Mathews ex rel. D.W. v. Illinois

690 F.Supp.3d 808

Shanice MATHEWS, as guardian ad litem and ON BEHALF OF her son D.W., Plaintiff, v. The State of ILLINOIS, et al., Defendants.

Case No. 18-cv-6675

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division

Signed September 5, 2023

Christa Yvonne Nicols, Pro Hac Vice, Shira Lauren Feldman, Pro Hac Vice, Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, Washington, DC, Patrick V. Dahlstrom, Pomerantz, Chicago, IL, Willem Watson Bloom, Despres, Schwartz, and Geoghegan, Ltd., for Plaintiff.

Michael T. Dierkes, R. Douglas Rees, Office of the Illinois Attorney General, Chicago, IL, for Defendants State of Illinois, Illinois Department of State Police, J.B. Pritzker, Brendan Kelly.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Joan B. Gottschall, United States District Judge

Shanice Mathews brings this proposed class action against the State of Illinois, its governor, the Illinois Department of State Police ("ISP"), and its director under section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 ("Rehabilitation Act"), 29 U.S.C. § 794, and the Illinois Civil Rights Act of 2003 ("ICRA"), 740 Ill. Comp. Stat. § 23/5(a)(2), on behalf of her son, D.W., an African-American youth (aged 11 when the live, third amended complaint ("TAC") was filed). See TAC ¶¶ 19-25, 104-11, ECF No. 139; Fed. R. Civ. P. 17(c). Mathews and D.W. live in Chicago's Garfield Park neighborhood, where hearing gunshots is a weekly, and sometimes daily, part of life. TAC ¶ 19. The TAC describes the epidemic of gun violence in the City of Chicago as a "public health emergency" that is disproportionately concentrated in predominately African-American neighborhoods. See TAC ¶¶ 28-31. Citing studies conducted by the University of Chicago, the Chicago Police Department ("CPD"), and others, Mathews alleges that D.W. and other children who live in these neighborhoods suffer from posttraumatic stress disorder ("PTSD") and other trauma-related disabilities as a result of their exposure to gun violence. See TAC ¶¶ 28-31. As a reasonable accommodation, the TAC requests declaratory and injunctive relief compelling defendants to use the full extent of their regulatory authority over firearms dealers licensed in Illinois to reduce the flow of guns into Chicago, thereby reducing the exposure of children in the proposed class to future incidents of gun violence. See TAC ¶¶ 8-10, 81-89.

Two motions are before the court. Defendants move to dismiss the TAC for lack of standing under Article III of the Constitution and for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. See Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(1), 12(b)(6). Mathews moves to certify a class of African-American children who live in Chicago or used to live in Chicago and who, as a result of their exposure to gun violence, are either disabled or at risk of becoming disabled. See TAC ¶ 20; Fed. R. Civ. P. 23(a)-(b). Applying the Supreme Court's June 23, 2023, decision in United States v. Texas, 143 S. Ct. 1964, the court dismisses the third amended complaint for lack of Article III standing.

I. Procedural Background

Due primarily to an extended stay pending mediation in the Seventh Circuit, this case has not proceeded beyond the complaint stage. See Mathews v. Illinois, No. 18-cv-6675, order at 3-4 (N.D. Ill. June 10, 2023). The original complaint named three individual plaintiffs, including Mathews, each of whom sued as the guardian of an African-American minor child who lived, or formerly lived, in a Chicago neighborhood with a high rate of gun violence. See Compl. ¶¶ 4-6, ECF No. 1. The original complaint traced each child's PTSD diagnosis to exposure to gun violence. Id. Many of the original complaint's factual allegations are similar to the TAC's, but the disability-related claims in the original complaint were pleaded under Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act ("ADA"), 42 U.S.C. § 12101 et seq., rather than the Rehabilitation Act. See Compl. 26-27. Defendants moved to dismiss the original complaint for lack of standing and for failure to state a claim. ECF No. 24. Like the TAC, the original complaint requested only declaratory and prospective injunctive relief intended to reduce the flow of crime guns into Chicago. See Compl. 26, 27, 28-29.

On September 30, 2019, the court granted defendants' motion to dismiss the original complaint in part, in an opinion captioned in the name of the former lead plaintiff, Demetria Powell ("Powell"). Powell v. Illinois, 2019 WL 4750265 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 30, 2019), reconsideration denied, 2019 WL 10349403 (Dec. 18, 2019). The court dismissed two of the three named plaintiffs for lack of standing, leaving only Powell, the guardian of her minor son D.P. Id. at *7-8. When the complaint was filed, D.P. lived in Chicago's Austin neighborhood, but the children represented by the two dismissed plaintiffs lived in nearby suburbs. Id. at *8; see Compl. ¶¶ 4-6. Because there was no indication that the two children living outside Chicago intended to return, neither faced "a reasonably likely ongoing threat of experiencing the harm alleged in the complaint—exposure to gun violence in Chicago." Powell, 2019 WL 4750265, at *8 (footnote and citations omitted). On the other hand, the court ruled that D.P., represented by Powell, had standing to sue for declaratory and forward-looking injunctive relief. Id. at *6-11.

