Medina v. Somers et al

Filing 32

RULING granting 24 Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment; denying 30 Plaintiff's Motion for Summary Judgment. Signed by Judge Janet Bond Arterton on 7/13/2011. (Kelsey, N.)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT

ALEXANDER MEDINA,
Plaintiff,

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:
:
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v.
SOMERS, et al.,
Defendants.

PRISONER
3:10cv299(JBA)

RULING ON DEFENDANTS’ MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT [DOC. # 24]
Plaintiff Alexander Medina commenced this civil rights
action pro se claiming that he was subjected to excessive force
on August 4, 2008.
defendants:

In his amended complaint he names five

Correctional Officers V. Somers, Velasques, Thomas,

Deleon and Gentles.

The defendants move for summary judgment on

the sole ground that Medina failed to exhaust his administrative
remedies before filing this action.

For the reasons that follow,

the defendants’ motion is granted.
A.

Standard of Review

In a motion for summary judgment, the burden is on the
moving party to establish that there are no genuine issues of
material fact in dispute and that it is entitled to judgment as a
matter of law.

See Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c); Anderson v. Liberty

Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 256 (1986).

The moving party may

satisfy this burden by demonstrating the lack of evidence to
support the nonmoving party’s case.

PepsiCo, Inc. v. Coca-Cola

Co., 315 F.3d 101, 105 (2d Cir. 2002) (per curiam).

A court must grant summary judgment if the pleadings,
discovery materials on file and any affidavits show that there is
no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving
party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.
Falls, 999 F.2d 655, 661 (2d Cir. 1993).

Miner v. Glen

A dispute regarding a

material fact is genuine if there is sufficient evidence that a
reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.
Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248.
The court resolves all ambiguities and draws all permissible
factual inferences in favor of the nonmoving party.

Patterson v.

County of Oneida, 375 F.3d 206, 218 (2d Cir. 2004).

If there is

any evidence in the record from which a reasonable inference
could be drawn in favor of the opposing party on the issue on
which summary judgment is sought, summary judgment is improper.
Security Ins. Co. of Hartford v. Old Dominion Freight Line Inc.,
391 F.3d 77, 83 (2d Cir. 2004).
Where one party is proceeding pro se, the court reads the
pro se party’s papers liberally and interprets them to raise the
strongest arguments suggested therein.
F.3d 787, 790 (2d Cir. 1994).

See Burgos v. Hopkins, 14

Despite this liberal

interpretation, however, an unsupported assertion cannot overcome
a properly supported motion for summary judgment.
Crescenzi, 923 F.2d 18, 21 (2d Cir. 1991).

2

Carey v.

B.

Facts1

The alleged use of excessive force underlying this action
occurred on August 4, 2008, at the Carl Robinson Correctional
Institution.

Medina was admitted to the University of

Connecticut Health Center where he underwent surgery on his right
fibula.

Medina was released from the hospital three days later,

on August 7, 2008, and was then housed in the Hospital III unit
at Osborn Correctional Institution until August 27, 2008 when he
was discharged back to general population and taken to
Restrictive Housing Unit Segregation.
It is undisputed that Medina did not file an institutional
grievance while he was in the Osborn hospital unit and that

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Most of the facts are taken from Defendants’ Local Rule
56(a)1 Statement [Doc. #24] and attached exhibits. Local Rule
56(a)2 requires the party opposing summary judgment to submit a
Local Rule 56(a)2 Statement which contains separately numbered
paragraphs corresponding to the Local Rule 56(a)1 Statement and
indicates whether the opposing party admits or denies the facts
set forth by the moving party. Each admission or denial must
include a citation to an affidavit or other admissible evidence.
In addition, the opposing party must submit a list of disputed
factual issues. See D. Conn. L. Civ. R. 56(a)2 & 56(a)3.
With their motion for summary judgment, defendants filed a
Notice to Pro Se Litigant [Doc. #25] informing Medina of his
obligation to respond to the motion for summary judgment and of
the contents of a proper response. Although he references a Rule
56(a)2 Statement, Medina filed only a declaration with exhibits
[Doc. #29] in response to the motion for summary judgment. D.
Conn. L. Civ. R. 56(a)1 states “All material facts set forth in
said statement will be deemed admitted unless controverted by the
statement required to be served by the opposing party in
accordance with Rule 56(a)2.” Notwithstanding the deficiencies
in the form of plaintiff’s response, the court has considered
Medina’s statements and exhibits in deciding the motion for
summary judgment.
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grievance forms are available in the Hospital III unit.

Medina

states that he did not ask staff for a grievance form.
Plaintiff denies that he was in a “clear state of mind” and
claiming that he suffered from withdrawal due to the
discontinuance of Percocet and Tylenol # 3 when he was placed in
Segregation.

He does not claim, however, that he was medically

unable to file a grievance form.

He claims to have requested

grievance forms between August 27 an September 18, 2008 “but to
no avail.”

It is undisputed that, to date, Medina has never

filed any grievance regarding this incident.
C.

