Opinion
3:20-cv-206-KRG-KAP
04-02-2021
MICHAEL S. HENRY, Plaintiff v. DANIEL CLINE, C.F.S.I., et al., Defendants
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
Keith A. Pesto, United States Magistrate Judge
The complaint, ECF no. 8, should be dismissed for failure to state a claim without leave to amend.
Report
Plaintiff Henry is an inmate at S.C.I. Houtzdale who states he is currently serving a 4-year and 1 day to 21-year sentence imposed by Court of Common Pleas of Philadelphia. That is consistent with the information in the public record for plaintiff, a copy of which is attached. In his complaint, Henry names as defendants eleven employees of the Department of Corrections as a result of an alleged incident that began in the kitchen at Houtzdale on December 26, 2019.
The Prison Litigation Reform Act, as codified at 28 U.S.C.§ 1915A, commands:
(a) Screening.--The court shall review, before docketing, if feasible or, in any event, as soon as practicable after docketing, a complaint in a civil action in which a prisoner seeks redress from a governmental entity or officer or employee of a governmental entity.
(b) Grounds for dismissal.--On review, the court shall identify cognizable claims or dismiss the complaint, or any portion of the complaint, 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.
According to Henry, who identifies himself as the “founder of New World Democracy, ” on December 26, 2019, he was working in the tray room of “chow hall one” 1 with an inmate named “Jay” who is a “first generation Indonesian.” Jay told Henry that he (Jay) had been informed by a kitchen staff member that Henry was a “rat, snitch and a rapist.” Complaint at 13. Jay and Henry began arguing until Daniel Cline, a food services employee, told them to stop and to follow him to the kitchen supervisor's office. Id. Cline informed the supervisor, Mr. M. Schraff, that when he ordered Henry to “stop” Henry did not and that Cline wanted Henry's pay “demoted” from $.42/8 hours to $.29/8 hours. Id. at 13-14. Plaintiff was pleading his case to Schraff when Charles Pittsinger, a food services manager, yelled at him to get his I.D. and immediately return to his housing unit before he (Pittsinger) changed his mind and pepper-sprayed Henry and had the L-5 Guards take him bodily to the RHU. Id. at 14. Henry acquiesced; while Schraff escorted him back to the housing unit, Henry asked that his pay not be demoted unless Jay's pay was also demoted. Id. at 15. Schraff said he would see what he could do. Id. Henry returned to his cell and immediately filed grievances against Cline and Pittsinger. When Henry returned to work several days later, he had been demoted to table wiper and (presumably) his pay rate had been reduced. Id. at 15-16. Schraff told Henry that “they AM shift forced his hand.” Id. at 16. Henry told Schraff he would add him to the grievances Henry had already filed against Cline and Pittsinger. Id. Schraff then called Henry to his office, told him the demotion had not been processed, and agreed to put him on pots and pans detail without loss of pay in order to separate him from Jay. Id.
Henry also identified himself as “Founder of New World Democracy” in an action filed in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania in 2011. Henry v. C.F.C.F./Philadelphia Prisons System, Civ. No. 2:11-cv-07411-PD (E.DPa.). The analysis of the complaint, in full, was that the complaint “fails to comply with the filing requirements of Rule 8(a) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. It is rambling, largely incomprehensible, and fails to identify how and when each Defendant violated his civil rights.” Id., ECF no. 2 at 1. Plaintiff was given leave to file an amended complaint but did not do so. Henry also had Henry v. Giorla, Civ . No. 2:11-cv-7689-PD (E.D.Pa.) dismissed for failure to prosecute. Henry had a complaint dismissed as frivolous at Henry v. Kane, Civ. No. 2:93-cv-149-NS (E.D.Pa.), appeal dismissed as frivolous, No. 93-1133 (3d Cir.).
Henry's grievances were assigned to Mr. D. Close. Id. Allegedly, Close failed to properly investigate the grievances and failed to “yield to the Plaintiff's plain as the nose on one's face to the, “Iron Clad Evidence” well presented and suggested remedy.” Id. at 17. Eight subsequent reviewers of plaintiff's grievances - Mr. Barry Smith, Ms. Bobby Joe Salamon, Ms. R. Reifer, Ms. S. Hnatkovich, Ms. K. Keri Moore, Ms. Amanda West, Ms. D. Varner, and John E. Wetzel - similarly failed to provide plaintiff with the relief he sought. Id. at 17-20.
