Stewart v. Corizon Medical, LLC et al

Filing 32

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER. (See Full Order.) IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that defendants' motion for partial summary judgment [# 26 ] is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. Glennis Stewart's complaint is dismissed as to all medical issues except those raised in grievance complaint numbers WERDCC-15-404 and WERDCC-16-225. Signed by District Judge Catherine D. Perry on 10/26/2017. (CBL)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
EASTERN DISTRICT OF MISSOURI
NORTHERN DIVISION
GLENNIS STEWART,
Plaintiff,
vs.
CORIZON MEDICAL, LLC, et al.,
Defendants.

)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)
)

Case No. 2:16 CV 82 CDP

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
Plaintiff Glennis Stewart, currently incarcerated within the Missouri
Department of Corrections (MDOC), filed this pro se action under 42 U.S.C. §
1983. She alleges that defendants violated her civil rights by being deliberately
indifferent to her serious medical needs in failing to provide her with adequate
medical and dental care. Defendants are the MDOC medical services provider, a
medical director, and a director of nursing. Defendants have filed a partial motion
for summary judgment, arguing that Stewart failed to exhaust her administrative
remedies before filing this suit. Because the undisputed evidence shows that
Stewart did fail to exhaust administrative remedies on many of the grievances she
complains of in this suit, I must grant defendants’ motion for dismissal as to the
unexhausted claims at the time of filing.

Background
Plaintiff Glennis Stewart is now incarcerated within the Missouri
Department of Corrections at the Chillicothe Correctional Center. Her § 1983
complaint alleges violations of her civil rights during her imprisonment at the
Women’s Eastern Reception, Diagnostic, and Correctional Center (WERDCC) in
Vandalia, Missouri. She contends that defendant Corizon Medical, LLC, the
contracted medical provider for MDOC inmates, has a policy of denying inmates
medical care in order to increase its profits. She also claims that defendants Dr.
Justin Jones (Medical Director at WERDCC) and Danielle Halterman (Director of
Nursing and Health Services Administrator at WERDCC) have refused to provide
her the necessary treatment and medications for her medical conditions.
According to the allegations of the complaint, Stewart had a bilateral
mastectomy and reconstructive breast surgery performed by a MDOC surgeon in
2013, following a breast cancer diagnosis. At some point she was released from
the MDOC, and while not in custody, an oncologist prescribed her Lupron
injections every three months as part of her ongoing cancer care treatment. She
was then re-incarcerated at WERDCC in 2015.
Stewart has filed multiple medical grievance complaints, alleging many
different medical and dental issues. She contends that defendants have denied her
standard cancer care, including continuation of her Lupron injections, of which she

–2–

missed three of over a nine month period. She also seeks a continuation of the
medication Gabapentin for her hot flashes. Stewart claims that the breast implants
used by the MDOC in her reconstructive surgery are substandard and have resulted
in significant pain and leakage, which has not been properly treated. As for dental
care, Stewart alleges that Corizon has an unwritten “outwait” policy for cutting
dental care costs: patients who need filings are put on a wait list that is so long that
the only option remaining at time of treatment is extraction of teeth, which is also
the least expensive option for Corizon.
Defendants have now moved for partial summary judgment on all claims
except those involving Stewart’s requests for Lupron injections. Defendants argue
that Stewart failed to exhaust administrative remedies before filing suit as to all her
other claims.
Summary Judgment Standard
The standards for summary judgment are well settled. In determining
whether to grant a motion for summary judgment, the court views the facts – and
any inferences from those facts – in the light most favorable to the nonmoving
party. Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co., Ltd. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587
(1986). The movant bears the burden of establishing that (1) it is entitled to
judgment as a matter of law and (2) there are no genuine issues of material fact.
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a); Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986). Once

–3–

the movant has met this burden, however, the non-moving party may not rest on
the allegations in its pleadings but must, by affidavit and other evidence, set forth
specific facts showing that a genuine issue of material fact exists. Fed. R. Civ. P.
56(e). Where a factual record taken as a whole could not lead a rational trier of
fact to find for the nonmoving party, there is no genuine issue for trial.
Matsushita, 475 U.S. at 587. At the summary judgment stage, I will not weigh the
evidence and decide the truth of the matter, but rather I need only determine if
there is a genuine issue for trial. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242,
249 (1986).
The Prison Litigation Reform Act and MDOC Grievance Policy
The Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) requires a prisoner to exhaust
administrative remedies before filing suit: “No action shall be brought with respect
to prison conditions under section 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.” 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a).
Congress’s goal in enacting this statute was “to reduce the quantity and improve
the quality of prisoner suits” by affording prison officials time to resolve the
complaints internally before going to federal court. Porter v. Nussle, 534 U.S. 516,
524-25 (2002). The PLRA requires that an inmate exhaust administrative remedies
before filing a suit in federal court, and mandates dismissal if exhaustion was not

