Inmate Should Have Been Assigned to "No Stairs" Unit

McDaniel v. Syed, 115 F.4th 805 (7th Cir. 2024)

Key Finding: Inmate presented sufficient evidence that having to make his way up and down stairs to get to meals, the infirmary, and other prison programs had effectively denied him access to those programs.

Carl McDaniel was a Wisconsin prisoner for more than fourteen years. He had many serious medical conditions, including some that caused problems with mobility and incontinence. McDaniel sued the Wisconsin Department of Corrections under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), 42 U.S.C. § 12131, and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, 29 U.S.C. § 794.

He asserted that the Department had violated his rights under both statutes by denying him a cell (a) in a no–stairs unit, (b) that was single–occupancy, and (c) with a bed without a top bunk above it. McDaniel also brought an Eighth Amendment claim against a prison physician, Dr. Salam Syed, alleging that he had been deliberately indifferent to McDaniel's medical needs. A federal district court granted summary judgment for the Department on all claims and for Dr. Syed on the Eighth Amendment claim. McDaniel appealed.

After the appeals court heard oral argument, McDaniel was released from prison, but later died in February 2024. His son Robert McDaniel represented his father's estate and was now the plaintiff.

The appeals court affirmed in part and reversed in part. They affirmed summary judgment for the defendants on the claims for a single–occupancy cell and no top bunk, as well as on the Eighth Amendment claim against Dr. Syed. However, they reversed on the refusal to assign McDaniel to a no–stairs unit. The court found that McDaniel had presented evidence that having to make his way up and down stairs to get to meals, the infirmary, and other prison programs effectively denied him access to those programs, and that the Department knew its refusal to place McDaniel in a no–stairs unit was having that effect.

The court first looked at the facts. While incarcerated, McDaniel had received medical treatment for various ailments, including spinal surgery in the summer of 2017. Before that surgery, McDaniel used a wheelchair. Afterward, he could move using a four–wheel walker. McDaniel continued to experience other medical problems, including degenerative joint disease of the spine and incontinence issues, resulting in significant back pain and difficulty controlling urination and defecation. Following his spinal surgery, the treating physician gave McDaniel several post–operative instructions: he was to avoid "strenuous exercising," "lifting more than 5–10 pounds," and "bending, lifting, carrying, twisting," but the physician said he could "climb stairs."

A few months after the spinal surgery, the Department of Corrections transferred McDaniel to the Columbia Correctional Institution. Before the transfer, McDaniel had restrictions in his file for a low–tier floor, no–stairs unit, low bunk, and walker. At the new facility, however, a physical therapist evaluated McDaniel and recommended changing those restrictions. As part of the evaluation, McDaniel had successfully walked up and down just six stairs. The therapist concluded the no–stairs and low–tier restrictions were no longer necessary. McDaniel's eventual cell assignment, he said, required him to walk up and down the stairs at least sixteen times each day to access prison programs and activities, including meals and the infirmary. Dr. Syed, one of the facility's treating physicians, approved discontinuing those restrictions. McDaniel then received a walker, a cane, and a double–occupancy cell with a low bunk, but in a unit that was accessible only by stairs.

The cell assignment created problems for McDaniel almost immediately. For one, the stairs impeded his access to meals and medications since the cafeteria and infirmary were on another floor. McDaniel complained from the start that he was not able to get out of his cell to eat or to retrieve his pain medication. He eventually stopped attending most meals and taking his medications because of the pain from going up and down the stairs to access those services. In the end, McDaniel testified, he had missed some 600 meals during his year at Columbia.

When McDaniel was able to navigate the stairs, he did so with help. For instance, McDaniel would often purchase food from the prison commissary. To pick up his orders, McDaniel would use the goods he brought from the commissary to "pay" other prisoners to help him up and down the stairs. Other prisoners carried McDaniel's walker for him while he used the railing to move or sat and scooted down the stairs. Sometimes other prisoners would even put their arms around him and walk McDaniel up the stairs. Prison staff eventually forbade McDaniel from asking prisoners, guards, or anyone else for help. Staff also told McDaniel he had to stop scooting down the stairs on his buttocks or he would get a "conduct report."

McDaniel also had difficulty navigating his cell. In double–occupancy cells that contain a toilet, people sometimes use so–called "courtesy screens" to create some privacy. Most of the time, McDaniel could use his walker to access the toilet. When a courtesy screen was up, however, there was simply not enough room to hold onto the walker when using the toilet. As a result, McDaniel emphasized, he had multiple falls moving around his cell and when using the toilet, which lacked railings and support to hold.

McDaniel submitted several requests for accommodations of his disabilities at Columbia, but all were denied. McDaniel eventually filed his lawsuit, which resulted in summary judgment for all of the defendants, followed by an appeal.

The appeals court found that the evidence McDaniel presented concerning the denial of the no–stairs unit causing him to miss about 600 meals in just the one year he was in the Columbia Correctional Institution, and that prison staff knew he was missing meals and medication because of his pain and difficulty in getting up and down stairs, was sufficiently clear so that the district court was required to treat those facts as true. On those facts, which the appeals court hoped were unusual, a reasonable jury could have found that the denial of a no–stairs unit amounted to an intentional violation of rights under the ADA and the Rehabilitation Act.

The court further stated that McDaniel's release from prison rendered moot his request for injunctive relief, but his ADA and Rehabilitation Act claims for compensatory damages survived his release from prison and his death and were still available.

Additionally, a jury could find prison officials were deliberately indifferent to McDaniel's lack of access to various prison programs, and because a jury could also find that the same conduct—deliberate indifference to McDaniel's inability to access, in particular, regular meals—violated the Eighth Amendment, the Department was not entitled to sovereign immunity, and compensatory damages could be available under the ADA for failure to accommodate his disabilities.

The district court's grant of summary judgment for the Department on McDaniel's ADA and Rehabilitation Act failure–to–accommodate claim based on the denial of a no–stairs unit at the Columbia Correctional Institution was reversed.

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This article was originally published under our Inmate Litigation Reporter issue 251215 1.

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