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Abstract: 

Plaintiff Berkshire was improving while in the Residential Treatment Program (RTP). He was the unit representative to a warden’s forum, which conveyed inmate complaints to the attention of staff members. After one such set of complaints Dr. Debra Dahl, unit chief of the outpatient program, raised Berkshire’s Global Assessment Functioning (GAF) to a score that meant he was on his way out of the RTP. This drove Berkshire over the edge and led to his depriving himself of food and water, a suicide attempt, and homicidal ideation. Only after the suicide attempt was plaintiff transferred to a Crisis Stabilization Unit. Plaintiff was physically restrained and Sergeant Nelson deprived him of bathroom access causing him to spend hours awash in his own excrement. The words of a C.O.: “You are going to stay like this until your mental illness goes away!” Berkshire had a diagnosis of bipolar disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder and major depression. The RTP offered art and music therapy, weight training, and psychotherapy. To be exiled from there appears to have meant not only the absence of treatment, but also brutal, demeaning care instead. The case comes to us on the district court’s denial of summary judgment to the defendants based on immunity. The Sixth Circuit confirms, and this invigorates the case.

Keywords: First Amendment Retaliation; Berkshire v Beauvais (6th Cir. 2019)

Affiliations:  1: Executive Editor.