. Id.

The next day, Jones explained to ARNP Heilman that he could not walk;

however, she responded that he had pulled a muscle and had not sustained a

fracture because an x-ray would have detected it. Id. Jones asserts that on

February 3, 2023, he received a CT scan at an outside medical facility which

showed he had a fractured femur. Id. at 2. Jones contends Defendants engaged

in “malpractice and negligence.” Doc. 1 at 3. As relief, he requests punitive

damages. Id. at 5.

The Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) requires the Court to dismiss

this case at any time if the Court determines that the action is frivolous,

malicious, fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted or seeks

monetary relief against a defendant who is immune from such relief.1 See 28

U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2)(B); 1915A. “A claim is frivolous if it is without arguable

merit either in law or fact.” Bilal v. Driver, 251 F.3d 1346, 1349 (11th Cir. 2001)

(citing Battle v. Cent. State Hosp., 898 F.2d 126, 129 (11th Cir. 1990)). A

complaint filed in forma pauperis which fails to state a claim under Federal

Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) is not automatically frivolous. Neitzke v.

Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 328 (1989). Section 1915(e)(2)(B)(i) dismissals should

only be ordered when the legal theories are “indisputably meritless,” id. at 327,

or when the claims rely on factual allegations which are “clearly baseless.”

1 Jones requests to proceed as a pauper. See Motion (Doc. 2).

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Denton v. Hernandez, 504 U.S. 25, 32 (1992). “Frivolous claims include claims

‘describing fantastic or delusional scenarios, claims with which federal district

judges are all too familiar.’” Bilal, 251 F.3d at 1349 (quoting Neitzke, 490 U.S.

at 328). Additionally, a claim may be dismissed as frivolous when it appears

that a plaintiff has little or no chance of success. Id. As to whether a complaint

“fails to state a claim on which relief may be granted,” the language of the

PLRA mirrors the language of Rule 12(b)(6), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure,

and therefore courts apply the same standard in both contexts.2 Mitchell v.

Farcass, 112 F.3d 1483, 1490 (11th Cir. 1997); see also Alba v. Montford, 517

F.3d 1249, 1252 (11th Cir. 2008).

To state a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a plaintiff must allege that (1)

the defendant deprived him of a right secured under the United States

Constitution or federal law, and (2) such deprivation occurred under color of

state law. Salvato v. Miley, 790 F.3d 1286, 1295 (11th Cir. 2015); Bingham v.

Thomas, 654 F.3d 1171, 1175 (11th Cir. 2011) (per curiam); Richardson v.

Johnson, 598 F.3d 734, 737 (11th Cir. 2010) (per curiam). Moreover, under

Eleventh Circuit precedent, to prevail in a § 1983 action, a plaintiff must show

“an affirmative causal connection between the official’s acts or omissions and

2 “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual

matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’”

Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (citing Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S.

544, 570 (2007)).

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the alleged constitutional deprivation.” Zatler v. Wainwright, 802 F.2d 397,

401 (11th Cir. 1986) (citation omitted); Porter v. White, 483 F.3d 1294, 1306

n.10 (11th Cir. 2007).

Under the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, a complaint need only

contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is

entitled to relief.” Fed. R. Civ. P. (8)(a)(2). In addition, all reasonable inferences

should be drawn in favor of the plaintiff. See Randall v. Scott, 610 F.3d 701,

705 (11th Cir. 2010). Nonetheless, the plaintiff still must meet some minimal

pleading requirements. Jackson v. BellSouth Telecomms., 372 F.3d 1250,

1262–63 (11th Cir. 2004). Indeed, while “[s]pecific facts are not necessary[,]”

the complaint should “‘give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is

and the grounds upon which it rests.’” Erickson v. Pardus, 551 U.S. 89, 93

(2007) (per curiam) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555

(2007)). Further, the plaintiff must allege “enough facts to state a claim to relief

that is plausible on its face.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570. “A claim has facial

plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to

draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct

alleged.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). While not required to

include detailed factual allegations, a complaint must allege “more than an

unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.” Id.

