Weatherholt v. Officer Bradley , 316 F. App'x 300 ( 2009 )

UNPUBLISHED
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FOURTH CIRCUIT
No. 08-7157
JIMMY RAY WEATHERHOLT, JR.,
Plaintiff – Appellant,
v.
OFFICER BRADLEY,
Defendant – Appellee,
and
SERGEANT HARVEY,
Defendant.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern
District of Virginia, at Norfolk. Jerome B. Friedman, District
Judge. (2:08-cv-00054-JBF-JEB)
Submitted: January 30, 2009 Decided: March 13, 2009
Before WILKINSON, MOTZ, and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges.
Vacated and remanded by unpublished per curiam opinion. Judge
Wilkinson wrote a dissenting statement.
Jimmy Ray Weatherholt, Jr., Appellant Pro Se. Richard Carson
Vorhis, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Richmond, Virginia,
for Appellee.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
PER CURIAM:
Jimmy Ray Weatherholt, Jr., a Virginia prisoner at the
Greensville Correctional Center, appeals the district court’s
order dismissing his pro se 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (2006) complaint
against Sergeant Harvey, and the order granting summary judgment
in favor of Officer Bradley and denying his renewed motion for
appointment of counsel. Because the district court erred in
both instances, we vacate the orders and remand the case for
further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I. Dismissal of Claim Against Sergeant Harvey
We review de novo a district court’s dismissal under
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6). See Sec’y of State
for Defense v. Trimble Navigation Ltd., 484 F.3d 700, 705 (4th
Cir. 2007). A plaintiff’s statement of his claim “need only
give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is and
the grounds upon which it rests.” Erickson v. Pardus, 127 S.
Ct. 2197, 2200 (2007) (citations and internal quotation marks
omitted). “Factual allegations must be enough to raise a right
to relief above the speculative level” and have “enough facts to
state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Bell
Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. ___, 127 S. Ct. 1955, 1965, 1974
(2007). “[W]hen ruling on a defendant’s motion to dismiss, a
judge must accept as true all of the factual allegations
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contained in the complaint.” Erickson, 127 S. Ct. at 2200(citations omitted). In particular, a pro se complaint must be
liberally construed and “held to less stringent standards than
formal pleadings drafted by lawyers.” Id. (citation omitted).
The Eighth Amendment imposes a duty on prison
officials “to protect prisoners from violence at the hands of
other prisoners.” Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 833 (1994)
(citation omitted). To establish a claim for failure to protect
from violence, an inmate must show: (1) “that he is incarcerated
under conditions posing a substantial risk of serious harm,” id.
at 834, and (2) that the prison officials had a “sufficiently
culpable state of mind.” Id. (internal citations and quotations
omitted). “In prison-conditions cases that state of mind is one
of ‘deliberate indifference’ to inmate health or safety.” Id.(internal citations omitted). To be deliberately indifferent, a
prison official must “know[] of and disregard[] an excessive
risk to inmate health or safety.” Id. at 837.
“Whether a prison official had the requisite knowledge
of a substantial risk is a question of fact subject to
demonstration in the usual ways, including inference from
circumstantial evidence, . . . and a factfinder may conclude
that a prison official knew of a substantial risk from the very
fact that the risk was obvious.” Id. at 842. “While the
obviousness of a risk is not conclusive and a prison official
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may show that the obvious escaped him, . . . he would not escape
liability if the evidence showed that he merely refused to
verify underlying facts that he strongly suspected to be true,
or declined to confirm inferences of risk that he strongly
suspected to exist.” Id. at 843 n.8. A prison official also
may not “escape liability for deliberate indifference by showing
that, while he was aware of an obvious, substantial risk to
inmate safety, he did not know that the complainant was
especially likely to be assaulted by the specific prisoner who
eventually committed the assault.” Id. at 843. A plaintiff’s
failure to personally notify prison officials of an alleged risk
to his safety is not dispositive as to the issue of whether
prison officials knew of the risk. Id. at 848-49. A showing of
mere negligence does not qualify as deliberate indifference.
See Davidson v. Cannon, 474 U.S. 344, 347 (1986); Grayson v.
Peed, 195 F.3d 692, 695 (4th Cir. 1999). The plaintiff must
also show he suffered a serious or significant physical or
mental injury as a result of the defendants’ conduct.
