Neal

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF OKLAHOMA

LAURA NEAL, as Special Administratix )

of the Estate of PARKER STEPHENS, )

deceased, )

)

Plaintiff, )

) Case No. CIV-23-114-PRW

v. )

)

OKLAHOMA COUNTY CRIMINAL )

JUSTICE AUTHORITY, et al., )

)

Defendants. )

ORDER

Before the Court is United States Magistrate Judge Shon T. Erwin’s Report and

Recommendation (Dkt. 78), which recommends that the Court grant Defendants’ Motion

for Summary Judgment (Dkt. 53) but only as to Defendant Matthew Francis. It

recommends the Court deny summary judgment to the Defendants Board of County

Commissioners for Oklahoma County (“Board”), Oklahoma County Criminal Justice

Authority (“OCCJA”), and William Cunningham. Only the Board filed a timely objection.

For the reasons given below, the Court ADOPTS IN PART Judge Erwin’s Report and

Recommendation (Dkt. 78).

Background

Laura Neal brings this lawsuit on behalf of the Estate of Parker Stephens, after

Oklahoma County Jail detention officers allegedly failed to deliver prompt medical care

following Mr. Stephens’s suicide. In her Complaint (Dkt. 1), Plaintiff alleges that Officers

Francis, Cunningham, and Jacob Hamiliton were deliberately indifferent to Mr. Stephens’s

medical emergency and failed to protect him from serious bodily harm. Plaintiff also seeks

to hold the Board and OCCJA liable both for the officers’ actions and for alleged systemic

deficiencies in staffing and procedures. On February 28, 2025, all Defendants, except

Officer Hamiliton, moved for summary judgment, arguing that (1) Plaintiff lacks Article

III standing to pursue a Monell claim against the Board, (2) Plaintiff cannot succeed on a

Monell claim as a matter of law against the Board and OCCJA, (3) there is no evidence

that Officers Cunningham or Francis were involved in the alleged violation of Mr.

Stephens’s rights, and (4) Officers Cunningham and Francis are entitled to qualified

immunity. Judge Erwin recommends granting summary judgment only in favor of Officer

Francis. The Board objects to Judge Erwin’s recommendation to deny them summary

judgment.

Legal Standard

The Court must “determine de novo any part of the magistrate judge’s disposition

that has been properly objected to.”1 An objection is “proper” if it is both timely and

specific.2 A specific objection “enables the district judge to focus attention on those

issues—factual and legal—that are at the heart of the parties’ dispute.”3 Additionally, “[a]n

‘objection’ that merely reargues the underlying motion is little different than an ‘objection’

that simply refers the District Court back to the original motion papers; both are

1 Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(3).

2 United States v. One Parcel of Real Prop., 73 F.3d 1057, 1059 (10th Cir. 1996).

3 Id. (citation and internal quotation marks omitted).

insufficiently specific to preserve the issue for de novo review.”4 In the absence of a proper

objection, the district court may review a magistrate judge’s recommendation under any

standard it deems appropriate.5

Discussion

To establish municipal liability under Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs. of New York, a

plaintiff must show “(1) an official policy or custom (2) caused the plaintiff's constitutional

injury and (3) that the municipality enacted or maintained that policy with deliberate

indifference to the risk of that injury occurring.”6 The Board raises three specific objections

to Judge Erwin’s determination that Plaintiff satisfied each of these requirements. First,

that Judge Erwin wrongly decided there was a municipal policy or custom in place because

he failed to distinguish the Board from the OCCJA in his analysis. Second, that Judge

Erwin imputed additional duties on the Board that Oklahoma law and the public trust do

not require. Third, that Judge Erwin did not address the causal nexus requirement between

the Board and Mr. Stephen’s death. The Court reviews these portions of the Report and

Recommendation de novo.

4 Vester v. Asset Acceptance, L.L.C., No. 1:08-cv-01957-MSK-LTM, 2009 WL 2940218,

at *8 (D. Colo. Sept. 9, 2009) (citing One Parcel of Real Prop., 73 F.3d at 1060).

5 Summers v. State of Utah, 927 F.2d 1165, 1167–68 (10th Cir. 1991).

6 George ex rel. Bradshaw v. Beaver Cnty. ex rel. Beaver Cnty. Bd. of Comm'rs., 32 F.4th

1246, 1253 (10th Cir. 2022).

I. The Board’s Policy and Custom

The municipality cannot be held liable on a respondeat superior theory.7 Instead,

the “municipality itself must have generated the ‘moving force’ behind the alleged

constitutional violation, either through official policy or widespread and pervasive

custom,” to support the imposition of liability.8 Such policies and customs can take any of

the following shapes:

(1) a formal regulation or policy statement; (2) an informal custom

amounting to a widespread practice that, although not authorized by written

law or express municipal policy, is so permanent and well settled as to

constitute a custom or usage with the force of law; (3) the decisions of

employees with final policymaking authority; (4) the ratification by such

final policymakers of the decisions—and the basis for them—of subordinates

to whom authority was delegated subject to these policymakers’ review and

approval; or (5) the failure to adequately train or supervise employees, so

long as that failure results from deliberate indifference to the injuries that

may be caused.9

The Board’s first and second objections are intertwined as they both relate to the

question of whether the Board had a policy or custom in place that contributed to Mr.