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A “plaintiff’s obligation to provide the grounds of his entitlement to relief

requires more than labels and conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the

elements of a cause of action will not do[.]” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555 (internal

quotations omitted); see also Jackson, 372 F.3d at 1262 (explaining that

“conclusory allegations, unwarranted deductions of facts or legal conclusions

masquerading as facts will not prevent dismissal” (original alteration

omitted)). Indeed, “the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the

allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal

conclusions[,]”which simply “are not entitled to [an] assumption of truth.”

Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678, 680. In the absence of well-pled facts suggesting a

federal constitutional deprivation or violation of a federal right, a plaintiff

cannot sustain a cause of action against the defendant.

In assessing the Complaint, the Court must read Jones’s pro se

allegations in a liberal fashion. Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519 (1972). And,

while “[p]ro se pleadings are held to a less stringent standard than pleadings

drafted by attorneys and will, therefore, be liberally construed,” Tannenbaum

v. United States, 148 F.3d 1262, 1263 (11th Cir. 1998), “‘this leniency does not

give the court a license to serve as de facto counsel for a party or to rewrite an

otherwise deficient pleading in order to sustain an action.’” Campbell v. Air

Jamaica Ltd., 760 F.3d 1165, 1168–69 (11th Cir. 2014) (quoting GJR Invs., Inc.

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v. Cnty. of Escambia, 132 F.3d 1359, 1369 (11th Cir. 1998) (citations omitted),

overruled in part on other grounds as recognized in Randall, 610 F.3d at 709).

The Eighth Amendment “imposes duties on [prison] officials, who must

provide humane conditions of confinement; prison officials must ensure that

inmates receive adequate food, clothing, shelter, and medical care, and must

‘take reasonable measures to guarantee the safety of the inmates.’” Farmer v.

Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 832 (1994) (quoting Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. 517,

526–27 (1984)). To establish an Eighth Amendment violation, a prisoner must

satisfy both an objective and subjective inquiry regarding a prison official’s

conduct. Swain v. Junior, 961 F.3d 1276, 1285 (11th Cir. 2020) (citing Farmer,

511 U.S. at 834).

As it relates to medical care, “the Supreme Court has held that prison

officials violate the bar on cruel and unusual punishments when they display

‘deliberate indifference to serious medical needs of prisoners.’” Keohane v. Fla.

Dep’t of Corr. Sec’y, 952 F.3d 1257, 1265 (11th Cir. 2020) (quoting Estelle v.

Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 104 (1976)). For decades, the Eleventh Circuit has

described a “more than mere negligence” or “more than gross negligence

standard” in determining whether an official acted with deliberate indifference

to that serious medical need. See Hoffer v. Sec’y, Fla. Dep’t of Corr., 973 F.3d

1263, 1270 (11th Cir. 2020) (“To establish deliberate indifference, a plaintiff

must demonstrate that the prison officials (1) had subjective knowledge of a

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risk of serious harm; (2) disregarded that risk; and (3) acted with more than

gross negligence.”) (internal quotations omitted)); see also Wade v. McDade,

106 F.4th 1251, 1255 (11th Cir. 2024). Recently, however, the Eleventh Circuit

determined that those standards conflicted with the Supreme Court’s decision

in Farmer and clarified that courts in this circuit should apply the “subjective

recklessness” standard as used in criminal law. See Wade, 106 F.4th at 1253.

Specifically, the Eleventh Circuit has instructed that to establish liability on

an Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim, the plaintiff must show:

First . . . as a threshold matter, that he suffered

a deprivation that was, “objectively, ‘sufficiently

serious.’” [Farmer, 511 U.S. at 834].

Second, . . . that the defendant acted with

“subjective recklessness as used in the criminal law,”

id. at 839, and to do so he must show that the

defendant was actually, subjectively aware that his

own conduct caused a substantial risk of serious harm

to the plaintiff—with the caveat, again, that even if

the defendant “actually knew of a substantial risk to

inmate health or safety,” he “cannot be found liable

under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause” if

he “responded reasonably to the risk.” Id. at 844–45.

Id. at 1262 (enumeration and emphasis omitted).3

3 The Court notes that the Honorable Adalberto Jordan wrote a concurrence to

the majority’s opinion in Wade, finding that to the extent prior Eleventh Circuit

deliberate indifference cases are not inconsistent with Wade, “they should continue

to be cited as binding precedent.” Wade, 106 F.4th at 1265 (Jordan, J., concurring).

