[PUBLISH]
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT FILED
________________________
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
ELEVENTH CIRCUIT
No. 02-13499 October 29, 2003
________________________ THOMAS K. KAHN
CLERK
D. C. Docket No. 87-00369-CV-T-24
MILLER FRANK JOHNSON, LLOYD KOGER, et al.,
Plaintiffs-Appellees,
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,
Intervenor-Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
STATE OF FLORIDA, et al.,
Intervenor-Defendants,
KATHLEEN KEARNEY, Secretary,
Department of Children and Families,
Intervenor-Defendant-Appellant.
________________________
No. 02-14670
________________________
D. C. Docket No. 87-00369-CV-T-24
MILLER FRANK JOHNSON, LLOYD KOGER, et al.,
Plaintiffs-Appellees,
UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
Intervenor-Plaintiff-Appellee,
versus
DICK BRADLEY, G. PIERCE WOOD MEMOR, et al.,
Defendants-Appellants,
STATE OF FLORIDA, JEB BUSH, Governor of
the State of Florida, et al.,
Intervenor-Defendants-Appellants.
________________________
Appeals from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Florida
_________________________
(October 29, 2003)
Before ANDERSON and COX, Circuit Judges, and NANGLE*, District Judge.
ANDERSON, Circuit Judge:
These consolidated cases arise out of litigation against the State of Florida
(“the State”) over conditions at a former state-run mental health facility, G. Pierce
Wood Memorial Hospital (“GPW”), which closed in February 2002. In the first
case, #02-13499 (“the Consent Decree case”), the State1 challenges the district
*
Honorable John F. Nangle, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of
Missouri, sitting by designation.
1
The principal named Defendant, Bradley, is the former Superintendent of GPW.
Because the suit is in substance one against the State of Florida, “the State” will be used to refer
2
court's refusal to lift all conditions of a Consent Decree under which GPW was
subject to court-supervised monitoring. The Consent Decree was entered to settle
litigation between a plaintiff class of patients and the State regarding conditions of
confinement, treatment and release at the hospital. In the second case, #02-14670
(“the attorney fee case”), the State challenges the district court's order refusing to
award attorneys' fees incurred in defending claims brought by the Justice
Department as Intervenor on behalf of the patients. The State won on all counts at
a bench trial, and claims it is statutorily entitled to attorney fees as the prevailing
party.
I. BACKGROUND
Until its closure, GPW was a state-run hospital for the mentally ill, at which
approximately 85 percent of the patients were involuntarily committed by court
order under a Florida statute known as the “Baker Act.” A group of patients at
GPW brought a class action in the Middle District of Florida in November 1987,
alleging that the State was violating their constitutional rights by providing
substandard care and housing, and by failing to release them when they were
“discharge ready.” Specifically, the complaint alleged that the State: (1) violated
their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment by failing to discharge them into less
to the Defendants in the aggregate.
3
restrictive settings; (2) denied them procedural due process in violation of the
Fourteenth Amendment by arbitrarily revoking privileges without formal standards
and with no opportunity for challenge; (3) abridged their First, Ninth and
Fourteenth Amendment rights by arbitrarily restricting visitation privileges; (4)
infringed their right to counsel in violation of the First, Fifth, Sixth and Fourteenth
Amendments by failing to provide legal assistance or an adequate law library, and
(5) violated their Fourteenth Amendment rights by providing inadequate medical
staffing, recreation, vocational training, security and nutrition.
The court certified a class of “all persons who are now or will in the future
be committed” to GPW, and a subclass of present and future patients “who have
been determined by their treatment team to be