Marshall v. Milyard , 415 F. App'x 850 ( 2011 )

FILED
United States Court of Appeals
Tenth Circuit
January 31, 2011
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
Elisabeth A. Shumaker
Clerk of Court
FOR THE TENTH CIRCUIT
ERIC MARSHALL,
Plaintiff-Appellant,
v. No. 10-1104
(D.C. No. 1:08-CV-00299-PAB-BNB)
KEVIN MILYARD, Warden; (D. Colo.)
STEVEN BADE, Lieutenant; JAMES
FRYER, Correctional Officer;
ANTHONY A. DECESARO,
Grievance Officer; FLOYD A. WADE,
West CC Manager; M. NEGLEY, Shift
Commander,
Defendants-Appellees.
ORDER AND JUDGMENT *
Before HARTZ, Circuit Judge, PORFILIO and BRORBY, Senior Circuit
Judges.
Eric Marshall, a Colorado state-prison inmate proceeding pro se, appeals
the district court’s dismissal of his claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 asserting
*
After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel has determined
unanimously that oral argument would not materially assist the determination of
this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 34(a)(2); 10th Cir. R. 34.1(G). The case is
therefore ordered submitted without oral argument. This order and judgment is
not binding precedent, except under the doctrines of law of the case, res judicata,
and collateral estoppel. It may be cited, however, for its persuasive value
consistent with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1 and 10th Cir. R. 32.1.
constitutional violations. Exercising jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, we
affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand for further proceedings.
Background
Although Mr. Marshall asserted four claims in his amended complaint, on
appeal he addresses only two of them: his excessive-force and retaliation claims
against Lieutenant Steven Bade. In support of these claims he alleged the
following:
Lieutenant Bade approached him at the shower on June 11, 2007, and told
him to lock down in his cell. When he asked why he needed to lock down,
Lieutenant Bade replied that he was not sure. Mr. Marshall retorted that “per the
Co[d]e of Penal Disciplinary Book your order must give notice and it must be
reasonable in nature.” R. at 45. Lieutenant Bade replied, “I don’t care[. G]o
lock down.” Id. As Mr. Marshall began walking toward his cell to lock down,
Lieutenant Bade grabbed his upper right arm. He turned and told Lieutenant
Bade, “[D]o not put your hands on me.” Id. Lieutenant Bade then ordered him to
“turn around and cuff up.” Id. Mr. Marshall did not resist being handcuffed but
remarked, “[A]ll you had to do was ask me first before you put your hands on me
for no reason. I was walking to the cell to lock down.” Id. Lieutenant Bade and
another officer then escorted Mr. Marshall about 1,200 feet to see Captain
M. Negley, the shift commander, with Lieutenant Bade holding Mr. Marshall’s
right arm and the other officer holding his left arm. As they were walking,
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Lieutenant Bade put his fingernails deep into Mr. Marshall’s right arm. 1
Lieutenant Bade injured him, as documented by a prison medical form attached to
his amended complaint. That form, dated June 11, 2007, indicated that he had a
three-by-four-centimeter bruise on the inside of his upper right arm and a
four-by-five-centimeter red area on the outside of that arm.
Mr. Marshall asserted to Captain Negley that Lieutenant Bade had violated
prison policy by ordering him to lock down, but Captain Negley placed him in
segregation for 14 days, at Lieutenant Bade’s request. He received a notice of
Code of Penal Discipline (COPD) charges, accusing him of advocating or creating
a facility disruption and disobeying a lawful order on June 11. The charges were
dismissed after a hearing, however, because a prison lieutenant testified that no
instruction had been given for Mr. Marshall to be locked down. Lieutenant Bade
then retaliated by bringing a false charge against him for unauthorized absence
and ensuring his conviction on that charge by procuring false statements from
lower-ranking staff members. As a result of this conviction, Mr. Marshall lost
eight days of good-time credit and he was ineligible for earned-time credit for a
period of time.
Mr. Marshall filed this action in February 2008. Defendants moved under
Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6) to dismiss his amended complaint for failure to state a
1
Mr. Marshall made conflicting statements in his amended complaint
concerning whether this alleged force began before or after he was in handcuffs.
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claim. The district court referred the motion to a magistrate judge, who
recommended dismissal of all claims. After reviewing Mr. Marshall’s objections,
the district court accepted the magistrate judge’s recommendations and entered
judgment in favor of defendants. Mr. Marshall filed a timely appeal. The district
court denied his application for leave to proceed in forma pauperis on appeal,
concluding that his appeal was not taken in good faith.
Standard of Review
We review de novo a district court’s dismissal of a claim under
Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b)(6). See Peterson v. Grisham, 594 F.3d 723, 727 (10th Cir.
