Nadezda Steele-Warrick and Darryl Schultz, individually and on behalf of others similarly situated v. Microgenics Corporation, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Inc., Anthony Annucci, James O’Gorman, Charles Kelly, Richard Finnegan, and Corey Bedard

Summary

The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York denied the DOCCS defendants’ motions for summary judgment based on qualified immunity in a putative class action concerning allegedly unreliable drug tests used in New York prisons. The court held that triable issues existed as to whether four defendants were deliberately indifferent to complaints about false-positive results and whether another defendant acted conscience-shockingly in selecting and implementing the testing system. The action arises under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and involves substantive due process rights.

Holdings

1. The four defendants were not entitled to qualified immunity at summary judgment because the record created triable issues as to whether their deliberate indifference to repeated complaints and evidence of unreliable testing constituted conscience-shocking conduct violating substantive due process.
2. Bedard was not entitled to qualified immunity because a reasonable jury could find that he engaged in conscience-shocking conduct by disregarding evidence of unreliable CEDIA testing and helping implement a directive that omitted the assay’s required confirmatory-testing instruction.
3. The right of incarcerated persons to be free from arbitrary punishment based on unreliable drug tests was clearly established, and the difference between a recommendation for confirmatory testing and an instruction requiring confirmatory testing could make reliance on the earlier testing precedent unreasonable.

Questions Presented

1. Whether Annucci, O’Gorman, Kelly, and Finnegan were entitled to qualified immunity because the developed record could not support a finding that their conduct was conscience-shocking or deliberately indifferent.
2. Whether Bedard was entitled to qualified immunity because the record could not support a finding that his role in selecting and implementing the Microgenics testing system violated substantive due process.
3. Whether the plaintiffs’ substantive due process rights were clearly established when the defendants allegedly permitted discipline based on unreliable drug tests without required confirmatory testing.

Disposition

denied