Piner v. Politic Reform Law et al
Filing
56
Memorandum Opinion and Order. Granting Defendants' 52 Motion for Summary Judgment and dismissing Complaint with prejudice. Final Judgment in favor of Defendants to be entered. Signed by Magistrate Judge Linda R. Anderson on 3/26/2013. (ACF)
IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF MISSISSIPPI
JACKSON DIVISION
CHARLES HARVEY PINER
VS.
PLAINTIFF
CIVIL ACTION NO. 3:10CV66-LRA
CAPTAIN EDDIE THOMPSON; SHERIFF
RONNIE PENNINGTON; LIEUTENANT
ROBERT ANDREWS; LIEUTENANT JIM
SPEARS; LIEUTENANT BOUNDS; OFFICER
BANGS; OFFICER GREEN; OFFICER NANCY
GRAVES; and OFFICER LURA
DEFENDANTS
MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER
THIS cause is before the Court on Defendants Captain Eddie Thompson, Sheriff
Ronnie Pennington, Lieutenant Robert Andrews, Lieutenant Jim Spears, Lieutenant Al
Bounds, Deputy Chris Banes, and Deputy Barbara Green’s Motion for Summary
Judgment. For the reasons discussed below, Defendants’ motion shall be granted.
Background and Procedural History
Plaintiff, acting pro se and filing in forma pauperis, filed this Complaint pursuant
to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, on February 1, 2010. Plaintiff’s allegations arise out of events
which occurred while he was incarcerated at the Rankin County Detention Facility
between June 21, 2009, and June 8, 2010, after he was convicted of exploitation of a
minor child.
Plaintiff appeared before the undersigned United States Magistrate Judge on
November 21, 2011, at the Federal Courthouse in Jackson, Mississippi, for an omnibus
hearing. The Court scheduled this hearing for various pretrial purposes, including a
Spears hearing. The hearing was conducted in an attempt to insure the just, speedy,
and inexpensive determination of this pro se prisoner litigation and to determine
whether or not Plaintiff’s claims were supported by a factual or legal basis.
In his Complaint, Plaintiff alleges he is a “victim of circumstance on technology
[and] medicine.” [ECF No. 1, p.5]. Plaintiff asserts that a device that was somehow
implanted into his body has caused him “pain by receiving heart attacks from analysis
works.” [ECF No.1, p.6]. According to Plaintiff, these events somehow involve “people
of 800 feet human-to-human interface.” [ECF No.1, p.6]. Human-to-human interface
somehow implanted a device into his body that allowed certain unknown individuals to
lower his heart rate; he was sexually assaulted in his sleep as a result, according to his
testimony.
In addition to being tortured by heart attacks, Plaintiff asserts the implanted
device has caused him to be assaulted, raped, and sexually harassed. [ECF No.1, p. 4].
In a subsequent pleading to this Court, Plaintiff clarified this claim as follows:
If, Darla Palmer had I Charles Harvey Piner setup, by being sexually
assultted [sic], and raped by one Michael McLaurance in, and at Rankin Co.
Jail, POD #W-207, cell #219, on or about the 2nd day of March, 2010! A [sic]
example of the nature of my complaints. Please don’t let the people torsure
[sic] me! Torsure [sic] no more! Sense [sic] 1964 my brith [sic] up to now,
I sufferd [sic] “pain,” through “heart attacks” for to [sic] “long,” “raped” to [sic]
“long” by men! I do hate queer men, all men. Because of this homosexual
stuff!
But, on the other hand I do in fact love the ladies!
[ECF No. 11, p. 3].
In his original Complaint, Plaintiff filed suit against “Politic Reform Law,”
“Public Corporate File,” “Adult Entertainment,” and the “Federal US Supreme
Courts.” [ECF No.1, p. 1]. On May 27, 2010, Plaintiff amended his Complaint to
add Captain Eddie Thompson, Sheriff Ronnie Pennington, Lieutenant Robert
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Andrews, Lieutenant Jim Spears, Lieutenant Al Bounds, Deputy Chris Banes,
Deputy Barbara Green, Officer Nancy Graves, and Officer Lura as defendants.
Officers Graves and Lura have not been served with summons. The original
Defendants were dismissed on July 15, 2010.
