Opinion
24-3093-JWL
07-22-2024
DEVONTA B. MILLER, Plaintiff, v. CHIANNA HEMKEN, Defendant.
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
JOHN W. LUNGSTRUM, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
Plaintiff filed this pro se civil rights case under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Plaintiff is in custody at the Larned State Hospital in Larned, Kansas (“LSH”). The Court granted Plaintiff leave to proceed in forma pauperis. On June 12, 2024, the Court entered a Memorandum and Order to Show Cause (Doc. 3) (“MOSC”) granting Plaintiff until July 12, 2024, in which to show good cause why his Complaint should not be dismissed for the reasons set forth in the MOSC. Plaintiff has failed to respond by the Court's deadline.
Plaintiff alleges that his due process rights were violated when he was not allowed to go to the law library for 25 days. It is well-established that a prison inmate has a constitutional right of access to the courts. However, it is equally well-settled that in order “[t]o present a viable claim for denial of access to courts, . . . an inmate must allege and prove prejudice arising from the defendants' actions.” Peterson v. Shanks, 149 F.3d 1140, 1145 (10th Cir. 1998) (citations omitted); Lewis v. Casey, 518 U.S. 343, 349 (1996) (“The requirement that an inmate . . . show actual injury derives ultimately from the doctrine of standing.”).
An inmate may satisfy the actual-injury requirement by demonstrating that the alleged acts or shortcomings of defendants “hindered his efforts to pursue” a non-frivolous legal claim. Lewis, 518 U.S. at 351-53; see also Burnett v. Jones, 437 Fed.Appx. 736, 744 (10th Cir. 2011) (“To state a claim for violation of the constitutional right to access the courts, a prisoner ‘must demonstrate actual injury . . .-that is, that the prisoner was frustrated or impeded in his efforts to pursue a nonfrivolous legal claim concerning his conviction or his conditions of confinement.'”) (quoting Gee v. Pacheco, 627 F.3d 1178, 1191 (10th Cir. 2010)).
The Supreme Court plainly held in Lewis that “the injury requirement is not satisfied by just any type of frustrated legal claim.” Lewis, 518 at 354. Rather, the injury occurs only when prisoners are prevented from attacking “their sentences, directly or collaterally” or challenging “the conditions of their confinement.” Id. at 355. “Impairment of any other litigating capacity is simply one of the incidental (and perfectly constitutional) consequences of conviction and incarceration.” Id. (emphasis in original); see also Carper v. DeLand, 54 F.3d 613, 617 (10th Cir. 1995) (“[A]n inmate's right of access does not require the state to supply legal assistance beyond the preparation of initial pleadings in a civil rights action regarding current confinement or a petition for a writ of habeas corpus.”) (citations omitted).
The right to access the courts does not guarantee inmates the right to a law library or to legal assistance, but merely to “the means for ensuring ‘a reasonably adequate opportunity to present claimed violations of fundamental constitutional rights to the courts.'” Lewis, 518 U.S. at 350-51 (quoting Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817, 825 (1977)). The right to access the courts is “only [the right] to present . . . grievances to the courts,” and does not require prison administrators to supply resources guaranteeing inmates' ability “to litigate effectively once in court” or to “conduct generalized research.” Id. at 354, 360.
The Court found in the MOSC that Plaintiff has failed to allege an actual injury arising from the delay in use of the law library. See Massengill v. Snyder, No. 23-3062-JWL, 2023 WL 2475102, at *3 (D. Kan. Mar. 13, 2023) (holding that plaintiff failed to state a claim for lack of access to the court because he alleged no actual injury when he failed “to explain why [his] claims are non-frivolous, and fail[ed] to explain how those claims have been prejudiced by the limited access to law library materials”) (citing Counts v. Wyoming Dep't of Corr., 854 Fed.Appx. 948, 952 (10th Cir. 2021) (unpublished)).
The Court's MOSC provides that “[f]ailure to respond by the deadline may result in dismissal of this matter without further notice for failure to state a claim.” (Doc. 3, at 6.) Plaintiff has failed to respond to the MOSC by the Court's deadline and has failed to show good cause why this matter should not be dismissed for failure to state a claim.
IT IS THEREFORE ORDERED BY THE COURT that this matter is dismissed for failure to state a claim.
IT IS SO ORDERED.