Chrisco v. Hayes

LUKE IRVIN CHRISCO, Plaintiff, v. CRAIG S. HAYES, Deputy, Boulder County Jail and Sheriff's Department, Defendant.

Civil Action No. 17-cv-00072-MSK-MEH

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLORADO

November 13, 2017

Chief Judge Marcia S. Krieger

ORDER DENYING MOTION TO RECONSIDER, OVERRULING OBJECTION TO MAGISTRATE JUDGE'S ORDER, AND DISMISSING CASE

THIS MATTER comes before the Court on Plaintiff Luke Irvin Chrisco's Motion to Reconsider (#53) and Objection (#62) to the Magistrate Judge's July 20, 2017 Recommendation (#48) that the Defendant's Motion to Dismiss (#28) be granted. Also at issue is Mr. Chrisco's Motion to Stay (#58).

ALLEGATIONS OF FACT

The Court offers a brief summary of the Complaint's allegations here and elaborates as necessary in its analysis.

Mr. Chrisco, who appears pro se,¹ is currently incarcerated at the Centennial Correctional Facility in Cañon City, Colorado.

The Complaint alleges that Mr. Chrisco was detained at the Boulder County Jail after probation revocation proceedings were initiated against him. He filed a motion to dismiss the probation revocation proceedings, arguing that the State of Colorado's Sex Offender Intensive Supervised Probation program ("SOISP program") was unconstitutional. When he filed his reply brief ("Reply Brief") with the Boulder County District Court, he kept a personal copy of the it with the intent of using it in order to pursue an independent civil action against the State of Colorado to prohibit imposition of the SOISP program against him. Ultimately, Mr. Chrisco's probation was revoked.

The day before the sentencing hearing on the probation violation, Mr. Chrisco was in the jail library, when Deputy Hayes² instructed him to leave. Deputy Hayes prevented Mr. Chrisco from picking up his paperwork, which included his Reply Brief. After Mr. Chrisco left, Deputy Hayes placed a different inmate in the law library, and purportedly destroyed the Reply Brief. When Mr. Chrisco discovered that he did not have the Reply Brief, he returned to the library to retrieve it, but it was no longer there. He attempted to obtain an additional copy of it from Boulder County District Court, but was unable to do so. He contends that without the Reply Brief, he was unable to file a civil action seeking to enjoin the SOISP program.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Mr. Chrisco filed his Complaint (#1), and upon initial review, the Court dismissed) all claims against Defendants other than Deputy Hayes (#5). Two claims against Deputy Hayes remain. One asserts that Deputy Hayes violated Mr. Chrisco's rights under the Equal Protection Clause and the other that Deputy Hayes violated his rights under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Asserting that he is entitled qualified immunity, Deputy Hayes filed a Motion to Dismiss (#28) Mr. Chrisco's remaining claims. The Court referred the Motion to the Magistrate Judge. The Magistrate Judge issued a Recommendation (#48) that the motion be granted. Specifically, the Magistrate Judge found that (1) the Complaint did not state a traditional equal protection claim because it failed to allege that Mr. Chrisco is a member of a protected class or that similarly situated individuals were treated more favorably; (2) the Complaint also failed to state a "class-of-one" equal protection claim because it did not identify other similarly situated individuals who were treated more favorably than Mr. Chrisco and its allegations were too conclusory to demonstrate that Deputy Hayes' actions were irrational, abusive, and wholly unrelated to any legitimate state activity; and (3) the Complaint failed to state a due process claim because Mr. Chrisco was not a pretrial detainee, Deputy Hayes' conduct was not sufficiently egregious so as to shock the conscience, and Mr. Chrisco had an alternate, adequate remedy under Colorado law. Finally, the Magistrate Judge sua sponte recommended that Mr. Chrisco not be granted leave to amend the Complaint.

Mr. Chrisco filed a Motion to Reconsider (#53), in which he asked the Court to reconsider the recommendation that he not be granted leave to amend the Complaint. He then filed his Objection (#62) to the Recommendation. In the Objection, he does not challenge the Magistrate Judge's finding that the Complaint does not state a plausible, traditional equal protection claim or a substantive due process claim. Instead, he argues that the Complaint adequately pleads a class-of-one equal protection claim and asks for leave to amend the Complaint to correct the deficiencies in his due process claim.

ANALYSIS

A. Standard of Review

Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 72(b), the Court reviews the objected-to portions of the Recommendation de novo.

