-KMW DAVIS v. NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS et al, No. 1:2010cv06007 - Document 2 (D.N.J. 2010)
Court Description: OPINION. Signed by Judge Renee Marie Bumb on 11/23/2010. (nz, )
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NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY LEROY DAVIS, Plaintiff, v. NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS, et al., Defendants. : : : : : : : : : : Civil Action No. 10-6007 (RMB) OPINION APPEARANCES: Plaintiff pro se Leroy Davis Camden County Correctional Facility P.O. Box 90431 Camden, NJ 08103 BUMB, District Judge Plaintiff Leroy Davis, a prisoner confined at Camden County Correctional Facility in Camden, New Jersey, seeks to bring this action in forma pauperis pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging violations of his constitutional rights. Based on his affidavit of indigence and the absence of three qualifying dismissals within 28 U.S.C. §1915(g), the Court will grant Plaintiff s application to proceed in forma pauperis pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a) and order the Clerk of the Court to file the Complaint. At this time, the Court must review the Complaint to determine whether it should be dismissed as frivolous or malicious, for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, or because it seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. I. BACKGROUND The following factual allegations are taken from Plaintiff s Complaint and are accepted as true for purposes of this review. Plaintiff alleges that while he was confined in South Woods State Prison, in 2010, he was detained seven months beyond the end of his release date. Plaintiff names as defendants the New Jersey Department of Corrections, the John Doe Administrator of South Woods State Prison, the John Doe Senior Classification Officer, and the New Jersey State Parole Board. Plaintiff alleges that the Administrator of South Woods State Prison sits on the classification board that held him past his release date. He alleges that the Classification Officer is responsible for all the clerical work dealing with inmates and that he calculates the release date. He also alleges that th Classification Officer is responsible for relaying the sentence calculation information to the New Jersey State Parole Board so that the Board can prepare an expiration of sentence ready for the prisoner s release. Finally, he alleges that the Parole Board is responsible for the original setting of [the] sentence imposed by the Judge, that is 2 then sent to The Classification and re-calculated to apply all jail credits. Plaintiff seeks compensatory and punitive damages. II. STANDARDS FOR A SUA SPONTE DISMISSAL This Court must dismiss, at the earliest practicable time, certain in forma pauperis and prisoner actions that are frivolous, malicious, fail to state a claim, or seek monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. See 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2) (in forma pauperis actions); 28 U.S.C. § 1915A (actions in which prisoner seeks redress from a governmental defendant); 42 U.S.C. § 1997e (prisoner actions brought with respect to prison conditions). In determining the sufficiency of a pro se complaint, the Court must be mindful to construe it liberally in favor of the plaintiff. Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520-21 (1972); United States v. Day, 969 F.2d 39, 42 (3d Cir. 1992). The Court must accept as true all of the allegations in the complaint and all reasonable inferences that can be drawn therefrom, and view them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Morse v. Lower Merion School Dist., 132 F.3d 902, 906 (3d Cir. 1997). A complaint is frivolous if it lacks an arguable basis either in law or in fact. Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 325 (1989) (interpreting the predecessor of § 1915(e)(2), the former § 1915(d)). The standard for evaluating whether a 3 complaint is frivolous is an objective one. Deutsch v. United States, 67 F.3d 1080, 1086-87 (3d Cir. 1995). In addition, any complaint must comply with the pleading requirements of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Rule 8(a)(2) requires that a complaint contain a short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief. A complaint must plead facts sufficient at least to suggest a basis for liability. 218, 236 n.12 (3d Cir. 2004). Spruill v. Gillis, 372 F.3d Specific facts are not necessary; the statement need only give the defendant fair notice of what the ... claim is and the grounds upon which it rests. Erickson v. Pardus, 127 S.Ct. 2197, 2200 (2007) (citations omitted). While a complaint ... does not need detailed factual allegations, a plaintiff s obligation to provide the grounds of his entitle[ment] to relief requires more than labels and conclusions, and a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not do, see Papasan v. Allain, 478 U.S. 265, 286, 106 S.Ct. 2932, 92 L.Ed.2d 209 (1986) (on a motion to dismiss, courts are not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a factual allegation ). Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level ... . Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 127 S.Ct. 1955, 1964-65 (2007) (citations omitted). The Supreme Court has demonstrated the application of these general standards to a Sherman Act conspiracy claim. In applying these general standards to a § 1 [conspiracy] claim, we hold that stating such a claim requires a complaint with enough factual matter (taken 4 as true) to suggest that an agreement was made. Asking for plausible grounds to infer an agreement does not impose a probability requirement at the pleading stage; it simply calls for enough fact to raise a reasonable expectation that discovery will reveal evidence of illegal agreement. And, of course, a well-pleaded complaint may proceed even if it strikes a savvy judge that actual proof of those facts is improbable, and that a recovery is very remote and unlikely. ... It makes sense to say, therefore, that an allegation of parallel conduct and a bare assertion of conspiracy will not suffice. Without more, parallel conduct does not suggest conspiracy, and a conclusory allegation of agreement at some unidentified point does not supply facts adequate to show illegality. Hence, when allegations of parallel conduct are set out in order to make a § 1 claim, they must be placed in a context that raises a suggestion of a preceding agreement, not merely parallel conduct that could just as well be independent action. The need at the pleading stage for allegations plausibly suggesting (not merely consistent with) agreement reflects the threshold requirement of Rule 8(a)(2) that the plain statement possess enough heft to sho[w] that the pleader is entitled to relief. A statement of parallel conduct, even conduct consciously undertaken, needs some setting suggesting the agreement necessary to make out a § 1 claim; without that further circumstance pointing toward a meeting of the minds, an account of a defendant s commercial efforts stays in neutral territory. ... Twombly, 127 S.Ct. at 1965-66 (citations and footnotes omitted). The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has held, in the context of a § 1983 civil rights action, that the Twombly pleading standard applies outside the § 1 antitrust context in which it was decided. See Phillips v. County of Allegheny, 515 F.3d 224, 234 (3d Cir. 2008) ( we decline at this point to read Twombly so narrowly as to limit its holding on plausibility to the antitrust context ). 5 Context matters in notice pleading. Fair notice under Rule 8(a)(2) depends on the type of case -- some complaints will require at least some factual allegations to make out a showing that the pleader is entitled to relief, in order to give the defendant fair notice of what the ... claim is and the grounds upon which it rests. Indeed, taking Twombly and the Court s contemporaneous opinion in Erickson v. Pardus, 127 S.Ct. 2197 (2007), together, we understand the Court to instruct that a situation may arise where, at some point, the factual detail in a complaint is so undeveloped that it does not provide a defendant the type of notice of claim which is contemplated by Rule 8. Put another way, in light of Twombly, Rule 8(a)(2) requires a showing rather than a blanket assertion of an entitlement to relief. We caution that without some factual allegation in the complaint, a claimant cannot satisfy the requirement that he or she provide not only fair notice, but also the grounds on which the claim rests. Phillips, 515 F.3d at 232 (citations omitted). More recently, the Supreme Court has emphasized that, when assessing the sufficiency of any civil complaint, a court must distinguish factual contentions -- which allege behavior on the part of the defendant that, if true, would satisfy one or more elements of the claim asserted -- and [t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements. Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 1949 (2009). Although the Court must assume the veracity of the facts asserted in the complaint, it is not bound to accept as true a legal conclusion couched as a factual allegation. Id. at 1950. Thus, a court considering a motion to dismiss can choose to begin by identifying pleadings that, because they are no more than conclusions, are not entitled to the assumption of truth. 