Stephens’s death. The Board is correct that Plaintiff does not articulate a particularized

policy or custom of the Board that contributed to Mr. Stephens’s death. Plaintiff, however,

argues that this omission is not fatal under the nondelegable duty doctrine.10 Under such

7 Est. of Beauford v. Mesa Cnty., 35 F.4th 1248, 1274–75 (10th Cir. 2022).

8 Id. at 1275 (citing City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 388–89 (1989)).

9 Bryson v. City of Oklahoma City, 627 F.3d 784, 787 (10th Cir. 2010) (citing Brammer-

Hoelter v. Twin Peaks Charter Acad., 602 F.3d 1175, 1189–90 (10th Cir. 2010) (cleaned

up).

10 Resp. (Dkt. 66), at 18 n.2.

doctrine, Plaintiff asserts that OCCJA’s policy of understaffing and poor supervision

becomes the Board’s policy.11

Several courts have recognized, in various formulations, that municipalities cannot

avoid the constitutional duty to provide adequate medical care to prisoners by contracting

out constitutional duties to private healthcare entities.12 Some courts have referred to this

rule as the nondelegable duty doctrine. Essentially, this body of case law stands for the

proposition that if the private entity has “the responsibility to make final decisions

regarding [prisoner medical care], then their acts, policies and customs become official

policy” of the municipality.13 To emphasize, “[t]he underlying rationale is not based on

respondent superior, but rather on the fact that the private company’s policy becomes that

of the [c]ounty if the [c]ounty delegates final decision-making authority to it.”14

Alternatively, if the county did not delegate final decision-making authority, the county

could still be held liable when it is has actual or constructive knowledge that its agents are

violating constitutional rights.15 The motivating principle behind these cases is the concern

that counties will rely on private entities to insulate themselves from liability.

11 Id.

12 See, e.g., King v. Kramer, 680 F.3d 1013, 1020 (7th Cir. 2012) Leach v. Shelby Cty.

Sheriff, 891 F.2d 1241, 1250 (6th Cir. 1989); Crooks v. Nix, 872 F.2d 800, 804 (8th Cir.

1989); Ancata v. Prison Health Servs., Inc., 769 F.2d 700, 705 (11th Cir. 1985).

13 Ancata v. Prison Health Servs, Inc., 769 F.2d 700, 705 n.9 (11th Cir. 1985).

14 King v. Kramer, 680 F.3d 1013, 1020 (7th Cir. 2012) (citing Ancata, 769 F.2d at 705–

06).

15 Id. at 1021.

Cases imposing the nondelegable duty doctrine beyond the medical care and private

entity context are comparatively limited and less uniform. Some courts have applied similar

lines of reasoning in the Fourth Amendment context when a county contracts with a city

(or vice versa) to run their jails. And these cases generally diverge down two paths: one

following the Sixth Circuit in Deaton v. Montgomery County and another following the

District of Massachusetts in Ford v. City of Boston.16 Where the paths differ is in what

showing must be made before the delegatee-city’s policy or custom can be attributed to the

delegator-county. In Deaton, the county must be deliberately indifferent to the delegatee-

entity’s failure to follow the law.17 But, in Ford, no state of mind must be shown; instead,

the delegator-county has an affirmative duty to monitor jail conditions.18

The Court concludes that the Board is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. To be

clear, the Court does not hold that the nondelegable duty doctrine or the analogous

reasoning in cases such as Deaton could never apply in a similar case. Rather, Plaintiff’s

cursory invocation of the doctrine, coupled with her apparent assumption that it imposes

automatic liability on the Board, is insufficient to survive summary judgment. Plaintiff fails

to identify which recognized basis for municipal liability she relies upon—whether

delegation of final policymaking authority or deliberate indifference—and offers no

developed evidentiary argument supporting either theory. Moreover, given that the Tenth

16 Deaton v. Montgomery Cnty., 989 F.2d 885 (6th Cir. 1993); Ford v. City of Boston, 154

F. Supp. 2d 131 (D. Mass. 2001).

17 Deaton, 989 F.2d at 889.

18 Ford, 154 F. Supp. 2d at 148–49.

Circuit has not adopted the nondelegable duty doctrine, Plaintiff does not explain why this

Court should extend that reasoning here. A passing reference to a novel theory of liability,

confined to a single footnote and unsupported by any meaningful analysis, cannot create a

genuine dispute of material fact. Compounding this deficiency, Plaintiff repeatedly

conflates the OCCJA with the Board, even though nearly all proffered evidence relates

solely to the conduct and policies of the OCCJA or its officers, rather than to any policy or

custom attributable to the Board itself.

II. Remaining Portions of the Report and Recommendation

The Court reviews the unobjected-to portions of the Report and Recommendation

to confirm that there is no clear error on the face of the record.19 Finding none, the Court

concurs with Judge Erwin’s well-reasoned conclusions and analysis.

Conclusion

Accordingly, the Court ADOPTS IN PART Judge Erwin’s Report and

Recommendation (Dkt. 78), as set forth herein, and GRANTS IN PART and DENIES IN

PART Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. 53). The Court GRANTS

summary judgment in favor of Matthew Francis and the Board. The Court DENIES

summary judgment to the remaining Defendants: the OCCJA and William Cunningham.

19 Summers, 927 F.2d at 1167–68.

IT IS SO ORDERED this 31st day of March 2026.

PATRICK R. WYRICK

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE