## Facts

- Michigan placed the City of Flint under state-appointed emergency management after a declared financial emergency.
- Flint officials, with state regulators’ involvement, switched the municipal water supply from treated Lake Huron water (via Detroit’s system) to the Flint River as a cost-saving measure.
- Beginning April 25, 2014, Flint distributed Flint River water through an outdated treatment plant without corrosion-control treatment despite the water’s known corrosivity.
- Residents promptly reported foul-smelling and foul-tasting water and physical symptoms; later reports included bacterial contamination, a Legionnaires’ disease spike, and elevated blood-lead levels in children.
- Plaintiffs alleged that state and city officials knew the system was not prepared to safely treat Flint River water, approved the switch anyway, and repeatedly represented the water as safe while ignoring or suppressing contrary information.
- Plaintiffs claimed injuries from drinking and bathing in lead-contaminated water and sued numerous officials and entities under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and state law.
- The district court denied qualified immunity to certain remaining defendants on a Fourteenth Amendment substantive due process “bodily integrity” theory; the City of Flint also sought Eleventh Amendment immunity.
- Defendants took consolidated interlocutory appeals limited to qualified immunity and (for the City) Eleventh Amendment immunity.

## Issues

1. Whether allegations that officials knowingly caused residents to consume lead-contaminated water while misrepresenting its safety plausibly state a substantive due process violation of the Fourteenth Amendment right to bodily integrity sufficient to defeat qualified immunity at the motion-to-dismiss stage.
2. Whether the City of Flint, while governed by a state emergency manager, is an “arm of the state” entitled to Eleventh Amendment immunity.

## Decision

- Affirmed in part and reversed in part the denial of qualified immunity.
- Held that plaintiffs plausibly alleged a conscience-shocking violation of the right to bodily integrity against certain officials alleged to have knowingly authorized and maintained distribution of unsafe water and misrepresented its safety; qualified immunity was unavailable at the pleading stage for those defendants.
- Held that other defendants were entitled to qualified immunity where the allegations amounted to negligence, inaction, or tangential involvement insufficient to plead a constitutional violation.
- Affirmed the denial of Eleventh Amendment immunity to the City of Flint, holding it was not an arm of the state even under emergency management.
- Remanded for further proceedings.

## Legal Principles

- Substantive due process protects a fundamental right to bodily integrity against egregious governmental conduct.
- A substantive due process claim requires conduct that “shocks the conscience”; deliberate exposure of the public to serious bodily harm coupled with deception can satisfy this standard at the pleading stage.
- Qualified immunity is unavailable when (1) the complaint plausibly alleges a constitutional violation and (2) the unlawfulness was clearly established at the time; exact factual matches in prior cases are not required if prior law makes the illegality apparent.
- Allegations of negligence or less culpable failures to act generally do not rise to a constitutional violation for substantive due process purposes.
- Eleventh Amendment “arm of the state” analysis gives primary weight to whether the state treasury is legally liable for a judgment; substantial state control alone does not convert a municipality into an arm of the state.

## Conclusion

The Sixth Circuit permitted a substantive due process bodily-integrity claim to proceed against certain officials alleged to have knowingly exposed Flint residents to lead-contaminated water and misrepresented its safety, while granting qualified immunity to others whose alleged conduct sounded only in negligence, and it rejected the City of Flint’s claim to Eleventh Amendment immunity despite state emergency management.


Guertin v. Michigan, 912 F.3d 907 (6th Cir. 2019)