–4–

completed at the time of filing. Johnson v. Jones, 340 F.3d 624, 627 (8th Cir.
2003).
Defendants have produced uncontroverted evidence of the MDOC Offender
Grievance Policy, which establishes a three-step procedure for inmates to use for
filing complaints. To initiate the process, an inmate must file an Informal
Resolution Request (IRR) within fifteen days of the date of the incident giving rise
to the IRR. If an inmate is dissatisfied with the response to her IRR, she can file a
formal grievance within seven days of receiving the response. If an inmate is also
dissatisfied with the response to her formal grievance, she can file a grievance
appeal within seven days of receiving that response. Only after the inmate receives
a response to her appeal is the administrative grievance procedure exhausted. ECF
Nos. 28-1, 2.
Discussion
Stewart has filed more than eight separate medical grievances through the
offender grievance process at WERDCC since January 1, 2013. She filed her
complaint in this case on November 18, 2016, and attached as exhibits paperwork
from her prison grievance file. ECF No. 1. Later, she filed more paperwork from
her grievance file as “Additional Exhibits” on two separate occasions, and as
exhibits to her opposition to partial summary judgment. ECF Nos. 15, 20, 29.
Stewart’s own filings show that only two of her medical grievances were

–5–

exhausted as of the date that she filed this lawsuit. ECF No. 1 at 6 (Chart under
“V. EXHAUSTION OF LEGAL REMEDIES” shows only IRR Numbers 16-225
and 15-404 as having “GRIEVANCE APPEAL RESPONSE” dates at time of
filing complaint); ECF No. 29 at 2 (Chart showing only complaint numbers 15-404
and 16-225 were exhausted before November 18, 2016, filing date). Defendants’
evidence also indicates that only two grievances, WERDCC-15-404 and
WERDCC-16-225, were exhausted by the filing date. ECF No. 28-3 at 3.
Stewart’s complaint number WERDCC-15-404 was initiated as an IRR on
October 15, 2015, the grievance appeal was filed January 12, 2016, and the appeal
response was dated February 11, 2016. ECF No. 28-3 at 28, 36. This medical
grievance was exhausted by the November 18, 2016, filing date. In the IRR,
Stewart complains that she was not receiving adequate “cancer treatment and
relevant medications,” including Lupron injections and Gabapentin. She also
requests to be seen by Dr. Jones.
Stewart’s complaint number WERDCC-16-225 was initiated as an IRR on
June 21, 2016, the grievance appeal was filed August 30, 2016, and the appeal
response was dated September 14, 2016. ECF No. 28-3 at 38, 46. This medical
grievance was also exhausted by the date of filing. In the IRR, Stewart again
complains about not receiving the medication Gabapentin, this time in relation to
an incident where one of the pills was found in her locker so Dr. Jones said she

–6–

would be “weaned off” of it. Stewart claims she needs the medication for her hot
flashes and fibromyalgia.
All other medical grievance complaints listed in Stewart’s multiple
grievance file exhibits (WERDCC-16-430, WERDCC-16-431, WERDCC-16-432,
WERDCC-16-490, WERDCC-16-494, WERDCC-17-089, WERDCC-17-134,
WERDCC-17-142, and CCC-17-142) were not administratively exhausted by the
filing of this suit on November 18, 2016. ECF No. 29 at 2-3, 8-11. According to
Stewart’s own filings, all of these complaints were not even appealed until after
November 18, 2016, except WERDCC-17-142, which was not even submitted as a
formal grievance until five months after this suit was filed. Id.
Defendants’ motion for partial summary judgment attempts to categorize all
the allegations of Stewart’s complaint into five distinct claims. Defendants then
argue that only the allegations in one of those five claims – requests for Lupron
injections as made in WERDCC-15-404 – have been exhausted. Therefore,
defendants argue all other claims should be dismissed. As for WERDCC-16-225,
defendants do not deny that the complaint was administratively exhausted before
the filing date, instead they argue that the “grievance does not pertain to any claim
in this suit” and therefore any concerns regarding the medication Gabapentin
should be dismissed. ECF No. 27 at 9. I disagree. Stewart mentions the
withdrawal of Gabapentin in her complaint section on “Denial of Cancer

–7–

Treatment,” she also lists complaint number “16-225” in her chart of grievances
filed, and she attached copies of the WERDCC-16-225 grievance filings as
exhibits to the complaint. ECF No. 1 at 5, 6, 8-17. Defendants’ describe their
motion for summary judgment as pertaining to the “sole issue of exhaustion,” but
they make arguments for the exclusion of issues by attempting to narrow the
allegations raised by Stewart in her complaint, and narrow the issue raised in each
of her grievances. As to the sole issue of exhaustion, only claims raised in
complaint numbers WERDCC-15-404 and WERDCC-16-225 survive dismissal.
Conclusion
The PLRA requires the dismissal of any of Stewart’s claims to which she
has not exhausted her available administrative remedies. See Jones v. Bock, 549
U.S. 199, 211 (2007) (“There is no question that exhaustion is mandatory under the
PLRA and that unexhausted claims cannot be brought in court.”) (internal citation
omitted); Gibson v. Weber, 431 F.3d 339, 341 (8th Cir. 2005). Therefore,
defendants’ motion for partial summary judgment is granted to the extent that it
seeks dismissal of all claims that were not administratively exhausted as of the
filing date. Only allegations raised by Stewart in grievance complaint numbers
WERDCC-15-404 and WERDCC-16-225 shall proceed.
Accordingly,

–8–

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that defendants’ motion for partial summary
judgment [#26] is GRANTED in part and DENIED in part. Glennis Stewart’s
complaint is dismissed as to all medical issues except those raised in grievance
complaint numbers WERDCC-15-404 and WERDCC-16-225.

____________________________________
CATHERINE D. PERRY
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
Dated this 26th day of October, 2017.

–9–