Davis v. Schmidt et al
Filing
53
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER denying 44 Motion to Amend Complaint.; denying 48 Motion to Dismiss. Signed by District Judge Eric F. Melgren on 6/12/2020.Mailed to pro se party Robert Davis by regular mail. (cm)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF KANSAS
ROBERT DAVIS,
Plaintiff,
vs.
Case No. 18-cv-03107-EFM-KGG
DEREK SCHMIDT and JEFFREY EASTER,
Defendants.
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
Pro se Plaintiff Robert Davis brings a claim for injunctive relief in the form of the repeal
of the Kansas Sexually Violent Predator Act, K.S.A § 59-29a01, et seq. (“KSVPA”), as well as
immediate release from Sedgwick County Detention Facility (“SCDF”), where he was committed
during his parole pursuant to the KSVPA. He also requests that all offenders who have been held
at Larned State Hospital pursuant to the KSVPA either be released or moved to civilian hospitals
or facilities. He has named Kansas Attorney General Derek Schmidt and the Sheriff of Sedgwick
County, Jeffrey Easter, as defendants. Davis has filed a Motion to Amend Complaint (Doc. 44)
seeking to clarify how the Defendants were responsible for the damages he claims. In response,
Defendant Easter has filed a Combined Response in Opposition to Plaintiff’s Motion to Amend
Complaint and Defendant Jeff Easter’s Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 48). For reasons stated in more
detail below, the Court denies Davis’s Motion to Amend Complaint. The Court also denies
Easter’s Motion to Dismiss.
I.
Factual and Procedural Background1
Davis was released on parole for an unidentified crime from Hutchinson Correctional
Facility in December 2015. Pursuant to a jury finding under the KSVPA that he was a sexually
violent predator, Davis was promptly booked into the Sedgwick County Detention Center. He has
been housed there ever since.
On April 24, 2018, Davis filed suit against Attorney General Derek Schmidt, Sheriff
Jeffrey Easter, and Secretary of the Kansas Department for Aging and Disability Services Tim
Keck in their official capacities. Davis cited Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment violations
inflicted on him by the Defendants in their application of the KSVPA to him. He maintains that
being held in a criminal detention center rather than a civilian hospital or facility is a violation of
his right not to have cruel and unusual punishment inflicted on him. Keck has since been dismissed
from this claim.
Easter filed his Answer to the Complaint on September 7, 2018. He filed no other motions
or pleadings of any kind between waiving the service of summons and the day he submitted his
Answer.
On April 2, 2020, Davis filed a Motion to Amend Complaint. In response, on April 15,
2020, Easter filed a single document in which he includes a Response in Opposition to Plaintiff’s
Motion to Amend Complaint and a Motion to Dismiss. Both motions are before this Court today.
1
The facts are taken from Davis’s Complaint and are accepted as true for the purposes of this ruling.
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II.
A.
Legal Standard
Motion to Amend Complaint
Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 15, parties may amend pleadings “once as a matter
of course” before trial if they do so within (A) twenty-one days of serving the pleading or (B) “if
the pleading is one to which a responsive pleading is required,” twenty-one days of service of a
responsive pleading or a motion under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b), (e), or (f), whichever
is earlier.2 Other amendments before trial are allowed “only with the opposing party’s written
consent or the court’s leave.”3 Courts “should freely give leave when justice so requires.”4 Rule
15 is intended “to provide litigants ‘the maximum opportunity for each claim to be decided on its
merits rather than on procedural niceties.’ ”5 Courts, however, may deny leave to amend based on
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, or futility of amendment.6 Whether to allow a proposed
amendment, after the permissive period, addresses the sound discretion of the court.7
2
Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a)(1).
3
Fed. R. Civ. P. 15(a)(2).
4
Id.; accord Foman v. Davis, 371 U.S. 178, 182 (1962).
5
Minter v. Prime Equip. Co., 451 F.3d 1196, 1204 (10th Cir. 2006) (quoting Hardin v. Manitowoc–
Forsythe Corp., 691 F.2d 449, 456 (10th Cir. 1982)).
6
Foman, 371 U.S. at 182; Wilkerson v. Shinseki, 606 F.3d 1256, 1268 (10th Cir. 2010); Minter, 451 F.3d at
1204.
