Simons v. Washington, No. 20-1406 (6th Cir. 2021)
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The Prison Litigation Reform Act’s “three-strikes rule,” 28 U.S.C. 1915(g), provides that a prisoner accrues a strike when he brings a frivolous lawsuit. After three strikes, the Act prohibits inmates from filing those lawsuits without paying the initial court fee. Simons, a Michigan prisoner, broke a prison window. Prison officials removed money from his commissary account to make repairs. Simons filed a pro se complaint, targeting this seizure of funds as a violation of state and federal law. The district court allowed Simons to proceed in forma pauperis under 28 U.S.C. 1915(b)(1), then screened Simons’s lawsuit under 28 U.S.C. 1915A and rejected Simons’s federal claims on the merits. The court stated the dismissal would count as a “strike.”
The Sixth Circuit affirmed. Simon’s challenges to the underlying dismissal lacked merit. The court’s “opinion” calling the dismissal a strike is not a judgment, and will not, alone, prohibit Simons from filing a free lawsuit in the future. Section 1915(g) calls on a later court that has before it a civil action brought by the prisoner to engage in a backward-looking inquiry and determine whether the prisoner “on 3 or more prior occasions” has brought an action or appeal that was “dismissed on the grounds that [it was] frivolous, malicious, or fail[ed] to state a claim.”
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