Russell v. Bogle

1

MICKEY RUSSELL, Plaintiff, v. MICHELLE BOGLE, KRIS BOGLE, HASINA JAVED, FAIZA KAREEMI, DREW BECK, QUINTON IVY, JAMES PATRICK CORCORAN, M.D., THOMAS ZUBIK, MICHAEL MCCOTTER, DANIEL DYSLIN, PETER NEUMER, and GRACE B. HOU, Defendants.

No. 23 C 3682

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

May 28, 2024

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

Honorable Sunil R. Harjani, Judge

In this lawsuit, Plaintiff alleges that from late 2015 through October 2022, while he was confined at Elgin Mental Health Center (EMHC) and Chester Mental Health Center (CMHC) or on conditional release, he was abused and seduced into a sexual relationship by Michelle Bogle, a security therapy aide at EMHC. Plaintiff alleges that Defendants Kris Bogle, Hasina Javed, Faiza Kareemi, Drew Beck, Quinton Ivy, James Corcoran Thomas Zubik, Michael McCotter, Daniel Dyslin, Peter Neumer and Grace B. Hou (the “Eleven Defendants” or “Defendants”) were aware of the relationship between Russell and M. Bogle but failed to take any action to stop the abuse. As a result, Plaintiff alleges the Defendants were acting under color of law in their official capacities and violated his substantive and procedural due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.^[1] The Eleven Defendants have moved to dismiss the Complaint pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6) claiming that the Court lacks subject matter jurisdiction and that the Complaint fails to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. For the reasons stated below, the Eleven Defendants' motion [28] is granted in part and denied in part.

Discussion

Plaintiff moves to dismiss the Complaint based on Rules 12(b)(1) and 12(b)(6) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. A Rule 12(b)(1) motion tests whether the Court has subjectmatter jurisdiction. Hallinan v. Fraternal Order of Police of Chi. Lodge No. 7, 570 F.3d 811, 820 (7th Cir. 2009). The plaintiff bears the burden of establishing subject matter jurisdiction. Ctr. for Dermatology & Skin Cancer, Ltd. v Burwell, 770 F.3d 586, 588-89 (7th Cir. 2014). The Court “must accept as true all well-pleaded factual allegations, and draw reasonable inferences in favor of the plaintiff.” Ezekiel v. Michel, 66 F.3d 894, 897 (7th Cir. 1995)

“A motion under Rule 12(b)(6) tests whether the complaint states a claim on which relief may be granted.” Richards v. Mitcheff, 696 F.3d 635, 637 (7th Cir. 2012). To survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, “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)). This pleading standard does not necessarily require a complaint to contain detailed factual allegations. Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555. Rather, “[a] claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Adams v. City of Indianapolis, 742 F.3d 720, 728 (7th Cir. 2014) (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678). When deciding a motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), the court accepts as true all factual allegations in the complaint and draws all inferences in favor of the plaintiff. Heredia v. Capital Management Services, L.P., 942 F.3d 811, 814 (7th Cir. 2019). However, a complaint must consist of more than “threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555).

Rooker-Feldman Doctrine

The Eleven Defendants contend that the Court lacks jurisdiction over Plaintiff's claims, because they are barred by the Rooker-Feldman doctrine since they involve his involuntary commitment and are thus “inextricably intertwined” with that state court judgment. Plaintiff responds that he is not challenging the duration of his involuntary confinement, so Rooker-Feldman doctrine does not apply. Federal courts generally lack jurisdiction to review the decisions of state courts. The Rooker-Feldman doctrine precludes lower federal court jurisdiction over claims made in state court and claims that are inextricably intertwined with state court determinations “no matter how erroneous or unconstitutional the state court judgment may be.” Swartz v. Heartland Equine Rescue, 940 F.3d 387, 390 (7th Cir. 2019) (quoting Kelley v. Med-1 Solutions LLC, 548 F.3d 600, 603 (7th Cir. 2008)). To put it simply, “[w]hen a state court judgment is the cause of a plaintiffs' injury, Rooker-Feldman bars federal review.” Id. at 391. Plaintiff contends that he is not challenging any of the transfers during his confinement or the duration of his confinement, so the Rooker-Feldman doctrine does not apply.