2010). The court’s function is “to assess whether the plaintiff’s amended
complaint alone is legally sufficient to state a claim for which relief may be
granted.” Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). In doing so, we accept all
well-pleaded allegations as true and construe them in the light most favorable to
Mr. Marshall. See id. And because Mr. Marshall is proceeding pro se, we
liberally construe both his amended complaint and his arguments on appeal.
See Hall v. Bellmon, 935 F.2d 1106, 1110 (10th Cir. 1991) (recognizing pro se
litigant’s pleadings are “held to a less stringent standard”); Cummings v. Evans,
161 F.3d 610, 613 (10th Cir. 1998) (liberally construing pro se appellate brief).
Our broad reading of his complaint, however, does not relieve Mr. Marshall of
“the burden of alleging sufficient facts on which a recognized legal claim could
be based.” Hall, 935 F.2d at 1110. To avoid dismissal, his amended complaint
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must contain enough facts to state a claim for relief that is “plausible on its face.”
Peterson, 594 F.3d at 727 (internal quotation marks omitted).
Excessive-Force Claim
Mr. Marshall argues that his amended complaint sufficiently alleged an
excessive-force claim against Lieutenant Bade. “Ordinarily, an excessive force
claim involves two prongs: (1) an objective prong that asks if the alleged
wrongdoing was objectively harmful enough to establish a constitutional
violation, and (2) a subjective prong under which the plaintiff must show that the
officials acted with a sufficiently culpable state of mind.” Smith v. Cochran,
339 F.3d 1205, 1212 (10th Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks and brackets
omitted). “The subjective element of an excessive force claim turns on whether
force was applied in a good faith effort to maintain or restore discipline or
maliciously and sadistically for the very purpose of causing harm.” Id. (internal
quotation marks omitted). Mr. Marshall contends that his amended complaint
satisfied the subjective component by showing that Lieutenant Bade used force
against him on June 11, 2007, when he had no cause to do so. He points to his
allegation that there was no basis for Lieutenant Bade’s order to lock down in his
cell. He asserted that he was nonetheless complying with that order and moving
toward his cell when Lieutenant Bade grabbed his arm. He further alleged that he
did not resist being handcuffed, yet Lieutenant Bade dug fingernails into his arm
with enough force to injure him. Mr. Marshall argues that these allegations
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support a conclusion that Lieutenant Bade acted maliciously and sadistically to
cause him harm, rather than to maintain or restore discipline.
These allegations may be sufficient to satisfy the subjective prong of an
excessive force claim. But we need not decide that issue because Mr. Marshall
failed to allege sufficient facts to show wrongdoing that was “objectively harmful
enough to establish a constitutional violation.” Smith, 339 F.3d at 1212. An
action by a prison guard may be malevolent yet not amount to cruel and unusual
punishment. See Hudson v. McMillian, 503 U.S. 1, 9 (1992). As the Court made
clear in Hudson, “Not every push or shove, even if it may later seem unnecessary
in the peace of a judge’s chambers, violates a prisoner’s constitutional rights.”
Id. (internal quotation marks omitted). Thus, even if a use of force is deemed
unnecessary after the fact, if it was both de minimus and “not of a sort repugnant
to the conscience of mankind,” it will not sustain an excessive-force claim. Id. at
10 (internal quotation marks omitted).
We accept as true, as we must, the allegation that Lieutenant Bade grabbed
Mr. Marshall’s arm and dug his fingernails into it, resulting in an injury. We
addressed a similar extent of force in Norton v. City of Marietta, 432 F.3d 1145,
1156 (10th Cir. 2005), in which prison guards were alleged to have injured a
prisoner by grabbing him around his neck and twisting it. We held that the
officers’ actions were not “objectively harmful enough to establish a
constitutional violation.” Id. We reach the same conclusion here. The force
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allegedly used against Mr. Marshall was both de minimus and not of a nature that
is repugnant to mankind.
Our conclusion is bolstered by our sister circuits’ decisions considering
comparable, or even greater, uses of force. In DeWalt v. Carter, 224 F.3d 607,
610-11 (7th Cir. 2000), a prisoner alleged that an officer shoved him into a
doorframe after the prisoner called him unprofessional. The prisoner suffered
bruising on his back. Id. at 611. The court held that the force used was
de minimus and insufficient to support an Eighth Amendment claim. Id. at 620.
Another court held that bumping, grabbing, elbowing, and pushing a prisoner was
“not sufficiently serious or harmful to reach constitutional dimensions.” Boddie
v. Schnieder, 105 F.3d 857, 862 (2d Cir. 1997); see also Lunsford v. Bennett,
17 F.3d 1574, 1578, 1582 (7th Cir. 1994) (hitting prisoner in the head with a
bucket, causing daily headaches, was minor use of force insufficient to establish
constitutional violation); Black Spotted Horse v. Else, 767 F.2d 516, 517 (8th Cir.
