Karsjens v. Minnesota Department of Human Services

Background

The plaintiffs were people civilly committed under Minnesota law and residing at the Minnesota Sex Offender Program (MSOP). Fourteen named plaintiffs represented a class of patients civilly committed to MSOP. Their Third Amended Complaint challenged Minnesota’s civil-commitment law and various MSOP treatment and confinement policies under the United States and Minnesota Constitutions, Minnesota statutes, contract theories, and tort theories.

The case had proceeded in two trial phases. In Phase One, the district court had previously found Minnesota’s commitment statute unconstitutional on its face and as applied, but the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit reversed those findings and vacated the related injunction. The Eighth Circuit held that the statute was rationally related to a legitimate government purpose and that the challenged conduct did not meet the demanding standard requiring conduct to be egregious, malicious, or sadistic enough to shock the conscience.

Phase One claims

The district court concluded that the Eighth Circuit had not expressly or implicitly decided the remaining Phase One claims: Count III, failure to provide treatment; Count V, freedom from punishment; Count VI, less restrictive alternative confinement; and Count VII, freedom from inhumane treatment. The district court therefore addressed those claims on their merits under the Eighth Circuit’s two-part substantive due-process test: the plaintiffs had to show both conscience-shocking conduct and a violation of a fundamental liberty interest.

The court held that the plaintiffs failed to establish liability on Count III because, under controlling Eighth Circuit precedent, civilly committed individuals do not have a recognized due-process right to appropriate, effective, or reasonable treatment for the condition that led to their commitment. The court also held that the Eighth Circuit’s decision foreclosed liability on Count VI because the plaintiffs could not establish the required fundamental liberty interest or conscience-shocking conduct concerning less restrictive alternatives.

The court likewise held that the Eighth Circuit’s decision prevented liability on Counts V and VII. Although the district court had previously found that the commitment system had a punitive effect, the Eighth Circuit had concluded that the identified conduct and shortcomings did not meet the conscience-shocking standard. The court rejected the plaintiffs’ alternative theory that the MSOP system was punitive, explaining that the same substantive due-process standard applied and that the Eighth Circuit’s decision compelled the result.

The court dismissed Counts III, V, VI, and VII with prejudice. The opinion also states that certain Minnesota-law aspects of these claims were dismissed with prejudice for lack of jurisdiction under the Eleventh Amendment.

Class certification and Phase Two claims

The Phase Two claims challenged MSOP policies on a classwide basis. Count VIII alleged violations involving religious freedom; Count IX alleged restrictions on speech and association; and Count X alleged unreasonable searches and seizures. The plaintiffs argued that these policies were punitive when viewed together. They also argued that the class should be decertified because some injuries might require individualized analysis.

The court declined to decertify the class. It concluded that common questions and shared interests remained concerning policies and practices generally applicable to MSOP patients. The court stated, however, that its rulings on the classwide claims did not foreclose individual claims based on how particular policies were applied to particular people.

The court granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment on Count VIII. It assumed, without deciding, that the plaintiffs might show a substantial burden on religious practice, but found no record evidence from which a jury could conclude that the policies applied to the class were not reasonably related to legitimate therapeutic and institutional interests. To the extent the religion claim relied on generalized substantive due process rather than the First Amendment, the court also dismissed that theory.

The court granted summary judgment on Count IX because the plaintiffs had not shown a genuine dispute about whether the speech and association policies unreasonably restricted the class’s First Amendment rights. The court granted summary judgment on Count X because the record lacked substantial evidence that MSOP’s search policies were an unnecessary or unjustified response to institutional-security concerns. The court relied in part on prior decisions upholding various MSOP policies and on testimony from court-appointed experts indicating that the policies were reasonable for a civil-commitment facility.

The order states that Counts VIII, IX, and X were dismissed with prejudice after summary judgment was granted to defendants.

Expert costs and disposition

Defendants asked the court to require the plaintiffs to pay the costs of experts appointed under Federal Rule of Evidence 706. The court held that deciding the allocation of those costs at that stage would be premature. It denied the motion without prejudice to renewal in connection with a later motion for costs under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54.

Judge Donovan W. Frank’s order therefore dismissed the remaining Phase One claims with prejudice, granted defendants’ summary-judgment motion on the Phase Two claims and dismissed those claims with prejudice, and denied the request for final apportionment of expert costs without prejudice.