Plaintiff's view of what he is challenging is too narrow. The inquiry is not limited to whether a plaintiff is directly challenging the state court's order; it asks whether the plaintiff's claims are inextricably intertwined with state court determinations. For example, in Gunderson v. Corcoran, the plaintiff was adjudicated not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to a state health facility, and alleged that the staff delayed his conditional release for approximately two years by falsifying documents and giving false testimony, which resulted in plaintiff's petition being denied. No. 21-CV-04891, 2023 WL 6049914, at *4 (N.D. Ill. Sept. 15, 2023). The court found that claims related to the defendant's actions that caused delay in the state court's grant of conditional release were inextricably intertwined with a state court judgment because his alleged injuries from those claims were caused by the state court's ruling finding him not guilty by reason of insanity and denying his conditional release. Similarly in Dopson v. Corcoran, the plaintiff, who was adjudicated not guilty by reason of insanity and committed to a state health facility, alleged that he was emotionally and sexually abused by one of the staff members and that the other defendants allowed this to happen and kept him confined in violation of his rights. No. 19 C 5077, 2020 WL 3268513, at *1-2 (N.D. Ill. June 17, 2020). The court held that any claim that the plaintiff was being wrongfully detained was barred, as the challenge necessarily related back to the state court's decision on his conditional release. Id. at *7.

Plaintiff's claims are analogous to the claims in Gunderson and Dopson. Despite Plaintiff's protestations that he is not challenging the duration of his involuntary confinement, Plaintiff repeatedly alleges that Defendants' actions denied him accurate reports to the criminal court, which, if the reports had been accurate, the court could have ordered his release from custody. Plaintiff further contends in his Response that the Defendants' actions and omissions “created a false ‘constitutionality' for the Plaintiff's involuntary confinement[.]” Doc. [33] at 9. These injuries were caused by the state court's rulings and what the Defendants told the state court in relation to his ongoing confinement, so they are subject to Rooker-Feldman.

Plaintiff tries to save his claims by pointing to Defendants' intentions and their bad faith actions, but Rooker-Feldman bars federal review of state court judgments even when the judgment was obtained through bad faith actions of the defendants. Swartz, 940 F.3d at 391. In Swartz, the plaintiffs alleged that the defendants worked in concert to make false claims of animal neglect to the state court, which resulted in the state court ordering the seizure of plaintiffs' livestock. In their § 1983 claim, the plaintiffs alleged that the seizure occurred with less than probable cause in violation of the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments because it was based on false information given by the defendants. The Seventh Circuit held that this was “the type of claim routinely dismissed under Rooker-Feldman” because finding that the defendants acted wrongfully in seizing the animals would call into question the state court's judgment of there being probable cause that the animals were neglected under state law. Id. at 392. Similarly, Plaintiff claims that the Eleven Defendants acted to cover-up their own misconduct by falsifying his medical records that were reported to the state court when it evaluated whether Plaintiff should be released, which resulted in an extension of Plaintiff's involuntarily confinement. This, as in Swartz, is the type of claim that is dismissed under Rooker-Feldman, because finding the Defendants falsified the records would call into question the state court's decision to continue Plaintiff's involuntary confinement.

In further support of dismissal is the fact that Plaintiff had the opportunity to raise this claim in state court. Rooker-Feldman bars claims if the plaintiff had a “reasonable opportunity” to litigate them in state court. Swartz, at 392. Whether there was a “reasonable opportunity” turns on the difficulties imposed by factors other than the defendant's actions that “precluded a plaintiff from bringing federal claims in state court, such as state court rules or procedures.” Jakupovic v Curran, 850 F.3d 898, 904 (7^th Cir. 2017) (cleaned up). In Gunderson, the court found that the plaintiff had a reasonable opportunity to raise the claim in state court because Illinois law provides for an insanity acquittee to petition for conditional release, which he did, and the plaintiff did not argue that he was prevented to from raising the issue of the defendants providing false statements and evidence with the state court. Gunderson, 2023 WL 6049914, at *5. Similarly, here, Plaintiff alleges that he received a conditional release three times while the alleged conduct...