Billy Tedder v. Sgt. Johnson

Filing

UNPUBLISHED AUTHORED OPINION filed. Originating case number: 8:09-cv-03067-JMC. Copies to all parties and the district court/agency. [999127970]. [12-6687]

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UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT

No. 12-6687

BILLY TEDDER,
Plaintiff - Appellant,
v.
SGT. JOHNSON,
Defendant – Appellee,
and
MARGRETT BELL, Associate Warden of Security; WARDEN ANTHONY
PADULA; DIRECTOR JOHN OZMINT, South Carolina Department of
Corrections,
Defendants.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of
South Carolina, at Anderson.
J. Michelle Childs, District
Judge. (8:09-cv-03067-JMC)

Argued:

March 20, 2013

Decided:

June 12, 2013

Before TRAXLER, Chief Judge, WYNN, Circuit Judge, and HAMILTON,
Senior Circuit Judge.

Reversed and remanded by unpublished opinion.
Chief Judge
Traxler wrote the opinion, in which Judge Wynn and Senior Judge
Hamilton joined.

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Thomas Elwyn Davies, PUBLIC JUSTICE CENTER, Baltimore, Maryland,
for Appellant.
Walker Heinitsh Willcox, WILLCOX BUYCK &
WILLIAMS, PA, Florence, South Carolina, for Appellee.

Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.

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TRAXLER, Chief Judge:
Appellant

Billy

Tedder,

an

inmate

at

Lee

Correctional

Institution (“LCI”) in Bishopville, South Carolina, filed this
§

1983

action

Johnson

used

against

Sergeant

constitutionally

Henry

Johnson,

excessive

alleging

force

when

that

Johnson

pepper-sprayed him while Tedder was attempting to join LCI’s
“pill line” to receive his seizure medication.

Johnson moved

for summary judgment on several grounds: (1) that Tedder failed
to

exhaust

force

his

against

administrative
Tedder

was

remedies;

reasonable;

entitled to qualified immunity.

(2)
and

that
(3)

the

that

use
he

of
was

The district court concluded

that a genuine issue of material fact existed on the exhaustion
issue, but that Tedder failed to adduce sufficient evidence to
establish

a

Accordingly,

violation
the

favor of Johnson.

of

district

his

court

Eighth
granted

This appeal followed.

Amendment
summary

rights.

judgment

in

We reverse the grant

of summary judgment and remand for further proceedings.
I.
We recount the relevant facts in a light most favorable to
Tedder who is the non-moving party.

See, e.g., Robinson v.

Clipse, 602 F.3d 605, 607 (4th Cir. 2010).

Tedder, who is

serving a life sentence in a minimum security unit at LCI, has
been

in

the

custody

of

the

South

Corrections (“SCDC”) since the 1980s.
3

Carolina

Department

of

During this 20-plus year

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period, Tedder accrued three disciplinary citations classified
as “assaultive.” *

There are numerous other charges listed in

Tedder’s disciplinary record, but these are classified as “nonassaultive

disciplinaries”—presumably

relatively minor.

from

that

were

J.A. 77.

Tedder

infractions

suffers

a

significant

seizure

disorder

that

requires him to take medication three times per day immediately
following meals.

If Tedder does not take his medication with

food, he vomits violently.

Moreover, Tedder's seizure condition

causes

dizziness

him

to

experience

several

times

per

day.

Therefore, SCDC doctors issued him a “pass” permitting him to
sit down or lie down when he has bouts of dizziness and to use a
cane.

Additionally,

Tedder

suffers

from

asthma

and

takes

prescription asthma medication.
Prescription medication is distributed at LCI via the “pill
line” in the medical unit.

LCI is divided into a “West Yard”

and an “East Yard”; Tedder’s unit is in the West Yard.

