MIZZONI v. State of Nevada, Defendant. (2021)

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.2021-01-27No. No. 19-16506

Summary · law.co

Holding. The district court's grant of summary judgment was affirmed because Mizzoni failed to establish a genuine dispute of material fact regarding whether defendants were deliberately indifferent to his serious medical needs.

Joseph Mizzoni, a former Nevada state prisoner, appealed the district court's grant of summary judgment in his federal civil rights lawsuit against state officials. Mizzoni claimed the defendants showed deliberate indifference to his serious medical condition—Hepatitis C—in violation of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The appellate court reviewed the district court's decision and found that Mizzoni did not present sufficient evidence to create a factual dispute about whether the defendants acted with deliberate indifference.

The court explained that deliberate indifference imposes a demanding legal standard. Simply disagreeing with doctors' treatment choices, making a medical error, or providing care that differs from what another physician might recommend does not satisfy this standard. Instead, a prisoner must demonstrate that the chosen treatment was medically unacceptable under the circumstances and that officials selected it while consciously ignoring a substantial risk to the prisoner's health. Because Mizzoni failed to meet this burden, the lower court properly entered summary judgment against him.

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Key issues

Whether medical personnel's treatment decisions constitute deliberate indifference to serious medical needs
Whether a difference of opinion about medical treatment can amount to constitutional violation
Standard for proving deliberate indifference in prison medical care cases

Procedural posture

The appellant appealed pro se from the district court's summary judgment dismissing his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 civil rights action alleging deliberate indifference to serious medical needs.

Authorities cited

No cited authorities resolved to law.co cases yet.

Opinion · public domain

MEMORANDUM **

Former Nevada state prisoner Joseph L. Mizzoni appeals pro se from the district courts summary judgment in his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action alleging deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We review de novo. Guatay Christian Fellowship v. County of San Diego, 670 F.3d 957, 970 (9th Cir. 2011) (cross-motions for summary judgment); May v. Baldwin, 109 F.3d 557, 560-61 (9th Cir. 1997) (district courts decision on qualified immunity). We affirm.

The district court properly granted summary judgment because Mizzoni failed to raise a genuine dispute of material fact as to whether defendants were deliberately indifferent in treating Mizzonis Hepatitis C. See Toguchi v. Chung, 391 F.3d 1051, 1060-61 (9th Cir. 2004) (holding deliberate indifference is a “high legal standard” requiring a defendant be aware of and disregard an excessive risk to an inmates health; medical malpractice, negligence, or a difference of opinion concerning the course of treatment does not amount to deliberate indifference); Jackson v. McIntosh, 90 F.3d 330, 332 (9th Cir. 1996) (for a difference of opinion to amount to deliberate indifference, the plaintiff “must show that the course of treatment the doctors chose was medically unacceptable under the circumstances” and “that they chose this course in conscious disregard of an excessive risk to [the prisoners] health” (internal citations omitted)).

AFFIRMED.