Opinion
Case No. 1:01-CV-465
April 8, 2002
Attorney(s) for Plaintiff(s), James H. Koning, Smith, Koning, VanWagoner Beck, P.C. Portage, MI.
Attorney(s) for Defendant(s), Ron W. Kimbrel, Early, Lennon, Cocker Bartosiewicz, PC, Kalamazoo, MI.
JUDGMENT
In accordance with an Opinion filed this day,
IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Jurisdiction (Dkt. No. 11) is GRANTED.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Count I of Plaintiffs Complaint is DISMISSED WITH PREJUDICE for failure to state a claim.
IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that this case is DISMISSED from this Court in its entirety.
OPINION
This matter is before the Court on Defendants' Motion to Dismiss for Lack of Jurisdiction. The Court will grant Defendants' Motion and will decline supplemental jurisdiction over the remaining state law claims, dismissing the case from this Court.
I. Standard of Review and Applicable Federal Rules
Defendants bring their motion pursuant to Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(l) and (2), asserting this Court's lack of subject matter jurisdiction over the federal claim and lack of personal jurisdiction over Defendant Lakeview School District. To survive a Rule 12(b)(1) motion, the plaintiff only need show that the complaint alleges a claim under federal law, and that the claim is "substantial," i.e., non-frivolous. Board of Trustees of Painesville Twp. v. City of Painesville, 200 F.3d 396, 398 (6th Cir. 1999). The plaintiff will survive the defendant's motion to dismiss by showing "any arguable basis in law" for the claims set forth in the complaint. Id.
The Court does not address the Rule 12(b)(2) standard, since a motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction is not applicable under the facts at hand, as described below.
Most complaints are not so clearly insufficient so as to warrant dismissal under Rule 12(b)(1). Apple v. Glenn, 183 F.3d 477, 480 (6th Cir. 1999). Instead, they should be considered under Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim upon which relief may be granted. Id. Defendants' motion is more properly brought pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6), so the Court will consider Plaintiffs Complaint under the familiar Rule 12(b)(6) standards.
A district court's dismissal of a civil rights complaint under Rule 12(b)(6) is scrutinized with special care. Lillard v. Shelby County Bd. of Educ., 76 F.3d 716, 724 (6th Cir. 1996). A motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim should not be granted unless it appears beyond doubt that Plaintiff can prove no set of facts which would entitle her to relief. See Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46 (1957). This Court must construe the complaint liberally and accept all of the allegations as true, as well as making any permissible inferences from the alleged facts. Id. "A complaint need not set down in detail all the particularities of a plaintiffs claim, [but] the complaint must give the defendant fair notice of what the plaintiffs claim is and the grounds upon which it rests." Id.
The rules generally require only a "short and plain statement of the claim" and not detailed allegations. Leatherman v. Tarrant County Narcotics Intelligence Coordination Unit, 507 U.S. 163, 168 (1993). The complaint, however, "must contain either direct or inferential allegations respecting all the material elements to sustain a recovery under some viable legal theory." Scheid v. Fanny Farmer Candy Shops, Inc., 859 F.2d 434, 436 (6th Cir. 1988) (quotations omitted) (emphasis in original). The Court "need not accept as true legal conclusions or unwarranted factual inferences." Gregory v. Shelby County, Tenn., 220 F.3d 433, 446 (6th Cir. 2000).
II. Facts
Plaintiff Alison Noble was a high school student at Lakeview High School on January 29, 2000 when she alleges that an accident in a chemistry class caused an explosion which caused severe burn injuries to her head and face, as well as other serious injuries. Defendant Alan Lee Kiste was teaching the class and conducting the experiment which resulted in the explosion that injured Plaintiff Plaintiff alleges that Defendant Kiste's actions and/or lack of precautionary measures taken in conducting the experiment violated her Constitutional rights and may have violated federal, state and local laws and regulations.
III. Analysis
A. Defendant Lakeview School District's Argument That It Is Not A "Person" Under § 1983
Defendant Lakeview School District asserts that this Court has no personal jurisdiction over it because it is not a "person" for purposes of 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Surely this Court has personal jurisdiction over Defendant Lakeview School District, since that is an entity operating within the State of Michigan with all of the other indicia of jurisdiction present in its presumably Michigan-centered activities. However, dismissal of Defendant Lakeview School District would be proper if it is not a "person" for purposes of 42 U.S.C. § 1983 as a matter of law, since dismissal for failure to state a claim against this Defendant would destroy the Court's only basis for subject matter jurisdiction over it.
