Cormier v. Edwards et al

Filing 71

RULING denying 37 Motion for Partial Summary Judgment. Signed by Chief Judge Shelly D. Dick on 8/24/2018. (SWE)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA

TONY CORMIER

CIVIL ACTION

VERSUS

17-241-SDD-EWD

JOHN BEL EDWARDS ET. AL.
RULING
This matter is before the Court on the Partial Motion for Summary Judgment filed
by Defendants John Bel Edwards,1 Tim Hopper, James LeBlanc, and Raman Singh
(“Defendants”).2 Plaintiff, Tony Cormier (“Plaintiff” or “Cormier”) has filed an Opposition
to the motion.3 For the following reasons, the Defendants’ motion will be denied.
I.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND4
Plaintiff, who filed his Complaint pro se, is an inmate at Elayn Hunt Correctional

Center (“Elayn Hunt”).5 Cormier was diagnosed with Hepatitis C on November 5, 2012,6
and has been in Stage III Hepatitis C (“HCV”) since August 4, 2016.7 Cormier claims he
asked for treatment for his HCV from Elizabeth Britton (“Britton”), a Defendant, and the
liver clinic coordinator at Elayn Hunt in 2016.8 Despite his request, Plaintiff maintains he
received no treatment at Elayn Hunt for his HCV.9

Accordingly, Plaintiff filed an

1

Defendant Edwards has been dismissed from this suit. See Rec. Doc. 70.
Rec. Doc. 37.
3
Rec. Doc. 40.
4
For a full discussion of the underlying facts of this case, see the Court’s Ruling at Rec. Doc. 70.
5
Rec. Doc. 1, p. 3.
6
Id. at p. 6.
7
Id. at p. 13, ¶ 24.
8
Id. at p. 7, ¶¶ 3-6.
9
Id. at ¶ 7.
2

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Administrative Remedy Prison Procedure (ARP No. EHCC-2016-850, “ARP”) on October
7, 2016 for the failure to treat his HCV, and he pursued his ARP through both Step 1 and
2.10
In his ARP, Plaintiff alleges that Britton and Dr. Pretty Singh (“P. Singh”) failed to
provide care for his HCV. Defendants maintain that Cormier’s failure to “mention any one
of these defendants [Hooper, LeBlanc, and Singh], [failure] to provide any functional
description of any of these defendants, and [failure] to complain of any actions taken
directly or [sic] indirect of these defendants”11 results in the Plaintiff not exhausting his
administrative remedies.

It is Defendants’ contention that the failure to name the

Defendants in the ARP necessitates their dismissal because the proper ARP procedure
was not followed before the filing of the present lawsuit. Cormier has opposed the
Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment on this issue.
II.

LAW AND ANALYSIS
A. Motion for Summary Judgment Standard
“The court shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no

genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter
of law.”12 “When assessing whether a dispute to any material fact exists, we consider all
of the evidence in the record but refrain from making credibility determinations or weighing
the evidence.”13 A party moving for summary judgment “must ‘demonstrate the absence
of a genuine issue of material fact,’ but need not negate the elements of the nonmovant’s

10

Rec. Doc. 37-3, pp. 23-25.
Rec. Doc. 37-1, p. 7.
12
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a).
13
Delta & Pine Land Co. v. Nationwide Agribusiness Ins. Co., 530 F.3d 395, 398-99 (5th Cir. 2008).
11

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case.”14 If the moving party satisfies its burden, “the non-moving party must show that
summary judgment is inappropriate by setting ‘forth specific facts showing the existence
of a genuine issue concerning every essential component of its case.’”15 However, the
non-moving party’s burden “is not satisfied with some metaphysical doubt as to the
material facts, by conclusory allegations, by unsubstantiated assertions, or by only a
scintilla of evidence.”16
Notably, “[a] genuine issue of material fact exists, ‘if the evidence is such that a
reasonable jury could return a verdict for the nonmoving party.’”17 All reasonable factual
inferences are drawn in favor of the nonmoving party.18 However, “[t]he Court has no
duty to search the record for material fact issues. Rather, the party opposing the summary
judgment is required to identify specific evidence in the record and to articulate precisely
how this evidence supports his claim.”19 “Conclusory allegations unsupported by specific
facts … will not prevent the award of summary judgment; ‘the plaintiff [can]not rest on his
allegations … to get to a jury without any “significant probative evidence tending to
support the complaint.”’”20 In the present case, Plaintiff attached 410 pages of exhibits
but failed to direct the Court to the particular exhibit or exhibits which purportedly

14

Guerin v. Pointe Coupee Parish Nursing Home, 246 F.Supp.2d 488, 494 (M.D. La. 2003)(quoting Little
v. Liquid Air Corp., 37 F.3d 1069, 1075 (5th Cir. 1994)(en banc)(quoting Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S.
317, 323-25, 106 S.Ct. at 2552)).
15
Rivera v. Houston Independent School Dist., 349 F.3d 244, 247 (5th Cir. 2003)(quoting Morris v. Covan
World Wide Moving, Inc., 144 F.3d 377, 380 (5th Cir. 1998)).
16
Willis v. Roche Biomedical Laboratories, Inc., 61 F.3d 313, 315 (5th Cir. 1995)(quoting Little v. Liquid Air
Corp., 37 F.3d 1069, 1075 (5th Cir. 1994).
17
Pylant v. Hartford Life and Accident Insurance Company, 497 F.3d 536, 538 (5th Cir. 2007)(quoting
Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986)).
18
Galindo v. Precision American Corp., 754 F.2d 1212, 1216 (5th Cir. 1985).
19
RSR Corp. v. International Ins. Co., 612 F.3d 851, 857 (5th Cir. 2010).
20
Nat’l Ass’n of Gov’t Employees v. City Pub. Serv. Bd. of San Antonio, Tex., 40 F.3d 698, 713 (5th Cir.
1994)(quoting Anderson, 477 U.S. at 249).

