The US Supreme Court Thursday declined to consider whether jail officials who “respond unreasonably” to “obvious risk” are protected by qualified immunity.

Derek Monroe was placed on suicide watch while in a Texas jail by jail administrator Mary Jo Brixey. Monroe attempted to commit suicide. Sheriff Leslie Cogdill allegegedly spoke with Monroe and reflected Monroe’s mental health concern on his intake form. However, Cogdill and Jesse Laws, the jailer on duty, placed Monroe in a cell alone with a 30-inch cord. According to court documents, “jail policy, jail training, and common sense directed the officials against isolating an inmate known to be suicidal in a cell with an obvious potential ligature.”

Laws watched Monroe hang himself but did not call 911 or administer aid to Monroe. The petition states that “[c]alling for emergency assistance was a precaution that Laws knew he should have taken.” A trial court held that defendants Law, Cogdill and Brixey were not entitled to qualified immunity. However, the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that the defendants are entitled to qualified immunity.

Justice Sotomayor dissented to the court’s denial, calling Laws’ inaction an “inexplicable and unreasonable decision” that showed a “deliberate indifference to Monroe’s life-or-death medical needs.”