Discussion

The Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a),
requires an inmate to exhaust “administrative remedies as are
available” before bringing an “action ... with respect to prison
conditions.”

The Supreme Court has held that this provision

requires an inmate to exhaust administrative remedies before
filing any type of action in federal court, regardless of whether
the inmate may obtain the specific relief he desires through the
administrative process.

Woodford v. Ngo, 548 U.S. 81, 85 (2006).

Inmates must properly exhaust their administrative remedies,
which includes complying with all procedural requirements,
including filing deadlines, so that the inmate’s grievance can be
reviewed on the merits.

See id. at 90, 94-95.

The DOC administrative directive in effect during the time

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period relevant to plaintiff’s claims provided that the inmate
grievance process could be used to address individual employee
actions and matters relating to conditions of care and
supervision.

(See Defs.’ Local Rule 56(a)1 Statement,

Administrative Directive 9.6, §§6(B) and 4, effective January 1,
2008.)

The grievance procedures are applicable to Medina’s claim

of use of excessive force.

Directive 9.6, Section 6(A), requires

that the inmate attempt to resolve the matter informally before
filing a grievance.

If this process is unsuccessful, or the

inmate has not received a response to his attempt at informal
resolution, however, Section 6(C) allows him to proceed to the
next step and file a grievance.

Section 6(C)(7) requires that

the grievance be filed within thirty days of the occurrence
giving rise to the grievance.

Medina concedes that he did not

file a grievance regarding the use of excessive force.
The Second Circuit recognizes three exceptions to the
exhaustion requirement:

“(1) administrative remedies were not

available to the prisoner; (2) defendants have either waived the
defense of failure to exhaust or acted in such a way as to estop
them from raising the defense; or (3) special circumstances, such
as a reasonable misunderstanding of the grievance procedures,
justify the prisoner’s failure to comply with the exhaustion
requirement.”

Ruggiero v. County of Orange, 467 F.3d 170, 175

(2d Cir. 2006) (citing Hemphill v. New York, 380 F.3d 680, 686

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(2d Cir. 2004)).

The existence of special circumstances “must be

determined by looking at circumstances which might understandably
lead usually uncounselled prisoners to fail to grieve in the
normally required way.”

Giano v. Goord, 380 F.3d 670, 678 (2d

Cir. 2004).
In the declaration submitted in opposition to the motion for
summary judgment, Medina states that he was not aware of his
right to file a grievance while he was in the hospital.

He

acknowledges, however, that he was in the hospital for only three
days.

(See Medina Decl. [Doc. # 29], ¶¶ 5-6).

Medina does not

address his failure to request a grievance form while in the
hospital unit at Osborn Correctional Institution.
Medina states that shortly after his release from the
hospital unit he was sent to segregation at Osborn Correctional
Institution, where he remained until September 18, 2008.

Medina

does not attach to his declaration the disciplinary report
purportedly documenting this transfer.

Medina states that he

tried to obtain a grievance form while in segregation but no form
was provided.

(See id., ¶¶ 8-9.)

He provides no other

information, particularly any detail from which it could be
inferred that his requests were timely.

Medina attaches

declarations from two other inmates stating that, at unspecified
times they were denied grievance forms while in restrictive
housing at Osborn Correctional Institution.

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(See Ortiz &

Hernandez Aff. [Doc. # 29-1].)

Medina offers no evidence

suggesting that any defendant named in this case was responsible
for denying him a grievance form while in segregation.
From Medina’s statement that he requested grievance forms
while in segregation it can be inferred that he was aware of the
grievance requirement.

The Second Circuit has found special

circumstances might exist “where the prison grievance regulations
are confusing and the prisoner relies upon a reasonable
interpretation of those regulations.”
App’x 641, 643 (2d Cir. 2009).

Chavis v. Goord, 333 F.

Plaintiff has presented no

evidence suggesting that the Connecticut grievance directives
were confusing or even that he attempted to discover the
requirements.
Medina does not claim that he thought he could not file a
grievance because he was no longer confined at Carl Robinson
Correctional Institution where it occurred; he requested
grievance forms for this purpose while confined Osborn
Correctional Institution.

Although he may have been under the

impression that he could not file a grievance while he was
hospitalized at the University of Connecticut Health Center, he
provides no reason for his failure to request a grievance form
for nearly three weeks after being brought to Osborn Correctional
Institution or for never filing a grievance regarding this
incident at all.

The Court concludes that Medina has not

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demonstrated any special circumstances precluding application of
the exhaustion requirement in this case.

Accordingly, the

defendants’ motion for summary judgment is granted.
IV. Conclusion
Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment [Doc. # 24] is
GRANTED.
DENIED.

Plaintiff’s Motion for Summary Judgment [Doc. # 30] is
The Clerk is directed to enter judgment and close this

case.
IT IS SO ORDERED.

/s/
Janet Bond Arterton
United States District Judge
Dated at New Haven, Connecticut: July 13, 2011.

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