Arriaga v. Otaiza

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

PHILIP M. HALPERN, United States District Judge:

Plaintiff, currently incarcerated at Sing Sing Correctional Facility (“Sing Sing”), proceeding pro se and in forma pauperis, brings this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that Hearing Officer Joanna Otaiza (“Otaiza”) and New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision (“DOCCS”) Director of Special Housing Donald Venettozzi (“Venettozzi”, and together, “Defendants”) violated his due process rights in connection with a disciplinary hearing and were deliberately indifferent to the conditions of his confinement in keeplock at Sing Sing. (Doc. 2, “Compl.”). Plaintiff alleges further that these were acts of retaliation and conspiracy against him.

Defendants filed a motion to dismiss the Complaint under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6) on May 7, 2021. (Doc. 28; Doc. 29, “Def. Br.”). Plaintiff opposed the motion on June 8, 2021 (Doc. 30, “Pl. Opp.”), and the motion was fully briefed with the filing of Defendants' reply memorandum of law in further support of their motion to dismiss on June 21, 2021 (Doc. 31, “Reply Br.”).

For the reasons set forth below, Defendants' motion to dismiss is GRANTED.

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BACKGROUND

Plaintiff filed a lawsuit in March 2016 entitled Arriaga v. Gage, No. 16-CV-01628 (PMH) (“Arriaga I”) regarding, inter alia, his medical care at Sing Sing, as well as claims against Sergeant Alvarado-who is not a party to this action-for allegedly confiscating Plaintiff's prescription glasses and cane, and falsifying a misbehavior report against Plaintiff.^[1] (Compl. at 4-5, 17).^[2]While a motion by Alvarado and others to dismiss Arriaga I was pending, on September 15, 2017, Alvarado searched Plaintiff's cell and purported to find items that violated Sing Sing's rules, including “excess/altered clothes” and four temporary passes. (Id. at 3).

Two other correction officers also searched the law library, focusing primarily on workstation #6 where Plaintiff had been working. (Id. at 2-3). Plaintiff alleges that prior to these searches he had a job as a law library clerk and was housed on the “honor block, ” also known as the Earned Housing Unit, which afforded him many privileges. (Id. at 2, 8-9). As a result of the searches, however, Plaintiff was immediately placed on keeplock status and removed from his library law clerk position. (Id. at 8-9). Another inmate told Plaintiff that he overheard staff saying that Plaintiff would be found guilty no matter what “because they want Plaintiff out of the law library.” (Id. at 4).

The disciplinary hearing began on September 20, 2017 and concluded on October 27, 2017. (Id. at 3). When Plaintiff entered the hearing room on October 27, 2017, Otaiza already had a guilty disposition completed, even though she had previously granted Plaintiff's request to review and respond to documents filed by the facility; she read the guilty disposition into the record, denying

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Plaintiff any opportunity to respond to or oppose the evidence. (Id. at 8). Otaiza sentenced Plaintiff to ninety days' keeplock, and loss of recreation, phones, packages, and commissary. (Id.).

On November 14, 2017, Plaintiff appealed the decision to Venettozzi, who affirmed the decision on December 1, 2017. (Id. at 11-12). On December 15, 2017, Plaintiff filed an Article 78 proceeding in the New York State Supreme Court, Albany County, challenging the disciplinary determination, and on March 26, 2018, the state court reversed the decision and ordered that it be expunged from Plaintiff's records. (Id. at 12).

Plaintiff commenced the instant action on August 26, 2020.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

I. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1)

“Federal courts are courts of limited jurisdiction, and Rule 12(b)(1) requires dismissal of an action ‘when the district court lacks the statutory or constitutional power to adjudicate it.'” Schwartz v. Hitrons Sols., Inc., 397 F.Supp.3d 357, 364 (S.D.N.Y. 2019) (quoting Makarova v. United States, 201 F.3d 110, 113 (2d Cir. 2000)). “The party invoking the Court's jurisdiction bears the burden of establishing jurisdiction exists.” Hettler v. Entergy Enters., Inc., 15 F.Supp.3d 447, 450 (S.D.N.Y. 2014) (citing Conyers v. Rossides, 558 F.3d 137, 143 (2d Cir. 2009)). When deciding a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(1) at the pleadings stage, “the Court ‘must accept as true all material facts alleged in the complaint and draw all reasonable inferences in the plaintiff's favor.'” Id. (quoting Conyers, 558 F.3d at 143); see also Doe v. Trump Corp., 385 F.Supp.3d 265, 274 (S.D.N.Y. 2019).

