Social Worker Faces Revived Suit Over Suicide in Texas Prison

A social worker must face a claim that she was deliberately indifferent to the medical needs of a man who died by suicide in jail, the Fifth Circuit said in reversing a finding that she was immune from suit.

Natalee Oliver’s employer, Correctional Healthcare Companies LLC, is “systematically organized to perform the major administrative task of providing mental-health care at state facilities,” according to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit’s opinion.

Sister circuits have agreed that employees of such facilities aren’t entitled to qualified immunity, the court said Monday. Correctional Healthcare Companies is now known as Wellpath. ...