LCI

policy is to not have West Yard and East Yard inmates waiting in
the pill line simultaneously because of previous altercations

*

The record contains little information about the
“assaultive disciplinaries” other than the name of the charged
infraction, the disposition of the charge and the date of the
underlying incident: 1) “Fighting without a weapon,” convicted,
2009; 2) “Striking an employee,” convicted, 2004; and 3)
“Fighting without a weapon,” convicted, 1996. J.A. 77.
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between East and West inmates.

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However, there was evidence that

this policy was not strictly enforced.
For about six months prior to August 28, 2009, Lieutenant
Anthony Graham had been permitting Tedder to leave the mess hall
immediately after his meal and go directly to the pill line
regardless of whether the West Yard or East Yard was currently
in line.
line

on

Johnson had witnessed Tedder leave early for the pill
numerous

occasions.

In

fact,

on

several

of

these

occasions, Johnson was working the “Plaza Gate” through which
inmates must pass to join the pill line.

Johnson often stopped

Tedder from going through this gate until Tedder could show a
pass or a superior officer confirmed that Tedder was permitted
to pass.
On

August

28,

2009,

proceeded to the pill line.

Tedder

ate

lunch

and

immediately

Lt. Graham, who was in charge of

the prison yard for the day, gave Tedder permission to enter the
Plaza Gate in order to stand in the pill line.

Lt. Graham

indicated that he would tell Johnson, who was at the Plaza Gate,
to let Tedder pass for his medication.
Tedder

in

line

to

come

through

the

When Johnson noticed

Plaza

Gate,

however,

he

yelled that Tedder was not getting through and told Tedder to
return

to

his

unit.

At

the

time,

East

Yard

inmates

were

technically supposed to be in the pill line; witnesses, however,

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noticed that inmates from both the East and West Yards were
mingled together in the pill line.
Rather

than

immediately

comply

with

Johnson’s

order

to

leave, Tedder told Johnson that Lt. Graham was going to call him
to confirm that Tedder had permission to pass through the gate
to get his seizure medication.

And, in fact, Lt. Graham did

contact Johnson via radio and instruct him to let Tedder pass
through the gate.

Nonetheless, Johnson repeated to Tedder, “you

ain’t coming through the gate,” and Tedder again insisted that
he

had

permission

from

Lt.

Graham

to

enter.

According

to

witnesses, Johnson became hostile with Tedder, telling him “No,
cracker, you ain’t coming through this gate” and “your cracker
ass is not going to do nothing but go back to the Unit.”
At this point, witnesses observed Tedder moving slowly and
concluded that he was ill.

Tedder informed Johnson, “I can’t

make it back to the dorm, I am too tired and too weak to make it
to the dorm.

I am going to lean against this here wall until I

can make it to the dorm.”

Johnson reacted by poking Tedder’s

nose with his finger and yelling in his face, “You damn cracker,
you’re going to listen to me.”

Tedder tried to turn away from

Johnson, but Johnson sprayed him in the face with approximately
14

ounces

of

pepper

spray,

cough, gag, and vomit.

causing

Tedder

to

gasp

for

air,

According to inmates who watched the

entire sequence of events, “[A]t no time whatsoever did Tedder
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make any threatening moves towards Johnson or anyone else.
no time did Tedder verbally threaten anyone.”

J.A. 88.

At

After

discharging the pepper spray, Johnson grabbed Tedder and shoved
him into the wall and then onto the ground.

Tedder cursed at

Johnson and asked Johnson, “Why the hell did you spray me?”
Johnson then put his knee into Tedder’s back and cuffed Tedder’s
hands behind him.

When Tedder yelled that Johnson was hurting

him, Johnson laughed.
Superior officers eventually arrived and directed Johnson
to take Tedder to get cleaned up.

Tedder was kept in a holding

cell for a few hours and then released back to his unit.

As a

result of this incident, disciplinary charges for refusing or
failing to obey a guard were lodged against Tedder.

The charges

were ultimately dropped.
Johnson’s version of what occurred is different.

According

to Johnson, Tedder simply refused to obey and raised his cane at
Johnson

in

a

menacing

fashion.

