Sanchez-Rivera v. United States

JUAN SANCHEZ-RIVERA, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, Defendant.

No. 22-cv-1254-BAS-BGS

United States District Court, S.D. California

February 17, 2023

ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO AMEND COMPLAINT (ECF No 7)

Hon Cynthia Bashant United States District Judge

Before the Court is Plaintiff Juan Sanchez-Rivera (“Plaintiff”)'s unopposed motion for leave to file an amended pleading that adds Defendant Management &amp Training Corporation (“MTC”) to this tort action. (Mot., ECF No. 7; Proposed Am. Compl. (“Am Compl.”), ECF No. 7-1; Exhibits, ECF No. 7-2.) For the reasons set forth below, the Court GRANTS Plaintiff's Motion.

I. BACKGROUND^[1]

A. Initial Complaint and Screening Order

Plaintiff is being detained by Immigration & Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) at the Imperial Regional Detention Facility (“IRDF”) in Calexico, California while he awaits removal proceedings. (Compl. ¶ 1, ECF No. 1.) ICE contracted MTC, a private corporation, to operate IRDF. (Id.) IRDF staff is employed by MTC, not the Government. (Id.) MTC personnel effectively perform the functions of correctional officers at IRDF; they do so under “the direct supervision of their federal contract officer representative.” (Id.)

In his initial Complaint, Plaintiff claims that he and a group of other detainees commenced a hunger strike on April 1, 2020 to protest IRDF's “lack of precautionary measures relat[ed] to the COVID-19 pandemic.” (Compl. ¶ 32.) In response, IRDF staff ordered an emergency lockdown. (Id.) While Plaintiff was waiting for the lockdown to be lifted, “MTC administrative operators and security staff, under the direct supervision of [an ICE officer],” physically removed Plaintiff from his cell, mechanically restrained him, and placed him in IRDF's “solitary confinement unit under [allegedly] fabricated charges of threats against staff and inciting others to riot.” (Id. ¶ 33.) Plaintiff was later told these charges were based upon “accusations of two confidential sources.” (Id. ¶ 35.)

On April 2, 2020, Plaintiff received an incident report detailing the bases of the charges against him. (Compl. ¶ 35; Information Report, Ex. B to Compl., ECF No. 1-3.) The Incident Report, which is printed on MTC letterhead, was authored by IRDF Gang Intelligence Officer Jose Builteman. (Compl. ¶¶ 34-35.) It states the group of detainees who organized the hunger strike had pressured others to partake and had planned to assault IRDF staff. (Id. ¶ 35.) Plaintiff alleges the Incident Report “only vaguely identified [his] role in the allegations.” (Id.) Nevertheless, Plaintiff was charged with, inter alia, “Inciting others to riot” under IRDF's rules and procedures. (Id.)

IRDF's Institution Disciplinary Panel (“IDP”) held a hearing on April 3, 2020, at which it adjudicated the charges levied against Plaintiff. (See Compl. ¶ 45.) The IDP concluded in a written report that the proffered “‘[e]vidence [was] not enough to support [the] charges' against Plaintiff” and, therefore, it determined “[n]o prohibited act was committed” to warrant sanctioning Plaintiff. (Id. (citing Hearing Report, Ex. D to Compl., ECF No. 1-5).) But on April 7, 2020, IRDF Facility Administrator Sixto Marrero overruled the IDP's conclusions, found Plaintiff guilty of “Inciting others to riot,” and imposed a sanction of “30 days of disciplinary detention.” (Marrero Memorandum, Ex. E to Compl., ECF No. 1-6; Compl. ¶ 46.)

Plaintiff filed a grievance pursuant to MTC and ICE policy on April 15, 2020, challenging Marrero's determination. (See Compl. ¶ 47; Grievance, Ex. F to Compl., ECF No. 1-7; MTC Detainee Handbook, Ex. G to Compl., ECF No. 1-8.) However, his grievance was denied by IRDF Assistant Facility Administrator Edward Ruiz. (Compl. ¶ 47.) Plaintiff then sought to petition ICE directly, but ICE refused to investigate, review, or adjudicate Plaintiff's grievance. (Id. ¶ 52.)

Approximately two years later, in August 2022, Plaintiff commenced the instant action against the United States pursuant to the Federal Tort Claims Act (“FTCA”). (See generally Compl.) He alleged that the actions taken by IRDF officials against him constitute “intentional tortious actions of assault, false imprisonment, and intentional infliction of emotional pain,” and that, as a result of those actions, he suffered “injuries, including physical pain, emotional distress, physiological trauma, and mental deterioration.” (Id. ¶¶ 52, 54.) Plaintiff also contemporaneously moved to proceed in forma pauperis (“IFP”). (IFP App., ECF No. 2.)