Deputy Hayes invokes the doctrine of qualified immunity seeking dismissal under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). Under the doctrine of qualified immunity individual government actors are protected from civil liability if their conduct does not violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a reasonable person would have known. Wilson v. Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 609 (1999); Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982). When a defendant asserts a qualified immunity defense in a motion to dismiss, the Court determines (1) whether a complaint's allegations are sufficient to show that the defendant violated a constitutional or statutory right and (2) whether the constitutional or statutory right was clearly established when the alleged violation occurred. See Peterson v. Jensen, 371 F.3d 1199, 1202 (10th Cir. 2004). The Court may undertake these two inquiries in whichever order it deems fit. Pearson v. Callahan, 555 U.S. 223, 232 (2009).

The first inquiry is indistinguishable from the inquiry that the Court would take in assessing a garden-variety Rule 12(b)(6) challenge to the sufficiency of the pleadings. See Saucier v. Katz, 533 U.S. 194, 201 (2001). In considering a motion to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), the Court is limited to the factual allegations of the Complaint. Oxendine v. Kaplan, 241 F.3d 1272, 1275 (10th Cir. 2001); Jacobsen v. Deseret Book Co., 287 F.3d 936, 941 (10th Cir. 2002); Dean Witter Reynolds, Inc. v. Howsam, 261 F.3d 956, 961 (10th Cir. 2001). It accepts all well-pleaded allegations in the Amended Complaint as true and view those allegations in the lightmost favorable to the nonmoving party. Stidham v. Peace Officer Standards & Training, 265 F.3d 1144, 1149 (10th Cir. 2001) (quoting Sutton v. Utah State Sch. for the Deaf & Blind, 173 F.3d 1226, 1236 (10th Cir. 1999)). A claim is subject to dismissal unless it is "plausible on its face." Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). To make such an assessment, the Court first discards those averments in the Amended Complaint that are merely legal conclusions or "threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements." Id. at 678-79. The Court takes the remaining, well-pleaded factual contentions, treats them as true, and ascertains whether those facts (coupled, of course, with the law establishing the requisite elements of the claim) support a claim that is "plausible" as compared to merely being "conceivable" or "possible". What is required to reach the level of "plausibility" varies from context to context, but generally, allegations that are "so general that they encompass a wide swath of conduct, much of it innocent," are not sufficient. Khalik v. United Air Lines, 671 F.3d 1188, 1191 (10th Cir. 2012).

The second, "clearly established" inquiry examines whether the contours of the constitutional right were so well-settled, in the particular circumstances presented, that "every reasonable official would have understood that what he is doing violates that right." Reichle v. Howards, 566 U.S. 658, 664 (2012).

Here, the Court begins with the analysis of the sufficiency of the allegations in the Complaint to state a claim, but only considers the findings to which Mr. Chrisco has specifically objected. All findings to which no objections have been made are reviewed for clear error, and finding none, the Court adopts them.

B. Class-of-One Equal Protection Claim

Mr. Chrisco objects to the recommendation that his class-of-one equal protection claim be dismissed. He argues that the Magistrate Judge disregarded multiple allegations pertinent to theclaim, specifically, the allegation, "The jail deputies did not mess with the papers of other prisoners - only Mr. Chrisco's papers were repeatedly destroyed or confiscated and deprived from him." He also argues that the Magistrate Judge failed to consider allegations that Deputy Hayes destroyed the Reply Brief because he hated Mr. Chrisco for submitting grievances against him, filing a lawsuit against him, and "being a sex offender who was publically known in the press and on top of this daring to question the system of sex offender treatment."

The Equal Protection Clause prohibits government actors from treating people differently than those who are similarly situated without adequate justification. Engquist v. Or. Dep't of Agric., 553 U.S. 591, 601-02 (2008). A traditional equal protection claim requires a showing that a defendant engaged in discrimination against members of a protected class. An alternative type of equal protection claim known as "a class-of-one claim" is not based on discrimination against members of a class, but instead asserts that a government actor discriminated against an individual out of spite or another improper motive. See SECSYS, LLC v. Vigil, 666 F.3d 678, 685-88 (10th Cir. 2012). For Mr. Chrisco to state a class-of-one equal protection claim, the Complaint must contain factual allegations that plausibly show that: (1) Deputy Hayes treated others who were similarly situated in all material aspects to Mr. Chrisco more favorably than he treated Mr. Chrisco; and (2) there is no objectively reasonable basis for Deputy Hayes' differential treatment of Mr....