Harnage v. Chapdelaine et al

Filing 84

ORDER: The plaintiff's Motion for Reconsideration (Doc. No. 83 ) is hereby DENIED as set forth in the attached document. Signed by Judge Alvin W. Thompson on 7/10/18. (Mata, E.)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF CONNECTICUT
JAMES A. HARNAGE,
Plaintiff,
v.
WARDEN CHAPDELAINE, ET AL.,
Defendants.

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Case No. 3:14cv1366(AWT)

RULING AND ORDER
The plaintiff, James A. Harnage, is incarcerated at the
MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution in Suffield,
Connecticut (“MacDougall-Walker”).

Pending before the court is

the plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration filed pursuant to
Local Rule 7(c), D. Conn. L. Civ. R.
83].

See Mot. Recon., ECF No.

The plaintiff asks the court to reconsider its order

granting the motion to dismiss the complaint.

For the reasons

set forth below, the motion for reconsideration is being denied.
I.

Procedural Background
The plaintiff initiated this action by filing a complaint

pro se pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against over 30 Department
of Correction employees.

See Compl., ECF No. 1.

He

subsequently filed a first amended complaint, and the court
granted the plaintiff leave to file a second amended complaint.
See Am. Compl., ECF No. 10; Second Am. Compl., ECF No. 45.

On

August 18, 2016, the court dismissed the claims in the second

amended complaint against the State of Connecticut Department of
Correction and concluded that the unconstitutional strip search,
privacy and retaliation claims should proceed against Wardens
Carol Chapdelaine and Peter Murphy, Correctional Officers
Peters, Hammond, McCarly, Vargas, Lapila, Bond, Gonzalez,
Velasquez, Martinez, Beaudry, Gondruszka, Shepard, Melendez and
Doe in their individual and official capacities.

See Ruling

Pending Mots., ECF No. 50 at 7-8.
On September 26, 2016, the defendants filed a motion to
dismiss addressed to the First, Fourth, Eighth and Fourteenth
Amendment claims in the second amended complaint.

In the motion

to dismiss, the defendants asserted four arguments.

See Mem.

Supp. Mot. Dismiss, ECF No. 59 at 8, 9, 11, 14-17.

They argued

that: (1) the Eighth Amendment claims asserted in counts one,
three, six and seven failed to state a claim upon which relief
may be granted; (2) the Fourteenth Amendment due process claim
asserted in counts one, two and three failed to state a claim
upon which relief may be granted; (3) they were entitled to
qualified immunity as to the Fourth Amendment claims directed to
the searches that were conducted in view of other inmates and
correctional staff; and (4) the First Amendment retaliation and
Fourth Amendment search claims which had also been raised in an
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identical pending state court action should be stayed or
dismissed pursuant to Colorado River abstention.
Although the motion to dismiss raised arguments addressed
to the plaintiff’s Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment claims, the
plaintiff did not respond to those arguments.

Thus, the court

considered the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment claims to have
been abandoned and did not find it necessary to address the
defendants’ arguments pertaining to those claims.
It was apparent that the abstention argument was addressed
to the Fourth Amendment strip search and First Amendment
retaliation claims that had also been raised in the state court
action.

See Mem. Supp. Mot. Dismiss at 15 (comparing First

Amendment retaliation and Fourth Amendment strip search claims
raised in this action and state court action).

The Eighth and

Fourteenth Amendment claims raised in this action were not
raised in the state court action.

See id., Ex. A, ECF No. 59-2

(complaint filed in state court action).
Although not addressed explicitly, the court considered the
plaintiff’s Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment claims to have been
abandoned given the plaintiff’s decision not to respond to the
arguments seeking dismissal of those claims.

Accordingly, the

Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment claims were simply abandoned by
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the plaintiff, and the First and Fourth Amendment claims were
dismissed by the court based on Colorado River abstention.
On September 7, 2017, the court granted the motion to
dismiss on the ground that abstention under Colorado River Water
Conservation Dist. v. United States, 424 U.S. 800 (1976), was
warranted and that dismissing, rather than staying, the action
was appropriate given the scope of the state court action.
Order, ECF No. 72.

See

On September 21, 2017, the Clerk entered

judgment dismissing the case pursuant to the court’s order
granting the motion to dismiss.

See ECF No. 76.

On October 20,

2017, the plaintiff filed a notice of appeal of the judgment
dismissing the case.

See Notice, ECF No. 80.

On November 14,

2017, the plaintiff filed a motion for reconsideration of the
order granting the motion to dismiss with respect to the Fourth
Amendment strip search and First Amendment retaliation claims.
II.

Legal Standard
As a general matter, “[t]he filing of a notice of appeal is

an event of jurisdictional significance—it confers jurisdiction
on the court of appeals and divests the district court of its
control over those aspects of the case involved in the appeal.”
Griggs v. Provident Consumer Disc. Co., 459 U.S. 56, 58 (1982).

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Fed. R. Civ. P. 62.1, however, permits a district court to deny
a motion filed after the entry of a judgment or order in a
situation where the district court lacks authority to grant the
motion because an appeal is pending, as long as the motion was
timely filed.

See Rule 62.1, Fed. R. Civ. P. (“If a timely

motion is made for relief that the court lacks authority to
grant because of an appeal that has been docketed and is
pending, the court may: (1) defer considering the motion; (2)
deny the motion; or (3) state either that it would grant the
motion if the court of appeals remands for that purpose or that
the motion raises a substantial issue.”)
The plaintiff filed several motions for extension of time
to file his Local Rule 7(c) motion for reconsideration because
he did not timely receive notice of the court’s order granting
the motion to dismiss.

See Mots. Ext. Time, ECF Nos. 73, 79.

On October 25, 2017, the court granted the plaintiff a final
extension until November 15, 2017, to file his motion.
Order, ECF No. 82.

See

As indicated above, the plaintiff filed his

motion for reconsideration on November 14, 2017.

Thus, the

court considers the motion to have been timely filed.

The court

concludes that it has jurisdiction to review the motion for
reconsideration under Rule 62.1, Fed. R. Civ. P.
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See, e.g.,

United States v. Peterson, No. 04 Cr. 752(DC), 2013 WL 1830217,
at *2 (S.D.N.Y. May 1, 2013) (exercising discretion under Fed.
R. Civ. P. 62.1 to deny Rule 60(b) motion because it was
untimely and meritless); Harry v. Suarez, No. 10 Civ. 6756(NRB),
2012 WL 2589080, at *1 (S.D.N.Y. May 18, 2012) (retaining
jurisdiction under Fed. R. Civ. P. 62.1 to deny motion for
reconsideration of ruling on motion for summary judgment).
Pursuant to Rule 7(c), D. Conn. L. Civ. R., “[m]otions for
reconsideration shall not be routinely filed and shall satisfy
the strict standard applicable to such motions.”

Generally,

reconsideration will be granted only if the moving party can
identify “controlling decisions or data that the court
overlooked” and that would reasonably be expected to alter the
court’s decision.

Shrader v. CSX Transp., Inc., 70 F.3d 255,

257 (2d Cir. 1995).

A party’s identification of “an intervening

change of controlling law, the availability of new evidence, or
the need to correct a clear error or prevent manifest injustice”
may also constitute sufficient reasons to grant a motion for
reconsideration.

Kolel Beth Yechiel Mechil of Tartikov, Inc. v.

YLL Irrevocable Trust, 729 F.3d 99, 104 (2d Cir. 2013) (citation
and internal quotation marks omitted).

A party may not,

however, use a motion for reconsideration to re-argue prior
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issues that have already been decided, present “new theories” or
arguments that could have been raised earlier, seek a new
hearing “on the merits, or [to] otherwise tak[e] a second bite
at the apple.”

Analytical Surveys, Inc. v. Tonga Partners,

L.P., 684 F.3d 36, 52 (2d Cir. 2012) (internal quotation marks
and citation omitted).
III. Discussion
In dismissing the First and Fourth Amendment claims, the
court considered the factors set forth in Village of Westfield
v. Welch’s, 170 F.3d 116 (2d Cir. 1999), for determining whether
abstention was appropriate pursuant to Colorado River.
Order, ECF No. 72 at 9.

See

Those factors included:

(1) the assumption of jurisdiction by either court
over any res or property;
(2) the inconvenience of the federal forum;
(3) the avoidance of piecemeal litigation;
(4) the order in which jurisdiction was obtained;
(5) whether state or federal law supplies the rule of
decision; and
(6) whether the state court proceeding will adequately
protect the rights of the party seeking to invoke
federal jurisdiction.
See id. (quoting Village of Westfield, 170 F.3d at 121.
The court considered each factor and determined that the
first, second and fifth factors weighed in favor of retaining
jurisdiction and the third, fourth and sixth factors weighed in
favor of abstention.

See id. at 11-14.
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The court concluded

that the “relevant factors,” including the avoidance of
piecemeal litigation and the fact that the state court action
had progressed further than the federal action, “weighed in
favor of abstention.”

Id. at 14.

The plaintiff contends that the court erred in determining
the weight of the fifth and sixth Village of Westfield factors.
The plaintiff’s concern is that only two of the defendants in
the state action have been served with the complaint filed in
that action and that he only sued those defendants in their
individual capacities.

He believes that his rights will not be

protected because the only claims that will be litigated in the
state action are the claims against these two defendants.
The court notes, however, that all of the defendants in the
complaint filed in the state court action were named in their
individual and official capacities.

See Harnage v. Murphy, No.

HHD-CV14-5037637-S (Conn. Super. Ct. March 11, 2014) (Party &
Appearance Information and Complaint at 4-7)1 & Defs.’ Mem. Supp.
Mot. Dismiss, Ex. A, ECF No. 59-2 at 5-8.

In addition, all

defendants are still listed on the docket as defendants.

See

Information regarding this action may be found at:
http://www.jud.ct.gov/jud2.htm under Superior Court Case Lookup; Civil/Family/Housing/Small Claims; Case Look-up by Docket
Number using HHD-CV14-5037637-S (Last visited on 4/10/18).
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Harnage, No. HHD-CV14-5037637-S (Party & Appearance
Information).
Furthermore, in ruling on a motion to dismiss filed in that
action, the state court judge did not specifically dismiss any
defendants from the action.

See Harnage v. Murphy, No.

HHDCV145037637, 2017 WL 4812422, at *21 (Conn. Super. Ct. Aug.
31, 2017).

Rather, the judge denied the motion as to certain

counts and granted the motion as to certain counts.

See id.

Thus, the plaintiff’s concern that the case in state court will
not protect his rights because it is only proceeding as to a few
defendants in their individual capacities is without merit.
The plaintiff has not otherwise pointed to any facts or
decisions that the court overlooked in ruling that abstention
was appropriate with respect to the Fourth and First Amendment
claims.
IV. Conclusion
Accordingly, the Motion for Reconsideration [ECF No. 83],
which is addressed to the dismissal of the Fourth and First
Amendment claims on the ground of abstention, is hereby DENIED.
It is so ordered.

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Signed this 10th day of July 2018, at Hartford,
Connecticut.
___________/s/AWT____________
Alvin W. Thompson
United States District Judge

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