When Plaintiff appeared at his omnibus hearing, he elaborated on the
specific allegations against each of the Defendants as follows:
1)
Captain Eddie Thompson
Q.
All right. You filed a complaint against Eddie Thompson.
A.
What happened there is due to this and the circumstance of
back in the eighties when I had signed a contract with Danny
Owens and adult entertainment, they had this little program
they can use that basically you can size my penis. And not
only that, you can lower my heart rate through systems
analysis.
All right. That was all designed for these women that worked
for analysis companies doing data processing, data
programming, for corporations. That had nothing to do with the
county jail using it to make money. Okay? Now, I realize they
remodeled the jail, built kitchens, and I realize that the penal
system does use analysis on the prisoners. But anytime they
are going against the will of a prisoner and causing the
prisoner pain through heart attacks and stuff like that, they
have went too far.
Q.
Did you have a heart attack?
A.
What I mean by that is there is software out called Megarace
(phonetic) put out software form the leverance code of the
1960s. In that is where they are using to where it’s a triotransmitter which is connected to regulate free on in a tube for
like organ malfunction which goes way back to Christopher
Columbus days. Technology and medicine. They said that’s
what I have inside my body. How can I prove this? I have no
way to prove that except for I can go back and get the books
and show you science investigation how it works in the
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encyclopedia, which is a higher education than a school will
ever give you.
Q.
All right. Eddie Thompson. What did he have to do with your
false arrest?
A.
Well, with all these things going on about being sexually
assaulted and while I was asleep they gave me blow jobs,
things like that. I am like, Hey, I don’t do men. So that I
considered to be sexual assault and rape. I mean women,
fine. But men, no. This adult entertainment in the eighties was
all about women. Not men or children.
Q.
So Eddie Thompson did what now?
A.
Well, it is his jail. He is the captain over his jail. Maybe it
wasn’t personally him, but he is responsible because the
administration is done under him through the jail he had control
of. Now, when I complained to him about different things, he
kind of laughed it off at first.
Q.
You are saying you were sexually assaulted?
A.
Yes, ma’am.
Q.
But you said you weren’t aware of it; you were asleep when it
happened?
A.
Right. When you lower a man’s heart rate, what does that do?
That cuts the blood and oxygen to the brain. Somebody could
do something like that to you and get through and walk away
and you really not have memory of it. It would be like taking
Rohypnol. You will get a little glimpse of it, but that’s about it
as far as the memory in your mind.
Q.
You don’t personally have any memory of the sexual assaults?
A.
Just the glimpse.
Q.
And Eddie Thompson is over the jail, so you are suing him?
A.
He runs the jail, so his administrators or he allowed that
administration to go on in his jail. Right.
[OH Transcript, pgs. 11-14].
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2)
Sheriff Ronnie Pennington
Q.
Ronnie Pennington. What did he do?
A.
He is the sheriff of that county. Rankin County. Well, Rankin County,
when I had my home and stuff, they also used this world-wide media
to be watching me in my home through neighborhood watch, the
police officers and other ways. And, therefore, that is invasion of
privacy rights of the home. And plus, they displayed indecent material
of me taking showers and things like that on the world-wide web,
which you can find that out through the ACLU with Donna Rice
Hodges. She is the one sent me the letter way back when it started
back in the – back when the world-wide web went public back in ‘91
all the way up to ‘93. And then by ‘96, my attorney was John Reid,
went against the political reform law and United States Supreme
Courts on tort where Howard Campbell was a Supreme Court judge
in North Carolina. Of course, I never got over there to get anything
out of that, and I was living in Memphis, and I finally found out John
Reid was out of Tupelo, Mississippi.
Id. at 14.
3)
Lieutenant Robert Andrews
Q.
Lieutenant Robert Andrews. What did he do or not do? Why
are you suing him?
A.
What did he not do?
Q.
Why are you suing him?
A.
Because whenever you go filing complaints and trying to talk
to these people and they don’t get it stopped, what can you
do? I mean, I don’t really know who all to blame. That’s why
I said I would like it to be investigated when I wrote and find out
what all their positions were or what they all did, because, I
mean, this is absurd.
Id. at 15.
4)
Lieutenant Jim Spears/Lieutenant Albert Bounds
Q.
What about Lieutenant Jim Spears?
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A.