1985) (pushing cubicle-cell wall onto prisoner’s leg, causing bruises, was
insufficient use of force to state a constitutional violation); Olson v. Coleman,
804 F. Supp. 148, 149-50 (D. Kan. 1992) (single blow to prisoner’s head while
escorting him into prison, causing contusion, was de minimus use of force not
repugnant to conscience of mankind).
Moreover, although Mr. Marshall was not required to allege a significant
injury in order to state an Eighth Amendment excessive-force claim, the extent of
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his injury “may . . . provide some indication of the amount of force applied.”
Wilkins v. Gaddy, 130 S. Ct. 1175, 1178 (2010); see also Hudson, 503 U.S. at 7(absence of serious injury is relevant to Eighth Amendment inquiry, “but does not
end it”). Mr. Marshall argues on appeal that Lieutenant Bade used enough force
to make his arm bleed. But that is not what his amended complaint alleged. He
asserted that the prison medical form attached as an exhibit to his amended
complaint documented his injury. We consider this attachment as a part of his
complaint for purposes of a Rule 12(b)(6) motion. See Hall, 935 F.2d at 1112.
The medical form shows only areas of redness and bruising. Thus, the facts he
averred regarding the extent of his injuries lend further support to our conclusion
that Lieutenant Bade used only de minimus force. See DeWalt, 224 F.3d at 620(relying, in part, on prisoner’s minor injuries in concluding force was
de minimus); Lunsford, 17 F.3d at 1582 (same); Black Spotted Horse, 767 F.2d
at 517 (same).
The district court did not err in dismissing Mr. Marshall’s excessive-force
claim under Rule 12(b)(6) for failure to state a claim. In reaching this conclusion,
we do not condone unnecessary uses of force by prison guards. But
Mr. Marshall’s allegations of de minimus force simply fall short of what is
required to establish a constitutional violation. The district court’s dismissal of
Mr. Marshall’s excessive-force claim is affirmed.
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Retaliation Claim
Mr. Marshall alleged that Lieutenant Bade retaliated against him for the
dismissal of the COPD charges related to the June 11, 2007, incident. He claimed
that Lieutenant Bade initiated an unfounded charge of unauthorized absence and
then ensured his conviction by procuring false statements from lower-ranking
officers. As a result of his COPD conviction, Mr. Marshall lost eight days of
good-time credit and he was temporarily ineligible to receive earned-time credit.
The district court dismissed Mr. Marshall’s retaliation claim as barred by
Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994), because he had failed to allege that his
COPD conviction and the resulting deprivation of good-time credits had already
been invalidated. In Heck the Court held that “habeas corpus is the exclusive
remedy for a state prisoner who challenges the fact or duration of his confinement
and seeks immediate or speedier release, even though such a claim may come
within the literal terms of § 1983.” Id. at 481.
Thus, when a state prisoner seeks damages in a § 1983 suit, the
district court must consider whether a judgment in favor of the
plaintiff would necessarily imply the invalidity of his conviction or
sentence; if it would, the complaint must be dismissed unless the
plaintiff can demonstrate that the conviction or sentence has already
been invalidated.
Id. at 487.
The Heck rule also applies to a claim challenging prison disciplinary
proceedings when the alleged unconstitutional conduct could support a core
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habeas claim. See Edwards v. Balisok, 520 U.S. 641, 643, 648 (1997) (prisoner’s
§ 1983 claim barred by Heck because allegations of deceit and bias necessarily
implied invalidity of disciplinary proceedings used to deprive him of good-time
credits toward his release). On the other hand, a § 1983 claim remains available
if “success in the action would not necessarily spell immediate or speedier release
for the prisoner,” Wilkinson v. Dotson, 544 U.S. 74, 81 (2005), because a core
habeas remedy is not available in that circumstance, see id. at 83-84. In
Wilkinson the Court held that the prisoners’ claims were cognizable under § 1983
because judgments in their favor would, at most, entitle them to speedier or new
consideration for discretionary parole. See id. at 82. In short:
[A] state prisoner’s § 1983 action is barred (absent prior
invalidation)–no matter the relief sought (damages or equitable
relief), no matter the target of the prisoner’s suit (state conduct
leading to conviction or internal prison proceedings)–if success in
that action would necessarily demonstrate the invalidity of
confinement or its duration.
Id. at 81-82.
The district court concluded that Mr. Marshall’s § 1983 retaliation claim
was barred by Heck because a judgment in his favor would necessarily imply the
invalidity of his COPD conviction and his resulting loss of good-time credits.
