McKenzie v. County of Erie, et al

Filing 8

DECISION AND ORDER GRANTING in part and DENYING in part Defendants' 4 Motion to Dismiss. Signed by William M. Skretny, Chief Judge on 9/23/2013. (MEAL) - CLERK TO FOLLOW UP - (See paragraph 4.)

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
WESTERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK
ALVIN McKENZIE,
Plaintiff,
v.

DECISION AND ORDER
12-CV-912S

COUNTY OF ERIE, et al.,
Defendants.

1.

Plaintiff, Alvin McKenzie, a former inmate at the Erie County Holding Center

in Buffalo New York, brings this action against the County of Erie, the County’s Sheriff –
Timothy Howard – and several of the County’s departments.
Defendants now move to dismiss the complaint.1 For the following reasons, that
motion is granted in part and denied in part.
2.

According to the complaint, while in the custody of Erie County at the Holding

Center, McKenzie hanged himself in an unsuccessful attempt to take his own life. He
brings this action against the County for failure to properly care for him.
3.

Defendants move to dismiss this action under Rule 12(b)(6) of the Federal

Rules of Civil Procedure, which allows dismissal of a complaint for “failure to state a claim
upon which relief can be granted.” Federal pleading standards are generally not stringent:
Rule 8 requires only a short and plain statement of a claim. Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). But the
plain statement must “possess enough heft to show that the pleader is entitled to relief.”
Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1966, 167 L. Ed. 2d 929 (2007).
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Defendants filed this m otion on Septem ber 27, 2012, subm itting a brief and an attorney affidavit
in support thereof. McKenzie responded on October 15, 2012 with a brief and an attorney affidavit of his
own. Defendants did not subm it a Reply.

When determining whether a complaint states a claim, the court must construe it
liberally, accept all factual allegations as true, and draw all reasonable inferences in the
plaintiff’s favor. ATSI Commc’ns, Inc. v. Shaar Fund, Ltd., 493 F.3d 87, 98 (2d Cir. 2007).
Legal conclusions, however, are not afforded the same presumption of truthfulness. See
Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 677, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1949, 173 L. Ed. 2d 868 (2009)
(“The tenet that a court must accept as true all of the allegations contained in a complaint
is inapplicable to legal conclusions.”).
“To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter,
accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’” Id. at 678 (quoting
Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). Labels, conclusions, or a “formulaic recitation of the elements
of a cause of action will not do.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555. Facial plausibility exists when
the facts alleged allow for a reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the
misconduct charged. Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678. The plausibility standard is not, however, a
probability requirement: the pleading must show, not merely allege, that the pleader is
entitled to relief. Id. at 678; Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). Well-pleaded allegations must nudge
the claim “across the line from conceivable to plausible.” Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570.
4.

As an initial matter, state-law claims against the Sheriff and all claims against

each of the five Erie County departments named in the complaint – the Department of the
Sheriff, the Erie County Holding Center, the Erie County Department of Health, and the
Erie County Department of Mental Health – must be dismissed.
McKenzie’s state claims against the Sheriff are time barred. Under New York’s Civil
Procedure Rule 215(1), “an action against a sheriff . . . upon a liability incurred by him by
doing an act in his official capacity or by omission of an official duty” shall be commenced
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within one year from the incident giving rise to the suit.” See Taylor v. Mayone, 626 F.2d
247, 251, n. 5 (2d Cir .1980); Houghton v. Cardone, 295 F. Supp. 2d 268 (W.D.N.Y. 2003);
Kingston v. Erie County, 122 A.D.2d 543, 543, 505 N.Y.S.2d 9 (4th Dept.1986). McKenzie
does not dispute that his claim was commenced over one year after the incident giving rise
to the suit; instead, he argues that the applicable statute of limitations is one year and
ninety days. But that time period, which is set forth in New York’s General Municipal Law
§ 50-i, applies to claims against the County, not the Sheriff. Duryea v. County of Livingston,
No. 06 CV 643T, 2007 WL 1232228, at *3 (W.D.N.Y. Apr. 26, 2007) (citing Fljer v. Cayuga
County, No. 5:03-CV-578, 2006 WL 2655698, at *4 (N.D.N.Y. Sept. 15, 2006) (“CPLR §
215(1) provides the statute of limitations for tort claims against a sheriff and his deputies
while [General Municipal Law] § 50-i sets forth the limitations period for tort claims against
a county.”). Thus, this claim must be dismissed.2
McKenzie’s claims against the various Erie County departments must also be
dismissed. Each of these departments is merely an administrative arm of the County, and
they therefore lack the capacity to be sued. See, e.g., S.W. by J.W. v. Warren, 528 F.
Supp. 2d 282, 303 (S.D.N.Y. 2007) (“Because the Department of Health is merely an
administrative arm of the County, it lacks the capacity to be sued in this action”); Holley v.
County of Orange, N.Y., 625 F. Supp. 2d 131, 143 (S.D.N.Y. 2009) (“[T]here can be no
claims against the Sheriff's Department itself as it is an arm of a municipality”); Tulloch v.

2

To the extent McKenzie has sued the Sheriff under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, that claim is governed by a
three-year statute of lim itations, and is therefore not tim e barred. See Taylor, 626 F.2d at 253 (“[T]he
appropriate statute of lim itations for § 1983 actions against sheriffs and their deputies is the three-year
provision of CPLR § 214(2) rather than the one-year provision of § 215(1).”).

3

Erie Cnty. Holding Ctr., No. 10-CV-0207S, 2010 WL 2609054, at *2 (W.D.N.Y. June 24,
2010) (“[C]laims against the Erie County Holding Center must be dismissed because [] the
Erie County Holding Center is merely an arm of the County, and does not have a legal
identity separate and apart from the County and thus cannot be sued.”).
5.

McKenzie also seeks to assert a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1997, the Civil

Rights of Institutionalized Persons Act of 1980, amended in 1996 by the Prison Litigation
Reform Act. But “Plaintiff may not assert a cause of action under § 1997, because this
statute only creates a cause of action for the Attorney General of the United States.”
Laureano v. Vega, No. 92 CIV. 6056 (LMM), 1994 WL 68357, at *6 (S.D.N.Y. Feb. 25,
1994); see also McDonald v. Rivera, No. 9:06CV410(LEK/DEP), 2008 WL 268345, at *11
(N.D.N.Y. Jan. 30, 2008) (Report and Recommendation; adopted in full); Miller v.
Carpinello, No. 06 CV 12940 (LAP), 2007 WL 4207282, at *5 (S.D.N.Y. Nov. 20, 2007).
6.

Last, Defendants seek to dismiss McKenzie’s complaint generally, arguing

that it contains only conclusions of law and thus fails to satisfy the relevant pleading
standard. But this Court finds that McKenzie’s complaint contains “sufficient factual matter”
under Iqbal. 556 U.S. at 678. Though factually sparse, McKenzie alleges in his complaint
that he hanged himself as a result of Defendants’ failure to properly evaluate him as a
suicide risk and failure to provide him with necessary medication. Presuming these
allegations to be true, they “nudge the claim across the line from conceivable to plausible.”
See Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570.

****
IT HEREBY IS ORDERED, that Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss (Docket No. 4 ) is
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GRANTED in part and DENIED in part.
SO ORDERED.
Dated: September 23, 2013
Buffalo, New York
_______/s/William M. Skretny
WILLIAM M. SKRETNY
Chief Judge
United States District Court

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