Davis v. Chorak

1

JOSEPH EDWARD DAVIS, Plaintiff, v. ZACHARY D. CHORAK, A. TOOKER, J.C. SCAVARDA, and EATON COUNTY, Defendants.

No. 1:22-cv-166

United States District Court, W.D. Michigan, Southern Division

August 26, 2022

OPINION

SALLY J. BERENS, U.S. Magistrate Judge.

Plaintiff Joseph Davis has sued Defendant Zachary Chorak for injuries he received in an assault and battery that occurred on July 2, 2020, when Chorak attacked Davis while both men were incarcerated at the Eaton County Jail. Davis filed this action in federal court because he has also sued jail employees Deputy Corrections Officers J.C. Scavarda and A Tooker pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that they violated his Fourteenth Amendment rights by failing to protect him from Chorak. Finally, Davis alleges a Monell liability claim against Eaton County.^[1]

Defendants Scavarda, Tooker, and Eaton County (the County Defendants) move for dismissal pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6).^[2] (ECF No. 10.) Scavarda and Tooker allege that Davis fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, and they are entitled to qualified immunity. The County argues that it is entitled to dismissal because Davis fails to allege an underlying constitutional violation, and alternatively, Davis fails to allege a Monell claim. The matter is fully briefed and ready for decision.

For the following reasons, the Court will grant the motion in its entirety and dismiss Davis's complaint against the County Defendants with prejudice.^[3] The Court declines to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the assault and battery claim against Chorak and, therefore, will dismiss it without prejudice.

I. Background

On September 27, 2019, Davis was booked into the Eaton County Jail as a pretrial detainee. (ECF No. 1 at PageID.2.) Davis was charged with possession of methamphetamine, habitual offender, at the time of booking. (ECF No. 11-2 at PageID.64.) He pled guilty to the offense on October 17, 2019. (Id. at PageID.66.) Later, while still housed at the jail, Davis was charged with a second offense of delivery/manufacture of methamphetamine. (ECF No. 11-3 at PageID.73.) He pled guilty to that offense on June 23, 2020. (Id. at PageID.75.)

At intake, Davis was classified at the “4-Medium” security level. Except for the month of February 2020, in which he was elevated to “3-Medium High,” Davis remained at the “4-Medium” level through July 2020. (ECF No. 1 at PageID.2.)

On or about February 29, 2020, Chorak was booked into the jail as a pretrial arrestee or pursuant to a court order, on a charge of unarmed robbery. Defendant Scavarda performed the initial security classification and assigned Chorak a “3-Medium High” designation. The booking report contained the following “‘jail alerts:' sex offender, no IW or RC assignments, disciplinary, prison transport to MDOC ....” It also identified several prior bookings and indicated an “active hold.” (Id. at PageID.3.) On March 30, 2020, Defendant Tooker maintained Chorak's “3-Medium High” classification. On May 1, 2020, Tooker lowered Chorak's classification to “4-Medium.” Tooker maintained that classification on June 4, 2020. (Id.)

On July 2, 2020, Davis, Chorak, and a third inmate were playing a card game in a day room when Davis accused Chorak of cheating. A brief argument ensued, and Chorak attacked Davis without warning. Following the attack, Davis was taken to the hospital, where he was diagnosed with “eye trauma with suspected globe rupture” due to an assault. Davis was thereafter transferred to the University Michigan Hospital for further specialized treatment. He ultimately lost vision in his left eye due to the attack. (Id. at PageID.3-4.)

Chorak's criminal history included, among other things, a conviction for assault with intent to commit sexual penetration. In addition, a classification document from a previous incarceration at the jail in 2019 listed Chorak as “2-Close” based on prior assaultive felony convictions and known past institutional behavior problems. (Id. at PageID.4-5.)