Johnson

believes

that

discharging chemical munitions in Tedder’s face was required to
maintain order as he was concerned that Tedder’s unruly behavior
might incite other inmates in the vicinity.
II.
In

the

prison

context,

a

claim

that

officials

applied

excessive force falls under the Cruel and Unusual Punishments
Clause of the Eighth Amendment, which “protects inmates from
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inhumane treatment and conditions while imprisoned.”
v.

Benjamin,

77

F.3d

756,

761

(4th

Cir.

1996);

Williams

see

Iko

v.

Shreve, 535 F.3d 225, 238 (4th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation
marks omitted).
as

to

whether

“Eighth Amendment analysis necessitates inquiry
the

prison

official

acted

with

a

sufficiently

culpable state of mind (subjective component) and whether the
deprivation

suffered

or

injury

inflicted

on

sufficiently serious (objective component).”

the

inmate

was

Williams, 77 F.3d

at 761.
The objective component focuses not on the severity of any
injuries inflicted, but rather on “the nature of the force,”
which must be “nontrivial.”

Wilkins v. Gaddy, 130 S. Ct. 1175,

1179 (2010). The objective component can be met by “the pain
itself,”

even

if

the

prisoner

has

no

“enduring

injury.”

Williams, 77 F.3d at 762 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Regarding

the

subjective

component,

the

key

question

is

“whether force was applied in a good faith effort to maintain or
restore discipline or maliciously and sadistically for the very
purpose of causing harm.”

Whitley v. Albers, 475 U.S. 312, 320-

21 (1986) (internal quotation marks omitted); see Shreve, 535
F.3d at 239.
when

In Whitley, the Court outlined factors to consider

deciding

maliciously:

if

the

prison

official

acted

wantonly

or

(1) the necessity for the application of force;

(2) the relationship between the need for force and the amount
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of force used; (3) “the extent of the threat to the safety of
staff and inmates, as reasonably perceived by the responsible
officials on the basis of the facts known to them” at the time;
and (4) the “efforts made to temper the severity” of the force
applied.
The

Whitley, 475 U.S. at 321.
district

court

concluded

that

Tedder

proffered

insufficient evidence to satisfy the subjective component of his
Eighth Amendment claim.

Applying the Whitley factors, the court

concluded that a reasonable jury could not conclude from the
facts presented that the pepper spray was not used in good faith
but maliciously.

Specifically, the district court relied on the

fact that Tedder did not comply with Johnson’s orders to return
to his unit.

The court noted that in his affidavit, Johnson

stated that the use of mace on Tedder was necessary to “restore
order,

prevent

possible

unrest

among

the

inmates

[in

the

immediate vicinity], and protect the safety of [Johnson], other
inmates, and Tedder.”
We disagree.

As this appeal arises from a grant of summary

judgment, we must view the record in a light most favorable to
Tedder.

Application of the Whitley factors would permit a trier

of fact to conclude that Johnson sprayed Tedder wantonly and
maliciously for the purpose of causing him harm.
is

evidence

application

suggesting
of

force

at

that
the

there
time
9

was
that

no

First, there
need

Johnson

for

the

applied

it.

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Johnson

did

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not

use

the

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mace

on

Tedder

until

after

Tedder

indicated that he was “too tired and too weak to make it to the
dorm,” and was “going to lean against this here wall until [he]
c[ould] make it to the dorm.”

J.A. 73.

Witnesses stated that

Tedder appeared visibly sick and that Tedder had not said or
done anything threatening to Johnson, other guards or anyone
else.

Moreover,

Johnson

was

well

aware

that

Tedder

had

an

actual medical problem for which he had routinely been given
accommodation.

Accordingly,

when

Johnson

applied

the

pepper

spray, Tedder had already indicated that he was not going to
resist and would return to his unit when he was physically able
to do so.

Second, because the facts, viewed in Tedder’s favor,

permit the conclusion that no force was necessary at all, the
Whitley “amount of force” factor favors Tedder as well.
In applying the third Whitley factor, we must consider the
extent of any threat posed by Tedder to the staff or other
inmates, as reasonably perceived by Johnson based on the facts
known to him at the time.

