The Supreme Court on Monday, Nov. 9, appeared likely to bar federal prison inmates from suing prison officials who deny them medical care, in a case the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had allowed to go forward.
The case, Nielsen v. Watanabe, was brought by Kekai Watanabe, a former inmate at a federal detention center in Honolulu. He says a prison medical worker, Francis Nielsen, gave him only over-the-counter pain medicine after he was injured in a gang fight in July 2021. An X-ray seven months later showed a fractured coccyx with bone chips in the surrounding tissue, SCOTUSblog reported.
What's at stake
The case tests a 1980 ruling, Carlson v. Green, that let federal inmates sue officials for deliberate indifference to their medical needs under the Eighth Amendment. It builds on the 1971 Bivens decision, which first allowed lawsuits against individual federal officials for constitutional violations. Nielsen asked the justices to overturn Bivens entirely. The Trump administration backed Nielsen but did not ask the court to overturn Bivens.
Justice Samuel Alito questioned whether such claims provide "anything of value," and Justice Brett Kavanaugh pointed to the Federal Tort Claims Act as an alternative, NBC News reported. Kavanaugh and Chief Justice John Roberts appeared reluctant to overturn Bivens itself.
What's next
A federal judge dismissed Watanabe's suit, but the 9th Circuit revived it in 2024. A decision is expected next year. Related: Supreme Court orders on Griffith and Clemente cases.