Bell v. Strange et al

Filing 28

MEMORANDUM... The Court notes that it has relied on materials outside the pleadings in coming to its conclusion that plaintiff has not exhausted his administrative remedies. As a result, the Court was required to treat defendants motion as a motion f or summary judgment. Pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(d), the "parties must be given a reasonable opportunity to present all the material that is pertinent to the motion." Here, plaintiff responded to the defendants motion, wh ich clearly states that it is a motion for summary judgment, and he has been afforded ample time to file additional materials since defendants filed their reply memorandum on September 23. Plaintiff's complaint will be dismissed. Signed by Honorable Stephen N. Limbaugh, Jr on 12/8/2011. (JMC)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI
SOUTHEASTERN DIVISION

ROBERT BELL,
Plaintiff,
vs.
BILL STANGE, et al.,
Defendants.

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Case No. 1:11-cv-91 SNLJ

MEMORANDUM
Plaintiff, a prisoner at South Central Correctional Center (“SCCC”) in Licking, Missouri,
filed this 42 U.S.C. § 1983 lawsuit alleging violations of his constitutional rights against
defendants Bill Stange, Jeff Norman, Rodney Owens, Geoffrey Wohlferd, and John Roach on
May 24, 2011. At the time plaintiff filed his complaint, he was an inmate at Southeast
Correctional Center (“SECC”), and the events complained of in the complaint took place at
SECC. The defendants have moved to dismiss, or, in the alternative, for summary judgment
(#13), and plaintiff has responded.
Plaintiff alleges that he suffers from arthritis in his ankles, anxiety and depression and
that, as a result of these conditions, he has been given a doctor’s order stating that he should not
stand in place for prolonged periods of time. Plaintiff alleges that each month for the past eight
months, defendants have made plaintiff stand in line for thirty minutes or more with other
inmates to access SECC’s canteen. Plaintiff alleges that he has shown defendants the doctor’s
orders instructing him not to stand for prolonged periods of time, but that the defendants
informed him that he could sit on the ground if he did not wish to stand. Plaintiff claims that the
guards’ actions constitute deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs.

Plaintiff also claims that he has filed a lawsuit in the Circuit Court of St. Francois
County, Missouri for inadequate access to the SECC library, naming as defendants Officers
Wohlferd and Roach. Plaintiff alleges that defendants’ refusal to “honor” his doctor’s orders
against prolonged standing are in retaliation for filing grievances and the lawsuit described
above.
I.

Legal Standard
The purpose of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim is to test the

legal sufficiency of a complaint so as to eliminate those actions “which are fatally flawed in their
legal premises and designed to fail, thereby sparing litigants the burden of unnecessary pretrial
and trial activity.” Young v. City of St. Charles, 244 F.3d 623, 627 (8th Cir. 2001) (quoting
Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 326-27 (1989)). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a claim
must be facially plausible, meaning that the ‘factual content . . . allows the court to draw the
reasonable inference that the respondent is liable for the misconduct alleged.’” Cole v. Homier
Dist. Co., Inc., 599 F.3d 856, 861 (8th Cir. 2010) (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 S.Ct. 1937,
1949 (2009)). The Court must “accept the allegations contained in the complaint as true and
draw all reasonable inferences in favor of the nonmoving party.” Id. (quoting Coons v. Mineta,
410 F.3d 1036, 1039 (8th Cir. 2005)).
II.

Discussion
The Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1996 (“PLRA”) “requires immediate dismissal of all

claims brought by inmates with respect to prison conditions . . . under 42 U.S.C. § 1983...until
‘such administrative remedies as are available are exhausted.” Gibson v. Weber, 431 F.3d 339,
341 (8th Cir. 2005) (citing 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a)). The Missouri Department of Corrections
(“MDOC”) has developed an administrative grievance procedure for inmates to internally grieve

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complaints against MDOC and its staff; the procedure requires that the inmate file an informal
resolution request (“IRR”), an inmate grievance, and, finally, an inmate grievance appeal. See
Foulk v. Charrier, 262 F.3d 687, 694 (8th Cir. 2001); Dashley v. Corr. Med. Serv., 345 F. Supp.
2d 1018, 1022-23 (E.D. Mo. 2004). Not only is the inmate required to exhaust the administrative
remedies available to him under PLRA, but he is required to properly exhaust those
administrative remedies. Woodford v. Ngo, 548 U.S. 81, 93 (2006).
Plaintiff’s complaint ultimately fails because he failed to exhaust his administrative
remedies prior to initiating his lawsuit, as required by 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a).
Under the plain language of section 1997e(a), an inmate must exhaust administrative
remedies before filing suit in federal court. Thus, in considering motions to dismiss
for failure to exhaust under section 1997e(a), the district court must look to the time
of filing, not the time the district court is rendering its decision, to determine if
exhaustion has occurred. If exhaustion was not completed at the time of filing,
dismissal is mandatory.
Johnson v. Jones, 340 F.3d 624, 627 (8th Cir. 2003). In support of this argument, defendant has
provided the Court with affidavits supporting that plaintiff filed one IRR (the first step to
exhausting his administrative remedies) related to his claims in this matter before he filed this
lawsuit, on April 14, 2011, and two IRRs after he filed this lawsuit, both in June 2011. Clearly,
the two June 2011 IRRs could not have been exhausted before plaintiff filed this complaint on
May 24, 2011. As for the April 14 IRR, plaintiff received a response on May 13 and filed an
Offender Grievance (step two) on May 24. Plaintiff received a response to the grievance on June
24, and plaintiff then filed an Offender Grievance Appeal (step three) on July 29. As of
September 23, plaintiff had not received a response to the appeal.1 Regardless, it is clear that

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Plaintiff does not appear to have received responses to two offender grievances or the
offender grievance appeal. Because plaintiff was transferred from SECC to SCCC sometime in
July 2011, the Court suspects that his prison transfer is the reason the administrators had not yet
responded to his grievances/appeal.
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“exhaustion was not completed at the time of filing,” and, as a result, “dismissal is mandatory.”
Id.
The Court notes that it has relied on materials outside the pleadings in coming to its
conclusion that plaintiff has not exhausted his administrative remedies. As a result, the Court
was required to treat defendants’ motion as a motion for summary judgment. Pursuant to Federal
Rule of Civil Procedure 12(d), the “parties must be given a reasonable opportunity to present all
the material that is pertinent to the motion.” Here, plaintiff responded to the defendants’ motion,
which clearly states that it is a motion for summary judgment, and he has been afforded ample
time to file additional materials since defendants filed their reply memorandum on September 23.
Plaintiff’s complaint will be dismissed.

Dated this 8th

day of December, 2011.

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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