Wrongful Death and Survival Actions in Custody Medical Cases

Scope and warning#

This page addresses California wrongful-death and survival actions and their federal counterparts in the Ninth Circuit when the death follows medical care, or the absence of it, in a county jail, a state prison or a contracted correctional facility in California. It assumes the reader has read Roadmap 040 (the correctional cluster's starting point), 042 and 043 (the constitutional standards for detainees and sentenced prisoners), 044 (negligence versus deliberate indifference) and 047 (entity liability for private contractors), and it does not restate them. It does not address the investigation, autopsy and public-reporting systems that follow a custody death (Roadmap 064), the standard of care and the professional-negligence statutes in depth (Roadmap 066), the Government Claims Act in depth (Roadmaps 078–079), causation in depth (Roadmap 075), or the measure of damages in depth (Roadmap 076 and the remedies matrix, 096.2). It is not probate advice: whether a personal representative should be appointed, who succeeds to a decedent's property by intestate succession, and how a recovery is distributed are questions for probate counsel.

Every California statute cited here was read on a reproduction host (Justia's 2025 California Code edition or California.Public.Law), because the official legislative host refused automated requests during this session; those entries are graded "verified with limitation" and must be re-read on the official host before publication. One statute — Code Civ. Proc. § 377.34 — contains dated language whose currency matters a great deal and is discussed with particular care below. Nothing on this page is legal advice. This page uses role vocabulary — heir, personal representative, successor in interest, decedent's estate — throughout, because each action belongs to a person in a defined role.

The factual situation this roadmap addresses#

A generic hypothetical. A 46-year-old man is held pretrial in a county jail in California. Medical care at the jail is provided under a contract between the county and a private correctional health care company, whose nurses and physicians staff the clinic. Over two days he submits sick-call requests describing chest pain and shortness of breath; he is seen twice by nursing staff, given antacids and returned to his housing unit. On the third day a custody officer finds him slumped on his bunk; he is transported to a community hospital, where he is diagnosed with a condition that the hospital records describe as advanced, and he dies four days later without leaving the hospital.

He leaves a spouse from whom he had been separated for a year but never divorced; two children, one an adult daughter and one a 12-year-old son who lives with the boy's mother; and his own mother, to whom he had sent money every month before his arrest. He left no will, and no probate proceeding has been opened. His adult daughter wants to "sue the jail." The spouse is uncertain whether she is entitled to do anything. The mother believes she is the one who should decide, because she was closest to him.

The questions this Roadmap addresses are the ones that hypothetical raises: which actions exist; who may bring each one; what must be filed or presented before suit, and against whom; what each action can recover; how the state and federal claims fit together; and what records the family can lawfully obtain to evaluate them. Nothing in the hypothetical is drawn from any real case.

Governing law#

Two actions, not one

California's death-litigation statutes occupy Chapter 4 of Title 3 of Part 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure, beginning at § 377.10. The chapter separates the decedent's own causes of action (Articles 2 and 3, §§ 377.20–377.35) from the cause of action for wrongful death (Article 6, §§ 377.60–377.62). The separation is not a matter of drafting convenience. The two actions differ in who owns them, who may bring them, what they compensate, and how they are limited. (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The survival rule is stated in § 377.20(a): "Except as otherwise provided by statute, a cause of action for or against a person is not lost by reason of the person's death, but survives subject to the applicable limitations period." Subdivision (b) extends the rule to losses that occur at or after the death of a person "who would have been liable if the person's death had not preceded or occurred simultaneously with the loss or damage" (§ 377.20(b)). The survival statute does not create a new claim; it preserves the decedent's claim. A later Court of Appeal decision, describing an elder-abuse survival action, put the point compactly: "in this survivor action for elder abuse only the injury that [the decedent] suffered before death matters" (Carter v. Prime Healthcare Paradise Valley LLC, No. D057852 (Cal. Ct. App. Aug. 12, 2011), reproduction host). (Grade: Settled — statute text; the Carter sentence is an appellate statement read on a reproduction host.)

The wrongful-death action, by contrast, is the heirs' own. The statute identifies the persons who may assert it, and it measures their damages by what "under all the circumstances of the case, may be just, but may not include damages recoverable under Section 377.34" (§ 377.61) — that is, it may not include the survival damages. The two actions are designed to be complementary rather than overlapping: the survival action recovers what the decedent lost before death; the wrongful-death action recovers what the survivors lose because of it.

The statute expressly contemplates that both will often be litigated together: "An action under Section 377.30 may be joined with an action under Section 377.60 arising out of the same wrongful act or neglect," and a wrongful-death action and a continued survival action "arising out of the same wrongful act or neglect may be consolidated for trial as provided in Section 1048" (§ 377.62(a)–(b)). (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

Quiroz v. Seventh Ave. Center (2006) 140 Cal.App.4th 1256, a published California Court of Appeal opinion now inspected in full on a third-party opinion reproduction (not on the court's official host), rejected relation back when a successor first added a survival claim after the limitation period had expired to an initially timely wrongful-death action. The injuries and legal capacities differed: the original heir sued for her own loss, while the new successor claim sought the decedent's predeath injury. That holding applies to the opinion's procedural facts and does not resolve every relation-back scenario. Counsel should identify, independently preserve and timely plead both possible causes of action rather than relying on a later amendment to cure the different injury and plaintiff capacity. (Grade: published appellate decision inspected on a reproduction host; later judicial history not independently citator-checked.)

The survival action: whose claim, and who brings it

Who owns it. "A cause of action that survives the death of the person entitled to commence an action or proceeding passes to the decedent's successor in interest, subject to Chapter 1 (commencing with Section 7000) of Part 1 of Division 7 of the Probate Code, and an action may be commenced by the decedent's personal representative or, if none, by the decedent's successor in interest" (§ 377.30; AR-0961-S06). Two roles appear in that sentence, and they are not interchangeable. The personal representative is the executor or administrator appointed in a probate proceeding. The successor in interest is defined in § 377.11 as "the beneficiary of the decedent's estate or other successor in interest who succeeds to a cause of action or to a particular item of the property that is the subject of a cause of action." The beneficiary of the decedent's estate, in turn, is defined by § 377.10: if the decedent left a will, "the sole beneficiary or all of the beneficiaries who succeed to a cause of action . . . under the decedent's will"; if the decedent died without a will, "the sole person or all of the persons who succeed to a cause of action . . . under Sections 6401 and 6402 of the Probate Code" (or under the law of a sister state or foreign nation, if that law governs succession). (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The structure has an important consequence. The survival claim is property of the decedent's estate. When there is a personal representative, the representative brings it. When there is none, it is brought by those who succeed to it — under a will, the beneficiaries who take the claim; without a will, the intestate heirs under the Probate Code's succession rules. Who those persons are, and in what shares, is a probate question this page does not answer (Probate Code §§ 6401, 6402, not opened). (Grade: Settled as to the structure; the identification of successors in a given family is a probate question.)

