Crowder v. Boyce et al

Filing 5

ORDER DISMISSING COMPLAINT AND GRANTING LEAVE TO AMEND. Signed by Judge James D. Todd on 7/28/15. (Todd, James)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF TENNESSEE
WESTERN DIVISION

TIMOTHY CROWDER, 

Plaintiff, 

vs.

No. 2:14-cv-2962-JDT-tmp

DEPUTY JAILER BOYCE, et. al.,
Defendants.

ORDER DISMISSING COMPLAINT AND GRANTING LEAVE TO AMEND

On December 10, 2014, Plaintiff Timothy Crowder (“Crowder”), an inmate at the Shelby
County Criminal Justice Complex (“Jail”) in Memphis, Tennessee, filed a pro se complaint
pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 accompanied by a motion asking leave to proceed in forma
pauperis. (ECF Nos. 1 & 2.) In an order issued December 11, 2014, the Court granted leave to
proceed in forma pauperis  and assessed the civil filing fee pursuant to the Prison Litigation
Reform Act of 1995 (“PLRA”), 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(a)-(b). (ECF No. 4). The Clerk shall record
the defendants as Deputy Jailer First Name Unknown (“FNU”) Boyce, Johnnie Trenell, and
Deputy Jailer FNU Frazier. 
I. THE COMPLAINT
Crowder alleges that on August 11, 2014, he was attacked by a fellow inmate, Defendant
Trenell. (ECF No. 1 at 2.) Crowder alleges that the attack occurred because Defendants Boyce
and Frazier did not follow proper procedure when opening and closing housing unit doors. (Id.)
Crowder also alleges that Deputy Frazier did not notice or acknowledge that inmate Trenell had

tennis shoes on for 30 to 45 minutes prior to the attack. (Id.) Crowder requests the officers be
re-trained and that he be compensated for trauma and injuries resulting from the attack. (Id. at 3)
II. ANALYSIS
A.

Screening and Standard
The Court is required to screen prisoner complaints and to dismiss any complaint, or any

portion thereof, if the complaint—
(1)
is frivolous, malicious, or fails to state a claim upon which relief
may be granted; or
(2)

seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such

relief.
28 U.S.C. § 1915A(b); see also 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B).
In assessing whether the complaint in this case states a claim on which relief may be
granted, the court applies the standards under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), as
stated in Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 677-79 (2009), and in Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U.S. 544, 555-57 (2007). Hill v. Lappin, 630 F.3d 468, 470-71 (6th Cir. 2010). “Accepting
all well-pleaded allegations in the complaint as true, the Court ‘consider[s] the factual allegations
in [the] complaint to determine if they plausibly suggest an entitlement to relief.’” Williams v.
Curtin, 631 F.3d 380, 383 (6th Cir. 2011) (quoting Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 681) (alteration in
original). “[P]leadings that . . . are no more than conclusions . . . are not entitled to the
assumption of truth. While legal conclusions can provide the framework of a complaint, they
must be supported by factual allegations.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 679; see also Twombly, 550 U.S. at
555 n.3 (“Rule 8(a)(2) still requires a ‘showing,’ rather than a blanket assertion, of entitlement to
relief. Without some factual allegation in the complaint, it is hard to see how a claimant could