7
Foman, 371 U.S. at 182.
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B.
Motion to Dismiss
Under Rule 12(b)(6), a defendant may move for dismissal of any claim for which the
plaintiff has failed to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.8 Upon such motion, the
court must decide “whether the complaint contains ‘enough facts to state a claim to relief that is
plausible on its face.’ ”9 A claim is facially plausible if the plaintiff pleads facts sufficient for the
court to reasonably infer that the defendant is liable for the alleged misconduct.10 The
plausibility standard reflects the requirement in Rule 8 that pleadings provide defendants with
fair notice of the nature of claims as well the grounds on which each claim rests.11
Pro se complaints are held to “less stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by
lawyers.”12 A pro se litigant is entitled to a liberal construction of his pleadings.13 If a court can
reasonably read a pro se complaint in such a way that it could state a claim on which it could
prevail, it should do so despite “failure to cite proper legal authority . . . confusion of various
legal theories . . . or [Plaintiff’s] unfamiliarity with pleading requirements.”14 But it is not the
8
Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6).
9
Ridge at Red Hawk, LLC v. Schneider, 493 F.3d 1174, 1177 (10th Cir. 2007) (quoting Bell Atl. Corp. v.
Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)); see also Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009).
10
Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556).
11
See Robbins v. Oklahoma, 519 F.3d 1242, 1248 (10th Cir. 2008) (citations omitted); see also Fed. R. Civ.
P. 8(a)(2).
12
Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520 (1972).
13
See Trackwell v. U.S. Gov’t, 472 F.3d 1242, 1243 (10th Cir. 2007) (“Because Mr. Trackwell appears pro
se, we review his pleadings and other papers liberally and hold them to a less stringent standard than those drafted
by attorneys.”).
14
Hall v. Bellmon, 935 F.2d 1106, 1110 (10th Cir. 1991).
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proper role of a district court to “assume the role of advocate for the pro se litigant.”15 As it
relates to motions to dismiss generally, “the court accepts the well-pleaded allegations of the
complaint as true and construes them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff.”16 “Wellpleaded” allegations are those that are facially plausible such that “the court [can] draw the
reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.”17
III.
A.
Analysis
Motion to Amend Complaint
The Court first examines whether justice requires allowing the amendment to Davis’s
Complaint. In examining the proposed amended complaint, the Court finds numerous deficiencies
that make it unable to be accepted as a complaint.
The first and most significant flaw in the proposed amended complaint is its failure to state
the relief that Davis seeks. After a description of the violations of the Eighth and Fourteenth
Amendments he alleges Schmidt and Easter committed, he adds only the following: “Wherefore,
the Plaintiff humbly and respectfully prays that this Honorable Court grants this Amended
Complaint.”18 He asks for the Court to grant this amended complaint, but he does not actually
state what his overall claim for relief is. In order to be a proper complaint, it must include a prayer
for relief like the one included in the original Complaint. It is possible that Davis intended for this
proposed amended complaint to serve as additions or alterations to the original Complaint, but the
Court does not take it on itself to blend a complaint and its amendments into a new complaint for
15
Id.
16
Ramirez v. Dep’t of Corr., Colo., 222 F.3d 1238, 1240 (10th Cir. 2000).
17
Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678.
18
Doc. 44, at 2.
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the plaintiff. A proper amended complaint should include all the claims and facts that the plaintiff
wants to keep from the original Complaint.
Additionally, a related deficiency is the failure to allege any specific facts that indicate that
Schmidt or Easter violated Davis’s rights in their official or individual capacity. Similar to the
problem with the prayer for relief deficiency, it seems likely that Davis is mistaken about the
process by which amending complaints is done. Any facts that indicate how the Defendants
violated Davis’s rights should have been included in the proposed amended complaint as they do
not carry over automatically from the original Complaint.
