C. Money Damages

• Library: The Jailhouse Lawyer's Handbook (CCR) (2021 Ed.)

C. Money Damages

In a Section 1983 or Bivens lawsuit, the court can order prison officials to give you money to make up for the harm you suffered when your rights were violated. You can get money damages instead of, or in addition to, an injunction. You may want an injunction against some of the people you sue and money damages from others, or both. This section explains when and how to get money damages.

1. The Three Types of Money Damages

There are three types of money damages. The first type is an award of nominal damages. Nominal damages are frequently just $1, or some other very small sum of money. Nominal damages are awarded when you have proven a violation of your rights, but you have not shown any actual harm that can be compensated.

You are most likely to win a significant amount of money if you suffered an actual physical injury. The officials who are responsible should pay you for medical and other expenses, for any wages you lost, for the value of any part of your body or physical functioning which cannot be replaced or restored, and for your "pain and suffering." These are called compensatory damages. The idea behind compensatory damages is to try and get you back to the condition you were in before you were injured.

The third type of damages you may be able to get is punitive damages. To get punitive damages, you need to show that the defendants' actions were "motivated by evil motive or intent" or involved "reckless or callous indifference to your rights." In other words, the officials hurt you on purpose or did something so clearly dangerous, they must have known it was likely to hurt you. An example of a prisoner getting punitive damages can be found in Smith v. Wade, 461 U.S. 30 (1983). In that case, Mr. Wade had been moved into protective custody in his prison after having been assaulted by other prisoners. A prison guard moved two other prisoners into Mr. Wade's cell, one of whom had recently beaten and killed another prisoner. Mr. Wade's cellmates harassed, beat, and sexually assaulted him. The court found that the guard's conduct in placing Mr. Wade in a situation the guard knew was likely to expose him to serious physical harm satisfied the standard for punitive damages. Mr. Wade won $25,000 in compensatory damages and $5,000 in punitive damages.

Not all punitive damage awards require physical assault. Some courts and juries have awarded punitive damages for violations of other constitutional rights based on a showing of "evil intent" by prison officials. One example is Siggers-El v. Barlow, 433 F. Supp. 2d 811 (E.D. Mich. 2006). In that case a prisoner received $200,000 in punitive damages after he was transferred in retaliation for complaining to the warden about a prison official who harassed the prisoner and refused to put in the routine paperwork the prisoner needed to pay his appellate lawyer. The transfer ended up causing the prisoner to lose a very...