Lawrence Peterson v. Glunt ( 2019 )

NOT PRECEDENTIAL
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT
___________
No. 16-3861
___________
LAWRENCE PETERSON,
Appellant
v.
SUPERINTENDENT GLUNT; MS. BARBER; MS. HOOVER;
IRWIN, SECURITY LIEUTENANT; K. SHEA, SECURITY LIETENANT;
BYRON E. BRUMBAUGH, JR.; D. MOWREY;
CORRECTIONAL OFFICER MCGARVEY
____________________________________
On Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Pennsylvania
(W.D. Pa. Civil Action No. 3:16-cv-00187)
District Judge: Honorable Kim R. Gibson
____________________________________
Submitted Pursuant to Third Circuit LAR 34.1(a)
December 1, 2017
Before: GREENAWAY, JR., GREENBERG, and ROTH, Circuit Judges
(Opinion filed February 12, 2019)
_________
OPINION *
_________
PER CURIAM
Pro se appellant Lawrence Peterson appeals the District Court’s dismissal of his
*
This disposition is not an opinion of the full Court and pursuant to I.O.P. 5.7 does not
constitute binding precedent.
amended complaint for failure to state a claim pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B).
For the reasons that follow, we will vacate the District Court’s judgment and remand the
case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I.
Because we write primarily for the benefit of the parties, we will recite only the
facts necessary for our discussion; these facts are recounted as alleged by Peterson in his
amended complaint. During the time relevant to Peterson’s claims, he was incarcerated
at the State Correctional Institution in Houtzdale, Pennsylvania. 1 Peterson was involved
in a verbal altercation with a corrections officer in April 2013. The officer told Peterson
that he wanted to see if Peterson could prove how tough he was. Two days later, the
officer assigned Peterson a new cellmate, William Keitel, and as Keitel entered the cell,
the officer told Peterson that he would see how tough Peterson was. Keitel had a history
of bias toward black men and people with sexual assault convictions; Peterson is black
and has a sexual assault conviction. Peterson met with a different officer in early May
2013 to report that Keitel had repeatedly threatened his life and had been assaulting him,
but the officer said that Keitel was a good man and that Peterson had nothing to fear from
him.
On May 10, 2013, Keitel punched Peterson in the face. Peterson met with various
correctional staff in the following days about the incident but did not receive assistance.
From May through August 2013, Keitel continued assaulting Peterson. Peterson and
1
Peterson is presently incarcerated at the State Correctional Institution at Smithfield in
Huntingdon, Pennsylvania.
2
Keitel were involved in a fight on August 2, 2013; Keitel later died of injuries he
sustained during the incident. In 2015, Peterson pleaded guilty to the murder of Keitel.
Peterson claims that he attempted to resolve his issues with Keitel and prison staff
using internal prison procedures by filing several grievances, but never received a
response. Peterson maintains that Keitel’s assignment to his cell was part of a practice of
corrections officers placing adversaries together to discipline prisoners they did not like.
In August 2016, Peterson filed a complaint against numerous correctional staff
seeking damages for several claims. A Magistrate Judge recommended dismissing
Peterson’s complaint for failure to state a claim pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B).
Peterson filed timely objections to the Magistrate Judge’s report and sought leave
to amend his complaint. Peterson’s amended complaint narrowed his claims: he alleged
that his placement in a cell with Keitel constituted cruel and unusual punishment and that
correctional staff failed to protect him from Keitel. The District Court ultimately adopted
the Magistrate Judge’s report and recommendation to dismiss Peterson’s original
complaint, granted Peterson’s motion to amend his complaint, and dismissed Peterson’s
amended complaint without further leave to amend. The District Court did not provide
any reasoning to explain its dismissal of Peterson’s amended complaint. Peterson timely
appealed and seeks an opportunity to pursue the claims in his amended complaint.
II.
We have jurisdiction over this appeal pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1291. We exercise
plenary review over the District Court’s sua sponte dismissal of Peterson’s claims
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B). See Allah v. Seiverling, 229 F.3d 220, 223 (3d
3
Cir. 2000). Dismissal is appropriate “only if, accepting all well-pleaded allegations in the
complaint as true and viewing them in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, a court
finds that [the] plaintiff’s claims lack facial plausibility.” Warren Gen. Hosp. v. Amgen
Inc., 643 F.3d 77, 84 (3d Cir. 2011) (citing Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544,
555-56 (2007)).
III.
The District Court, while granting Peterson leave to file an amended complaint,
did not analyze any of Peterson’s allegations before dismissing his amended complaint
without further leave to amend. The Magistrate Judge’s report concluded that most of
Peterson’s original claims, including the two claims that Peterson repeated in his
amended complaint, were barred by the favorable termination rule in Heck v. Humphrey,
512 U.S. 477 (1994). However, the Magistrate Judge did not address all of the
allegations in Peterson’s original complaint when he recommended dismissal, and
regardless, Peterson clarified his allegations in his amended complaint. The Magistrate
Judge also concluded that granting Peterson leave to amend would be futile because his
claims were filed outside of the applicable limitations period.
The District Court did not discuss either of these issues in its order dismissing
Peterson’s amended complaint. Accordingly, this matter must be remanded for the
District Court to address these questions in the first instance. See Farnese v. Bagnasco,
687 F.2d 761, 766 (3d Cir. 1982) (noting that “[i]n the absence of a sufficient articulation
of the reasons for [a district court’s] decision, our review of the . . . decision is almost
speculative”); see also Forbes v. Twp. of Lower Merion, 313 F.3d 144, 150 (3d Cir.
4
2002); Vadino v. A. Valey Eng’rs, 903 F.2d 253, 258 (3d Cir. 1990). On remand, the
District Court should consider whether Peterson’s amended complaint includes viable
claims that are not barred by the favorable termination rule in Heck. 2 Further, the District
Court has not addressed whether the timeliness issue raised in the Magistrate Judge’s
report applies to the claims in Peterson’s amended complaint. 3
2
In Heck, the Supreme Court held that if the success of a previously convicted plaintiff’s
damages claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 “would necessarily imply the invalidity of his
conviction or sentence,” the plaintiff may bring his claim only if he “can demonstrate that
the conviction or sentence has already been invalidated.” 512 U.S. at 487. The District
Court has not explained how Peterson’s allegations about defendants’ actions months
before the incident underlying Peterson’s murder conviction “would necessarily imply
the invalidity of his conviction or sentence.” See id.
3
Such analysis may be necessary given this Court’s holding that the limitations period
for § 1983 claims is tolled “while a prisoner exhausts administrative remedies,” see
Pearson v. Sec’y Dep’t of Corr., 775 F.3d 598, 603 (3d Cir. 2015), as Peterson has
alleged that he has done. See Fogle v. Pierson, 435 F.3d 1252, 1258 (10th Cir. 2006)
(explaining that a district court may dismiss claims sua sponte as time-barred only where
the untimeliness “is obvious from the face of the complaint and no further factual record
is required to be developed”).
5