UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

┐ RHIANNON NUGENT and JUAN QUINTANA, SR., Co- │ Personal Representatives of the Estate of Juan A. │ Quintana, II, deceased, > No. 22-1487 Plaintiffs-Appellants, │ │ │ v. │ │ SPECTRUM JUVENILE JUSTICE SERVICES; SPECTRUM │ HUMAN SERVICES, INC., │ Defendants-Appellees. │ ┘

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Michigan at Detroit. No. 2:21-cv-12741—George Caram Steeh III, District Judge.

Argued: March 8, 2023

Decided and Filed: June 28, 2023

Before: GRIFFIN, BUSH, and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.

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COUNSEL ARGUED: Jonathan R. Marko, MARKO LAW, PLLC, Detroit, Michigan, for Appellant. Nathan Scherbarth, ZAUSMER, P.C., Farmington Hills, Michigan, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Jonathan R. Marko, MARKO LAW, PLLC, Detroit, Michigan, for Appellant. Nathan Scherbarth, Mark J. Zausmer, Jonathan R. Reshour, ZAUSMER, P.C., Farmington Hills, Michigan, for Appellees.

BUSH, J., delivered the opinion of the court in which MURPHY, J., joined. GRIFFIN, J. (pp. 13–18), delivered a separate dissenting opinion. No. 22-1487 Nugent, et al. v. Spectrum Juvenile Justice Servs., et al. Page 2

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OPINION _________________

JOHN K. BUSH, Circuit Judge. This case arises from the suicide of Juan Quintana, II, a fifteen-year-old, at a facility operated by defendants Spectrum Juvenile Justice Services and Spectrum Human Services, Inc. (collectively, Spectrum) in Highland Park, Michigan. Representatives of Quintana’s estate sued Spectrum based on Monell v. Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978). The complaint alleges that Spectrum functioned as a state actor and violated Quintana’s Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights when its personnel failed to visually check on him as required by state contract. The district court dismissed plaintiffs’ suit on the ground that the complaint did not plausibly allege state action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. We respectfully disagree, as explained below. We therefore REVERSE and REMAND for further proceedings.

I.

We recite the relevant facts as alleged in the complaint. Spectrum is licensed by the State of Michigan to run a “private child caring institution.” Spectrum contracts with the state to house children who are ordered to be detained in Spectrum’s facilities. The facilities are “similar to a prison setting”—the children are completely restricted in their movements, and the state requires Spectrum to monitor them on a 24/7 basis.

A court ordered Quintana’s detention at Spectrum’s Highland Park facility on August 24, 2018. In the days that followed, he struggled with depression, anxiety, and difficulty sleeping, among other things. On the evening of September 11, 2018, between 7:57 PM and 8:42 PM, Quintana took his own life in his bedroom at the facility. He died alone. No one checked his room