# Gibson v. County of Washoe, Nevada > Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit · May 22, 2002 · 290 F.3d 1175 URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9843231 ## Case - **Full name:** Michelle GIBSON, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. COUNTY OF WASHOE, NEVADA; Richard Kirkland, Washoe Co. Sheriff; Ray Wright, Washoe Co. Chief Deputy Sheriff; John Williams, Washoe Co. Supervising Sgt.; Rob Bowlin; Jereme Wormington; Michele Youngs; Scott Thomas; Robert Cook; Mary Jean Cloud, Individually and in Their Capacities as Deputy Sheriffs of Washoe Co., Defendants-Appellees - **Court:** Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit - **Decided:** May 22, 2002 - **Citations:** 290 F.3d 1175; 2002 Daily Journal DAR 5649; 2002 Cal. Daily Op. Serv. 4392; 2002 U.S. App. LEXIS 9604 - **Precedential status:** Published - **Opinion:** Concurrence by Reinhardt - **Judges:** Reinhardt, Tashima, Berzon - **Cited by:** 1,046 later opinions in the Frix Law Library ## Citator (automated) - **Red flag:** Overruled on other grounds by Jonathon Castro v. County of Los Angeles, 833 F.3d 1060 (2016). - Negative treatments: 1 - Distinguished by: 0 - Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9843231 ## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction) - holding that officers cannot be held liable for deliberate indifference unless an inmate “was so obviously mentally ill that the deputies, who had received no training regarding the diagnosis and treatment of mental illness, must have known that [he] was exhibiting symptoms of… - explaining municipal liability under § 1983, the Eighth Amendment’s deliberate indifference standard, and that a pre-trial detainee’s Fourteenth Amendment claims of inadequate medical care are evaluated under the Eighth Amendment’s deliberate indifference standard - explaining that a prison official is deliberately indifferent only if he or she “knows of and disregards an excessive risk to inmate health” (citation and internal quotation marks omitted) ## Opinion text REINHARDT, Circuit Judge, concurring: While I concur fully in the court’s opinion, I write separately to expand on a point that the opinion relegates to a footnote (n.9). Although Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825 , 114 S.Ct. 1970 , 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994), establishes a subjective test for determining deliberate indifference in the case of individual defendants, in that case the Supreme Court made it reasonably clear that the same standard does not apply in actions against government entities involving the adoption of affirmative government policies. The Farmer Court stated that, while a subjective standard is appropriate for determining the liability of prison officials, “considerable conceptual difficulty would attend any search for the subjective state of mind of a governmental entity, as distinct from that of a governmental official.” Id. at 841 , 114 S.Ct. 1970 . Here, whether we import the more stringent Farmer subjective standard or apply the less stringent objective standard employed in City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S. 378, 388-89 , 109 S.Ct. 1197 , 103 L.Ed.2d 412 (1989), 1 the record, when *1199 viewed in the light most favorable to Ms. Gibson, shows that the County’s failure to respond to her husband’s medical needs was a direct result of an affirmative County policy that demonstrated deliberate indifference to this need. Thus, there is no cause in this case to resolve definitively the question of which standard applies to the County, regardless of how obvious the answer may be. We can instead, for purposes of this decision, simply apply the more stringent standard. . See also Farmer, 511 U.S. at 841 , 114 S.Ct. 1970 ("It would be hard to describe the Canton understanding of deliberate indifference ... as anything but objective. Canton's objective standard, however, is not an appropriate test for determining the liability of prison officials under the Eighth Amendment as interpreted in our cases.”). --- Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9843231. Public record. Not legal advice.