Continuing a pending action. If the decedent had already filed suit before death, the action does not need to be refiled: "On motion after the death of a person who commenced an action or proceeding, the court shall allow a pending action or proceeding that does not abate to be continued by the decedent's personal representative or, if none, by the decedent's successor in interest" (§ 377.31). In the custody setting this matters where a detainee or prisoner had filed a civil-rights or negligence action while alive and later died; the continued action is the decedent's claim, now prosecuted by the estate's representative or the successor. (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The successor-in-interest declaration. A person who seeks to commence or continue an action as the decedent's successor in interest must execute and file an affidavit or a declaration under penalty of perjury stating the facts § 377.32(a) lists: the decedent's name; the date and place of death; that "No proceeding is now pending in California for administration of the decedent's estate"; if the estate was administered, a copy of the final order showing distribution of the cause of action to the successor; that the declarant is the successor in interest, or is authorized to act on behalf of the successor, with the facts supporting that status; that "No other person has a superior right to commence the action or proceeding"; and the penalty-of-perjury affirmation. If more than one person signs, the statements are modified as appropriate (§ 377.32(b)), and a certified copy of the decedent's death certificate must be attached (§ 377.32(c)). (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The declaration is not a formality. It is a sworn statement of facts about succession, and every statement in it must be true. "No other person has a superior right" is not the same proposition as "no other person has an equal interest." Section 377.32(b) expressly permits more than one declarant; a spouse and a child may hold coequal succession interests under facts requiring independent probate analysis. The existence of another beneficiary is not, without more, proof that a particular declarant lacks standing, but the declarant must substantiate succession and authority and must not conceal a superior claimant. Where the family's composition makes the declaration difficult — a separated but undivorced spouse; children of different relationships; a claimed domestic partner; a will no one can find — the safer course, and often the necessary one, is a probate appointment so that a personal representative brings the claim. That decision belongs to counsel.

The court's power over parties. "The court in which an action is commenced or continued under this article may make any order concerning parties that is appropriate to ensure proper administration of justice in the case, including appointment of the decedent's successor in interest as a special administrator or guardian ad litem" (§ 377.33). The provision gives the trial court the tools to cure defects in representation without dismissing the decedent's claim, but it does not relieve the parties of the obligation to present the facts accurately. (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

Survival damages under Code Civ. Proc. § 377.34

Section 377.34 is the statute that most shapes the value of a state-law survival claim, and its dated language makes it the single most currency-sensitive provision on this page. What follows is stated from the text as read on two reproduction hosts — Justia's 2025 California Code edition, which identifies the last amendment as Stats. 2023, ch. 131 (AB 1754), effective January 1, 2024, and California.Public.Law, which displays the same subdivision (b) dates — and must be re-read on the official legislative host before publication.

The general rule — subdivision (a). In an action or proceeding by a decedent's personal representative or successor in interest on the decedent's cause of action, "the damages recoverable are limited to the loss or damage that the decedent sustained or incurred before death," including penalties and punitive or exemplary damages that the decedent would have been entitled to recover had the decedent lived, and they "do not include damages for pain, suffering, or disfigurement" (§ 377.34(a)). Pre-death economic loss — medical expenses the decedent incurred, earnings the decedent lost between injury and death, property loss — is recoverable; punitive damages are recoverable if the substantive standard for them is met (Civ. Code § 3294, AR-037-S01; Roadmap 076); the decedent's pain, suffering and disfigurement are excluded. (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The dated exception — subdivision (b). Notwithstanding subdivision (a), in an action or proceeding by a decedent's personal representative or successor in interest, "the damages recoverable may include damages for pain, suffering, or disfigurement" if the action or proceeding "was granted a preference pursuant to Section 36 before January 1, 2022," or "was filed on or after January 1, 2022, and before January 1, 2026" (§ 377.34(b), as read). On the text read, then, the exception is defined by the date the action was filed (or by a trial preference granted before January 1, 2022); it is not defined by the date of the injury or of the death. An action filed within the window may include pre-death pain, suffering or disfigurement; an action filed outside it, and not within the preference clause, is governed by subdivision (a)'s exclusion. (Grade: Settled as to the text read; currency must be confirmed on the official host.)

The reporting provisions — subdivisions (c) and (d). Subdivision (c), as read, requires a plaintiff who recovers pain, suffering or disfigurement damages under subdivision (b) in a stated period to submit to the Judicial Council, within 60 days, a copy of the judgment, consent judgment or court-approved settlement with a cover sheet stating the filing date, the date of final disposition and the amount and type of damages. Subdivision (d), as read, directs the Judicial Council to report to the Legislature on those submissions, and provides that the subdivision becomes inoperative on January 1, 2029. A register entry made earlier for Roadmap 096.1, since consolidated into AR-065-S07, described the inoperative date as applying to the whole section; the text read for this page attaches it to subdivision (d), and the consolidated entry now records that reading. The point is flagged for official-host re-verification and must be resolved before publication. (Grade: Settled as to (c)–(d)'s existence; the scope of the inoperative clause is flagged.)

What the section does not alter — subdivisions (e) and (f). As read, the section does not alter Civil Code § 3333.2 — the MICRA limit on noneconomic damages in professional-negligence actions against health care providers — and does not affect claims made under the Elder Abuse and Dependent Adult Civil Protection Act (Welf. & Inst. Code § 15600 et seq., not opened). (Grade: Settled — statute text as read.)

Currency. A bill in the 2025–2026 session, Senate Bill 29, proposed to amend § 377.34 to extend the filing window. The bill-history display read for this page (LegiScan, a reproduction of the Legislature's records) shows that it passed the Senate in June 2025, was amended in the Assembly in September 2025, and on September 13, 2025 was "Ordered to inactive file" at the request of an Assembly Member, with no later action displayed. A second reading, on CalMatters Digital Democracy (a nonofficial tracker of the Legislature's records) on October 8, 2026, still showed the bill on the inactive file with September 13, 2025 as its latest displayed action (AR-065-E01). A fresh October 15, 2026 inspection of a January 2026 statute reproduction and a September 26, 2026 derivative leginfo-code export likewise displays the original filing cutoff of before January 1, 2026, so an action newly filed in October 2026 is not shown to fall within that exception. This is a corroborated derivative-source observation, not official California Legislature authentication: direct official statutory and SB 29 history URLs returned HTTP 403 on this run. A previously filed action within the specified window retains the statutory filing-date analysis. Check later enactments and controlling interpretations before any filing or merits assertion. (Grade: Documented report as to the bill's displayed history; Unsettled as to any 2026 change not verified.)

What § 377.34 does not reach. Section 377.34 governs the state-law survival claim. It does not govern the heirs' wrongful-death damages, which § 377.61 measures separately. And, as the next subsection explains, the Ninth Circuit has held that it does not govern a § 1983 survival claim where the constitutional violation caused the death. The result is that the same pre-death suffering may be compensable in the federal survival count and excluded in the state survival count of the same case. The jury instructions, the verdict form and any settlement allocation must keep the counts distinct.

The wrongful-death action: who may bring it, and the one-action rule

Who may bring it. Section 377.60 (AR-065-S08, which consolidates the earlier entries for its opening, (a) and (b)(1) and for the remainder) provides that a cause of action for the death of a person caused by the wrongful act or neglect of another may be asserted by the persons it lists, or by the decedent's personal representative on their behalf:

• Subdivision (a): the decedent's surviving spouse, domestic partner, children and issue of deceased children, or, if there is no surviving issue of the decedent, the persons, including the surviving spouse or domestic partner, who would be "entitled to the property of the decedent by intestate succession." If the parents of the decedent would be entitled to bring the action and are deceased, the decedent's legal guardians may bring it as if they were the parents.
• Subdivision (b)(1): whether or not qualified under (a), if they were "dependent on the decedent," the putative spouse, children of the putative spouse, stepchildren, parents, or the decedent's legal guardians where the parents are deceased. Subdivision (b)(2) defines the putative spouse as the surviving spouse of a void or voidable marriage who is found by the court to have "believed in good faith that the marriage to the decedent was valid."
• Subdivision (c): a minor, whether or not qualified under (a) or (b), if at the time of the decedent's death the minor "resided for the previous 180 days in the decedent's household" and was dependent on the decedent for "one-half or more" of the minor's support.
• Subdivision (f): for this section, a domestic partner is a person who, at the time of death, was the decedent's partner in a registered domestic partnership under Family Code § 297(b), with a separate rule for deaths before January 1, 2002.

(Grade: Settled — statute text.)

