Kathy Contreras, on Behalf of Her Minor Child A. L. v. Dona Ana County Board of County Commissioners, dba Dona Ana County Detention Center, et al.

Respondents, Doña Ana County Detention Center and three detention officers, regularly failed to secure access to a control panel that locked the inmates’ cell doors. Instead of monitoring an inmate who had loudly threatened Petitioner, the three detention officers watched television while the inmate accessed the unsecured and opened cell doors so that other inmates could brutally attack the 14-year-old Petitioner. This was the fourth such attack in an 18-month period. In three separate opinions, the Tenth Circuit panel affirmed dismissal of both the individual jailer claims and the Monell claims against the jail because the law was not “clearly established.” No one circuit judge took the same approach as the others or the district court. The questions presented are:

1. Whether this Court should resolve the confusion in the circuit courts about what constitutes “clearly established” law with a clear rule and guidance from this Court that allows a legitimate constitutional claim to proceed under Section 1983 whenever the circumstances give government actors ample opportunity to understand how the relevant legal doctrine applies, as the First, Second, Sixth, and Seventh Circuits have decided, rather than requiring factually identical precedent, as the Tenth Circuit required in this case?

2. Whether the Tenth Circuit’s decision that the law must be clearly established to support a Monell claim for deliberate indifference is inconsistent with the settled law of this Court?