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Abstract: 

Gordon v. County of Orange, 6 F.4th 961 (9th Circ. 2021) is a tale of woe for a mother suing for damages based on the death of her detainee son. Mathew died some 30 hours after his admission to the county jail. He told Nurse Finley at admission that he was a 3-grams-a-day heroin addict. There are two protocols at the jail for assessing substance abuse: the Clinical Opiate Withdrawal Scale (COWS) specifically for heroin addicts in withdrawal and the Clinical Institute Withdrawal Assessment for Alcohol–Revised (CIWA-Ar) useful with alcoholics and withdrawal cases. As our analysis shows, Gordon raises serious and complex issues regarding a detainee’s suicide.

Keywords: Qualified Immunity

Affiliations:  1: Executive Editor.