Lieutenant Jim Spears runs it whenever Andrews ain’t there.
And then beyond that one you would go with Lieutenant
Bounds. I have been in and out of jail. I have been harassed
so much in Rankin County it’s pathetic. But because the
Rankin County Chamber of Commerce also use this, see,
where companies in a commerce like this find out somebody
that has got kind of highly popular and a lot of people would
love to watch him in his home, they turn around and build a
audience and make their little web site. Okay. Now if you
have got 100,000 people checking your web site out at $7 a
piece, what are you going to have? $700,000 a year or more.
Id. at 15-16.
5)
Deputy Chris Banes
Q.
You sued Officer Bangs?
A.
Bangs.
Q.
B-A-N-G-S.
A.
I don’t really remember what his part was, but what are you
going to do? I mean, this is-
Q.
If you don’t have a claim against him, we have to release
him from the lawsuit.
A.
I understand that.
Id. at 17.
6)
Deputy Barbara Green
Q.
And Officer Green.
A.
Green? She is just about like the rest of them. With this
program like I was telling you from the adult entertainment file,
which Bill Gates can back up and all that, is to where they had
a way where their thought of human-to-human interface of 800
feet, they can actually think of whatever it was they were
thinking. I don’t know what it is because I never seen the
program. But they could size me. And whenever I go to
throbbing, of course they get to throb.
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Id. at 17-18.
Plaintiff avers that damages resulting from the alleged incidents amount to “one
hundred billion or trillion dollars.” [ECF No.1, p. 6]. Defendants have now filed a Motion
for Summary Judgment claiming they are entitled to qualified immunity.
Standard of Review
Summary judgment is warranted under Rule 56(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil
Procedure when evidence reveals no genuine dispute of material fact and that the
moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). The rule
“mandates entry of summary judgment, after adequate time for discovery and upon
motion, against a party who fails to make a showing sufficient to establish the existence
of an element essential to that party’s case, and on which that party will bear the burden
of proof at trial.” Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986).
The party moving for summary judgment “bears the initial responsibility of
informing the district court of the basis for its motion, and identifying those portions of
[the record] which it believes demonstrate the absence of a genuine issue of material
fact.” Id. at 323. The nonmoving party must then “go beyond the pleadings” and
“designate specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial.” Id. at 324.
Conclusory allegations, speculation, unsubstantiated assertions, and legalistic
arguments are not an adequate substitute for specific facts showing a genuine issue for
trial. SEC v. Recile, 10 F.3d 1093, 1097 (5th Cir. 1997). In reviewing the evidence,
factual controversies are to be resolved in favor of the nonmovant, “but only when ...
both parties have submitted evidence of contradictory facts.” Little v. Liquid Air Corp.,
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37 F.3d 1069, 1075 (5th Cir. 1994) (en banc). When such contradictory facts exist, the
court may “not make credibility determinations or weigh the evidence.” Reeves v.
Sanderson Plumbing Prods., Inc., 530 U.S. 133, 150 (2000).
Analysis
Defendants contend they are entitled to qualified immunity from suit. Qualified
immunity is a shield from individual liability for “‘government officials performing
discretionary functions ... as long as their actions could reasonably have been thought
consistent with the rights they are alleged to have violated.’” Good v. Curtis, 601 F.3d
393, 400 (5th Cir. 2010) (quoting Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 638 (1987)).
“[Q]ualified immunity generally protects ‘all but the plainly incompetent or those who
knowingly violate the law.’” Id. (quoting Malley v. Briggs, 475 U.S. 335, 341 (1986)).
Courts deciding qualified immunity employ a two-part test. Atteberry v. Nocona
Gen. Hosp., 430 F.3d 245, 253 (5th Cir. 2005). First, plaintiff “must claim that the
defendants committed a constitutional violation under current law.” Id. (citing Wilson v.
Layne, 526 U.S. 603, 609 (1999); Palmer v. Johnson, 193 F.3d 346, 351 (5th Cir.
