Lindsay v. Lewis

DERRICK JAVON LINDSAY, Plaintiff, v. ROBERT C. LEWIS, et al., Defendants.

1:11CV67

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE MIDDLE DISTRICT OF NORTH CAROLINA

August 21, 2013

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND RECOMMENDATION

OF UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

The instant matter comes before the undersigned United States Magistrate Judge for recommended rulings on Plaintiff's Motion to Amend (Docket Entry 36), Plaintiff's Motion in Limine (Docket Entry 39), and Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Docket Entry 40). (See Docket Entry dated May 7, 2013; see also Docket Entry dated Feb. 15, 2012 (assigning case to undersigned Magistrate Judge).) For the reasons that follow, the Court should grant Defendants' instant Motion and should deny Plaintiff's instant Motions as moot.¹

I. Background

Plaintiff commenced this case by filing a pro se prisoner form Complaint under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. (Docket Entry 2.) The Complaint alleges that Plaintiff, an inmate at Scotland Correctional Institution in Laurinburg, North Carolina, sustained injuries to his mouth in a fall that occurred when his shackles caught on the stairs of a prison van as he attempted to exit the vehicle. (See id. at 4.) The Complaint apparently asserts claims under the Eighth Amendment pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against the officers who transported Plaintiff, as well as against various supervisors and prison officials, concerning Defendants' alleged deliberate indifference to the dangers the vehicle steps presented to shackled inmates and the alleged inadequacy of subsequent medical attention Plaintiff received. (See id. at 4-10.)

To support their instant Motion for Summary Judgment, Defendants filed affidavits from various officials involved in the incident and related documents (attached as exhibits). (See Docket Entries 41-1, 41-2, 41-3, 41-4, 41-5, 41-6.)² In connection withhis Responses, Plaintiff provided a number of exhibits which either duplicate Defendants' exhibits (compare Docket Entry 44 at 21, with Docket Entry 41-1 at 8; compare Docket Entry 45 at 10-12, with Docket Entry 41-1 at 8-9) or which otherwise fail to contradict the evidence submitted by Defendants in any material way (see Docket Entry 44 at 7-20, 22-23). This latter category includes: (1) two grievance reports that discuss the incident in question in a manner materially consistent with the facts presented in the affidavits provided by Defendants (Docket Entry 44 at 7, 22); (2) an apparent copy of the North Carolina Department of Correction's Standard Operating Procedures, Chapter 4: Custody and Security (id. at 8-15); (3) an unpublished opinion of the North Carolina Court of Appeals apparently hand-copied from "Google Scholar" (id. at 16-19); and (4) a hand-copied version of an alleged letter Plaintiff received from "North Carolina Prisone [sic] Legal Services, Inc.," informing him that it would not represent him in the instant matter (id. at 20).

The uncontested record evidence indicates that Defendants Patterson and Martin transported Plaintiff from Scotland Correctional Institution to Central Prison on June 3, 2010. (Docket Entry 41-1 at 1; Docket Entry 41-2 at 1.) Defendant Patterson "opened the inmate passenger door [of the van] . . . . [Plaintiff] was standing up when [Defendant Patterson] opened the door. [Defendant Patterson] leaned down to let the transport van'sstep down, but before [she] could, [Plaintiff] took his foot and pushed the step forward." (Docket Entry 41-1 at 1-2.) Plaintiff stepped forward and, before Defendant Patterson could move to assist him, he "lost his balance and fell forward. . . . [He] fell with his feet still on the step and his two hands flat on the curb above his chest." (Id. at 2.) Upon inquiry from Defendant Patterson, Plaintiff indicated that "he had broken his tooth" but that he had not hit his head. (Id.) Defendants Patterson and Martin took Plaintiff to the Central Prison emergency room. (Id.; Docket Entry 41-2 at 2.) The emergency room staff referred him to the prison's dental clinic. (Docket Entry 41-5 at 1.) At the dental clinic, Plaintiff received treatment for several broken or cracked teeth, one tooth was removed, and a small "wound was closed in the usual manner with sutures." (Id. at 2.)