Court assumes that Defendant Lakeview School District meant to argue that this Court had no personal jurisdiction over it with respect to this particular argument, instead of no subject matter jurisdiction, since Defendants' Motion references Rule 12(b)(2).
Defendant Lakeview School District's argument that it is not a "person" under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 is clearly wrong, given settled Supreme Court and Sixth Circuit precedent. A local governmental entity may be held liable under § 1983 for violations of federal law perpetrated pursuant to governmental policy or custom. Soper v. Hoben, 195 F.3d 845, 853-54 (6th Cir. 1999), cert. den., 530 U.S. .1262 (citing Monell v. Department of Social Svcs. of the City of New York, 436 U.S. 658, 694 (1978)). A school district is a local governmental entity and can be sued under § 1983. See Soper, 195 F.3d at 854.
B. Defendants' Argument That There Is No Subject Matter Jurisdiction Because Plaintiff Does Not Properly Allege A § 1983 Claim
Plaintiff's Complaint contains five counts, and only Count I alleges a federal cause of action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. Both Defendants assert that Plaintiffs Count I and the whole of her Complaint makes factual allegations that sound in negligence only and do not rise to the level of a constitutional or federal law violation. The Court agrees, and thus, the Court has no subject matter jurisdiction over Plaintiffs claims and must dismiss her case.
This Court has subject matter jurisdiction over civil actions "arising under" the federal Constitution, laws or treaties. See 28 U.S.C. § 1331. One federal law, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, makes deprivation of rights, privileges or immunities secured by the Constitution and federal law actionable.
Plaintiff also alleges that 28 U.S.C. § 1343 confers jurisdiction on this Court, but that statute is generally inapplicable to this case as it confers jurisdiction largely for the purpose of adjudicating voting rights claims. See 28 U.S.C. § 1343. Moreover, 28 U.S.C. § 1331 provides jurisdiction to any claim "arising under" federal Constitutional or statutory law, which adequately covers the claims made in Plaintiffs Complaint.
To state a § 1983 claim, Plaintiff must allege that a person acting under color of state law deprived her of a federal right. Soper, 195 F.3d at 852; Lillard, 76 F.3d at 724. Plaintiff claims in her Complaint that Defendants' alleged conduct violated her substantive due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment; violated her equal protection rights under the Fourteenth Amendment; violated federal laws because of the manner in which the science experiment was conducted; and violated State law and/or National Fire Protection Association standards and guidelines.
1. Plaintiffs Substantive Due Process Claim
There are two types of substantive due process claims: (1) those which assert denial of a right, privilege or immunity granted by the Constitution or by federal statute, and (2) those which assert official acts that may not occur regardless of procedural safeguards accompanying them, i.e., those acts which "shock the conscience." Lillard, 76 F.3d at 724. The first type of claim occurs when, for example, the right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures has been violated. Id. The second type occurs when a government action "shocking the conscience" takes place and does not require the allegation of a violation of any Constitutional right other than due process. See id. Plaintiffs claim is of the kind falling into the second category.
The Sixth Circuit has stated that a constitutional due process claim, however, bears important differences from a tort claim where it was speaking to the state law torts of assault and battery:
[W]e emphasize once more that the substantive due process claim is quite different than a claim of assault and battery under state tort law. . . . [S]ubstantive due process is concerned with violations of personal rights of privacy and bodily security. . . . [T]he substantive due process inquiry . . . must be whether the force applied caused injury so severe, was so disproportionate to the need presented, and was so inspired by malice or sadism rather than a merely careless or unwise excess of zeal that it amounted to a brutal and inhumane abuse of official power literally shocking to the conscience.Webb v. McCullough, 828 F.2d 1151, 1158 (6th Cir. 1987) ( quoted in Lillard, 76 F.3d at 725). The district court is to determine whether the alleged actions of Defendants "were a brutal and inhumane abuse of official power, literally shocking to the conscience." Webb, 828 F.2d at 1159 ( quoted in Lillard, 76 F.3d at 725).
In Webb, the Sixth Circuit reversed a grant of summary judgment to a defendant school official on a substantive due process claim, holding that the school official's conduct there could constitute denial of substantive due process rights. Webb, 828 F.2d at 1158. There, the school principal caught a female student on a school trip in her room with a male student and alcohol, and upon being discovered, the female student ran into the bathroom and locked the door. Id. at 1154. When the school principal was able to break down the door, the door knocked the female student against a wall. Id. The school principal opened the door again and struck the female student again, this time to the floor, where he then grabbed her, threw her against the wall and slapped her before she was able to break away. Id.