Three features of the list matter in custody cases. First, subdivision (a) is categorical: a surviving spouse, domestic partner and children may sue without proving dependency, and a separated spouse who was never divorced remains a surviving spouse. Second, parents of a decedent who left a spouse or children are not subdivision (a) claimants (unless they would take by intestate succession, which they ordinarily would not where the decedent left issue), but they may sue under subdivision (b) if they were dependent on the decedent; dependency is a fact question that requires evidence. Third, the list does not include siblings, grandparents or friends except as the intestate-succession clause or the dependency clauses reach them. The decedent's closest emotional relationship may be with a person the statute does not name.

The one-action rule. The California Supreme Court has explained the nature of the action in three words — joint, single and indivisible. "In stating that an action for wrongful death is joint, it is meant that all heirs should join or be joined in the action," and that "a single verdict should be rendered for all recoverable damages"; "when it is said that the action is single, it is meant that only one action for wrongful death may be brought," "whether, in fact, it is instituted by all or only one of the heirs"; and "when it is said that the action is indivisible, it is meant that there cannot be a series of suits by heirs against the tortfeasor for their individual damages" (Cross v. Pacific Gas & Elec. Co. (1964) 60 Cal.2d 690, as read in segments on Justia). The same opinion recognized that "each heir should be regarded as having a personal and separate cause of action," and it relied on the then statute's express direction (former Code Civ. Proc. § 377, as quoted in the opinion) that "The respective rights of the heirs in any award shall be determined by the court" — a rule now carried into § 377.61. The Court also said that strict compliance with the joinder procedure is "not jurisdictional or even mandatory" in the sense that reversal necessarily follows a failure to comply. (Grade: Settled — binding California Supreme Court holding.)

The one-action joinder rule is procedural rather than a subject-matter-jurisdiction prerequisite; the California Court of Appeal explains that omission of an heir does not divest trial-court jurisdiction but can expose the wrongful-death plaintiffs to liability to the omitted heir (Ruttenberg v. Ruttenberg (1997) 53 Cal.App.4th 801, full published opinion inspected on a third-party reproduction; later case history not citator-checked). The Court of Appeal has drawn the practical consequences. "[P]laintiff heirs have a mandatory duty to join all known omitted heirs in the 'single action' for wrongful death"; "If an heir refuses to participate in the suit as a plaintiff, he or she may be named as a defendant"; and merely naming an heir as a nominal defendant without serving that heir is not joinder (Ruttenberg v. Ruttenberg (1997) 53 Cal.App.4th 801). Where an heir is wrongfully omitted, "the wrongfully omitted heir may bring an action against the heir who brought the wrongful death action," while "an heir not mentioned in the judgment is not entitled to share in it," and "The defendant cannot be subjected to a second recovery by another heir" (id., quoting Smith v. Premier Alliance for the first and last of these statements; as read on Justia). (Grade: Majority/likely — consistent appellate treatment; Ruttenberg is a published Court of Appeal decision applying Cross.)

The rule has a sharp edge in families like the hypothetical one. An adult child who files alone, without joining the surviving spouse and the minor sibling, does not thereby own the wrongful-death claim; the filing child assumes duties to the omitted heirs and risks liability to them, and a settlement that excludes them can produce litigation within the family rather than against the defendants. The one-action rule also protects defendants, which is why defense counsel will examine the family's composition early.

Damages. "In an action under this article, damages may be awarded that, under all the circumstances of the case, may be just, but may not include damages recoverable under Section 377.34. The court shall determine the respective rights in an award of the persons entitled to assert the cause of action" (§ 377.61). The categories conventionally recovered — the financial support the decedent would have provided, the value of household services, funeral and burial expenses, and the noneconomic loss of the decedent's love, companionship, comfort, care, society and moral support — are described in the pattern jury instructions (CACI 3921, not opened; Roadmap 076; remedies matrix 096.2). The heirs' grief, sorrow and mental anguish as such, and the decedent's own pre-death suffering, are not wrongful-death damages. Loss of relationship, guidance, comfort and society is conceptually distinct from grief; future economic losses are reduced to present cash value under the instruction. Ordinary wrongful-death damages do not include punitive damages, subject to the narrow exception in Civil Code § 3294(d) for a death caused by a homicide of which the defendant was convicted of a felony; punitive damages are independently unavailable against public entities under Government Code § 818. (Grade: § 377.61 and § 3294(d) read in reproduced statutory text; CACI 3921 text and Directions for Use read in a third-party reproduction identified as the 2026 edition, not independently authenticated against the official 2026 PDF.)

Federal survival: § 1988, Robertson, Chaudhry and Valenzuela

Section 1983 itself says nothing about what happens to a claim when the injured person dies. Section 1988(a) fills the gap: where the federal laws "are not adapted to the object, or are deficient in the provisions necessary to furnish suitable remedies," federal courts apply "the common law, as modified and changed by the constitution and statutes of the State" in which the court sits, "so far as the same is not inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of the United States" (42 U.S.C. § 1988(a), read on Cornell LII). (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The Supreme Court applied that provision to survival in Robertson v. Wegmann, 436 U.S. 584 (1978), holding that § 1988 required the federal court to apply Louisiana's survivorship statute, under which the § 1983 action at issue abated. The Court rejected the argument that the state rule was "inconsistent" with federal law merely because it defeated the claim: "A state statute cannot be considered 'inconsistent' with federal law merely because the statute causes the plaintiff to lose the litigation." The relevant question, the Court said, is whether application of state law "would be inconsistent with the federal policy underlying the cause of action under consideration." And the Court expressly reserved the death case: "We intimate no view, moreover, about whether abatement based on state law could be allowed in a situation in which deprivation of federal rights caused death." (Grade: Settled — binding holding, narrow by its own terms.)

California's survival statute preserves the claim (§ 377.20), so abatement is not the question in California. The question is the measure of damages, and the Ninth Circuit answered it in Chaudhry v. City of Los Angeles, 751 F.3d 1096 (9th Cir. 2014). There, a jury awarded $1,000,000 to the estate, based on the decedent's pain and suffering, on a § 1983 claim; the district court struck the award under § 377.34. The Ninth Circuit reversed: "California's prohibition against pre-death pain and suffering damages limits recovery too severely to be consistent with § 1983's deterrence policy," and § 377.34 therefore does not apply to § 1983 claims where the decedent's death was caused by the violation of federal law (as read on the court's official host). The court reasoned that the state rule produces a perverse incentive, making it "more economically advantageous for a defendant to kill rather than injure his victim." The opinion also recited the premise that made the analysis possible: "Under California's survival statute, Cal. Civ. Proc. Code § 377.20, [the decedent's] § 1983 claim survived his death." The court left a question open — it did not decide whether loss-of-life damages were recoverable ("We need not decide that question here") — and noted that the district court on remand could consider a motion for remittitur. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit — binding circuit holding.)

The open question was answered in Valenzuela v. City of Anaheim, No. 20-55372 (9th Cir. Aug. 3, 2021): "Following Chaudhry, we therefore hold that § 377.34's prohibition of loss of life damages is inconsistent with § 1983." The majority saw "no meaningful way to distinguish Chaudhry from this case"; a dissenting judge argued that Chaudhry should be reconsidered en banc. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit as a published circuit holding; the dissent signals continued contest, and any later history of the case was not verified for this page.)

Three limits on these holdings should be stated precisely; federal survival damages remain contingent on proof of the constitutional violation, actual and proximate causation, and applicable federal remedial law, not an automatic multiplier of the state death award. First, Chaudhry and Valenzuela govern § 1983 survival claims; they do not alter the state-law survival claim, which remains subject to § 377.34 as written. Second, the Chaudhry rule is tied to cases in which the decedent's death was caused by the constitutional violation; where the decedent died of an unrelated cause, the reasoning does not apply on its terms, and Robertson's general rule controls. Third, the decedent's federal claim must still be proven on its own elements: for a pretrial detainee, the objective standard of Gordon v. County of Orange (AR-0961-C01; Roadmap 042); for a sentenced prisoner, the subjective deliberate-indifference standard of Estelle v. Gamble and Farmer v. Brennan (AR-0961-C02, AR-0961-C03; Roadmap 043); and, for an entity defendant, an entity policy or custom that was the moving force (Monell, AR-0961-C04; Tsao v. Desert Palace, AR-0961-C08; Roadmap 047). A contracted physician treating prisoners acts under color of state law (West v. Atkins, AR-0961-C07). (Grade: Settled as to the limits drawn from the opinions' own terms; Analytical inference as to their application to any death.)

