Eighth Circuit denies qualified immunity to some St. Louis jailers

(CN) — Several corrections officers at a St. Louis city jail must partially face claims they excessively pepper sprayed detainees after an Eighth Circuit panel denied them qualified immunity on Monday, while concluding that they were justified in their actions in other instances.

Four pretrial detainees in the city’s maximum security jail filed a civil rights lawsuit in May 2024 in the Eastern District of Missouri against seven correctional officers, along with the city and several members of its Corrections Office.

The detainees claim they were sprayed with so much Mace they struggled to breathe. Two plaintiffs also said they were denied water as punishment.

The three-judge appeals panel said a lower court failed to conduct a proper individualized analysis of each officer’s conduct.

“We therefore held the qualified immunity analysis inadequate, conducted our own individualized analyses using the district court’s evidence-based factual findings, and reversed the denial of qualified immunity for many but not all the defendants,” U.S. Circuit Judge L. Steven Grasz wrote.

Grasz, a Donald Trump appointee, agreed that some of the officers should be denied qualified immunity, given that video evidence and related testimony offered little evidence that the detainees posed an immediate threats to themselves others or to jail “security and order.”

“Ordinarily, we would remand so the district court could conduct the proper analysis in the first instance,” he wrote. “But several of these incidents were caught on video, and the detainees and officers testified extensively during depositions regarding the others, so we will do the required analysis ourselves.”

In the case of one plaintiff, Darnell Rusan, Grasz denied qualified immunity to Lt. Javan Fowlkes, whom Rusan said pepper sprayed him while he was subjected to a strip search.

Rusan reportedly asked Fowlkes “Hey, you like this job, man?" prompting the officer to tell Rusan to “bend over and spread them again.”

At that point, Grasz wrote, Fowlkes “maced Rusan and left him in the mace-filled booth for three to four hours without medical attention or the ability to remove the mace residue from his person or clothing.”

Fowlkes is also accused of handcuffing and taking plaintiff Jerome Jones to a visiting booth. He then reportedly sprayed him with Mace and left Jones in the booth for thirty minutes, suffering from respiratory distress while no one provided medical attention.

“The plaintiff-friendly version of the facts says that Lieutenant Fowlkes’s use of force was unreasonable under these circumstances because Jerome was restrained and non-resistant when he was maced,” Grasz wrote.

However, Lt. Aisha Turner ducked similar claims from Rusan.

“Considering the relevant factors, Lieutenant Turner’s use of mace was not excessive,” Grasz wrote, granting her qualified immunity. “Rusan persistently refused to step into his cell and became increasingly agitated as the incident escalated. The security risk was high at this time, particularly because only two officers were in the housing unit with several other detainees, and Rusan’s demeanor became increasingly hostile.”

The panel also said it lacked jurisdiction over the plaintiffs’ ADA claimed violations, along with claims of unlawful conditions of confinement against the city of St. Louis over deprivation of water. The plaintiffs claimed they were denied water after it was shut off after riots broke out in the jail but the city says the detainees were provided with fluids while service was shut off.

Grasz noted that since the panel was reversing the denial of qualified immunity for some of the officers, the claims were not tied to the excessive force claims.

U.S. Circuit Judges James B. Loken, a George H. W. Bush appointee, and Raymond Gruender, a George W. Bush appointee, joined Grasz on the panel.

A representative of ArchCity Defenders, representing the plaintiffs, saw the ruling as a win.

“We’re pleased that the Eighth Circuit saw sufficient grounds for the majority of our clients’ claims to proceed. For over five years, our clients, and many others detained pretrial at the St. Louis City Justice Center have carried the impact of excessive macing and water deprivation. We remain fully committed to supporting our clients as we take the next steps in this case.”

The city of St. Louis did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

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