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satisfy the requirement of providing not only ‘fair notice’ of the nature of the claim, but also
‘grounds’ on which the claim rests.”).
“A complaint can be frivolous either factually or legally. Any complaint that is legally
frivolous would ipso facto fail to state a claim upon which relief can be granted.” Hill, 630 F.3d
at 470 (citing Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 325, 328-29 (1989)).
Whether a complaint is factually frivolous under §§ 1915A(b)(1) and
1915(e)(2)(B)(i) is a separate issue from whether it fails to state a claim for
relief. Statutes allowing a complaint to be dismissed as frivolous give “judges
not only the authority to dismiss a claim based on an indisputably meritless
legal theory, but also the unusual power to pierce the veil of the complaint’s
factual allegations and dismiss those claims whose factual contentions are
clearly baseless.” Neitzke, 490 U.S. at 327, 109 S. Ct. 1827 (interpreting 28
U.S.C. § 1915). Unlike a dismissal for failure to state a claim, where a judge
must accept all factual allegations as true, Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1949-50, a judge
does not have to accept “fantastic or delusional” factual allegations as true in
prisoner complaints that are reviewed for frivolousness. Neitzke, 490 U.S. at
327-28, 109 S. Ct. 1827.
Id. at 471.
“Pro se complaints are to be held ‘to less stringent standards than formal pleadings
drafted by lawyers,’ and should therefore be liberally construed.” Williams, 631 F.3d at 383
(quoting Martin v. Overton, 391 F.3d 710, 712 (6th Cir. 2004)). Pro se litigants and prisoners
are not exempt from the requirements of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Wells v. Brown,
891 F.2d 591, 594 (6th Cir. 1989); see also Brown v. Matauszak, No. 09-2259, 2011 WL
285251, at *5 (6th Cir. Jan. 31, 2011) (affirming dismissal of pro se complaint for failure to
comply with “unique pleading requirements” and stating “a court cannot ‘create a claim which [a
plaintiff] has not spelled out in his pleading’”) (quoting Clark v. Nat’l Travelers Life Ins. Co.,
518 F.2d 1167, 1169 (6th Cir. 1975)) (alteration in original); Payne v. Sec’y of Treas., 73 F.
App’x 836, 837 (6th Cir. 2003) (affirming sua sponte dismissal of complaint pursuant to Fed. R.
Civ. P. 8(a)(2) and stating, “[n]either this court nor the district court is required to create Payne’s
claim for her”); cf. Pliler v. Ford, 542 U.S. 225, 231 (2004) (“District judges have no obligation
to act as counsel or paralegal to pro se litigants.”); Young Bok Song v. Gipson, 423 F. App’x 506,
510 (6th Cir. 2011) (“[W]e decline to affirmatively require courts to ferret out the strongest cause

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of action on behalf of pro se litigants. Not only would that duty be overly burdensome, it would
transform the courts from neutral arbiters of disputes into advocates for a particular party. While
courts are properly charged with protecting the rights of all who come before it, that
responsibility does not encompass advising litigants as to what legal theories they should
pursue.”).
B.

§ 1983 Claim
Crowder filed his complaint on the court-supplied form for actions under 42 U.S.C.

§ 1983. Section 1983 provides:
Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation,
custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects,
or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within
the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities
secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an
action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress, except that
in any action brought against a judicial officer for an act or omission taken in
such officer's judicial capacity, injunctive relief shall not be granted unless a
declaratory decree was violated or declaratory relief was unavailable. For the
purposes of this section, any Act of Congress applicable exclusively to the
District of Columbia shall be considered to be a statute of the District of
Columbia.
To state a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a plaintiff must allege two elements: (1) a deprivation
of rights secured by the “Constitution and laws” of the United States (2) committed by a
defendant acting under color of state law. Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co., 398 U.S. 144, 150
(1970).

Crowder cannot sue Defendant Trenell, an inmate, under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. “A § 1983

plaintiff may not sue purely private parties.” Brotherton v. Cleveland, 173 F.3d 552, 567 (6th
Cir. 1999). Thus, “[i]n order to be subject to suit under § 1983 claim, defendant's actions must
be fairly attributable to the state.” Collyer v. Darling, 98 F.3d 211, 231-32 (6th Cir. 1997). As a
fellow inmate, Defendant Trenell is not a state actor under § 1983. 

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1.

Eighth Amendment Claim

A claim by a prisoner that Defendants failed to protect him from his fellow inmates arises

under the Eighth Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishments. See generally
Wilson v. Seiter, 501 U.S. 294 (1991). In the case of a person being held prior to trial, however,
“the ‘cruel and unusual punishment’ proscription of the Eighth Amendment to the Constitution
does not apply,” because “as a pre-trial detainee [the plaintiff is] not being ‘punished,’” Cuoco v.
Moritsugu, 222 F.3d 99, 106 (2d Cir. 2000). Instead, a person detained prior to conviction
receives protection against mistreatment at the hands of prison officials under the Due Process
Clause of the Fifth Amendment if the pretrial detainee is held in federal custody, or the Due
Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment if held in state custody. Compare Cuoco, 222
F.3d at 103, 106 (applying Fifth Amendment to a federal detainee), with Liscio v. Warren, 901
F.2d 274, 275–76 (2d Cir.1990) (applying Fourteenth Amendment to a state detainee). Caiozzo
v. Koreman, 581 F.3d 63, 69 (2d Cir. 2009). Even if Crowder was a pretrial detainee during the
evnt at issue, the court will analyze his claims under Eighth Amendment principles because the
rights of pretrial detainees are equivalent to those of convicted prisoners. Thompson v. Cnty. of
Medina, 29 f.3d 238, 242 (6th Cir. 1994) (citing Roberts v. City of Troy, 773 F.2d 720, 723 (6th
Cir. 1985).1
An Eighth Amendment claim consists of both objective and subjective components.
Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 834 (1994); Hudson v. McMillian, 503 U.S. 1, 8 (1992);

