A Colorado inmate has not plausibly claimed that prison officials’ allegedly-deficient COVID-19-prevention measures amounted to cruel and unusual punishment, the federal appeals court based in Denver has decided.

Delano Marco Medina, who is incarcerated at the Colorado Territorial Correctional Facility in Cañon City, first filed a petition in federal court in June 2020, claiming the Colorado Department of Corrections was quarantining detainees in their rooms, failed to follow public health guidance on social distancing, and shut down his access to the law library.

A three-judge panel for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit agreed Medina had not established prison officials acted with deliberate indifference, meaning they knew about an objective risk of serious harm and disregarded it.

“Instead, the complaint indicates that the defendants took affirmative steps to mitigate COVID-19’s risks, such as quarantining inmates with symptoms, locking down the facility, and restricting access to common areas at the prison,” wrote Judge Allison H. Eid in a July 13 order.

Medina’s complaint alleged violations of the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, as well as a First Amendment violation stemming from his inability to access the prison’s law library. 

U.S. District Court Judge Daniel D. Domenico dismissed the case last year, and also denied Medina an injunction that would have ordered the corrections department to prevent outbreaks and create a plan for mitigating COVID-19 spread. Domenico explained Medina had already contracted and recovered from COVID-19 in 2020, and therefore could not show future “irreparable harm.”

“Even if he had shown that his infection was the result of deliberate indifference, his prior infection actually makes the risk of future harm to him from exposure to the coronavirus significantly less than others who have not already had the disease,” Domenico wrote in February 2021.

Medina appealed to the 10th Circuit in October, amid further developments in the pandemic. To date, 35 inmates have died from the novel coronavirus in Colorado prisons with 13,572 documented COVID-19 infections. According to recent research, COVID-19 reinfections actually increase the risk of death or hospitalization.

The 10th Circuit did not address the question of Medina’s risk of reinfection, but instead focused on the only preventive measure Medina raised in his federal case: social distancing.

Medina “fails to plead any specific facts plausibly detailing how the defendants unreasonably failed to comply with that guideline,” Eid wrote. “Although the complaint also suggests that releasing inmates would be a preferable method of addressing the pandemic, this is not a form of relief that is available.”

The panel also concluded Medina had failed to advance an argument challenging the denial of his library access. Domenico previously noted prison officials had developed an alternative of bringing library materials to Medina’s cell.

The case is Medina v. Williams et al.