How to Sue for Methadone Denial in Jail
HOW TO SUE THE JAIL FOR DENYING METHADONE TREATMENT TO MAINTENANCE PATIENTS*
There seems to be an abundance of information available to support the effectiveness of methadone in the treatment of opioid addiction. The US National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health has compiled over 1000 publications detailing this subject.
The following publication details the legal consequences of denying
methadone to methadone maintenance patients in jail and addresses the Ethical Obligations to Ensure Access to Medication-Assisted Treatment in Prison: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2366202/
Even the Office of Justice Programs, at Crime Solutions .Com, details
the support of Methadone Maintenance Programs, see:
http://www.crimesolutions.gov/ProgramDetails.aspx?ID=158
There are very few lawsuits that have attacked jail policies denying
methadone to Methadone Maintenance Patients. This is generally the
result of several factors. First, attorneys are reluctant to take on
theses type of cases because the financial gain would be minimal, if non
existent. Secondly, inmates in jail usually are not knowledgeable
enough to mount a good legal argument on their own and the time spent in
jail is not sufficient to see results; in other words, once he/she is
released from jail they soon forget the agony of their methadone
withdrawal experience at the hands of their oppressors.
The following is an excellent article that addresses this issue, see: THE CASE FOR METHADONE MAINTENANCE TREATMENT IN PRISONS,
researched and written by Rebecca Boucher. This article definitely
provides an array of research to give someone wanting to sue the
jail/county for denying them methadone and forcing withdrawal in their
custody. See: http://www.drugpolicy.org/docUploads/boucher_prison_methadone.pdf
Ms. Boucher's publication pointed me to the following 6th Circuit Court of Appeals Decision: Cudnik v. Kreiger, 392 F. Supp. 305 (1974);
This case set the stage for a successful complaint against a jail which denies methadone to a Methadone Maintenance Patient. The only problem is that this 6th Circuit Court of Appeals decision, in favor of methadone in jail,is that it is from 1974. Nobody has seemed to successfully challenged illegal jail policies, denying methadone, to in treatment. This blog is to assist someone willing to do so. I've done all the footwork so all that is needed is for someone to initiate a suit on their own, following the leads and examples provided in this blog.
See also: Forced methadone withdrawal in jails creates barrier to treatment in community, by
I have prepared a sample FORM to make it easy for someone to file a complaint against the Kent County Correctional Facility. One of these was filed today for someone who had to kick a 180mg. habit in jail. He asked for $500, 000 in compensatory damages and $1,000,000 in punitive damages. This form may be copied and/or edited for your own use.
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF
MICHIGAN
SOUTHERN DIVISION
Plaintiff:
___________________________ Case
Number:_______________________
(Your name) (Completed by court)
v.
KENT
COUNTY
and
Sheriff
Lawrence Stelma;
The policy maker for the
Kent County Correctional
Facility.
Defendants.
COMPLAINT FOR THE DENIAL OF METHADONE DUE
TO THE PROHIBITIVE POLICY AT THE KENT COUNTY CORRECTIONAL FACILITY BY AND
THROUGH KENT COUNTY AND ITS POLICY MAKER
SHERIFF LAWRENCE STELMA
STATEMENT OF FACTS
On
_____________________, I was incarcerated in the Kent County Correctional
Facility and released on ____________________.
I
had been a Methadone Maintenance Patient at a state and federally approved and funded
Opioid Treatment Program located in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
I
received methadone on a daily bases as a part of that integral Opioid Treatment
Program; which was prescribed by the programs doctor, an expert in the field of
addiction and licensed to prescribe methadone by both the State of Michigan and
the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration in compliance with 42 Code of Federal Regulations
§ 8.
Against this backdrop, it is evident that
opioid dependence is a serious medical condition with immediate and future
risks. To deny previously prescribed methadone, whether by imposing
detoxification or abrupt withdrawal, constitutes deliberate indifference.
A medical need is serious where a
physician has diagnosed a condition as mandating treatment or if a lay person
would easily recognize the necessity for a doctor’s attention.
Upon
arrival to the Kent County Correctional Facility I was denied methadone; the
medication I needed daily, as a result of the facility’s policy prohibiting its
use. My medication was discontinued without the prescribing physician’s
evaluation and order authorizing such discontinuation. Even if the jail’s
doctor were to have authorized such discontinuation, he/she was not experience
in the field of addictionology to realize the implications of such abrupt
discontinuation of methadone.
