Goodman v. Schubring et al

Filing 35

ORDER Adopting 28 Report and Recommendation and Overruling 32 Objections. Signed by District Judge Stephanie Dawkins Davis. (RLou)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN
SOUTHERN DIVISION
Case No. 20-13368

JAMES ALBERT GOODMAN,

Stephanie Dawkins Davis
United States District Judge

Plaintiff,
v.
T. SCHUBRING, et al.,
Defendants.
___________________________ /

ORDER ADOPTING REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION (ECF No. 28)
AND OVERRULING OBJECTIONS (ECF No. 32)
I.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Plaintiff, James Albert Goodman, filed this prisoner civil rights lawsuit

against defendants on December 10, 2020. (ECF No. 1). The court referred this
matter to Magistrate Judge Anthony P. Patti for all pretrial proceedings. (ECF No.
11). The parties filed motions for summary judgment. (ECF Nos. 17, 22). Judge
Patti issued a report and recommendation (R&R) on January 19, 2022,
recommending that the court grant Defendants’ motion for summary judgment
(ECF No. 17) and deny Plaintiff’s motion for summary judgment (ECF No. 22).
(ECF No. 28). Goodman filed an objection and Defendants responded. (ECF Nos.
32, 33).

1

II.

LEGAL STANDARD
A party may object to a magistrate judge’s report and recommendation on

dispositive motions, and a district judge must resolve proper objections under a de
novo standard of review. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B)-(C); Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(b)(1)(3). This court “may accept, reject or modify, in whole or in part, the findings or
recommendations made by the magistrate judge.” Id. “For an objection to be
proper, Eastern District of Michigan Local Rule 72.1(d)(1) requires parties to
‘specify the part of the order, proposed findings, recommendations, or report to
which [the party] objects’ and to ‘state the basis for the objection.’” Pearce v.
Chrysler Grp. LLC Pension Plan, 893 F.3d 339, 346 (6th Cir. 2018). Objections
that dispute the general correctness of the report and recommendation are
improper. Miller v. Currie, 50 F.3d 373, 380 (6th Cir. 1995).
Moreover, objections must be clear so that the district court can “discern
those issues that are dispositive and contentious.” Id. (citing Howard v. Sec’y of
Health and Human Servs., 932 F.2d 505, 509 (6th Cir. 1991)); see also Thomas v.
Arn, 474 U.S. 140, 147 (1985) (explaining that objections must go to “factual and
legal” issues “at the heart of the parties’ dispute”). In sum, the objections must be
clear and specific enough that the court can squarely address them on the merits.
See Pearce, 893 F.3d at 346. And, when objections are “merely perfunctory
responses . . . rehashing . . . the same arguments set forth in the original petition,

2

reviewing courts should review [a Report and Recommendation] for clear error.”
Ramirez v. United States, 898 F.Supp.2d 659, 663 (S.D.N.Y. 2012); see also
Funderburg v. Comm’r of Soc. Sec., No. 15-10068, 2016 WL 1104466, at *1 (E.D.
Mich. Mar. 22, 2016) (Hood, J.) (noting that the plaintiff’s objections merely
restated his summary judgment arguments, “an approach that is not appropriate or
sufficient”).
III.

ANALYSIS AND CONCLUSION
Objection No. 1
Goodman first argues that Judge Patti overlooked his verified complaint in

considering whether he provided any evidence in response to the motion for
summary judgment. More specifically, Goodman asserts that the R&R failed to
consider his verified allegations regarding the personal involvement of Schubring
and Coffelt. Goodman says that his verified complaint explains how these
defendants came be involved in this case and show that they “were properly
grieved.” (ECF No. 32, PageID.229). Thus, he claims that the verified allegations
create a genuine issue of fact for trial.
Goodman’s argument misses the mark. Judge Patti’s decision was primarily
based on Goodman’s failure to exhaust his administrative remedies against
Schubring and Coffelt specifically, not whether he sufficiently alleged that they
were personally involved in the alleged deprivation of his constitutional rights. As

3

explained in the R&R, Goodman names only defendant Stevens in his grievance,
and he did not name Schubring or Coffelt. In support of his conclusion that
Goodman did not exhaust his administrative remedies against Schubring and
Coffelt, Judge Patti points to Brown v. McCullick, 2019 WL 5436159, *3 (6th Cir.
Apr. 23, 2019), in which the Sixth Circuit held that where a prisoner names a
particular person in the grievance, other unnamed defendants would have no way
of knowing that they were later be subject to a lawsuit and thus, claims against
such unnamed defendants were not exhausted. (ECF No. 28, PageID.209). See
also Dykes-Bey v. Finco, 2021 WL 2767584 (6th Cir. Feb. 2, 2021) (“Accordingly,
prison officials would naturally assume that [Dykes-Bey] complied with the
requirement to name those involved, and defendants cannot be said to have waived
the exhaustion defense when they had no way of knowing that they would be the
subject of a later lawsuit.”) (quoting Brown v. McCullick). Similarly here, because
Goodman failed to name Schubring or Coffelt during any step of the grievance
process, Judge Patti correctly concluded, based on the foregoing authority from the
Sixth Circuit, that he failed to exhaust his claims against them. Goodman does not
point to any verified allegations in the complaint that create a genuine issue of
material fact as to exhaustion of administrative remedies. Accordingly, to the
extent Goodman’s objection challenges Judge Patti’s conclusion that that he failed
to exhaust his administrative remedies, it is overruled.

4

Judge Patti also noted in the alternative that because these Defendants’ only
role in the lawsuit was the denial of administrative grievances, they lacked
sufficient personal involvement to sustain a claim against them. (ECF No. 28,
PageID.210). To the extent Goodman’s argument challenges Judge Patti’s
conclusion that he did not sufficiently allege personal involvement as to Schubring
and Coffelt, the court need not address this issue because it finds that granting
defendants’ motion for summary judgment based on failure to exhaust
administrative remedies is appropriate.
Objection No. 2
In his second objection, Goodman disputes Judge Patti’s observation that it
was unclear whether he intended to sue Defendants in their official or individual
capacities. (ECF No. 28, PageID.196, n. 2). Goodman points to paragraphs 6-7 of
his complaint where he states that he intends to sue Defendants in their individual
capacity for damages. (ECF No. 32, PageID.230). However, a review of the
complaint shows that there are no paragraphs numbered 6-7. It appears that the
pages on which such allegations might have been made are missing because the
document’s hand-written pagination starts with “1” and the next page is labeled
“4.” (ECF No. 1, PageID.41-42). Thus, Judge Patti’s observation appears
factually correct based on the complaint as docketed in this case and the objection
is, therefore, overruled. Moreover, even if the court accepted Goodman’s assertion

5

that the complaint is limited to suing these Defendants in their individual capacity
for money damages, the foregoing analysis regarding Goodman’s failure to exhaust
administrative remedies would not change.
IV.

ORDER
For these reasons, the court ACCEPTS and ADOPTS the Report and

Recommendation, OVERRULES Plaintiff’s objections, DENIES Plaintiff’s
motion for summary judgment, and GRANTS defendants’ motion for summary
judgment.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
Date: March 29, 2022

s/Stephanie Dawkins Davis
Stephanie Dawkins Davis
United States District Judge

I hereby certify that a copy of the foregoing document was mailed to counsel of
record and/or pro se parties on this date, March 29, 2022, by electronic and/or
U.S. First Class mail.
S/ R. Loury
Case Manager

6