II. Motion Standard

Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), a claim must be dismissed for failure to state a claim on which relief may be granted unless the “[f]actual allegations [are] enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level on the assumption that all of the complaint's allegations are true.” Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 545 (2007). As the Supreme Court more recently held, 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, 677-78 (2009). This plausibility standard “is not akin to a ‘probability requirement,' but it asks for more than a sheer possibility that a defendant has acted unlawfully.” If the complaint simply pleads facts that are “merely consistent with” a defendant's liability, it “stops short of the line between possibility and plausibility of ‘entitlement to relief.'” Id. As the Court further observed:

Two working principles underlie our decision in Twombly. First, the tenet that a court must accept as true all of the allegations contained in a complaint is inapplicable to legal conclusions. Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice. . . Rule 8 marks a notable and generous departure from the hypertechnical, code-pleading regime of a prior era, but it does not unlock the doors of discovery for a plaintiff armed with nothing more than conclusions. Second, only a complaint that states a plausible claim for relief survives a motion to dismiss. . . Determining whether a complaint states a plausible claim for relief will, as the Court of Appeals observed, be a context-specific task that requires the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and common sense. But where 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.”

Id. at 678-79 (internal citations omitted).

III. Discussion

A. Materials the Court May Consider

As an initial matter, the Court must determine what documents or information it may consider beyond the pleadings in deciding the County Defendants' motion, as such determination affects the scope of review.^[4]

In general, when deciding a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim under Rule 12(b)(6), a court's review is limited to the four corners of the pleading at issue. Fed. R. Civ. P 12(d); see also Courser v. Michigan House of Representatives, 404 F.Supp.3d 1125, 1139 (W.D. Mich. 2019) (noting that “[i]n general, in deciding a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss the court is limited to considering only the pleadings”) (citing Rondigo, LLC v. Twp of Richmond, 641 F.3d 673, 682 (6th Cir. 2011)). Nonetheless, it is well established that, in some circumstances, a court may consider matters beyond the pleadings without converting the motion to one for summary judgment under Rule 56. Examples include “any exhibits attached [to the Complaint], public records, items appearing in the record of the case and exhibits attached to defendant's motion to dismiss so long as they are referred to in the Complaint and are central to the claims contained therein.” Bassett v. NCAA, 528 F.3d 426, 430 (6th Cir. 2008). The specific items at issue here include: (1) the Register of Actions, Advice of Rights, and Judgment of Sentence in criminal case No. 2019 0000020274 FH, captioned State of Michigan v. Joseph Davis (ECF No. 11-2); (2) the Register of Actions, Advice of Rights, and Judgment of Sentence in criminal case No. 2019 0000020386 FH, captioned State of Michigan v. Joseph Davis (ECF No. 11-3); (3) a video of the July 2, 2020 assault (ECF No. 11-4); (4) the Register of Actions in criminal case No. 2021 0000020071, captioned State of Michigan v. Zachary Chorak (ECF No. 11-5); and (5) a video of the interview of Davis following the assault (ECF No. 11-6).

First, regarding the Registers of Actions in Davis's and Chorak's criminal cases, it is well established that a court may take judicial notice of the proceedings of other courts, including their docket reports. Chase v. MaCauley, 971 F.3d 582, 587 n.1 (6th Cir. 2020); see also Plassman v. City of Wauseon, No. 95-3736, 1996 WL 254662, at *3 (6th Cir. 1996) (stating that, in considering a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss, “any federal court may take judicial notice of the proceedings in other courts of record”); Rodic v. Thistledown Racing Club, Inc., 615 F.2d 736, 738 (6th Cir. 1980) (observing that federal courts may take judicial notice of the proceedings in other courts of record); Cooper v. Rapp, No. 2:16-cv-163, 2016 WL 7337521, at *3 (S.D. Ohio Dec. 19, 2016) (observing that “the Court's acknowledgment of the pendency of the State Court Proceedings- though not pleaded in Plaintiffs' Amended Complaint-does not convert Defendants' Motion to Dismiss into one for summary judgment”). The Court may therefore consider the Registers of Actions without converting the County Defendants' motion to dismiss into one for summary judgment. The cases Davis cites in his brief (ECF No. 20 at PageID.213-14), do not address this particular circumstance and are not to the contrary.

As for the videos Defendants attach to their brief, they are not critical to determination of the legal issues presented in the motion. That is, the primary focus of the Court's decision is whether the allegations of the complaint satisfy the applicable constitutional standard for imposing liability on the County Defendants. Nonetheless, the videos do provide additional support for the County Defe...