The
Kent County Correctional Facility’s prohibitive policy was the sole moving and
causative factor denying my established methadone treatment causing me profound
pain and prolonged suffering and violating my constitutionally protected
rights.
I
experienced a life threatening withdrawal due to not receiving my medication,
which was physically harmful, and caused severe psychological trauma. This
lasted in its acute phase for over one month and caused chronic symptoms
throughout my incarceration and I still suffer from the trauma of the
experience.
The
Kent County Correctional Facility’s prohibitive policy resulted in deliberate
indifference to my severe medical needs and placed my life in danger, which
could have resulted in my death.
To deny and disregard my established, diagnosed
opioid-dependence and previously prescribed methadone against my will further
constituted deliberate indifference to my severe medical need and condition.
Denial
of access to Medication Assisted Treatment at any level of the criminal justice
system violates the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the
Rehabilitation Act where the denial is pursuant to a blanket policy prohibiting
Medication Assisted Treatment or is denied without the required objective individualized
evaluation to do so by the physician at the patients Opioid Treatment Program. The
denial of Medication Assisted Treatment (MAT) pursuant to a policy prohibiting
the use of any prescribed controlled substance also violates the ADA and
Rehabilitation Act due to its disparate impact on opiate-addicted individuals
receiving or in need of MAT or if the agency fails to grant MAT as a
“reasonable accommodation.”
Addiction
is a disability and I am disabled and the policy in question was discriminatory
and prejudicial against me as a disabled American citizen and against my
disability.
Kent
County Correctional Facility’s prohibitive policy violated the United States
Constitution's Eighth Amendment prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment” and/or
the Fourteenth Amendment “due process” clause when they forced me, against my
will, to detoxify without the provision of medications approved by the Food and
Drug Administration for that use and/or the manufactures’ detailed cessation
protocol for the drug; in this case, the withdrawal protocol dictated by the
Opioid Treatment Program in which I participated.
The 6th Circuit Court of
Appeals has held that when a prison policy eliminates potential treatment
options it becomes impossible to consider a full range of medical treatment. While
the federal court acknowledged its proper deferential role to state prison
authorities, it declared its superior function is to protect the constitutional
rights of prisoners.
A
grant of deference may not be so broad so as to tread on the constitutional
rights of prisoners. The court has rejected the jails’ security interest
argument in denying methadone, suggesting that there were other means available
to ensure jail security, including housing Methadone Maintenance Treatment
recipients separately and allowing neighborhood clinic personnel to visit and
administer the drug.
The court reasoned that because methadone
is distributed in liquid form and must be consumed in the presence of the
person administering the drug according to strict regulations, an in-house
illicit market for methadone is “at best highly remote.”
The
courts must evaluate penal measures against “broad and idealistic concepts of
dignity, civilized standards, humanity, and decency.” The policy in question at
the Kent County Correctional Facility fails miserably in this regard.
In 1976, the Supreme Court recognized the government’s
obligation to provide medical care to prisoners. The Court reasoned that
because the government restrains inmates’ liberty and thereby prohibits inmates
from independently seeking medical care, the government must provide that care.
The
Kent County Correctional Facility’s prohibitive policy deprived me of the Medication
Assisted Treatment that I was entitled to and, as a pretrial detainee, violated
my Fourteenth Amendment right to “due process” under the law, before
discontinuing my MAT, ie. methadone; protected under the state and federal
regulations relegating the discontinuation of methadone to the Opioid Treatment
Program’s discretion and protocol, not to any protocol orchestrated by Kent
County Policies or by Sheriff Stelma, the policy maker/enforcer for the Kent
County Correctional Facility.
The
Federal Guidelines for Opioid Treatment governing Medication Assisted Treatment
Programs clearly addresses involuntary withdrawal from methadone under § O.
Administrative Withdrawal and Discharge (authorized by 42 CFR §
8.12(e)(4)):
A major goal for programs is to retain
patients for as long as they can benefit from treatment and express a desire to
continue it. Because retaining the patient is not always possible, programs
provide procedures for administrative withdrawal that employ the principles
involved in medically supervised withdrawal from medication. Administrative
withdrawal is usually involuntary. When
a program makes the decision administratively to discharge a patient from
pharmacotherapy, the program offers a humane schedule of medically supervised
withdrawal, using sound clinical judgment. A suggested medically supervised
withdrawal schedule for administrative withdrawal is generally a minimum of 21
days, but the physician or mid-level practitioner, as appropriate, may
adjust this time frame depending on clinical factors. The program documents the
patient’s condition during medically supervised withdrawal in the patient’s
record. On discharge, the program makes appropriate alternative referrals.