6 Id. Therefore, after Iqbal, when presented with a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, district courts should conduct a two-part analysis. First, the factual and legal elements of a claim should be separated. The District Court must accept all of the complaint's well-pleaded facts as true, but may disregard any legal conclusions. Second, a District Court must then determine whether the facts alleged in the complaint are sufficient to show that the plaintiff has a plausible claim for relief. In other words, a complaint must do more than allege the plaintiff's entitlement to relief. A complaint has to show such an entitlement with its facts. See Phillips, 515 F.3d at 234-35. As the Supreme Court instructed in Iqbal, [w]here the well-pleaded facts do not permit the court to infer more than the mere possibility of misconduct, the complaint has alleged-but it has not show[n] - that the pleader is entitled to relief. This plausibility determination will be a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common sense. Fowler v. UPMC Shadyside, 578 F.3d 203, 210-11 (3d Cir. 2009) (citations omitted). Rule 10(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provides: A party must state its claims ... in numbered paragraphs, each limited as far as practicable to a single set of circumstances. ... If doing so would promote clarity, each claim founded on a separate transaction or occurrence ... must be stated in a separate count or defense. Rule 18(a) controls the joinder of claims. In general, [a] party asserting a claim ... may join as independent or alternative claims, as many claims as it has against an opposing party. Rule 20(a)(2) controls the permissive joinder of defendants in pro se prisoner actions as well as other civil actions. 7 Persons ... may be joined in one action as defendants if: (A) any right to relief is asserted against them jointly, severally, or in the alternative with respect to or arising out of the same transaction, occurrence, or series of transactions or occurrences; and (B) any question of law or fact common to all defendants will arise in the action. (emphasis added). See, e.g., Pruden v. SCI Camp Hill, 252 Fed.Appx. 436 (3d Cir. 2007); George v. Smith, 507 F.3d 605 (7th Cir. 2007). In actions involving multiple claims and multiple defendants, Rule 20 operates independently of Rule 18. Despite the broad language of rule 18(a), plaintiff may join multiple defendants in a single action only if plaintiff asserts at least one claim to relief against each of them that arises out of the same transaction or occurrence and presents questions of law or fact common to all. If the requirements for joinder of parties have been satisfied, however, Rule 18 may be invoked independently to permit plaintiff to join as many other claims as plaintiff has against the multiple defendants or any combination of them, even though the additional claims do not involve common questions of law or fact and arise from unrelated transactions. 7 Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller, and Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 1655 (3d ed. 2009). Where a complaint can be remedied by an amendment, a district court may not dismiss the complaint with prejudice, but must permit the amendment. Denton v. Hernandez, 504 U.S. 25, 34 (1992); Grayson v. Mayview State Hospital, 293 F.3d 103, 108 (3d Cir. 2002) (dismissal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)); Shane v. Fauver, 213 F.3d 113, 116-17 (3d Cir. 2000) (dismissal 8 pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(c)(1)); Urrutia v. Harrisburg County Police Dept., 91 F.3d 451, 453 (3d Cir. 1996). III. SECTION 1983 ACTIONS A plaintiff may have a cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for certain violations of his constitutional rights. Section 1983 provides in relevant part: Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory ... subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress ... . Thus, to state a claim for relief under § 1983, a plaintiff must allege, first, the violation of a right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States and, second, that the alleged deprivation was committed or caused by a person acting under color of state law. West v. Atkins, 487 U.S. 42, 48 (1988); Piecknick v. Pennsylvania, 36 F.3d 1250, 1255-56 (3d Cir. 1994). Local government units and supervisors are not liable under § 1983 solely on a theory of respondeat superior. See City of Oklahoma City v. Tuttle, 471 U.S. 808, 824 n.8 (1985); Monell v. New York City Department of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658, 69091, 694 (1978) (municipal liability attaches only when execution of a government s policy or custom, whether made by its lawmakers 9 or by those whose edicts or acts may fairly be said to represent official policy, inflicts the injury complained of); Natale v. Camden County Correctional Facility, 318 F.3d 575, 583-84 (3d Cir. 2003). A defendant in a civil rights action must have personal involvement in the alleged wrongs, liability cannot be predicated solely on the operation of respondeat superior. Personal involvement can be shown through allegations of personal direction or of actual knowledge and acquiescence. Rode v. Dellarciprete, 845 F.2d 1195, 1207 (3d Cir. 1988) (citations omitted). Accord Robinson v. City