Who may bring the federal survival claim. Because the federal survival claim depends on state survival law, the person who brings it must satisfy that law. The Ninth Circuit has said that "The party seeking to bring a survival action bears the burden of demonstrating" that a particular state's law authorizes a survival action and "that the plaintiff meets that state's requirements for bringing a survival action" (Moreland v. Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Dep't, 159 F.3d 365 (9th Cir. 1998), as read on OpenJurist). In a California case that means the federal survival claim is brought by the personal representative or, if none, by the successor in interest, and a successor proceeding without a representative must satisfy § 377.32 in federal court as in state court. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit as to the burden; Analytical inference as to the practical consequence that a successor proceeding in federal court without a personal representative should file the § 377.32 declaration — district-court practice was not opened for this page.)

The heirs' own federal claim: loss of the familial relationship

A family member's grief is not, in itself, a federal claim, and the decedent's Fourth or Eighth Amendment rights are the decedent's alone. Moreland states both points, quoting Alderman v. United States for the first: "Fourth Amendment rights are personal rights which . . . may not be vicariously asserted." But the court recognized that the decedent's family members "each may assert a Fourteenth Amendment claim based on the related deprivation of their liberty interest" in the familial relationship, and that "This substantive due process claim may be asserted by both the parents and children" of the person killed. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit as to parents and children.) Whether and on what showing a spouse, sibling or more distant relative holds an independently actionable federal familial-association claim is not resolved by the Moreland passage inspected for this chapter. Do not turn Moreland's affirmative recognition for parents and children into a categorical rejection of all other relationships; identify relationship-specific controlling circuit precedent and the capacity pleaded before asserting or excluding a spouse's federal claim. (Unresolved; additional authority and subsequent-case-history review required.)

The standard for the family's claim is not the standard for the decedent's. In Lemire v. California Dep't of Corrections & Rehabilitation, 726 F.3d 1062 (9th Cir. 2013) — a prisoner-suicide case brought by "the estate, parents, and daughter of the deceased prisoner" — the Ninth Circuit explained that "only official conduct that 'shocks the conscience' is cognizable as a due process violation," and that deliberately indifferent conduct will generally shock the conscience where "the prison official had time to deliberate before acting or failing to act in a deliberately indifferent manner." The court vacated summary judgment on the family's due-process claims against two officials and found a triable issue whether two other officers' conduct in the emergency response was conscience-shocking. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit — binding circuit holding.)

Moreland shows the other side of the standard. In a rapidly evolving encounter, "only a purpose to cause harm unrelated to the legitimate object of arrest will satisfy the element of arbitrary conduct," and because the officers there "did not intend to commit any harm unrelated to the legitimate use of force," the family's claim failed. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit.) Medical care in custody is ordinarily a setting in which deliberation is possible — sick calls, chart reviews, referral decisions and medication orders are made over hours and days — which is why Lemire's deliberate-indifference formulation, rather than Moreland's purpose-to-harm formulation, is the one usually invoked in custody medical cases. Whether a particular emergency response falls on one side or the other is fact-dependent. (Grade: Analytical inference.)

Two consequences follow. First, the heirs' federal claim and the decedent's federal claim may rise or fall separately: the decedent's pretrial-detainee claim may be judged by Gordon's objective standard, while the family's claim requires conduct that shocks the conscience. Second, the family's federal claim is not subject to California's wrongful-death list of claimants or to § 377.61's measure; it is a federal claim with federal elements, though in practice it is pleaded alongside the state wrongful-death count and the damages proof overlaps.

State-law claims against public entities and public employees

Where a county, a city or the State is a potential defendant on the state-law wrongful-death or survival counts, the Government Claims Act supplies both liability rules and prerequisites.

Liability and immunity. "A public entity is liable for injury proximately caused by an act or omission of an employee of the public entity within the scope of his employment if the act or omission would, apart from this section, have given rise to a cause of action against that employee or his personal representative," but, except as otherwise provided by statute, "a public entity is not liable for an injury resulting from an act or omission of an employee of the public entity where the employee is immune from liability" (Gov. Code § 815.2(a)–(b)). For prisoners the Act then states a broad immunity with stated exceptions: notwithstanding any other provision of the part, and except as provided in that section and in Sections 814, 814.2, 845.4 and 845.6 (and in the Penal Code title cited), a public entity is not liable for "An injury to any prisoner" (Gov. Code § 844.6(a)). The same section preserves the employee's own liability — "Nothing in this section exonerates a public employee from liability for injury proximately caused by his negligent or wrongful act or omission" — and, as read, requires the public entity to pay any judgment, compromise or settlement for malpractice by a public employee "lawfully engaged in the practice of one of the healing arts" acting within the scope of employment (§ 844.6(d)). (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

The failure-to-summon exception. Section 845.6 is the exception most often pleaded in custody deaths. "Neither a public entity nor a public employee is liable for injury proximately caused by the failure of the employee to furnish or obtain medical care for a prisoner in his custody; but, except as otherwise provided by Sections 855.8 and 856, a public employee, and the public entity where the employee is acting within the scope of his employment, is liable if the employee knows or has reason to know that the prisoner is in need of immediate medical care and he fails to take reasonable action to summon such medical care." The section adds that nothing in it exonerates a public employee "who is lawfully engaged in the practice of one of the healing arts" from liability for malpractice, or relieves the entity of its § 844.6(d) payment obligation. (Grade: Settled — statute text.) The appellate decisions construing § 845.6 narrowly — as a duty to summon care for a need that is immediate, not a general duty to provide adequate care — are addressed in Roadmaps 066 and 078 (not opened for this page).

Presentation of claims. For state-law damages claims against a public entity, "no suit for money or damages may be brought" on a claim required to be presented until a written claim has been presented and acted upon or deemed rejected (Gov. Code § 945.4, AR-096-S02); a claim relating to death or injury to person must be presented not later than six months after accrual (§ 911.2, AR-096-S01); the claim's contents are prescribed (§ 910, AR-131-S01); and suit must follow within the period § 945.6 sets (AR-096-S03). The heirs' wrongful-death claim and the estate's survival claim are different claims belonging to different claimants, and the presentation strategy for each — who signs, whose losses are described, which accrual date is used — is a counsel question addressed in Roadmap 078 and Model 131. (Grade: Settled as to the statutes; the application to separate death and survival claimants is a counsel question.)

Not for § 1983. The Government Claims Act's presentation requirement does not apply to an action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (Williams v. Horvath (1976) 16 Cal.3d 834, AR-C08; see also Felder v. Casey, 487 U.S. 131 (1988), AR-C02 (R1 pre-checked)). A family that has missed a claim-presentation period for state counts may still have federal claims, subject to their own limitation rules. (Grade: Settled.)

Private contractors. The presentation requirement attaches to claims against public entities and public employees as the Act defines them. A private company that provides care under a county contract is not, by that fact alone, a public entity, and whether its employees are "employees" for the Act's purposes depends on the Act's definitions, which exclude independent contractors (Gov. Code § 810.2, AR-S506, R1 pending). Claims against the contractor and its clinicians therefore ordinarily proceed under ordinary limitation rules and the professional-negligence statutes rather than the claims statutes — but counsel commonly presents a claim to the county in any event, for the county's own potential liability. (Grade: Analytical inference; counsel question; Roadmap 079 addresses county-versus-contractor claims.)