Given the short time frame and poor prognosis for the withdrawal procedure,
patient referral or transfer to a suitable alternative treatment program is the
preferred alternative.
Nothing in these Federal Guidelines
or 42 Code of Federal Regulations § 8 deprives the Methadone Treatment Patient of
the right to the above provision if a patient is incarcerated. Nothing in the
Federal Guidelines or 42 Code Federal Regulations § 8 relegates the
discontinuation of methadone to any other authority if the patient is
incarcerated. Therefore I claim that I had a governmental induced liberty
interest and expectation, as a participant of an Opioid Treatment Program, to
be evaluated by the prescribing physician to determine if Medication Assisted Treatment
should be discontinued and if so, how. I claim that the prohibitive policy at
the Kent County Correctional Facility deprived me of that liberty interest and
reasonable expectation, thus violated my constitutional rights.
In 1997, after reviewing 941 studies, the National
Institutes of Health Consensus Development Panel issued a landmark statement
announcing that addiction to opioids is not an issue of willpower: opioid
dependence is a medical, brain-related disorder to be treated like any other
chronic medical illness.
Therefore
the policy, further, denied my Fourteenth Amendment right to “equal protection”
under the law.
The Supreme Court has held that the Eighth
Amendment also covers harm to one’s future health caused by a current condition
in prison. When a prison official exposes a prisoner to a “sufficiently
substantial ‘risk of serious damage to his future health,’” the Eighth
Amendment is implicated.
The Eighth Amendment covers prison
conditions that are sure or very likely to result in future harm. To cease
treatment for opioid dependence, especially against the patient’s will, creates
a substantial risk of future harm. A drug-free state is simply not medically
achievable and sustainable for the majority of persons dependent on opioids,
including those who attempt detoxification.
For
those whose treatment is halted against their will, it is a safe assumption
that their chances of achieving and maintaining abstinence are even slimmer. For
the majority of afflicted individuals, untreated opioid dependence results in
relapse, causes increased mortality, and can attract another range of
illnesses. Thus opioid dependence is a serious medical need in both the
immediate and future sense, and the decision to discontinue and deprive me of my
Methadone Maintenance Treatment subjected my future health to these dangers.
I
have suffered permanent damage to my ongoing treatment for addiction and I have
suffered further debilitating injuries, both physical and psychological, which
will last for the rest of my life.
As a convicted inmate the prohibitive policy,
under the Eighth Amendment, imposed a condition that inflicted “cruel and
unusual punishment” upon me during my incarceration.
Barry McCaffrey, former Director of the
White House Office of National Drug Control Policy has taken a strong stand on
Methadone Maintenance Treatment and its role in prisons:
“Clearly, one
of the most intractable of all drugs to deal with is heroin addiction. We have
been willing to marshal the political will and resources to put people behind
bars but we have not been able to marshal the political will and resources to
provide treatment in prison and for halfway houses on release. We have a failed
social policy, and we are going to have to correct it.”
The
Kent County Correctional Facility’s prohibitive policy has denied me the
evolving “contemporary standards of decency” which are guided by “evolving standards of
decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.”
The policy in question is antiquated
and does not conform to federal law and violated my civil rights.
CLAIM TO RELIEF
I
claim that compensatory damages in the amount of $_____________ is an
“appropriate” form of relief.
I
claim that punitive damages in the amount of $______________ is an
“appropriate” form of relief.
I
claim that declaratory relief is an “appropriate” form of relief.
At
a minimum “nominal” damage are warranted and “appropriate”.
I
claim any other “appropriate relief” that justice would so requires and allows.
Date
Submitted: ___________________________
Plaintiff: _________________________________
Address: _______________________________
City: ___________________________________
State of
Michigan _________________________
Zip Code: _______________________________
Phone No: ______________________________
Email: methadone.denied.in.jail@gmail.com
THIS SAMPLE LEGAL COMPLAINT IS FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY.