Hardy v. Quinn et al

Filing 8

WRITTEN Opinion entered by the Honorable Thomas M. Durkin on 2/7/2013: Plaintiff's motion to proceed in forma pauperis [R 3 ] is granted. The Court authorizes and orders the trust fund officer at Plaintiffs place of incarceration to deduct $8.44 from Plaintiff's account for payment to the Clerk of Court as an initial partial filing fee, and to continue making monthly deductions in accordance with this order. The Clerk shall send a copy of this order to the trust fund office r at the Stateville Correctional Center. The complaint is dismissed without prejudice to Plaintiff's submitting an amended complaint within 30 days of the date of this order. Plaintiff's failure to comply timely with this order will resu lt in summary dismissal of this case. The clerk is directed to send Plaintiff an amended complaint form. Plaintiff's motion for preliminary injunction [R 4 ] is denied. His motion for the appointment of counsel [R 6 ] is denied. Mailed notices. (For further details see opinion.)(pcs, )

Order Form (01/2005)

United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois
Name of Assigned Judge
or Magistrate Judge

Thomas M. Durkin

CASE NUMBER

12 C 6033

CASE TITLE

Sitting Judge if Other
than Assigned Judge

DATE

2/7/13

Nedrick Jeffrey Hardy, Sr. (B-50437) vs. Pat Quinn, et al.

DOCKET ENTRY TEXT

Plaintiff’s motion to proceed in forma pauperis [R. 3] is granted. The Court authorizes and orders the trust fund
officer at Plaintiff’s place of incarceration to deduct $8.44 from Plaintiff’s account for payment to the Clerk of Court
as an initial partial filing fee, and to continue making monthly deductions in accordance with this order. The Clerk
shall send a copy of this order to the trust fund officer at the Stateville Correctional Center. The complaint is
dismissed without prejudice to Plaintiff submitting an amended complaint within 30 days of the date of this order.
Plaintiff’s failure to comply timely with this order will result in summary dismissal of this case. The clerk is
directed to send Plaintiff an amended complaint form. Plaintiff’s motion for a a preliminary injunction [R. 4] is
denied. His motion for the appointment of counsel [R. 6] is denied.
O[ For further details see text below.]

Docketing to mail notices.

STATEMENT
Plaintiff, Nedrick Hardy, an inmate incarcerated at Stateville Correctional Center, has filed this 42 U.S.C.
§ 1983 civil rights suit against Governor Pat Quinn, Illinois Department of Corrections Director Salvador Godinez,
Warden Marcus Hardy, Stateville Counselor Jerry Baldwin, Grievance Officer Colleen Franklin, Gladye Taylor,
Wexford Health Sources, and the State of Illinois. Plaintiff alleges that Stateville is an “old, run down, and falling
apart correctional facility that’s understaffed and underfunded.” (Compl. at 12.) He states that there are numerous
problems, and that the State refuses to correct them in order to save money. In addition to alleged poor conditions,
Plaintiff generally asserts that medical attention to inmates has been delayed because of under-funding.
Plaintiff’s motion for leave to proceed in forma pauperis is granted. Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(b)(1),
he is assessed an initial partial filing fee of $8.44. The trust fund officer at Plaintiff’s place of incarceration is
directed to collect the partial filing fee from Plaintiff’s trust fund account and pay it directly to the Clerk of Court.
After the initial partial filing fee, Plaintiff’s trust fund officer is directed to collect monthly payments from Plaintiff’s
trust fund account in an amount equal to 20% of the preceding month’s income credited to the account. Monthly
payments shall be forwarded to the Clerk of Court each time the amount in the account exceeds $10 until the full
$350 filing fee is paid. All payments shall be sent to the Clerk, United States District Court, 219 S. Dearborn St.,
Chicago, Illinois 60604, attn: Cashier’s Desk, 20th Floor, and shall clearly identify Plaintiff’s name and the case
number of this action. This payment obligation will follow Plaintiff in the event he is transferred.
Under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A, the Court is required to conduct a prompt threshold review of the complaint.
The complaint, as currently drafted, cannot proceed. Plaintiff raises, at the very least, two sets of claims: deliberate
indifference to prison conditions and deliberate indifference to medical needs. Neither set of claims appears related
to the other, nor do they appear to involve the same Defendants. “Unrelated claims against different defendants
belong in different suits.” George v. Smith, 507 F.3d 605, 607-08 (7th Cir. 2007). “A litigant cannot throw all of
his grievances, against dozens of different parties, into one stewpot. Joinder that requires the inclusion of extra
parties is limited to claims arising from the same transaction or series of related transactions.” Wheeler v. Wexford
Health Sources, Inc., 689 F.3d 680, 683 (7th Cir. 2012). Accordingly, to proceed with this case, Plaintiff must
12C6033 Nedrick Jeffrey Hardy, Sr. (B-50437) vs. Pat Quinn, et al.

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STATEMENT
narrow the complaint to only related claims and include only those Defendants related to those claims. If any of
the claims of this case are also raised in Plaintiff’s later-filed cases, he should not repeat claims. If he has repeated
claims and would prefer to proceed with his other cases instead of this one, he may voluntarily dismiss this case.
Additionally, and perhaps more importantly, Plaintiff’s complaint provides insufficient notice of his claims.
Under the notice pleading requirement of Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a), a plaintiff need not state extensive details, but he
must at least provide a short plain statement about each claim to provide each defendant with notice of the claim,
as well as the grounds upon which the claim is based. Stanard v. Nygren, 658 F.3d 792, 797 (7th Cir. 2011).
Plaintiff lists a number of problems: there are too few doctors, nurses, and medical technicians, which causes delays
in medical treatment; the water is brown, smells like sewerage and chlorine, and contains radium; vents are never
cleaned and have vegetation and/or mold growing in them; windows are not opened during summers, allowing
temperatures to reach over 90 degrees inside cells; broken windows are not fixed during winter and allow freezing
temperatures in cells; there is a bug infestation, for which no one sprays because they are not paid; his cell is too
small for two inmates and does not have enough room to exercise; shower drains are backed up and allow water
to accumulate, thus forcing Plaintiff to come in contact with water that other inmates with open sores have used;
cell searches are conducted by officers who do not clean their hands; and food trays are not cleaned properly.
However, Plaintiff does not indicate which claim is being asserted against which Defendant or how each Defendant
is responsible for the conditions and lack of medical care. The complaint thus fails to provide sufficient notice to
each Defendant as to what claim is being asserted against him or her and the grounds upon which the claim is based.
Accordingly, the complaint is dismissed. Plaintiff is given 30 days to submit an amended complaint that
complies with both George and the notice-pleading requirements of Rule 8(a)(2). His failure to submit an
acceptable complaint by that time will result in the dismissal of this case.
Finally, Plaintiff's motion for a preliminary injunction about a lack of drinking water in his cell is denied.
The prerequisites to granting a preliminary injunction are well established. “To prevail on a motion for a
preliminary injunction, the moving party must demonstrate (1) a likelihood of success on the merits; (2) a lack of
an adequate remedy at law; and (3) an irreparable harm will result if the injunction is not granted.” Woods v. Buss,
496 F.3d 620, 622 (7th Cir. 2007), quoting FoodComm Int'l. v. Berry, 328 F.3d 300, 303 (7th Cir. 2003). If the
moving party meets the first three requirements, then the district court must then balance the relative harms that
could be caused to either party. Woods, 496 F.3d at 622, citing Incredible Tech., Inc. v. Virtual Tech., Inc., 400
F.3d 1007, 1011 (7th Cir. 2005). A preliminary injunction is an “extraordinary remedy” intended to minimize the
hardship to the parties and to preserve the status quo pending a more considered decision of the merits when
possible. Indiana Civil Liberties Union v. O'Bannon, 259 F.3d 766, 770 (7th Cir. 2001).
Issuance of a preliminary injunction is not warranted in this case. First, Plaintiff does not state that he has
been without drinking water, just drinking water from his sink. Although a complete lack of drinking water may
state a constitutional claim, Davis v. Biller, No. 00 C 50261, 2003 WL 22764872, 2 (N.D. Ill. Nov. 19, 2003)
(Reinhard, J.), a claim that a prisoner is unable to drink water from the sink in his cell, by itself, is insufficient. See
Kendrick v. Freeman, No. 07-0395, 2008 WL 1816465, 4 (N.D. Ind. April 21, 2008) (Springmann, J.) (receiving
something to drink with meals three times a day, but no other access to drinking water, was not an unconstitutional
condition of confinement). Also, the issue of radium in the water at Stateville has been found not to rise to the level
of a constitutional violation. See Carroll v. DeTella, 255 F.3d 470, 472 (7th Cir. 2001). Plaintiff has thus
demonstrated neither irreparable harm nor a likelihood of success on the merits with the claim for which he seeks
preliminary injunction. United States v. NCR Corp., __ F.3d __, 2012 WL 3140191 at *3-6 (7th Cir. July 23, 2012).
His motion for a preliminary injunction is therefore denied.

12C6033 Nedrick Jeffrey Hardy, Sr. (B-50437) vs. Pat Quinn, et al.

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