Wrongful death and survival compared#

The table below states the structure; each cell is explained in the subsections above.

Proving the role: heirs, personal representatives and successors in interest#

Most death cases are decided on causation and the standard of care, but many are delayed, and some are lost, on the question of who may act. The issue is evidentiary as much as legal, and the evidence should be assembled before suit.

The death itself. A certified copy of the death certificate is required for a successor's declaration (§ 377.32(c)) and is the first document every defendant will request. The death certificate's cause-of-death entries are not conclusive on causation in a civil case, and the coroner's or medical examiner's findings are a separate record (Roadmap 064).

The family's composition. For subdivision (a) claimants: the marriage certificate and, where relevant, evidence that no divorce or dissolution was entered; the registration of any domestic partnership (§ 377.60(f)); birth certificates or other proof of parentage for each child; and the death certificates of any deceased child whose issue claim through that child. For subdivision (b) claimants: evidence of dependency — transfers of money, shared housing, payment of bills — because dependency is an element of the claimant's right under that subdivision, not a presumption. For subdivision (c) claimants: proof that the minor resided in the decedent's household for the 180 days before death and was dependent for one-half or more of support. Custody itself complicates both inquiries: a decedent held in jail for months was not, during that time, residing in a household or earning income in the ordinary sense, and whether pre-arrest dependency or residence satisfies the statute is a question counsel must analyze with the facts. (Grade: Analytical inference.)

Succession to the survival claim. If the decedent left a will, the will identifies the beneficiaries who succeed to the claim (§ 377.10(a)); if not, the intestate-succession provisions of the Probate Code do (§ 377.10(b)). The successor's declaration must state the facts that establish succession and that no other person has a superior right. Where succession is shared among several persons — a surviving spouse and children, for example — counsel must identify who actually succeeded to the particular claim, whether any person has a superior right, and which declarant has authority. Joint declarations or authorized representation may provide a clean evidentiary record, and a court-appointed personal representative can resolve disputed authority; § 377.32 does not, by its text alone, impose a categorical signature-by-every-coheir requirement. Minors cannot sign a declaration on their own; a guardian ad litem is ordinarily required, and § 377.33 permits the court to appoint one or a special administrator. (Grade: Settled as to the statutory requirements; Analytical inference as to the practice.)

Conflicts within the family. Death cases frequently involve family members who are estranged from one another, and custody deaths more than most. The one-action rule requires joinder of all known heirs in the wrongful-death action, and the successor's declaration requires truthful facts showing the declarant's authority and absence of a superior claimant, with coequal successors identified rather than automatically treated as superior. A family member who wants to proceed should not attempt to resolve those conflicts by omission. Counsel can name a non-cooperating heir as a defendant and serve that heir (Ruttenberg), seek a probate appointment, or seek a guardian ad litem for minors; each step should be taken openly.

What not to do. Do not file a declaration under § 377.32 that is not true. Do not sign a release or a settlement on behalf of the estate or other heirs without authority. Do not request the decedent's records in a capacity the requester does not hold. Do not allege a fact unless you have a good-faith factual basis for it.

Federal and state claims in one case#

A custody death commonly supports four families of claims at once: the state-law wrongful-death action; the state-law survival action; the § 1983 survival claim; and the family members' § 1983 familial-association claims. Each has different defendants, prerequisites and damages rules. They can be brought together in federal court — the § 1983 claims under federal-question jurisdiction and the state claims under supplemental jurisdiction (28 U.S.C. § 1367(a), AR-0961-F03), which also tolls state limitation periods while the claims are pending and for 30 days after dismissal (§ 1367(d), as recorded in the register) — or together in superior court, where § 1983 claims may be heard, subject to the defendants' right to remove (Roadmap 089).

The forum choice affects practical questions: whether a jury will apply Chaudhry to the federal survival count while applying § 377.34 to the state survival count of the same case; whether the court will try the wrongful-death and survival actions together (§ 377.62(b)); how jury instructions separate the heirs' losses from the decedent's; and how a verdict form prevents double recovery. A defendant who faces both the state and federal counts may argue that a state-law limitation should cap the overlapping federal recovery, or that damages awarded on one count duplicate another; the answer depends on keeping each count's measure distinct from the outset.

The state counts against a public entity are subject to presentation, the § 844.6 immunity and its exceptions, and § 818's bar on punitive damages against public entities (Roadmap 076). The state counts against a private contractor and its clinicians are subject to the professional-negligence statutes where the claim is one of "professional negligence" by a "health care provider": the 90-day notice of intention to sue (Code Civ. Proc. § 364, AR-096-S04), the limitation period of § 340.5 (AR-069-S06), the procedure for pleading punitive damages against a health care provider (Code Civ. Proc. § 425.13; Roadmap 076), and the noneconomic-damages limits of Civil Code § 3333.2 (AR-0961-S03). The federal counts are not automatically limited by California MICRA or state claim-presentation conditions, but they require proof of federal claim elements, distinct federal accrual, proper claimant authority, and any applicable defenses. Qualified immunity depends on the defendant and function; Richardson v. McKnight addressed private prison guards in a particular setting and is not a categorical holding that every privately employed prison physician or jail clinician lacks qualified immunity. Monell's entity-liability requirements also remain independent.

MICRA's structure in death cases. As read on a reproduction host, Civil Code § 3333.2 as amended by AB 35 provides that in a professional-negligence action against a health care provider the injured plaintiff may recover noneconomic losses, subject to separate limits for wrongful-death and non-death cases (§ 3333.2(b), (c)). Each limit is stated in three categories — health care providers collectively, health care institutions collectively, and health care providers or institutions that are "unaffiliated" with those defendants, for acts of professional negligence "separate and independent" from theirs that "occurred at, or in relation to medical transport to, a health care institution" — which the statute calls "three separate limits of liability that may apply" (§ 3333.2(f)); no health care provider defendant and no health care institution defendant may be liable for noneconomic losses in more than one category. The limits apply "regardless of the number of defendant health care providers or health care institutions" and regardless of the number of causes of action. The statutory amounts increase on each January 1 on a schedule fixed by subdivision (g) and, after the ramp, by inflation adjustments under subdivision (h); the section applies to cases filed or arbitrations demanded on or after January 1, 2023, and the amount in effect at the time of judgment, arbitration award or settlement governs. For context only, the enacted ramp produces 2026 collective noneconomic limits of $470,000 for a non-death personal-injury category and $650,000 for a wrongful-death category, subject to the particular claim, statutory defendant grouping and year of judgment, arbitration award or settlement. This is statutory arithmetic corroborated by an October 2026 secondary guide, not a valuation of an actual case. A single provider or institution cannot appear in multiple categories, nor may three caps be assumed automatically; licensed-facility, affiliation, separate-independent act and professional-negligence predicates require evidence. The applicable amount and any total must be established case-specifically. "Health care provider" is defined by licensure (and includes the provider's employer and professional practice organization); "health care institution" means licensed health facilities owned or operated by the same entity or its affiliates; "professional negligence" means "a negligent act or omission to act by a health care provider in the rendering of professional services" that is the proximate cause of personal injury or wrongful death, within the scope of the provider's license (§ 3333.2(j)). (Grade: Settled as to the structure stated, on the full text displayed by the reproduction host; official-host confirmation pending.)

Two consequences in custody cases are analytical rather than settled. First, whether a correctional clinic is a "health care institution" depends on whether it is a licensed health facility; many jail clinics are not, and a contractor that employs licensed clinicians may instead fall within the provider category as their employer. Second, the MICRA limits are limits on a state-law professional-negligence recovery; they do not, by their terms, limit a federal § 1983 award, which is measured by federal law. (Grade: Analytical inference; counsel question.)