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“As applied in the prison context, the deliberate-indifference standard

sets an appropriately high bar.” Swain, 961 F.3d at 1285. Indeed, the law is

well settled that the Constitution is not implicated by the negligent acts of

corrections officials and medical personnel. Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 327,

330–31 (1986); Davidson v. Cannon, 474 U.S. 344, 348 (1986) (“As we held in

Daniels, the protections of the Due Process Clause, whether procedural or

substantive, are just not triggered by lack of due care by prison officials.”). The

Eleventh Circuit has also noted that “[n]othing in our case law would derive a

constitutional deprivation from a prison physician’s failure to subordinate his

own professional judgment to that of another doctor; to the contrary, it is well

established that ‘a simple difference in medical opinion’ does not constitute

deliberate indifference.” Bismark v. Fisher, 213 F. App’x 892, 897 (11th Cir.

2007)4 (quoting Waldrop, 871 F.2d at 1033). Similarly, “the question of whether

governmental actors should have employed additional diagnostic techniques or

forms of treatment ‘is a classic example of a matter for medical judgment’ and

therefore not an appropriate basis for grounding liability under the Eighth

4 The Court does not rely on unpublished opinions as binding precedent;

however, they may be cited in this Order when the Court finds them persuasive on a

particular point. See McNamara v. GEICO, 30 F.4th 1055, 1060–61 (11th Cir. 2022);

see generally Fed. R. App. P. 32.1; 11th Cir. R. 36-2 (“Unpublished opinions are not

considered binding precedent, but they may be cited as persuasive authority.”).

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Amendment.” Adams v. Poag, 61 F.3d 1537, 1545 (11th Cir. 1995) (citation

omitted).

Jones’s Complaint is due to be dismissed pursuant to the Court’s

screening obligation. First, the only allegations with respect to ARNP Heilman

are that she erroneously diagnosed Jones as having a pulled muscle, even

though he had a fractured femur. See Doc. 1-1 at 1–2. Accepting these

allegations as true, ARNP Heilman’s misdiagnosis constitutes, at most,

negligence, which “does not state a valid claim of medical mistreatment under

the Eighth Amendment.” Estelle, 429 U.S. at 106; see also Matthews v. Palte,

282 F. App’x 770, 771 (11th Cir. 2008) (per curiam) (finding prisoner’s

complaint that his psoriasis was misdiagnosed as spider bites and mistreated

with steroid creams did not state a claim of deliberate indifference because it

involved no more than medical negligence). Indeed, only a few days later, an

outside medical facility performed a CT scan on Jones and determined he had

a fractured femur. Doc. 1-1 at 2. And Jones does not allege that he failed to

receive medical treatment following the corrected diagnosis. Therefore, the

claim against ARNP Heilman is due to be dismissed.

Jones’s claim against Armor Healthcare also fails. Armor Healthcare

contracts with the Baker County Detention Center to provide medical services

to detainees. Where a claim of deliberate medical indifference is brought

against a private contractor based on its functional equivalence to a

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government entity, liability under § 1983 cannot be based on a theory of

respondeat superior. Craig v. Floyd Cnty., 643 F.3d 1306, 1310 (11th Cir. 2011)

(citation omitted). Instead, the plaintiff must show that the entity “had a

‘policy or custom’ of deliberate indifference that led to the violation of his

constitutional right.” Id. (citing Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 486 U.S. 658,

694 (1978)). Here, Jones does not allege Armor Healthcare’s custom or policy

led to the alleged violation of his constitutional rights. Thus, his allegations

are insufficient to maintain a claim against Armor Healthcare and are due to

be dismissed.

Therefore, it is now ORDERED:

1. This case is DISMISSED without prejudice.

2. The Clerk of Court shall enter judgment dismissing this case

without prejudice, terminate any pending motions, and close the case.

DONE AND ORDERED at Jacksonville, Florida, this 24th day of

September, 2024.

United States District Judge

Jax-9 9/20

C: Ronnie Jerome Jones, #20001665

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