Federal Judge Sides with School District in Heat-related Death Case
A federal judge from the Middle District of Georgia has granted, in part, a school district’s motion to dismiss in a case in which the district was sued by the family of a 17-year-old high school student and football player, who died from heat-related exposure after practice.
Anchoring the court’s decision was its conclusion that the Ben Hill County School District (BHCSD) did not have a custodial relationship over the student, Don’Terio Searcy, and the actions of the coaches did not rise to the level of “shocking the conscience,” which could have triggered liability.
On or about July 31, 2011, Searcy, a football player at Fitzgerald High School (FHS), which is a member school of BHCSD, arrived at Florida Bible Camp (FBC) in High Springs, Florida, to begin football practice and training. On August 1, the football team held three separate practices. During the third football practice, Searcy began to experience symptoms of heat-related illness, including, but not limited to, lightheadedness, loss of consciousness, cramping, nausea, vomiting, and incoherent speech, according to the complaint. A FHS football coach found Searcy unconscious in a bathroom on the FBC grounds during a practice that evening. The coach drove Searcy back to practice in a golf cart. Searcy continued to exhibit symptoms of heat-related illness and/or a medical emergency throughout the evening. On August 2, Searcy attended practice. After practice, Searcy lost consciousness and ultimately died.
On July 31, 2013, Carlton and Michelle Searcy, as natural father and mother and jointly as co-personal representatives of Searcy, filed a Georgia Wrongful Death Action in the Ben Hill Superior Court against BHCSD and FBC.
The plaintiffs alleged that the school district deprived their son of “due process of the law by failing to seek or summons emergency medical care by punishing (him) while he was experiencing a medical emergency by denying him water, forcing him to perform physical drills, threatening and punishing him and his teammates, and shouting profanities at him, worsening his medical condition, all in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983.”
On March 11, 2014, BHSCD moved to dismiss the case, pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6) because the complaint “does not allege 1) conduct that is conscience shocking in the constitutional sense or 2) facts demonstrating that Don’Terio Searcy was harmed on account of an official policy or custom of BHCSD or any final policymaker, as is required by Monell v. Dep’t of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 98 S. Ct. 2018, 56 L. Ed. 2d 611 (1978).”
While the court noted that it “must accept all the allegations in the complaint as true and construing them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff,” pursuant to Hill v. White, 321 F.3d 1334, 1335 (11th Cir. 2003), the allegations must be supported by facts. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1949-54, 173 L. Ed. 2d 868 (2009)
Among the Searcys’ allegations was that their son’s Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process rights were violated by the conduct of BHCSD, and its employees (FHS football coaches) when they “1) failed to seek or summons emergency medical care in Searcy’s behalf and 2) punished Searcy while he was experiencing a medical emergency by denying him water, forcing him to perform physical drills, threatening and punishing him and his teammates, and shouting profanities at him.
“As a general rule, to prevail on a claim of a substantive due-process violation, a plaintiff must prove that a defendant’s conduct ‘shocks the conscience.’ Nix v. Franklin Cnty. Sch. Dist., 311 F.3d 1373, 1377 (11th Cir. 2002).”
Further, the “conscience-shocking standard is an exacting one that ‘duplicates no traditional category of common-law fault, but rather points clearly away from liability, or clearly toward it, only at the ends of the tort law’s spectrum of culpability.’ County of Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833, 846, 118 S. Ct. 1708, 140 L. Ed. 2d 1043 (1998).”
Thus, the Supreme Court has “made it clear that the due process guarantee does not entail a body of constitutional law imposing liability whenever someone cloaked with state authority causes harm.”
In support of its position, BHCSD cited Davis v. Carter, 555 F.3d 979, 982 (11th Cir. 2009), as being “directly on point both as a matter of fact and law.” That court found that the coaches’ conduct did not meet the standard.
The plaintiffs did not disagree, but noted that Davis’ participation in football—an extracurricular after-school activity—“was voluntary and, consequently, no custodial relationship existed between Davis and the school. Id. at 983.”
Had a custodial relationship existed, the conscience-shocking standard might be met.
On that point, the plaintiffs claimed that, “unlike Davis, Searcy was in a custodial relationship with his high school because he was attending an out-of-state football camp, which means the ‘school had assumed complete responsibility for his safety’ … (and the plaintiffs) need only show that the defendant acted with deliberate indifference.”
The court disagreed.
“First, that Searcy was out of state when he engaged in an extracurricular school activity does not change the voluntary nature of the activity,” wrote the court. “Searcy and his parents still retained the ability to decline to participate in the football camp, be it in or out of the State of Georgia. If state laws that mandate that children go to school are not sufficient to invoke a custodial relationship while children are in school, voluntary extracurricular activities out of school and out of state are even less sufficient to give rise to a custodial relationship with the school. See Wright v. Lovin, 32 F.3d 538, 540 (11th Cir. 1994.
Second, the court disagreed with the plaintiffs, which argued that case law “stands for the proposition that schools have a custodial relationship with students, not only when they are in school, but also when they voluntarily participate in extracurricular activities.”
The court concluded that “Searcy was subjected to rigorous physical drills and treatment that may have been unreasonable and ill-advised under the circumstances, but not conscience shocking.”
Carlton Searcy, as Natural Father, and Michelle Searcy, as Natural Mother, and jointly as co-personal representatives of Don’terio Searcy, deceased v. Ben Hill County School District and Florida Bible Camp, Inc.; M.D. Ga.; CASE NO.: 1:14-CV-37 (WLS), 2014 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 67429; 5/16/14
Attorneys of Record: (for plaintiffs) Jasmine Rand, Lead Attorney, Tallahassee, FL; John D Steel, Lead Attorney, Atlanta, GA. (for defendant) Hieu M Nguyen, Martha M Pearson, Phillip L Hartley, Lead Attorneys, Gainesville, GA; John T. Croley , Jr., Lead Attorney, The Law Offices of John T. Croley, Fitzgerald, GA.