Plaintiff visited the dental clinic at Scotland Correctional Institution for follow-up three times over the next several days. (Id.) Plaintiff complained of some pain and that "spicules of bone were coming out of the extraction site." (Id.) However, the dentist indicated that "this was not unusual following this type of injury" and determined that the injuries were healing. (Id.) In October of 2010, Plaintiff returned to the dental clinic, again complaining of pain, and the clinic referred him to the dental clinic at Central Prison for a root canal. (Id.) Plaintiff received the root canal "as a result of trauma that occurred inJune [2010]." (Id. at 3.) In April of 2012, Plaintiff received a second root canal on another tooth that had been damaged during the June 2010 fall. (Id.)

The Complaint requests compensatory damages in the amount of $2,125,000 and punitive damages in the same amount. (Docket Entry 2 at 11.) It also seeks an injunction requiring that Defendants "replace [the] steps with a safer method of exiting the van." (Id.) Finally, the Complaint requests that Defendants pay the cost of repairing the dental damage from the incident, as determined and performed by a dentist of Plaintiff's choosing. (Id.)

Plaintiff's instant Motion to Amend (Docket Entry 36) seeks leave to amend Plaintiff's prior "Memorandum to Introduce Exhibits to be Used at Trial" (Docket Entry 35). (See Docket Entry 36 at 1.) Plaintiff's instant Motion in Limine (Docket Entry 39) "seeks to prevent [] [D]efendants or their attorney or any other party associated with [this case] from discussing [] [P]laintiff's criminal record, prison disoplinary [sic] record and any other matter which is not relevant to this case or which will influence the jury or judge appointed to this case unfairly" (id. at 1).

II. Summary Judgment Standard

"The [C]ourt shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). Such a genuine dispute exists if the evidence presentedcould lead a reasonable factfinder to return a verdict in favor of the non-moving party. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 255 (1986). In making this determination, the Court must view the evidence and any reasonable inferences therefrom in a light most favorable to the non-moving party. Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587 (1986).

The party moving for summary judgment may discharge its burden by identifying an absence of evidence to support the non-moving party's case. See Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 325 (1986). The non-moving party then must "set forth specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Matsushita Elec. Indus., 475 U.S. at 586-87 (citation omitted) (emphasis in original). In this regard, the non-moving party must convince the Court that evidence exists upon which a finder of fact could properly return a verdict in favor of the non-moving party. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 252 (citation omitted); see also Francis v. Booz, Allen & Hamilton, Inc., 452 F.3d 299, 308 (4th Cir. 2006) ("Mere unsupported speculation is not sufficient to defeat a summary judgment motion if the undisputed evidence indicates that the other party should win as a matter of law.").

III. Discussion

The Complaint alleges that Defendants violated Plaintiff's Eighth Amendment rights by exposing him to a condition Defendants knew to be unsafe (i.e., the van stairs) and failing to take stepsto protect Plaintiff from said condition. (See Docket Entry 2 at 6-11.) Liberally construed, the Complaint also alleges that Plaintiff suffered from inadequate dental treatment. (See id. at 5-6, 11.) In these regards, "when the State takes a person into its custody and holds him there against his will, the Constitution imposes upon it a corresponding duty to assume some responsibility for his safety and general well-being." DeShaney v. Winnebago Cnty. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 489 U.S. 189, 199-200 (1989). In other words, "when the State by the affirmative exercise of its power so restrains an individual's liberty that it renders him unable to care for himself, and at the same time fails to provide for his basic human needs — e.g., food, clothing, shelter, medical care, and reasonable safety — it transgresses the substantive limits on state action set by . . . the Due Process Clause." Id. at 200 (emphasis added).

However, not every injury suffered by a prisoner "translates into constitutional liability for prison officials responsible for the victim's safety." Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 834 (1994). Plaintiff thus cannot maintain a constitutional claim against Defendants merely based on allegations that they negligently failed to protect him from an unsafe condition because "deliberate indifference describes a state of mind more blameworthy than negligence," Farmer, 511 U.S. at 835.

Instead, this standard applies:

First, a constitutional violation occurs only where the deprivation alleged is "objectively, sufficiently serious." For a claim based on a failure to prevent harm, a [plaintiff] must show that he [was] detained or incarcerated "under conditions posing a substantial risk of serious harm." . . . Second, an official must have "a sufficiently culpable state of mind." In prison[/jail]-conditions cases, the requisite state of mind is "deliberate indifference."

Brown v. Harris, 240 F.3d 383, 388-89 (4th Cir. 2001) (quoting Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 834 (1994)) (internal citations and secondary internal quotation marks omitted) (emphasis added). Similarly, as to claims based on denial of medical care, Plaintiff "must demonstrate that the [officials] acted with ...