1999)). Second, plaintiff “must claim that the defendants’ actions were objectively
unreasonable in light of the law that was clearly established at the time of the actions
complained of.” Id. “The defendant’s acts are to be held to be objectively reasonable
unless all reasonable official’s in the defendant’s circumstances would have then known
that the defendant’s conduct violated the United States Constitution or the federal
statute as alleged by the plaintiff.” Thompson v. Upshur Cnty., Tex., 245 F.3d 447, 457
(5th Cir. 2001). Thus, “[a]n official is eligible for qualified immunity even if the official
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violated another’s constitutional rights,” as long as the conduct was not objectively
unreasonable. Id.
Plaintiff fails to show Defendants violated his rights and therefore never
surpasses the first prong. Plaintiff clearly testified at his omnibus hearing that he is not
alleging that any of the Defendants were in any way personally involved in the alleged
events. Instead, Plaintiff alleges that these Defendants are liable pursuant to their
supervisory positions with the Rankin County Sheriff’s Department and/or the Rankin
County Detention Facility. However, it is well-settled that “there is no vicarious or
respondeat superior liability of supervisors under § 1983.” Rios v. City of Del Rio, Tex.,
444 F.3d 417, 425 (5th Cir. 2006). A supervisor can only be found individually liable
under § 1983 on the basis of his or her own personal participation in the wrongful
conduct, or in cases involving a supervisor, where there is a causal connection between
the supervisor’s acts and the alleged constitutional violation. Gilmer v. Trowbridge,
2009 WL 649692 (S.D. Miss. 2009) (citing Hinshaw v. Doffer, 785 F.3d 1260, 1263 (5th
Cir. 1986). Thus, a supervisor like Defendants, “may be held liable [under § 1983] ... if
(1) he affirmatively participates in the acts that cause the constitutional deprivation, or
(2) he implements unconstitutional policies that causally result in the constitutional
injury.” Porter v. Epps, 659 F.3d 440, 446 (5th Cir. 2011) (citation omitted). In this
case, Plaintiff is unable to establish a claim of supervisory liability under either method.
He has failed to establish that Defendants affirmatively participated in the alleged
activities in any way or that Defendants implemented any unconstitutional policies.
Instead, Plaintiff appears to allege that Defendants failed to protect him from
being sexually assaulted by another inmate. To establish a failure to protect claim, a
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prisoner must show that he was “incarcerated under conditions posing a substantial risk
of serious harm and that prison officials were deliberately indifferent to [his] need for
protection.” Neals v. Norwood, 59 F.3d 530, 533 (5th Cir. 1995). A prison official acts
with deliberate indifference if the official “is aware of an ‘excessive risk to inmate ...
safety’ and disregards that risk.” Longoria v. Texas, 473 F.3d 586, 592-93 (5th Cir.
2006) (quoting Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 837 (1994)). The deliberate
indifference standard applies whether the plaintiff asserts that a supervisor affirmatively
participated in acts causing the alleged deprivation, adopted a policy, or failed to train or
supervise. Porter, 659 F.3d at 446.
Plaintiff is unable to meet this deliberate indifference standard. There is no
evidence that Defendants knew or had any reason to know that any sexual misconduct,
if any, would occur on this date. Plaintiff claims that an inmate named Michael
McLaurance sexually assaulted him at the Rankin County Jail on March 2, 2010.
However, Defendants attach the Inmate Roster for that date as Exhibit F to the Motion
to Dismiss; the roster shows no such inmate incarcerated in Rankin County during
March 2010. ECF No. 53, p. 11]. Without this inmate being incarcerated on this date, it
would be impossible for Defendants to have any reason to know that this alleged event
would occur. Plaintiff testified he was asleep when the alleged raped occurred, and he
has not specific recollection of the event. Further, although Plaintiff alleges in his initial
Complaint that the rape was somehow made possible by the implantation of a heart rate
device, he has alleged no set of facts establishing that Defendants were in any way
involved in the implantation of this device.
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Plaintiff has failed to provide any facts showing that Defendants violated his
constitutional rights in any way and he is thus unable to satisfy the first prong of
qualified immunity analysis. Accordingly, Defendants are entitled to summary judgment
on the basis of qualified immunity.
Conclusion
For the reasons discussed herein, the Court finds that Defendants are entitled to
summary judgment on the basis of qualified immunity.
IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED that Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment
is hereby granted, and the Complaint is dismissed with prejudice. Final Judgment in
favor of all Defendants shall be entered.
SO ORDERED this the 26th day of March, 2013.
/s/Linda R. Anderson
UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE
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