United States Tenth Circuit

In a suit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief on behalf of mentally ill patients at a county jail, denial of class certification is affirmed where: 1) Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(b)(2) authorizes an inquiry into the relationship between the class framed in the complaint and injunctive relief requested; and 2) a district court does not abuse its discretion in denying class certification where providing the requested relief at the level of specificity required by Fed. R. Civ. P. 65(d) would render a class action unmanageable, either because of difficulties in determining relevant aggregate characteristics of the class or because factual differences between class members require different standards of conduct for undefined groups within the class.

Appellate Information

• Decided 08/29/2008
• Published 08/29/2008

Judges

• GORSUCH, Circuit Judge., Before TYMKOVICH, GORSUCH, and HOLMES, Circuit Judges.

Court

• United States Tenth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Mark Silverstein, Legal Director, American Civil Liberties Foundation of Colorado, Denver, CO (David C. Fathi, National Prison Project for the ACLU Foundation, Inc., Washington, D.C., and Thomas S. Nichols, Davis Graham & Stubbs LLP, Denver, CO, with him on the briefs), for Plaintiffs-Appellants., Thomas J. Lyons and Andrew D. Ringel, Hall & Evans, L.L.C., Denver, CO, for Amicus Curiae Colorado Counties, Inc., Laura L. Rovner, Student Law Office, and Stephen Arvin, Stephanie Whalum and Margaret Yoder, Student Attorneys, University of Denver Sturm College of Law, Denver, CO, for Amici Curiae.


• For Appellees:
  
• Gordon L. Vaughan, Vaughan & DeMuro (Sara Ludke Cook, Vaughan & DeMuro, and Jay A. Lauer, County Attorney of El Paso County, with him on the brief), Colorado Springs, CO, for Defendants-Appellees.