But under Colorado law, accumulation of good-time credits affects only a
prisoner’s parole-eligibility date. See Jones v. Martinez, 799 P.2d 385, 388
(Colo. 1990) (good-time credits “do not constitute service of sentence” and only
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serve to “make the inmate eligible for release on parole”). In most cases, parole
in Colorado remains discretionary even after a prisoner accrues sufficient credits
to become eligible for it. See Thiret v. Kautzky, 792 P.2d 801, 805 (Colo. 1990). 2
Consequently, invalidation of Mr. Marshall’s COPD conviction and restoration of
his good-time credits would afford him only speedier consideration for
discretionary parole, rather than ensure speedier release. Thus, the district court
adopted an incorrect ground for barring Mr. Marshall’s § 1983 retaliation claim
under Heck. See Wilkinson, 544 U.S. at 82.
The Colorado Attorney General urges us to affirm the district court’s
dismissal of Mr. Marshall’s retaliation claim under Heck on another basis: the
implied challenge to his temporary loss of eligibility to receive earned-time
credits. The Attorney General asserts that earned-time credits, unlike good-time
credits, reduce the length of a prisoner’s sentence. 3 Although Mr. Marshall did
2
Some Colorado prisoners are entitled to parole upon reaching their parole
date, see Thiret, 792 P.2d at 805; but Mr. Marshall did not allege facts in his
amended complaint indicating that he falls in this category.
3
For this proposition the Attorney General cites C.R.S. § 17-22.5-402(2),
which provides: “[T]he full term for which an inmate is sentenced shall be
reduced by any earned release time and earned time granted pursuant to section
17-22.5-405 . . . .” Section 17-22.5-405(3) gives the department of corrections
authority to “grant, withhold, withdraw, or restore . . . an earned time deduction
from the sentence imposed.” We note, however, that the Colorado Supreme Court
cited both these statutory sections in its decision rejecting a prisoner’s contention
that he had satisfied his sentence and was entitled to an unconditional release
from prison based on his time served, plus his accumulated good-time and earned-
time credits. See Meyers v. Price, 842 P.2d 229, 231-32 (Colo. 1992).
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not allege in his amended complaint that he had lost any earned-time credits as a
result of his COPD conviction, the Attorney General states that under Corrections
Department policy his COPD conviction made him temporarily ineligible to
receive additional earned-time credits. Thus, according to the Attorney General,
Mr. Marshall’s retaliation claim is barred by Heck because a judgment in his
favor would necessarily imply the invalidity of his COPD conviction and of the
resulting loss of his earned-time-credit eligibility.
The Attorney General has not shown, however, that a claim of improper
deprivation of earned-time-credit eligibility is a core habeas claim (thus triggering
application of Heck)—that is, the Attorney General has not explained why
restoration of that eligibility would necessarily entitle Mr. Marshall to immediate
or speedier release from prison. See Wilkinson, 544 U.S. at 82. In this regard, we
are concerned that another filing by the Attorney General in a different appeal
appears to contend that a claim for loss of earned-time-credit eligibility cannot be
brought in a habeas proceeding. 4 In Frazier v. Jackson, 385 F. App’x 808, 809
(10th Cir. 2010), cert. denied, 79 U.S.L.W. 3399 (U.S. Jan. 10, 2011) (No.
10-6985), a prisoner sought a certificate of appealability from this court to appeal
the district court’s denial of his habeas application. The prisoner in Frazier
challenged on due-process grounds two COPD convictions that made him
4
That brief and the Attorney General’s brief on this appeal were filed by the
same Assistant Attorney General within a month of each other.
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temporarily ineligible to receive earned-time credits. See id. at 810. The
Attorney General’s brief in Frazier described the extent of Colorado prison
authorities’ discretion to award earned-time credits to, or withhold them from,
prisoners who are eligible to receive them—even indicating that prison authorities
have discretion to withdraw previously awarded earned-time credits. See
Response Brief in Accordance with the Court’s Order Dated May 17, 2010 at 5-6,
Frazier v. Jackson, No. 09-1429 (10th Cir. June 11, 2010). The Attorney General
asserted that Colorado prisoners therefore have no entitlement to earned-time
credits. See id.Hence, we are reluctant to embrace the Attorney General’s alternative Heck
argument without further clarification of his position concerning prisoners’ rights
with respect to earned-time credits. That clarification is best obtained through
proceedings in district court. We therefore reverse the district court’s dismissal
of Mr. Marshall’s retaliation claim and remand to the district court for further
consideration of that claim.
Conclusion
The judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED in part and REVERSED
in part, and REMANDED to the district court for further consideration consistent
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with this order and judgment. Mr. Marshall’s motion for appointment of counsel
is DENIED. His motion to proceed on appeal without prepayment of the filing
fee is GRANTED.
Entered for the Court
Harris L Hartz
Circuit Judge
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