Upon review of his IFP Application and Complaint, this Court granted Plaintiff IFP status and found Plaintiff had adequately alleged a claim under the FTCA to surpass the low threshold applied at the pre-answer screening stage under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B). Specifically, the Court found that Plaintiff's allegations of unwarranted disciplinary confinement and the attendant physical and emotional harm he suffered as a result were sufficient to form the basis of a false imprisonment claim. Furthermore, the Court determined Plaintiff had adequately shown the FTCA waived the United States' sovereign immunity from suit. (Order at 6, ECF No. 3.)^[2] Accordingly, the Court directed the U.S. Marshal to effect service of the Complaint upon the United States pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d) and the United States to file a responsive pleading. (Order at 8; see also Answer, ECF No. 16.) The United States initially moved to dismiss Plaintiff's action as time-barred (see ECF No. 11), but later withdrew that motion in light of arguments raised in Plaintiff's opposition (ECF Nos. 1213). The United States then filed an Answer to the Complaint. (ECF No. 16.)

B. Motion for Leave to Amend

Plaintiff seeks to amend his Complaint by adding MTC as a Defendant and asserting “state tort claims” against it in this action. He alleges this Court must exercise supplemental jurisdiction over those claims pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1367(a). (Mot.; Am. Compl. at 6.) Although truncated by comparison, the proposed Amended Complaint's substantive allegations are practically identical to those set forth in the initial Complaint, and the same key documents are appended as exhibits to the new pleading (see ECF No. 7-1).

II. LEGAL STANDARD

A. Rule 15(a)

Rule 15(a) governs a plaintiff's right to add defendants to his or her case.^[3]Under that provision, a plaintiff may amend his complaint once as a matter of course within specified time limits. Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a)(1). “In all other cases, a party may amend its pleading only with the opposing party's written consent or the court's leave. The Court should freely give leave when justice so requires.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(a)(2). Here, Plaintiff invokes Rule 15(a)(2) and requests leave of court to file his proposed Amended Complaint. See Ramirez v. Cty. of San Bernadino, 806 F.3d 1002, 1007 (9th Cir. 2015) (interpreting Rule 15(a) as being “organized substantively, not chronologically,” and thereby authorizing a plaintiff to seek amendment pursuant to Rule 15(a)(2) even if Rule 15(a)(1) also applies to the amendment).

While courts exercise broad discretion in deciding whether to allow leave to amend, they have generally adopted a liberal policy favoring amendment. See DCD Programs, Ltd. v. Leighton, 833 F.2d 183, 186 (9th Cir. 1987) (citing McCartin v. Norton, 674 F.2d 1317, 1321 (9th Cir. 1982)). Accordingly, leave is generally granted unless the court harbors concerns “such as undue delay, bad faith or dilatory motive on the part of the movant, repeated failure to cure deficiencies by amendments previously allowed, undue prejudice to the opposing party by virtue of allowance of the amendment, [and] futility of amendment[.]” Forman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962). The non-moving party here, the United States bears the burden of showing why leave to amend should not be granted. Genentech, Inc. v. Abbott Labs., 127 F.R.D. 529, 530-31 (N.D. Cal. 1989).

B. Pre-Answer Screening under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B)

In addition to their discretion to allow amendment under Rule 15(a), federal courts have a statutorily imposed obligation under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) to review an IFP complaint to determine whether it is “frivolous, malicious, fail[s] to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, or seek[s] monetary relief from a defendant immune from such relief.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B); Calhoun v. Stahl, 254 F.3d 845, 845 (9th Cir. 2001) (holding “the provisions of [Section 1915(e)] are not limited to prisoners”). “[S]ection 1915(e) not only permits but requires a district court to dismiss an in forma pauperis complaint that fails to state a claim.” Lopez v. Smith, 203 F.3d 1122, 1127 (9th Cir. 1999) (en banc).

This Court's own research does not disclose any Ninth Circuit precedent addressing whether Section 1915(e)'s statutory regime mandates district courts to undertake a preanswer screen of an amended IFP complaint where, as here there already is a Section 1915(e)(2)(B)-compliant pleading on file. Considering the purpose of Section 1915(e), and interpreting the text of that statute, this Court concludes it remains obligated to conduct a pre-answer screen in these particular procedural circumstances-where the amended IFP complaint seeks to add claims against a new defendant who has yet to be served or otherwise appear. “[T]he purpose of [screening] is ‘to ensure that the targets of frivolous or malicious suits need not bear the expense of responding.'” Nordstrom v. Ryan, 762 F.3d 903, 920 n.1 (9th Cir. 2014) (quoting Wheeler v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc., 689 F.3d 680, 681 (7th Cir. 2012)). And Section 1915(e)(2) authorizes a federal court to dismiss an IFP pleading that fails to comply with the requirements of that statute's sub-provisions “at any time.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(...