of Pittsburgh, 120 F.3d 1286, 1293-96 (3d Cir. 1997); Baker v. Monroe Twp., 50 F.3d 1186, 119091 (3d Cir. 1995). It appears that the claim against the South Woods Prison Administrator is based solely on a theory of vicarious liability and is dismissible on that basis. IV. A. ANALYSIS Claims Barred by the Eleventh Amendment Plaintiff names as defendants the New Jersey Department of Corrections and the New Jersey State Parole Board, both of which are immune from suit under the Eleventh Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Eleventh Amendment to the United States Constitution provides that, The Judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or 10 prosecuted against one of the United States by citizens of another State, or by Citizens or Subjects of any Foreign State. As a general proposition, a suit by private parties seeking to impose a liability which must be paid from public funds in a state treasury is barred from federal court by the Eleventh Amendment, unless Eleventh Amendment immunity is waived by the state itself or by federal statute. Jordan, 415 U.S. 651, 663 (1974). See, e.g., Edelman v. The Eleventh Amendment protects states and their agencies and departments from suit in federal court regardless of the type of relief sought. Pennhurst State School and Hospital v. Halderman, 465 U.S. 89, 100 (1984). Similarly, absent consent by a state, the Eleventh Amendment bars federal court suits for money damages against state officers in their official capacities. 169 (1985). See Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159, Section 1983 does not override a state s Eleventh Amendment immunity. Quern v. Jordan, 440 U.S. 332 (1979). Title 28 Sections 1915(e)(2)(B)(iii) and 1915A(b)(2) require this Court to dismiss this action if it seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. In addition, neither states, nor governmental entities that are considered arms of the state for Eleventh Amendment purposes, nor state officers sued in their official capacities for money damages are persons within the meaning of § 1983. Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U.S. 58, 64, 70-71 and n.10 11 (1989); Grabow v. Southern State Correctional Facility, 726 F.Supp. 537, 538-39 (D.N.J. 1989) (the New Jersey Department of Corrections is not a person under § 1983). For the foregoing reasons, all claims against the New Jersey State Parole Board and the New Jersey Department of Corrections must be dismissed with prejudice. B. The Claim for Detention Beyond the End of Term Plaintiff asserts that he was detained beyond the expiration of his term of imprisonment. The Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution, applicable to the individual states through the Fourteenth Amendment, prohibits the states from inflicting cruel and unusual punishments on those convicted of crimes. Chapman, 452 U.S. 337, 344-46 (1981). Rhodes v. This proscription against cruel and unusual punishments is violated by the unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain contrary to contemporary standards of decency. Helling v. McKinney, 509 U.S. 25, 32 (1993). The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has held that imprisonment beyond one s term may give rise to a claim for cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment. Sample v. Diecks, 885 F.2d 1099, 1107-12 (3d Cir. 1989). See The Court first held that there could be no doubt that imprisonment beyond one s term constitutes punishment within the meaning of the Eighth Amendment. 885 F.2d at 1108 (citing Hutto v. Finney, 12 437 U.S. 678, 685 (1978) and Haygood v. Younger, 769 F.2d 1350, 1354 (9th Cir. 1985), cert. denied, 478 U.S. 1020 (1986)). The Court then proceeded to evaluate the circumstances under which incarceration beyond one s term constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. One class of unnecessary and wanton wrongs, and the one most relevant here, is those wrongs totally without penological justification. ... A harm could be thought of as penologically justified in another sense, however. The administration of a system of punishment entails an unavoidable risk of error. In the case of punishment through imprisonment, those errors may result in harms to inmates. Elimination of the risk of error in many instances would be either literally impossible or unfeasible because prohibitively costly. Thus unforeseeable accidents or inadvertent mistakes are a necessary cost of any prison system; they therefore are not repugnant to the conscience of mankind, and do not violate the eighth amendment. The degree to which a harm is unnecessary in the sense of being unjustified by the exigencies of prison administration will affect the state-of-mind requirement a plaintiff must meet to demonstrate that a particular prison official violated the eighth amendment. ... ... Accordingly, we hold that there can be no eighth amendment liability in this context