Johnson contends that he believed

Tedder posed a threat because (1) Johnson “knew [Tedder] had a
long history of serious and violent disciplinary infractions,”
and

(2)

Tedder

raised

his

cane

shouted expletives at Johnson.
contains

sufficient

facts

in

a

threatening

J.A. 42-43.

from

which

a

and

Again, the record

trier

conclude that Tedder posed no threat at all.
10

manner

of

fact

could

First, it is

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debatable

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whether

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Tedder

“long

had

a

violent disciplinary infractions.”

history

of

serious

and

Johnson’s characterization

of Tedder’s disciplinary record is undercut by the fact that in
more than 20 years of SCDC custody, Tedder has only been cited
for three “disciplinaries” serious enough to be categorized as
“assaultive.”
question

More importantly, nothing about the incident in

suggests

that

Tedder

posed

a

threat.

Tedder

was

visibly in a weak physical condition and also communicated to
Johnson that he was too tired to walk back to his housing unit.
This squared with Tedder’s significant health problems of which
Johnson was aware since he had observed LCI’s accommodations to
Tedder on several previous occasions. Furthermore, Tedder told
Johnson that he would return when he had the strength to do so;
thus, he made clear that he intended to obey Johnson.
Tedder

specifically

denied

raising

his

cane

and

Finally,
witnesses

indicated Tedder did nothing threatening during the incident.
Tedder also denied cursing Johnson before getting maced.
Fourth,

the

facts

suggest

that

Johnson

temper the severity of the force applied.

did

nothing

to

Johnson points to the

fact that he used only a small amount of mace, but given that
none was required at all to force compliance from an inmate who
was already complying and unable to resist, this factor is of no
significant value to Johnson.

In fact, after spraying Tedder,

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Johnson

took

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him

down

and

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handcuffed

him

despite

Tedder’s

obvious distress.
Finally, Johnson ignored a direct order to allow Tedder to
get his medicine, used racial epithets against Tedder throughout
the incident, and laughed at Tedder’s complaints.

These facts

provide a sufficient basis from which a trier of fact could
conclude that Johnson acted maliciously.
We further conclude that Tedder created a genuine issue of
material fact on the objective component of his Eighth Amendment
excessive force claim.
the

pepper

Tedder’s adverse physical reaction to

spray—gagging,

establishes

that

the

breathing

nature

of

against Tedder was nontrivial.
1298,

1309

(11th

Cir.

2008)

difficulty,

the

force

Sgt.

and

vomiting—

Johnson

used

See Danley v. Allen, 540 F.3d
(observing

that

pepper

spray

is

designed to disable the person sprayed “by causing intense pain,
a burning sensation that causes mucus to come out of the nose,
an

involuntary

temporary

closing

paralysis

of

of

the

eyes,

the

larynx”

a

gagging

(internal

reflex,

quotation

and

marks

omitted)), overruled on other grounds by Randall v. Scott, 610
F.3d 701 (11th Cir. 2010).
Accordingly, the district court erred in concluding that
Tedder failed to proffer sufficient evidence to establish that
Johnson acted maliciously and sadistically in spraying Tedder
with pepper spray.

Johnson therefore cannot claim qualified
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immunity because malicious and sadistic use of force for the
very purpose of causing pain is always in violation of clearly
established law.
of the law.
immunity

This is not an incorrect guess in a gray area

See Shreve, 535 F.3d at 240 (denying qualified

to

a

prison

guard

because

right

to

be

free

from

excessive use of pepper spray was clearly established).
III.
Johnson urges us to affirm the district court’s summary
judgment order on alternative grounds.

See United States v.

Smith, 395 F.3d 516, 519 (4th Cir. 2005) (“We are not limited to
evaluation

of

the

grounds

offered

by

the

district

court

to

support its decision, but may affirm on any grounds apparent
from the record.”).