Applying the law to the hypothetical#

The wrongful-death action. The separated spouse, never divorced, is a surviving spouse under § 377.60(a). The adult daughter and the 12-year-old son are children under subdivision (a), whether or not either was dependent on him and regardless of where the son lived. Because the decedent left a spouse and children, his mother is not a subdivision (a) claimant on the facts given; she may be a subdivision (b)(1) claimant if she was "dependent on the decedent," and the monthly payments are the kind of evidence that question will turn on. The adult daughter cannot own the action alone. If she files, she must join her father's spouse, her brother (through a guardian ad litem) and, if the dependency facts support it, her grandmother — as plaintiffs if they agree, or as defendants who are actually served if they do not (Cross; Ruttenberg). The court, not the family, determines how any award is divided (§ 377.61).

The survival action. The decedent's own claims — for whatever he suffered from the delayed evaluation of his chest pain until his death — passed to his successors in interest. With no will, they are the persons who succeed to the claim under the Probate Code's intestate-succession provisions (§ 377.10(b)), which in a family with a surviving spouse and children ordinarily means the spouse and the children in shares the Probate Code fixes; this page does not state the shares. No probate proceeding exists; counsel should determine whether a properly authorized successor can execute the § 377.32 declaration and attach a certified death certificate, whether co-successors should execute jointly, or whether a personal representative should be appointed. Any minor claimant must act through an appropriate representative; the particular procedural appointment depends on the child's interest and forum, and is not established solely by § 377.32. The mother, however close to her son, would not ordinarily be his successor in interest where a spouse and children survive (Probate Code §§ 6401, 6402, not opened; a probate question), and on that footing she would not be the person to bring the survival claim.

What the state survival claim can recover. Pre-death economic loss — such as earnings lost between the onset of his illness and death (likely little, since he was in custody) and medical expenses he incurred (which may have been borne by the county or an insurer, a fact that bears on whether they are his loss) — and punitive damages if the standard of Civil Code § 3294 can be met against a defendant from whom they are recoverable. Whether his pre-death pain, suffering or disfigurement is recoverable on the state survival count depends on § 377.34: on the text read for this page, an action filed after the subdivision (b) window, and not within its preference clause, may not include those damages. The date of filing, not the date of death, is the operative fact on the text read, and counsel must confirm the statute's current text before relying on it.

The federal claims. The decedent was a pretrial detainee, so his § 1983 claim is judged under Gordon's objective standard (Roadmap 042). If a jury finds that a constitutional violation caused his death, Chaudhry permits the federal survival count to include his pre-death pain and suffering notwithstanding § 377.34, and Valenzuela permits loss-of-life damages. The successors bring that claim as they bring the state survival claim (Moreland). The adult daughter and the son may each assert a Fourteenth Amendment familial-association claim (Moreland: "both the parents and children"); the mother may as a parent; whether the spouse may is a question the authority opened here does not answer. Their claims require conduct that shocks the conscience; sick-call and nursing decisions made over two days would, as an analytical inference, ordinarily be decisions made with time to deliberate within Lemire's formulation, so the question would be whether the responsible persons were deliberately indifferent — a question this page does not answer. Against the contractor and the county as entities, each claim requires a policy, custom or decision that was the moving force (Monell; Tsao; Roadmap 047).

Prerequisites. For the state counts against the county and its custody staff (for example, a § 845.6 theory that an officer knew or had reason to know of a need for immediate medical care and failed to take reasonable action to summon it), a Government Claims Act claim is required, with its six-month presentation period running from accrual (§ 911.2). For state professional-negligence counts against the contractor's clinicians and the contractor, the § 364 notice is required and § 340.5 governs the period. For the federal counts, neither applies, but the borrowed two-year period does (Wallace v. Kato). If any Wellpath debtor entity is a potential defendant, Roadmaps 090/091 must be checked before suit. Nothing in this paragraph states when any period expires.

A step-by-step approach#

1. Secure the role facts. Obtain certified copies of the death certificate. Assemble the documents that show the family's composition (marriage, divorce or its absence, domestic-partnership registration, births, deaths of any children) and any dependency facts. Record them on Worksheet 111.
2. Decide how the estate will act. With counsel, decide whether a personal representative should be appointed or whether all successors in interest can and will sign a § 377.32 declaration; arrange a guardian ad litem for any minor.
3. Identify every potential heir and successor. The one-action rule requires joinder of all known heirs; the successor's declaration requires a truthful statement about anyone with a superior right. Do not proceed by omission.
4. Identify defendants by role and entity. Distinguish public entities and public employees from private contractors and their employees; identify the contracting entity from public records rather than branding; check whether any potential defendant is a Wellpath debtor (Worksheet 101; Roadmaps 003, 004, 086, 087, 090, 091).
5. Identify every limitation source with counsel. Government Claims Act presentation for state counts against public entities; § 364 notice and § 340.5 for professional negligence; § 335.1 for general negligence and borrowed federal periods; § 366.1 for the decedent's surviving claims; bankruptcy bar dates and plan provisions. Record sources and triggers in the five-component table below; compute nothing without counsel.
6. Request records lawfully. As personal representative (or in another capacity the law recognizes), request the decedent's medical records from the jail's provider and the hospital; request the coroner's or medical examiner's report; request public records of the county's health care contract and any custody-death report (Roadmaps 064, 083, 087; Model 132). Never access jail or medical systems directly.
7. Preserve. Send preservation demands to the county, the contractor and the hospital for video, logs, sick-call slips, medication administration records, electronic health record audit trails and communications (Roadmap 007; Model 132).
8. Present the government claim for state counts against public entities and employees, describing each claimant's claim accurately (Roadmap 078; Model 131).
9. Arrange targeted expert review promptly for clinical breach and cause-of-death questions (Roadmaps 066, 074, 075), but do not wait for a final expert opinion while claim-presentation or suit deadlines expire. Whether expert declaration, certification or other support is required at filing depends on the specific jurisdiction and claim, and an expert should not replace contemporaneous proof of responsible actors and timelines.
10. Evaluate and serve any required § 364 notice to each qualifying health care provider when a professional-negligence action is contemplated; analyze the 90-day waiting and limited limitations-extension rules separately from Government Claims Act presentation, and verify the notice and service evidence. Do not assume a § 364 notice cures a missed public-entity claim deadline.
11. Plead distinct actions with proper party capacity and timely joinder, identifying statutory wrongful-death claimants, the estate's representative or authorized successor, and separately eligible federal familial-association claimants. Keep state death, state survival, § 1983 survival and individual familial-association counts separate; submit the § 377.32 declaration where a successor proceeds, and do not count on later addition of a survival claim relating back (Quiroz). Do not allege a fact unless you have a good-faith factual basis for it.
12. Document damages by count — the heirs' losses, the decedent's pre-death losses, and any federal survival damages — on Worksheet 112 (Roadmap 076).

Elements of the claim#

Wrongful death (Code Civ. Proc. § 377.60). (1) The decedent's death; (2) caused by the wrongful act or neglect of the defendant, which requires proof of the elements of the underlying tort — for negligence, duty, breach and causation; for professional negligence, the standard of care, its breach and causation to a reasonable medical probability (Roadmap 066); for a public employee's failure to summon care, the § 845.6 elements; (3) the plaintiff is a person § 377.60 authorizes (or the personal representative on their behalf), and all known heirs are joined; (4) damages within § 377.61. (Grade: Settled as to the statutory components; the underlying tort elements are addressed in Roadmaps 044 and 066.)

State survival (Code Civ. Proc. §§ 377.20, 377.30, 377.34). (1) The decedent held a cause of action at death (or one that arises under § 377.20(b)); (2) the cause of action survives; (3) the plaintiff is the personal representative or, if none, the successor in interest who has satisfied § 377.32; (4) damages within § 377.34. (Grade: Settled — statute text.)