in the absence of a showing of deliberate indifference on the part of the defendant to whether the plaintiff suffers an unjustified deprivation of his liberty. ... To establish § 1983 liability in this context, a plaintiff must first demonstrate that a prison official had knowledge of the prisoner s problem and thus of the risk that unwarranted punishment was being, or would be, inflicted. Second, the plaintiff must show that the official either failed to act or took only 13 ineffectual action under the circumstances indicating that his or her response to the problem was a product of deliberate indifference to the prisoner s plight. Finally, the plaintiff must demonstrate a causal connection between the official s response to the problem and the infliction of the unjustified detention. Among the circumstances relevant to a determination of whether the requisite attitude was present are the scope of the official s duties and the role he or she has played in the everyday life of the prison. Obviously, not every official who is aware of a problem exhibits indifference by failing to resolve it. A warden, for example, although he may have ultimate responsibility for seeing that prisoners are released when their sentences are served, does not exhibit deliberate indifference by failing to address a sentence calculation problem brought to his attention when there are procedures in place calling for others to pursue the matter. On the other hand, if a prison official knows that, given his or her job description or the role he or she has assumed in the administration of the prison, a sentence calculation problem will not likely be resolved unless he or she addresses it or refers it to others, it is far more likely that the requisite attitude will be present. Sample, 885 F.2d at 1108-10 (citations omitted). The Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit has also held that detention beyond one s term may give rise to a claim for deprivation of liberty without due process under the Fourteenth Amendment if a policymaking official establishes a constitutionally inadequate state procedure for depriving people of a protected interest and someone is thereafter deprived of such an interest. Sample, 885 F.2d at 1114. Applying the balancing test of Mathews v. Eldridge, 424 U.S. 319, 335 (1976) to determine what process is due a prisoner facing detention 14 beyond his term, the Court held, procedural due process requires that an inmate with a challenge to the calculation of his release date promptly be listened to by someone having authority to decide the challenge or pass it on for further review and decision. Sample, 885 F.2d at 1115. See also Haygood v. Younger, 769 F.2d at 1356 ( due process in this case required the state to provide Haygood with a meaningful hearing at a meaningful time ). Here, Plaintiff has alleged nothing other than a clerical error, plainly insufficient to state a claim under either the Eighth or the Fourteenth Amendment. Accordingly, this claim will be dismissed with prejudice. V. CONCLUSION For the reasons set forth above, Complaint will be dismissed, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii) and 1915A(b)(1), for failure to state a claim.1 However, because it is conceivable that Plaintiff may be able to supplement his pleading with facts sufficient to overcome the deficiencies noted 1 The Court notes that [g]enerally, an order which dismisses a complaint without prejudice is neither final nor appealable because the deficiency may be corrected by the plaintiff without affecting the cause of action. ... The dispositive inquiry is whether the district court s order finally resolved the case. Martin v. Brown, 63 F.3d 1252, 1257-58 (3d Cir. 1995) (quoting Borelli v. City of Reading, 532 F.2d 950, 951 (3d Cir. 1976)) (other citations omitted). In this case, if Plaintiff can correct the deficiencies of his Complaint, he may file a motion to re-open these claims in accordance with the court rules. 15 herein, the Court will grant Plaintiff leave to move to re-open and to file an amended complaint.2 An appropriate order follows. s/Renée Marie Bumb Renée Marie Bumb United States District Judge Dated: November 23, 2010 2 Plaintiff should note that when an amended complaint is filed, the original complaint no longer performs any function in the case and cannot be utilized to cure defects in the amended [complaint], unless the relevant portion is specifically incorporated in the new [complaint]. 6 Wright, Miller & Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1476 (2d ed. 1990) (footnotes omitted). An amended complaint may adopt some or all of the allegations in the original complaint, but the identification of the particular allegations to be adopted must be clear and explicit. Id. To avoid confusion, the safer course is to file an amended complaint that is complete in itself. Id. 16
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