In Lillard, the Sixth Circuit affirmed dismissal of a plaintiff's due process claim where she was a high school student slapped across the face by her gym teacher and soccer coach. Lillard, 76 F.3d at 719, 725-26. The Sixth Circuit held that while there was no legitimate disciplinary purpose for the teacher's action, a single slap could not rise to the level of "shocking the conscience." Id. at 726. The Sixth Circuit called the teacher's actions "careless and unwise . . . but fall[ing] far short of `brutal' or `inhumane,' or any of the other adjectives employed to describe an act so vicious as to constitute a violation of substantive due process." Id. The Lillard Court also found that the same teacher's actions in rubbing the stomach of another student and making a sexually suggestive remark did not rise to the level of a constitutional violation. Id.
Plaintiffs allegations also do not rise to the level of a substantive due process violation, even if the allegations are true and even considering the serious nature of her injuries. Plaintiff has alleged gross negligence at best, and her claims belong in state court. She has alleged that Defendants intentionally took actions which greatly increased her risk of injury, and then in fact caused her injury, but she has not alleged that Defendants intended to hurt or degrade her. While intention to hurt or degrade has not been specifically required to find a substantive due process violation, it seems that most such violations would likely include intent. After all, the conduct must have been "so inspired by malice or sadism rather than a merely careless or unwise excess . . . that it amounted to a brutal and inhumane abuse of official power literally shocking to the conscience." See Webb, 828 F.2d at 1158. It would be a very rare case where non-intentional tortious conduct was sufficiently "so inspired by malice or sadism" as to give rise to a substantive due process violation, and Plaintiffs allegations do not indicate "malice or sadism." The fact that Plaintiff sustained serious injuries is not enough to support a "brutal and inhumane abuse of power," or else every tort in which someone was seriously injured would rise to the level of a constitutional violation. It is not enough to allege that "Defendant Kistie [sic] conducted the experiments with improper motives," Complaint, ¶ 72, without any factual basis alleged for that legal conclusion.
2. Plaintiff's Equal Protection Claim
As to Plaintiff's equal protection claim, Plaintiff claims that this claim can be sustained despite the fact that she has not alleged that she was a victim of unlawful discrimination based on characteristics of group membership. However, some type of discrimination must still be present, in that Plaintiff must be able to allege that she was treated differently from other students similarly situated by Defendants. A plaintiff, even in a "class of one," can successfully bring an equal protection claim where she can allege that she has been intentionally treated differently from others similarly situated and that there is no rational basis for the difference in treatment. Village of Willowbrook v. Olech, 528 U.S. 562, 564 (2000).
Plaintiff only makes a bare legal conclusion that she and other students in the classroom at the time of the explosion were treated differently from other chemistry students similarly situated. There were, however, no facts alleged to support that conclusory allegation. The same is true for Plaintiffs conclusion that Defendant Kiste acted with improper motives. There are no facts alleged that would permit this conclusion to be inferred. Defendants may have engaged in reckless and/or irrational behavior demonstrating a lack of care toward the students in Plaintiffs chemistry class, but there is no indication from the Complaint that this behavior was expressly directed at Plaintiffs particular chemistry class. There is no equal protection violation alleged here.
3. Plaintiff's Claims That Federal Laws Were Violated By Defendants
In addition, Plaintiff has not made any other claims "arising under" any federal laws. She has alleged that Defendants violated federal law in the manner in which they conducted the science experiment at issue and experiments generally, but she has not alleged that any federal law gives her a private right of action against these Defendants. To "arise under" the federal Constitution or a federal law, a claim must generally arise under a federal cause of action. See Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals Inc. v. Thompson, 478 U.S. 804, 808-09 (1986). To the extent that federal laws may provide standards of care that Defendants may have violated, the necessary interpretation of those laws does not provide a basis for federal subject matter jurisdiction. See id. at 813-14 ("the presence of the federal issue as an element of the state tort is not the kind of adjudication for which jurisdiction would serve congressional purposes and the federal system").
IV. Conclusion
Thus, Plaintiff's federal claims must be dismissed for failure to state a claim. Moreover, when federal claims are dismissed from a lawsuit, it is proper to decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over the state law claims. Musson Theatrical, Inc. v. Federal Express Corp., 89 F.3d 1244, 1254-55 (6th Cir. 1996). As a result, the Court will decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction, grant Defendants' Motion and dismiss this case in its entirety. A judgment consistent with this opinion will be entered.