Plaintiff concludes his statement of claim with the following:
All efforts to short any and all possible onslaughts on/towards plaintiff['s] very life and character has [sic] been to no avail; the odyssey; the saga continues thus complaintant, movant, victim, plaintiff feels the pangs of modern day []slavery or attempt slaveocracy over our democracy sovereignty like some sort of “1688” relapse - all the2
named defendants are relevant at all time [sic] and are being sued both in th[ei]r official and individual capacity for the inactions & inactions set forth throughout section IV of this action.Id. at 20. Plaintiff seeks five types of relief: (1) $2,750,000 in punitive damages ($250,000 per each of the 11 defendants); (2) $2,200,000 in compensatory damages ($200,000 per defendant); (3) $2,750,000 in “collateral” damages ($250,000 per defendant); (4) $500,000 in “irreparable” damages; and (5) “nominal relief, ” i.e., “immediate discharge” so that plaintiff may establish a “functional” I.C.U. “vs. gov. and mayors - due to the magnitude and severity coupled with the sovereignty of our nation, USA being dubbed a drug infested colonize network society.” Id. at 22.
Plaintiff has not alleged sufficient facts to support any federal claim. He has certainly not set forth any basis for the relief he seeks. Most of the relief plaintiff seeks is unavailable: the Prison Litigation Reform Act, as codified at 18 U.S.C.§ 3626(a) (1)(A), prohibits the award in a prison civil rights action of any “prospective relief” which is not “necessary to correct the violation of the Federal right of a particular plaintiff or plaintiffs.” The PLRA's definition of prospective relief is contained in 18 U.S.C. § 3626(g)(7): “all relief other than compensatory money damages.” To the extent that plaintiff does seek compensatory damages, however, he has failed to set forth any allegations that have any relation to a request for $2,200,000.
The only harm that plaintiff comes close to alleging is a demotion and pay cut of $.13 per 8 hours. This pay cut, if it took place at all, could constitute a loss of $2,200,000 only if plaintiff worked without a break for thousands of years. More fundamentally, Henry has no claim for damages because he suffered no injury to any legal right. Even if the Department of Corrections as a matter of policy permits inmates to keep money in inmate accounts and provides them with money as an incentive for desirable behaviors like work in prison, an inmate is not an employee and the inmate's relationship with prison personnel is not one of employment. See e.g. Wilkerson v. Samuels, 524 Fed.Appx. 776, 779 (3d Cir. 2013).
To the extent that plaintiff is attempting to imply that his threatened or actual demotion was “in retaliation for” grievances, because he would like to state a claim within the framework of Mitchell v. Horn, 318 F.3d 523, 530 (3d Cir.2003), he fails. Henry filed his grievances against Cline and Pittsinger after the relevant events that he contends injured him, so the filing of grievances could not have caused their actions. Nor can plaintiff plausibly claim that other unspecified grievances he filed against other Department of Corrections employees at some other unspecified time, see Complaint at 15, caused his threatened demotion. Henry has failed to allege enough to nudge any claim “across the line from conceivable to plausible.” See Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 683 3 (2009), quoting Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007). To the contrary, plaintiff's allegations permit only the conclusion that the commotion between Henry and Jay on December 26, 2019 caused Pittsinger to summarily dismiss Henry and demote or threaten to demote him from tray room to table wiper on December 26, 2019. In short, there is no protected activity, no legally adverse action, and no causal connection between the two.
Finally, plaintiff asserts that the defendants named because they administer the grievance process somehow generated “bogus and harmful reports [that] can be officially used to fu[r]ther taint any and all chance for ‘parole' plus a meaningful employment and status level thusly forcing Plaintiff to live a very miserable haphazard prison lifestyle -constituting deliberate indifference; wa[n]ton and malicious intent design[ed] to dehumanize and render a non-descript grievant . . . causing plaintiff a perpetual state of mental anguish to increase the leading cause of death associate with Black American Males - High Blood Pressure caused by high levels of stress and irreparable harm synonymous to all the above claims.” Complaint at 19. These statements have no support in any allegations of the complaint. And there is no chance that plaintiff could state a claim by amending his complaint to make a more coherent argument that some record of the December 26, 2019 incident exists that might have a detrimental effect on his chances of parole. Decades ago, the Supreme Court called that sort of argument “simply too attenuated” to invoke the Due Process Clause. Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 487 (1995). Even without considering Henry's criminal record, it is sheer speculation to claim that if a “bogus” report of Henry's possible temporary demotion to table wiper exists and some defendant generated it as part of the grievance process, it might “taint” Henry's prospects for parole.
The Court of Appeals, in Grayson v. Mayview State Hospital, 293 F.3d 103 (3d Cir.2002) and similar cases, directs district courts to allow plaintiffs in civil rights cases leave to amend unless that amendment is “futile” or “inequitable.” Amendment of the complaint is denied as futile. 4
Pursuant to 28 U.S.C.§ 636(b)(1), plaintiff can within fourteen days file written objections to this Report and Recommendation. Plaintiff is advised that in the absence of timely and specific objections, any appeal would be severely hampered or entirely defaulted. See EEOC v. City of Long Branch, 866 F.3d 93, 100 (3d Cir.2017) (describing standard of appellate review when no timely and specific objections are filed as limited to review for plain error). 5