Strickler v. Waters, 989 F.2d 1375, 1380-81 (4th Cir. 1993).
Weatherholt claims that he suffered serious injuries
at the hands of other inmates because Harvey directed that he
identify inmates who allegedly robbed him in person, rather than
through a photo identification process. Although Weatherholt
does not explicitly allege that Harvey knew of, and disregarded,
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the risk to his safety, his pro se pleading must be liberally
construed and is sufficient to give notice of a plausible claim
to relief under the Eighth Amendment. Weatherholt attached the
response to an administrative grievance that he filed with
prison officials concerning this incident, which indicates that
Harvey did not follow proper procedure and that “appropriate
action” was taken against her as a result. The resolution of
Weatherholt’s grievance in his favor is not conclusive evidence
that Harvey acted with deliberate indifference, but it
constitutes some evidence that Harvey may have disregarded an
obvious, general risk to inmate safety by failing to follow
proper procedure in ordering Weatherholt to make his
identifications in person. The attachment of the grievance
resolution to the complaint also constitutes further notice of a
plausible claim that Harvey was deliberately indifferent to a
serious risk to Weatherholt’s safety. Accordingly, we vacate
the order dismissing Weatherholt’s claim against Harvey.
II. Summary Judgment in Favor of Officer Bradley
We review a district court’s order granting summary
judgment de novo, viewing the facts and drawing all reasonable
inferences in the light most favorable to the non-moving party.
Doe v. Kidd, 501 F.3d 348, 354 (4th Cir. 2007), cert. denied,
128 S. Ct. 1483 (2008). Summary judgment “should be rendered if
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the pleadings, the discovery and disclosure materials on file,
and any affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as to any
material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a
matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). In order to withstand a
motion for summary judgment, the non-moving party must produce
competent evidence sufficient to reveal the existence of a
genuine issue of material fact. Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e)(2); see
Pension Benefit Guar. Corp. v. Beverley, 404 F.3d 243, 246-47
(4th Cir. 2005).
We conclude the district court accorded insufficient
weight to the administrative finding that proper procedures
called for Weatherholt to be asked to identify inmates involved
in the theft from him by looking at photos. While it is
correct, as noted by the court, that “failure to follow prison
rules or regulations does not, without more, give rise to a
constitutional violation,” Myers v. Klevenhagen, 97 F.3d 91, 94
(5th Cir. 1996), it does not appear that the court adequately
considered the rationale for the prison policy in question.
Presumably, the administrative rule violated in this case was
adopted out of recognition that in-person identification of
inmates involved in an incident inherently creates a risk of
retaliation. Accordingly, while we do not hold that Bradley’s
failure to follow proper procedures conclusively establishes her
deliberate indifference to a substantial risk of serious injury,
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we believe that resolution of the claim on the present record
was simply premature.
We make this finding recognizing that Bradley, in her
affidavit attached to her motion for summary judgment, explains
that she was not aware of any risk to Weatherholt’s safety
before taking him to identify the perpetrators he alleged
forcibly entered his cell, held him against his will, and robbed
him of his belongings. But Bradley’s asserted lack of awareness
of any risk of harm to Weatherholt from an in-person
identification of the inmates involved in the incident is not
dispositive. Given the violent nature of the incident
Weatherholt described, the present record could permit a
factfinder to rationally conclude that Bradley ignored an
obvious risk of significant harm to Weatherholt of which a
reasonable prison official would have been aware. Summary
judgment in favor of Bradley, at least at this stage of the
proceedings, was accordingly inappropriate.
For the reasons stated, we vacate the district court’s
judgment and remand for further proceedings. While
Weatherholt’s motion for appointment of counsel on appeal is
denied, we leave the question of appointment of counsel on
remand to the sound discretion of the district court. We
dispense with oral argument because the facts and legal
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contentions are adequately presented in the materials before the
court and argument would not aid the decisional process.
Judge Wilkinson dissents and would affirm the judgment for
the reasons given by the district court. See Weatherholt v.
Harvey, No. 2:08-cv-54, slip op. at 4-5 (E.D. Va. April 11,
2008); Weatherholt v. Bradley, No. 2:08-cv-54, slip op. at 8-9
(E.D. Va. June 20, 2008).
VACATED AND REMANDED
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