Johnson contends Tedder failed to exhaust

his

remedies

administrative

prior

to

filing

challenging prison conditions under federal law.

this

action

See 42 U.S.C.

§ 1997e(a) (“No action shall be brought with respect to prison
conditions under [42 U.S.C. § 1983] . . . by a prisoner confined
in any . . . correctional facility until such administrative
remedies

as

available

are

available

administrative

prerequisite to suit.
Inc.,

407

F.3d

674,

are

exhausted.”).

remedies

is

Exhaustion

mandatory

and

of
a

See Anderson v. XYZ Corr. Health Servs.,
677

(4th

Cir.

2005).

However,

“an

administrative remedy is not considered to have been available
if a prisoner, through no fault of his own, was prevented from
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availing himself of it.”

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Moore v. Bennette, 517 F.3d 717, 725

(4th Cir. 2008).
Tedder

filed

a

grievance

regarding

the

pepper

spray

incident shortly after it occurred, but the grievance form was
“closed

without

a

decision

on

its

merits,”

J.A.

55,

on

the

ground that the incident being grieved was also the subject of a
pending disciplinary charge.

Under prison policy, a grievance

could not be filed regarding an incident that was the subject of
a disciplinary charge until after the charge had been resolved.
J.A. 57.

After resolution of the charge, the inmate had 15 days

to file a grievance regarding the same subject matter.

The

disciplinary charges against Tedder based on the pepper spray
incident were dropped.

Tedder, however, did not re-file his

grievance after resolution of the disciplinary charges.
Johnson contends that the administrative grievance process
was available to Tedder as reflected by the fact that Tedder not
only

filed

a

grievance

regarding

this

incident

(albeit

improperly) but filed multiple grievances during his time at
LCI.

Johnson argues that because Tedder understood how to file

grievances, the grievance process was an administrative remedy
available to him but unexhausted.
We
basis.

cannot

affirm

the

grant

of

summary

judgment

on

this

At the summary judgment stage, Johnson has failed to

establish that the evidence is so one-sided that no reasonable
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factfinder could find that Tedder was prevented from exhausting
his administrative remedies.

See Anderson v. Liberty Lobby,

Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 251-52 (1986).

The record contains evidence

suggesting that Tedder was prevented from availing himself of
the grievance process in this particular instance because LCI’s
grievance

coordinator

grievance

was

Catherine

exhausted

and

no

James

told

further

Tedder

action

was

that

his

required

before he could proceed to federal court. The record further
contains evidence that Tedder was illiterate and therefore had
no choice but to rely on this assurance from James.
Tedder states in his affidavit that after the disciplinary
hearing which was resolved in his favor, officer James told him
“that [his] grievances were exhausted, i.e. ‘You can go to the
street to court,’ because it was after fifteen days from the
incident.”
was

told

grievance

J.A. 29.
by
was

the

In another affidavit, Tedder declared, “I

head

done.”

grievance
J.A.

74.

officer,

a

female,

that

my

Moreover,

James’s

official

written response to Tedder’s grievance, which was read to Tedder
by another inmate, suggested that he could not pursue the merits
of his excessive force grievance any further:
When an inmate is involved in an incident that results
in a disciplinary, that issue/complaint becomes nongrievable. Therefore, this complaint is being closed
without a decision on its merit. Once you have been to
your disciplinary hearing and if you feel that there
were
technical/procedural
errors
regarding
your
hearing, you may submit a grievance at that time.
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J.A.

Doc: 34

55

Filed: 06/12/2013

(emphasis

reasonably

added).

interpreted

to

Pg: 16 of 16

This
mean

written
that

response

Tedder

could

could

be

file

a

grievance if there was a technical error at the disciplinary
hearing.

Since the disciplinary charges were dropped, Tedder

would not have had reason to file a grievance with respect to
his hearing.

On this record, we cannot affirm summary judgment

in favor of Johnson.
IV.
For the foregoing reasons, we reverse the district court’s
grant of summary judgment and remand for additional proceedings.

REVERSED AND REMANDED

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