Federal survival (42 U.S.C. §§ 1983, 1988(a)). (1) The decedent's constitutional claim on its own elements (Gordon for detainees; Estelle/Farmer for sentenced prisoners; Monell for entities); (2) state law authorizes a survival action and the plaintiff meets its requirements (Moreland); (3) damages as federal law permits, including pre-death pain and suffering and loss of life where the violation caused the death (Chaudhry; Valenzuela). (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit.)

Familial association (Fourteenth Amendment, via § 1983). (1) The plaintiff is a parent or child of the decedent (Moreland; other relationships are a counsel question); (2) official conduct that shocks the conscience — deliberate indifference where there was time to deliberate, purpose to harm in a rapidly evolving situation (Lemire; Moreland); (3) causation of the loss of the relationship; (4) for an entity defendant, Monell liability. (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit as to elements (1)–(3) for parents and children.)

Do not allege a fact unless you have a good-faith factual basis for it. In a death case, that rule applies with particular force to the family's composition and dependency facts, to the § 377.32 declaration, and to allegations about what any clinician knew.

Potentially relevant defendants#

Defendants are identified by role and function, and every identification must rest on evidence, not on branding, a uniform, a badge or a logo on a form.

• Individual clinicians — nurses, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, physicians and mental-health clinicians who saw, triaged, declined to see, or made decisions about the decedent; whether each was employed by a public entity or a private contractor determines which state rules apply (Roadmap 045).
• Custody staff — officers who received requests, conducted checks or responded to an emergency; relevant to § 845.6 theories and to federal claims (Roadmap 059).
• Supervisors and medical directors — only on evidence of their own conduct, not their titles (Roadmap 045).
• The county or other public entity — vicariously under § 815.2 to the extent no immunity applies; under § 845.6's exception; under § 1983 only for its own policy or custom (Roadmaps 047, 078).
• The private health care contractor — under state law for its employees' torts within the scope of employment (respondeat superior; Lisa M. v. Henry Mayo Newhall Memorial Hospital, AR-C24, R1 pending) and, under § 1983, only for its own policy or custom (Tsao; Roadmap 047). The legal entity that contracted with the county, the entity that employed the clinicians, and any affiliated entity must each be identified from records (Roadmaps 003, 004, 101).
• An outside hospital and its clinicians — if the decedent's care after transfer is at issue, under ordinary professional-negligence rules.

Check Roadmaps 090/091 before suing any Wellpath debtor entity.

Administrative prerequisites#

• Government Claims Act presentation for state-law damages claims against a public entity (Gov. Code §§ 905, 910, 911.2, 945.4; AR-S501, AR-131-S01, AR-096-S01, AR-096-S02) and, through the Act's provisions on claims against public employees (Gov. Code § 950.2, not opened), for claims against employees whose employer's claim is barred. The heirs' and the estate's claims should each be considered. Late-claim relief exists under § 911.4 (AR-S503) and is addressed in Roadmap 079.
• No presentation for § 1983 (Williams v. Horvath, AR-C08).
• Notice of intention to sue a health care provider under Code Civ. Proc. § 364 (AR-096-S04) for professional-negligence counts, including wrongful-death counts based on professional negligence.
• Probate prerequisites — appointment of a personal representative, or the successor's declaration under § 377.32 with a certified death certificate.
• PLRA exhaustion. 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a) speaks of actions brought by a prisoner confined in a jail, prison or other correctional facility (AR-096-F04). An action commenced after the death by a personal representative, successor in interest or heir is not, on the text, an action brought by a confined prisoner; whether an action the decedent filed while confined, and that is continued under § 377.31, carries exhaustion questions with it is a separate issue (Grade: Analytical inference; authority not opened; Roadmap 080).
• Bankruptcy. Where any Wellpath debtor entity is involved, the claims process, the plan and the plan injunction may govern before any civil action (Roadmaps 090/091).

Limitation periods#

The table states sources and triggers. It does not state when any period ends, and it computes nothing.

Evidence and records to obtain#

Records key: H = presently has lawfully; R = obtainable by statutory or public-records request; D = discovery or subpoena only; P = potentially privileged or private; K = someone else must preserve but need not produce voluntarily (Roadmap 007); X = must not access, copy or remove.

• Death certificate (certified copies) — R; required for the § 377.32 declaration.
• Family-composition documents — marriage certificate, divorce or dissolution records or evidence of their absence, domestic-partnership registration, birth certificates, death certificates of any deceased child — H/R.
• Dependency evidence — bank transfers, money orders, receipts, shared-household evidence, the decedent's letters — H.
• The decedent's own medical records from the jail provider and the hospital, requested by the personal representative or other person the law recognizes (Health & Saf. Code § 123110, AR-S401, R1 pending; the definition of a patient's representative for a deceased patient, Health & Saf. Code § 123105(e), AR-058-S09; 45 C.F.R. § 164.502(g)(4), AR-064-R02) — R.
• Coroner's or medical examiner's report and autopsy — R (availability to next of kin varies by county; Roadmap 064).
• Custody-death reports to the Attorney General and related public records — R (Gov. Code § 12525, AR-093-S02; Roadmaps 064, 093).
• The county's health care contract, amendments, monitoring reports and invoices — R (Gov. Code § 7920.000 et seq., AR-S801, R1 pending; Roadmap 087).
• Sick-call requests, grievances and responses the decedent kept — H where they are among the decedent's property returned to the family; otherwise D.
• Booking, classification, housing and cell-check logs; body-worn camera and fixed video; radio and call logs — K then D (some may also be R under the Public Records Act, subject to exemptions).
• Medication administration records, nursing notes, provider orders, electronic health record audit trails — K then D (the decedent's own chart portions also R).
• Mortality reviews, root-cause analyses and peer-review records — P (Evid. Code § 1157, AR-032-S04; Roadmaps 064, 085); the underlying facts are not privileged.
• Policies, protocols, staffing records and training records — K then D (Roadmaps 048–050, 110).
• Insurance policies and indemnity provisions — D, with the contract's indemnity terms also R (Roadmap 086).
• Bankruptcy filings, proofs of claim and plan documents — public docket (Roadmap 090).
• Other detainees' records — P/X: never request or possess them outside formal discovery under a protective order.
• The jail's or contractor's electronic systems, charts, peer-review files and internal drives — X: never access, copy or remove.

Favorable and adverse facts#

Facts that tend to help the death actions. A complete and accurate account of the family's composition, with documents; a personal representative or a declaration signed by all successors; contemporaneous sick-call requests or grievances describing escalating symptoms; vital signs or findings that were recorded and not acted on; a short interval between the last missed opportunity and the collapse; hospital records describing the condition at arrival in terms an expert can connect to the delay; evidence of the decedent's pre-arrest role in the family (support, caregiving, regular contact); a government claim presented accurately for each claimant; and preservation demands that preceded any loss of video or logs.

Facts that tend to hurt them. An heir who was not joined or a declaration that overstated the declarant's role; a family dispute that a defendant can exploit; evidence that the decedent refused evaluation or treatment (Roadmap 072); a condition that, in the experts' view, would probably have been fatal even with timely care; contemporaneous assessments that, though wrong in hindsight, were reasoned; long estrangement or lack of contact, which bears on the heirs' noneconomic loss; a late government claim; and, in the federal familial-association claim, an emergency that unfolded too fast for deliberation.