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On June 22, 2015, the Supreme Court held, in Kingsley v. Hendrickson, 133 S. Ct. 2466
(2015), that excessive force claims brought by pre-trial detainees must be analyzed under a
standard of objective reasonableness, rejecting a subjective standard that takes into account a
defendant’s state of mind. Id. at 2472-73. It is unclear whether or to what extent the holding in
Kingsley will affect the deliberate indifference standard for claims concerning an inmate’s health
or safety, which the Sixth Circuit applies to both pre-trial detainees and convicted prisoners.
Sours v. Big Sandy Reg’l Jail Auth., 593 F. App’x 478, 483 (6th Cir. 2014). Absent further
guidance, the Court will continue to apply the deliberate indifference analysis to these claims.

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Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298; Williams v. Curtin, 633 F.3d at 383; Mingus v. Butler, 591 F.3d 474,
479-80 (6th Cir. 2010).
The objective component requires that the deprivation be “sufficiently serious.” Farmer,
511 U.S. at 834; Hudson, 503 U.S. at 8; Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298. To satisfy the objective
component of an Eighth Amendment claim, a prisoner must show that he “is incarcerated under
conditions posing a substantial risk of serious harm,” Farmer, 511 U.S. at 834; see also Miller v.
Calhoun Cnty., 408 F.3d 803, 812 (6th Cir. 2005), or that he has been deprived of the “minimal
civilized measure of life’s necessities,” Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298 (quoting Rhodes v. Chapman,
452 U.S. 337, 347 (1981)); see also Hadix v. Johnson, 367 F.3d 513, 525 (6th Cir. 2004). “The
Supreme Court has held that ‘prison officials have a duty . . . to protect prisoners from violence
at the hands of other prisoners.’” Bishop v. Hackel, 636 F.3d 757, 766 (6th Cir. 2011) (quoting
Farmer, 511 U.S. at 834). Here, Crowder has alleged he was assaulted by a fellow inmate.
To establish the subjective component of an Eighth Amendment violation, a prisoner
must demonstrate that the official acted with the requisite intent, that is, that he had a
“sufficiently culpable state of mind.” Farmer, 511 U.S. at 834; see also Wilson, 501 U.S. at 297,
302-03. The plaintiff must show that the prison officials acted with “deliberate indifference” to a
substantial risk that the prisoner would suffer serious harm. Farmer, 511 U.S. at 834; Wilson,
501 U.S. at 303; Helling v. McKinney, 509 U.S. at 32; Woods v. Lecureux, 110 F.3d 1215,1222
(6th Cir. 1997); Street, 102 F.3d at 814; Taylor v. Mich. Dep’t of Corr., 69 F.3d 76, 79 (6th Cir.
1995). “[D]eliberate indifference describes a state of mind more blameworthy than negligence.”
Farmer, 511 U.S. at 835. Thus,
[a] prison official cannot be found liable under the Eighth Amendment for
denying an inmate humane conditions of confinement unless the official knows of
and disregards an excessive risk to inmate health or safety; the official must both
be aware of facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk

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of serious harm exists, and he must also draw the inference. This approach
comports best with the text of the Eighth Amendment as our cases have
interpreted it. The Eighth Amendment does not outlaw cruel and unusual
“conditions”; it outlaws cruel and unusual “punishments.” An act or omission
unaccompanied by knowledge of a significant risk of harm might well be
something society wishes to discourage, and if harm does result society might
well wish to assure compensation. The common law reflects such concerns when
it imposes tort liability on a purely objective basis. . . . But an official’s failure to
alleviate a significant risk that he should have perceived but did not, while no
cause for commendation, cannot under our cases be condemned as the infliction
of punishment.
Id. at 837-38 (emphasis added; citations omitted); see also Garretson v. City of Madison Heights,
407 F.3d 789, 796 (6th Cir. 2005) (“If the officers failed to act in the face of an obvious risk of
which they should have known but did not, then they did not violate the Fourteenth
Amendment.”). The subjective component must be evaluated for each defendant individually.
Bishop, 636 F.3d at 767; see also id. at 768 (“[W]e must focus on whether each individual
Deputy had the personal involvement necessary to permit a finding of subjective knowledge.”).
Although Crowder’s claim that the Officers failed to protect him from the risk of violence from
fellow inmate Trenell might satisfy the objective component of an Eighth Amendment claim,
Crowder’s complaint does not sufficiently allege that he faced a “substantial risk of serious
harm.” Greene v. Bowles, 361 F.3d 290, 294 (6th Cir. 2004) (internal quotation marks omitted);
see also Bishop, 636 F.3d at 766 (“To establish a constitutional violation based on failure to
protect, a prison inmate must first show that the failure to protect from risk of harm is objectively
sufficiently serious.”) (internal quotation marks omitted).
The subjective component is not satisfied by the allegation that the Defendants did not
follow procedure. There are no allegations explaining the basis for Crowder’s fear of attack and,
therefore, it is not possible to conclude that Defendants Boyce and Frazier should have perceived
that the risk of harm to Crowder was substantial. That Defendants Boyce and Frazier might have

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been negligent or might have violated Jail policies does not establish they were aware of a
significant risk to Crowder’s safety and deliberately disregarded that risk.
III.

LEAVE TO AMEND

The Sixth Circuit has held that a district court may allow a prisoner to amend his
complaint to avoid a sua sponte dismissals under the PLRA. LaFountain v. Harry, 716 F.3d
944, 951 (6th Cir. 2013); see also Brown v. R.I., No. 12-1403, 2013 WL 646489, at *1 (1st Cir.
Feb. 22, 2013) (per curiam) (“Ordinarily, before dismissal for failure to state a claim is ordered,
some form of notice and an opportunity to cure the deficiencies in the complaint must be
afforded.”). Leave to amend is not required where a deficiency cannot be cured. Brown, 2013
WL 646489, at *1; Gonzalez-Gonzalez v. United States, 257 F.3d 31, 37 (1st Cir. 2001) (“This
does not mean, of course, that every sua sponte dismissal entered without prior notice to the
plaintiff automatically must be reversed. If it is crystal clear that the plaintiff cannot prevail and
that amending the complaint would be futile, then a sua sponte dismissal may stand.”); Grayson
v. Mayview State Hosp., 293 F.3d 103, 114 (3d Cir. 2002) (“in forma pauperis plaintiffs who file
complaints subject to dismissal under Rule 12(b)(6) should receive leave to amend unless
amendment would be inequitable or futile”); Curley v. Perry, 246 F.3d 1278, 1284 (10th Cir.
2001) (“We agree with the majority view that sua sponte dismissal of a meritless complaint that
cannot be salvaged by amendment comports with due process and does not infringe the right of
access to the courts.”).
IV.

CONCLUSION

The Court DISMISSES the complaint for failure to state a claim on which relief can be
granted, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii) and 1915A(b)(1).

However, with the

exception of Crowder’s § 1983 claims against Defendant Trenell, the court cannot conclude that

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any amendment to Crowder’s claims would be futile as a matter of law. Therefore, Crowder is
GRANTED leave to amend his complaint as to Defendants Frazier and Boyce in their individual
capacities. Any amendment must be filed within thirty (30) days of the date of entry of this
order. Crowder is advised that an amended complaint supersedes the original complaint and
must be complete in itself without reference to the prior pleadings. The text of the complaint
must allege sufficient facts to support each claim without reference to any extraneous document.
Any exhibits must be identified by number in the text of the amended complaint and must be
attached to the complaint. All claims alleged in an amended complaint must arise from the facts
alleged in the original complaint or the first amended complaint. Crowder may add additional
defendants provided that the claims against the new parties arise from the acts and omissions set
forth in the original or first amended complaints. Each claim for relief must be stated in a
separate count and must identify each defendant sued in that count. If Crowder fails to file an
amended complaint within the time specified, the Court will assess a strike pursuant to 28 U.S.C.
§ 1915(g) and enter judgment.
Crowder shall promptly notify the Clerk of any change of address or extended absence.
Failure to comply with these requirements, or any other order of the Court, may result in the
dismissal of this case without further notice.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
s/ James D. Todd
JAMES D. TODD
UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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