On the merits, the court denied defendants' motion to dismiss Powell's claims. See id. at *11-17. Among other things, the court held that the Eleventh Amendment did not bar the original complaint's claims under Title II of the ADA. Id. at *14-15 & nn.8 & 9. Defendants moved for reconsideration, which was denied. 2019 WL 10349403 (Dec. 18, 2019).

Defendants noticed an interlocutory appeal of the portion of the court's decision denying their motion to dismiss Powell's ADA claims on Eleventh Amendment grounds. Not. of Appeal 1, ECF No. 45. By agreement of the parties, this case was stayed for approximately 21 months while they attempted mediation in the Seventh Circuit. See Minute Entry, June 16, 2020, ECF No. 78; Status Reports on Mediation, ECF Nos. 80, 82, 84, 86, 88, 90, 92. In July 2021, Powell indicated that she wished to restart litigation in the district court. She obtained leave to file an amended complaint in July 2021, adding Mathews as a second plaintiff. Pl.'s Unopp. Mot. for Leave to File First Am. Compl., ECF No. 94; see also First Am. Compl., ECF No. 97. The first amended complaint also removed the ADA claims and substituted a Rehabilitation Act claim. See First Am. Compl. 33-34. Based on the filing of the amended complaint, defendants moved to dismiss their interlocutory appeal as moot. Appellants' Mot. to Dismiss Appeal & Vacate Decision Below, Powell v. Illinois, et al., No. 19-3144 (7th Cir. Aug. 6, 2022). The Seventh Circuit granted the motion and dismissed the appeal as moot. Order, Powell v. Illinois, et al., No. 19-3144 (7th Cir. Aug. 6, 2022).

Next, defendants moved in this court to dismiss the first amended complaint. ECF No. 105. In lieu of responding, the then-plaintiffs filed a motion for leave to file a second amended complaint correcting an error in the first. See Pls.' Unopp. Mot. to File Corrected Compl. 1-2, ECF No. 113; Second Am. Compl., ECF No. 115. Defendants refiled their motion to dismiss, this time aimed at the second amended complaint. ECF No. 116. The parties have fully briefed this motion. See ECF Nos. 120 and 125. After the motion to dismiss the second amended complaint was fully briefed, plaintiffs moved without opposition to file a third amended complaint dropping Powell because she and D.P. had moved to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and were no longer members of the proposed class. Mot. for Leave to Voluntarily Withdraw Powell as Pl. 1, ECF No. 135. The third amended complaint names Mathews as the sole plaintiff. ECF No. 139 ¶ 19. The parties agree that defendants' motion to dismiss the second amended complaint applies to the third amended complaint without rebriefing. See Mot. for Leave to Voluntarily Withdraw Powell as Pl. 1.

After the motion to dismiss the TAC was fully briefed, Mathews moved for leave to conduct discovery. ECF No. 126. The court denied this motion as unnecessary because "the pendency of [a] motion to dismiss does not automatically stay discovery." Powell v. Illinois, No. 18-cv-6675, order at 2 (N.D. Ill. Apr. 5, 2022). Defendants subsequently moved to stay discovery pending a ruling on their motion to dismiss. ECF No. 134; see also Resp. and Reply Briefs, ECF Nos. 140 and 141. The court granted defendants' motion to stay discovery in part because Mathews "provide[d] no specifics on the discovery she propose[d] to take," and she did not "request any discovery in order to pursue her arguments for class certification." Mathews v. Illinois, No. 18-cv-6675, order at 3 (N.D. Ill. June 10, 2022). Mathews then filed her pending motion for class certification, ECF No. 151, which is fully briefed. See Resp. and Reply Briefs, ECF Nos. 160 and 163.

II. The Third Amended Complaint

Defendants attack the sufficiency of the third amended complaint in their pending motion to dismiss. For purposes of defendants' motion, the court must accept the TAC's well-pleaded factual allegations as true and draw all reasonable inferences from them in the light most favorable to Mathews. See Hernandez v. Ill. Inst. of Tech., 63 F.4th 661, 666 (7th Cir. 2023) (citing Crescent Plaza Hotel Owner, L.P. v. Zurich Am. Ins. Co., 20 F.4th 303, 308 (7th Cir. 2021)) (failure to state a claim); Bria Health Servs., LLC v. Eagleson, 950 F.3d 378, 381-82 (7th Cir. 2020) (citing Remijas v. Neiman Marcus Grp., LLC, 794 F.3d 688, 691 (7th Cir. 2015)) (lack of subject matter jurisdiction).

A. Prevalence and Distribution of Gun Violence in Chicago

Chicago's "endemic problem of gun violence" has existed for decades. See United States v. Gonzalez, 3 F.4th 963, 967 (7th Cir. 2021); see also TAC ¶¶ 1-11, 28-31. Indeed, Chicago's gun violence problem is so well-known that the Seventh...