Likely defenses#

The defense playbook (Roadmap 133) collects the arguments in detail. In death cases the recurring ones are:

• Wrong plaintiff or defective representation — a claimant outside § 377.60; a missing or inaccurate § 377.32 declaration; a survival claim brought by a person who is not the representative or successor; omitted heirs (Cross; Ruttenberg).
• Prerequisites — no timely government claim for state counts; no § 364 notice; a limitation period run.
• Immunity — § 844.6 for the public entity, with argument about whether § 845.6's exception reaches the facts (a need for immediate care; a failure to summon, rather than inadequate treatment); qualified immunity for public employees on the federal claims (not for privately employed guards under Richardson; Roadmap 077).
• Damages limits — § 377.34(a) on the state survival count; MICRA on professional-negligence counts; no punitive damages against public entities (Gov. Code § 818; City of Newport v. Fact Concerts, AR-C73; Roadmap 076).
• Merits — no breach of the standard of care; no deliberate indifference or objective unreasonableness; no conscience-shocking conduct; no entity policy or custom.
• Causation — the death would have occurred despite timely care; an intervening cause (Roadmap 075).
• Bankruptcy — a stay, discharge, plan injunction or claim-processing defense only after the named debtor, legal relationship, relevant date and operative docket orders are verified from original bankruptcy records; Roadmaps 090/091 contain unresolved namespace issues and are not stand-alone proof of a defendant-specific injunction.
• **Challenge to *Chaudhry*** — a defendant may preserve the argument that Chaudhry and Valenzuela were wrongly decided, as the Valenzuela dissent argued; district courts in the Ninth Circuit are bound by them unless and until they are overruled.

The deep companions to Roadmap 133 for these defenses are Playbooks 138 (causation, damages and mitigation) and 135 (exhaustion and claim presentation, including each claimant's own claim).

Causation#

Causation appears three times in a death case and must be proven each time. For the wrongful-death action, the defendant's wrongful act or neglect must have caused the death. For the survival action, it must have caused the decedent's pre-death injury; a survival claim can exist even where causation of the death itself is contested, because the decedent may have suffered compensable injury from the delay regardless of the ultimate outcome. For the federal survival claim, causation of the death matters twice: once for liability, and again because Chaudhry's displacement of § 377.34 is tied to cases in which the violation caused the death.

The Ninth Circuit's treatment of causation in Lemire illustrates how a custody-death record is assessed at summary judgment. Deliberate-indifference claims require that the defendant's conduct be "an actual and proximate cause" of the injury; "If reasonable persons could differ" on causation, summary judgment is inappropriate and the question should be left to a jury; and on the record there, "a jury could conclude that had [the officers] provided CPR immediately, [the prisoner] might have survived." (Grade: Settled in the Ninth Circuit as to the summary-judgment standard; the application is record-specific.)

In professional-negligence claims California requires causation to a reasonable medical probability (description level; authority not opened for this page; Roadmap 075), and whether and how a reduced chance of survival is compensable is addressed in Roadmap 075, which this page does not anticipate. The heirs' familial-association claim requires that the conscience-shocking conduct caused the loss of the relationship — in practice, the death. Expert testimony is ordinarily indispensable: the treating hospital's findings, the autopsy, and a qualified expert's opinion on what timely evaluation would have shown and what treatment would have achieved (Roadmaps 074, 075).

Damages and remedies#

The remedies matrix (Roadmap 096.2) and the damages Roadmap (076) carry the detail; the structure in death cases is this. The heirs' wrongful-death damages are those that are "just" under § 377.61, excluding the decedent's own survival damages, and are divided among the heirs by the court; in professional-negligence cases against health care providers their noneconomic component is subject to § 3333.2's wrongful-death category limits. The state survival damages are the decedent's pre-death loss, including punitive damages only if the substantive statutory standard and defendant eligibility are proved, and excluding pain, suffering and disfigurement for actions first filed on or after January 1, 2026 unless a separate legally applicable exception is demonstrated. A qualifying older filing or pre-2022 preference requires proof of exact procedural history; § 377.34(f) preserves independent statutory elder/dependent-adult protections without proving their elements. The federal survival damages are measured by federal law and, where the violation caused the death, may include pre-death pain and suffering (Chaudhry) and loss of life (Valenzuela); punitive damages may be awarded against individual defendants on the federal standard but not against a municipality (Roadmap 076). The familial-association damages compensate the family member's own loss. Attorney's fees may be awarded to a prevailing party on the § 1983 claims (42 U.S.C. § 1988(b), AR-081-F05). The verdict form must prevent duplication among these heads, and a settlement must allocate among them with care, because the allocation affects who receives what and, in a professional-negligence case, how the MICRA limits apply.

Discovery#

Roadmaps 084 (discovery in correctional health care cases) and 038 (discovery method) carry the detail. In death cases the priorities are the complete chart and its audit trail; the sick-call, medication-administration and cell-check records for the relevant days; video and radio logs; the emergency-response timeline; the staffing for the shifts involved; the contractor's protocols for the presenting complaint; the mortality-review process (with the § 1157 limits on committee records and the rule that underlying facts are not privileged; Roadmap 085); the county contract and monitoring records; and depositions of the clinicians, the custody staff and the entity designees (Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(b)(6), AR-S945, R1 pending; Code Civ. Proc. § 2025.230, AR-038-S02). Defendants, for their part, will take discovery on the family's composition, the decedent's relationships and support, the decedent's health history and prior custody, and every family member's communications about the death. Protective orders govern the use of medical and custody records produced in discovery, and nothing produced under one may be published.

CFMG/Wellpath-specific relevance#

Why this may matter in a CFMG/Wellpath setting. California counties have contracted with private correctional health care companies to provide medical services in county jails. The inherited research archive includes unverified references to Chapter 11 proceedings under lead Case No. 24-90533 in the Southern District of Texas, to a proposed distinction between California Forensic Medical Group, Inc. and Wellpath CFMG, Inc., and to a debtor number 24-90556 (inherited AR-B01/AR-B071/AR-B12). None of those docket assertions was authenticated against original court dockets in this run, and they are research leads rather than verified corporate identity or operative injunction findings. The heirs' wrongful-death claims and the decedent's survival claims belong to different legal claimants; bankruptcy treatment, if relevant, must be decided from the actual debtor identities, applicable orders, dates, notice and plan documents rather than assumed from shared branding. Roadmaps 090/091 must not be treated as resolving the namespace or the actual scope of debtor protection. Which entity contracted with a county, which employed the clinicians, and which was insured are questions answered by the county contract and its amendments (Roadmaps 086, 087), by entity records (Roadmaps 004, 101), and by discovery — never by branding on a badge, a form or a website. Nothing here states that any entity caused any death, violated any duty, or is liable to any heir, successor or estate.

Primary authorities#

Related roadmaps#

003, 004, 007, 040, 041, 042, 043, 044, 045, 047, 059, 064, 066, 072, 074, 075, 076, 077, 078, 079, 080, 083, 084, 085, 086, 087, 089, 090, 091, 096.2, 101, 109, 111, 112, 129.1, 130, 131, 132, 133.

Companion worksheet#

Worksheet 111 (Death in Custody) records the decedent's details, the persons who may act under § 377.60, the probate status, the documents and the records requests; Worksheet 112 (Damages and Mitigation) records the losses by count; Worksheet 101 (Entity Identity) records the contracting, employing and insured entities; Worksheet 109 (Custody Medical Records) records the medical and custody records by source and request status. The dedicated companions are Worksheet 122 (Heirs, Successors and Family Records Worksheet), for the heirship and succession record — a family-composition chart that lists each potential § 377.60 claimant by subdivision, each potential successor in interest, each person's documents, minors and guardians ad litem, and the § 377.32 declaration's signatories — so that the one-action rule and the declaration can be satisfied from a single verified record, and Worksheet 119 (Clinical-Course and Causation Timeline Worksheet), for the clinical course.

What this page cannot do#

It cannot say whether any death was caused by any person's act or omission, whether any family member holds any claim, who succeeds to any decedent's estate or in what shares, whether any claim was timely, or what any case is worth. It cannot substitute for probate counsel, for litigation counsel, or for the expert review that every death case requires. It states the structure of the law as read on the date shown, flags the provisions whose currency must be confirmed — above all Code Civ. Proc. § 377.34 — and directs the reader to the companion Roadmaps for the standards, the prerequisites and the defenses that each claim will face.