When “the defendant moves for dismissal under Rule 12(b)(1) . . . as well as on other grounds, the court should consider the Rule 12(b)(1) challenge first since if it must dismiss the complaint for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, the accompanying defenses and objections

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become moot and do not need to be determined.” Saint-Amour v. Richmond Org., Inc., 388 F.Supp.3d 277, 286 (S.D.N.Y. 2019) (quoting United States v. New York City Dep't of Hous., Pres. & Dev., No. 09-CV-06547, 2012 WL 4017338, at *3 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 10, 2012)).

II. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6)

A Rule 12(b)(6) motion enables a court to dismiss a complaint for “failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.'” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). A claim is plausible on its face “when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). “The plausibility standard is not akin to a ‘probability requirement,' but it asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” Id. (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). The factual allegations pled “must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level ....” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555.

“When there are well-ple[d] factual allegations, a court should assume their veracity and then determine whether they plausibly give rise to an entitlement to relief.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 679. Thus, the Court must “take all well-ple[d] factual allegations as true, and all reasonable inferences are drawn and viewed in a light most favorable to the plaintiff[].” Leeds v. Meltz, 85 F.3d 51, 53 (2d Cir. 1996). The presumption of truth, however, “‘is inapplicable to legal conclusions,' and ‘[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice.'” Harris v. Mills, 572 F.3d 66, 72 (2d Cir. 2009) (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (alteration in original)). Therefore, a plaintiff must provide “more than labels and conclusions” to show entitlement to relief. Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555.

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A complaint submitted by a pro se plaintiff, “however inartfully ple[d], must be held to less stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers ....” Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 106 (1976) (quoting Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520-21 (1972) (internal quotation marks omitted)). Because pro se plaintiffs “‘are often unfamiliar with the formalities of pleading requirements,' courts must ‘apply a more flexible standard in determining the sufficiency of a pro se [complaint] than they would in reviewing a pleading submitted by counsel.'” Smith v. U.S. Dep't of Justice, 218 F.Supp.2d 357, 361 (W.D.N.Y. 2002) (quoting Platsky v. Cent. Intelligence Agency, 953 F.2d 26, 28 (2d Cir. 1991)). While “[p]ro se complaints are held to less stringent standards than those drafted by lawyers, even following Twombly and Iqbal, ” dismissal is proper “where a plaintiff has clearly failed to meet minimum pleading requirements.” Thomas v. Westchester Cty., No. 12-CV-06718, 2013 WL 3357171, at *2 (S.D.N.Y. July 3, 2013) (internal citations omitted); see also Chavis v. Chappius, 618 F.3d 162, 170 (2d Cir. 2010) (“Even in a pro se case . . . although a court must accept as true all of the allegations . . . in a complaint, that tenet is inapplicable to legal conclusions, and threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice.” (internal quotation marks omitted)). Therefore, while the Court must “draw the most favorable inferences that [a plaintiff's] complaint supports, [it] cannot invent factual allegations that [a plaintiff] has not pled.” Chappius, 618 F.3d at 170. The Court has also a duty to interpret “the pleadings of a pro se plaintiff liberally and interpret them ‘to raise the strongest arguments that they suggest.'” McPherson v. Coombe, 174 F.3d 276, 280 (2d Cir. 1999) (quoting Burgos v. Hopkins, 14 F.3d 787, 790 (2d Cir. 1994)).

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ANALYSIS

I. Lack of Subject-Matter Jurisdiction

The Court, as guided by precedent, turns first to Defendants' arguments regarding the lack of subject-matter jurisdiction and dismissal required under Rule 12(b)(1).

A. New York Correction Law § 24

Plaintiff does not specifically identify any state law claims for relief aside from generally referencing the existence of such claims. (See Compl. at 1 (claiming that the Complaint raises “supplemental state law claims”)). Defendants argue that to the extent Plaintiff raises supplemental state law claims concerning any constitutional violations, the Court must dismiss those claims for want of subject-matter jurisdiction. (Def. Br. at 13-14).

New York Correction Law § 24 provides, in pertinent part:

1. No civil action shall be brought in any