The proposed amended complaint reads in part, “Defendant Derek Schmidt, in his
Individual and Official capacity, violated the Plaintiff’s 14th Amendment Rights for protection
against Cruel and Unusual Punishment by housing the Plaintiff in the Sedgwick County Jail
pursuant to K.S.A. 59-29a05 when the Plaintiff was a Civilian and not a Criminal Defendant and
the Defendant knew that the Plaintiff was not to be housed as a Criminal Defendant or with
Criminal Defendants pursuant to K.S.A. 59-29a01.”19 There is an otherwise identical paragraph
identifying Easter as another offender. It goes on, “Both Defendants, Honorable Derek Schmidt
and Sheriff Jeff Easter, in their Individual and Official capacity, violated the Plaintiffs [sic] 8th
Amendment Rights by the living conditions the Plaintiff had to endure over his 39 months in the
Sedgwick County Jail while awaiting the conclusion of case #2015-PR-1528.”20 There are some
sparse statements of fact that back up the conclusory claims about violations of the Eighth and
Fourteenth Amendments, but they do not refer to the Defendants personally at all. Even if Schmidt
19
Doc. 44, at 2.
20
Doc. 44, at 2.
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and Easter are responsible for Davis’s incarceration in the SCDF, he notes that they did so pursuant
to state law, thereby making them state actors working in their official capacities. He alleges
nothing that either of them did in their individual capacities despite stating a claim against both in
their individual capacities. He also only makes a vague allusion to poor living conditions in the
SCDF without alleging any specifics of what parts of living there violated his Eighth Amendment
rights. Any facts backing this claim that existed in the original Complaint should have been
reiterated in the proposed amended complaint.
Overall, the proposed amended complaint is deficient because it only notes changes Davis
would like to make to his Complaint rather than being itself a complete new complaint. If Davis
wishes to amend his Complaint, he should first file a new motion to amend complaint, then submit
with that motion a full complaint with all allegations he wishes to make and specific facts in
support of those allegations integrated throughout, as well as a renewed prayer for relief.21 At this
time, however, the Court denies his Motion to Amend Complaint.
B.
Motion to Dismiss
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12, after listing the reasons for which a defendant may
move to dismiss, provides: “[a] motion asserting any of these defenses must be made before
pleading if a responsive pleading is allowed.”22 Rule 7(a)(2) provides that “an answer to a
21
The Court notes that Davis has included specific facts regarding the circumstances of his transport to
SCDF, his treatment at SCDF, and other factors elaborating on his quality of life while incarcerated, as well as an
updated claim for relief, in his Response to Defendant Jeffrey Easter’s Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 50) and his Reply to
Response to Motion to Amend Complaint (Doc. 52). These specific facts and claims should be presented in a
complaint rather than in replies to motions.
22
Fed. R. Civ. P. 12.
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complaint” is among the pleadings allowed in federal court.23 On September 7, 2018, Easter filed
his Answer to Davis’s Complaint. In so doing, Easter barred himself from making any motion
under Rule 12(b) to dismiss that Complaint.
Nevertheless, Easter filed a Motion to Dismiss anyway, in conjunction with a Response in
Opposition to Plaintiff’s Motion to Amend Complaint. The Motion to Dismiss cites Rule 12(b)(6)
as the reason for which the case should be dismissed. Because it relies on Rule 12(b), Easter’s
motion is therefore untimely submitted. The contents of the combined response and motion make
it ambiguous whether the complaint Easter wishes to dismiss is the original Complaint or the
proposed amended complaint, or perhaps both. Regardless, the timing is not correct for either. If
he wants the Court to dismiss the original Complaint, he has already barred himself from raising
this defense in a 12(b)(6) motion by his previously filed Answer. Conversely, if he wants the
Court to dismiss the amended complaint, his motion is premature because the amended complaint
has not been granted yet, and indeed under this order has been denied. As a result, only the original
Complaint remains, and Easter cannot move to dismiss it under Rule 12(b). Consequently, Easter’s
Motion to Dismiss is denied.
However, the Court sees fit to remind Easter that other avenues for dismissal exist. In
particular, the timing window for Rule 12(c) is different than for Rule 12(b).24 If Easter wishes
the Court to revisit the merits of dismissing this claim, he should do so in the form of a timely
motion.
23
Fed. R. Civ. P. 7(a)(2).
24
Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(c) (“After the pleadings are closed—but early enough not to delay trial—a party may
move for judgment on the pleadings.”).
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IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that Plaintiff’s Motion to Amend Complaint (Doc. 44)
is DENIED.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Defendant Easter’s Motion to Dismiss (Doc. 48) is
DENIED.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Dated this 12th day of June, 2020.
ERIC F. MELGREN
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
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