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substantiated the factual allegations in her summary judgment opposition.21 The Court is
under no obligation to search the record and find the evidentiary support, if any, for the
Plaintiff’s factual propositions. Accordingly, the Court’s ruling is drawn from the summary
judgment evidence that was identified and cited by the parties.
B. ARP Requirements
The Defendants’ sole basis for their motion is that “Plaintiff never filed an ARP that
presented to the grievance system the same facts and issues against any one of these
four defendants.”22 Accordingly, the only issue before the Court is whether, as a matter
of law, a prisoner plaintiff such as Cormier must name each prison official in an ARP
before filing a lawsuit and naming the prison officials as defendants.
42 U.S.C. § 1997(e) provides in relevant part: “No action shall be brought with
respect to prison conditions under § 1983 of this title, or any other Federal law, by a
prisoner confined in any jail, prison, or other correctional facility until such administrative
remedies as are available are exhausted.” As the Fifth Circuit outlined in Clifford v. Gibbs,
under 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a), a prisoner must exhaust available administrative remedies
before filing a § 1983 suit and is precluded from filing suit while the administrative
complaint is pending.23 In Johnson v. Johnson, the Fifth Circuit held that, a prisoner must
exhaust his administrative remedies by complying with applicable prison grievance
procedures before filing a suit related to prison conditions.24 The United States Supreme
Court in Woodford v. Ngo reasoned that, “not only must the prisoner exhaust all available

21

See Rec. Doc. 45.
Rec. Doc. 37-1, p. 8.
23
298 F.3d 328, 332 (5th Cir. 2002); See also, Underwood v. Wilson, 151 F.3d 292, 296 (5th Cir. 1998).
24
385 F.3d 503, 514 (5th Cir. 2004).
22

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remedies, but such exhaustion must be proper, including compliance with an agency’s
deadlines and other critical procedural rules.”25 “Because § 1997e(a) expressly requires
exhaustion, prisoners may not deliberately bypass the administrative process by flouting
an agency’s procedural rules.”26 In Days v. Johnson, the Fifth Circuit stated: “The §
1997e(a) exhaustion requirement is mandatory, irrespective of the forms of relief sought
and offered through administrative avenues.”27
This Court in Haynes v. Parker reasoned: “Under the Fifth Circuit’s strict approach
to the Prison Litigation Reform Act’s (PLRA) exhaustion requirement, mere ‘substantial
compliance’ with administrative remedy procedures does not satisfy exhaustion.”28
The PLRA does not specify who must be named in a prison
grievance in order to properly exhaust the prison grievance
system.29 Instead, it is the prison’s requirements, and not the
PLRA, that define the boundaries of proper exhaustion.”30
The primary purpose of a grievance is to alert prison officials
to a problem, not to provide personal notice to a particular
official that he may be sued.31 A grievance must provide
administrators with a fair opportunity under the circumstances
to address the problem that will later form the basis of the
suit.32
Defendants rely on the Fifth Circuit decision in Johnson v. Johnson for their
position that each prison official must be named in an ARP before a lawsuit is filed in
order to exhaust administrative remedies.33 The Defendants’ reliance on Johnson is

25

548 U.S.81, 90, 126 S.Ct. 2378, 2386 (2006).
Id. at 126 S.Ct. at 2389-90.
27
332 F.3d 863, 633 (5th Cir. 2003).
28
13-cv818-SDD-SCR, 2015 WL 1258130 at *3 (M.D. La. March 17, 2015)(See Wright v. Hollingsworth,
260 F.3d 357, 358 (5th Cir. 2001).
29
Id.(citing Jones v. Bock, 549 U.S. 199, 217-218 (2007)).
30
Id. (internal quotations omitted).
31
Id. (citing Johnson, 385 F.3d at 522.
32
Id.
33
Rec. Doc. 37-1.
26

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misplaced, and the plain language of the Johnson decision is inapposite to Defendants’
contention. The Johnson court specifically stated: “The primary purpose of a grievance
is to alert prison officials to a problem, not to provide personal notice to a particular
official that he may be sued.34
Because Johnson makes it clear that the function of an ARP notice is to alert prison
officials of a problem, and not to name every potential defendant so as to give them notice
that they may be sued, the Court finds Defendants’ exhaustion argument without merit.
Accordingly, the Defendants’ Motion for Partial Summary Judgment is denied.
III.

CONCLUSION
For the above stated reasons, the Defendants’ Motion for Partial Summary

Judgment is hereby denied.35
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Signed in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, this 24th day of August, 2018.

S

________________________________
SHELLY D. DICK
CHIEF DISTRICT JUDGE
MIDDLE DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA

34
35

Johnson, 385 F.3d at 522 (emphasis added).
Rec. Doc. 37.

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