Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-1_16-cv-00126/USCOURTS-caed-1_16-cv-00126-1/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 550
Nature of Suit: Prisoner - Civil Rights (U.S. defendant)
Cause of Action: 42:1983 Prisoner Civil Rights

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

CRAIG SIMONSON,

Plaintiff,

v.

T. SINGH, et. al.,

Defendant.

 CASE NO. 1:16-cv-00126-MJS (PC)

 ORDER DISMISSING COMPLAINT 

 WITH LEAVE TO AMEND 

 (ECF NO. 1)

 THIRTY-DAY DEADLINE TO AMEND

Plaintiff is a County Jail inmate proceeding pro se and in forma pauperis in this 

civil rights action brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. His complaint is before the Court 

for screening.

I. SCREENING REQUIREMENT

The Court is required to screen complaints brought by prisoners and pretrial

detainees seeking relief against a governmental entity or an officer or employee of a 

governmental entity. 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(a). The Court must dismiss a complaint or 

portion thereof if the prisoner has raised claims that are legally “frivolous or malicious,” 

that fail to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, or that seek monetary relief 

from a defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(b)(1), (2). 

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“Notwithstanding any filing fee, or any portion thereof, that may have been paid, the court 

shall dismiss the case at any time if the court determines that . . . the action or appeal . . . 

fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii). 

II. PLEADING STANDARD

A complaint must contain “a short and plain statement of the claim showing that 

the pleader is entitled to relief. . . .” Fed. R. Civ. P. 8(a)(2). Detailed factual allegations 

are not required, but “[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported 

by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice,” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 

(2009) (citing Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007)), and courts “are 

not required to indulge unwarranted inferences,” Doe I v. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., 572 F.3d 

677, 681 (9th Cir. 2009) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted). While factual 

allegations are accepted as true, legal conclusions are not. Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678.

Under section 1983, Plaintiff must demonstrate that each defendant personally 

participated in the deprivation of his rights. Jones v. Williams, 297 F.3d 930, 934 (9th Cir. 

2002). This requires the presentation of factual allegations sufficient to state a plausible 

claim for relief. Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678-79; Moss v. U.S. Secret Service, 572 F.3d 962, 

969 (9th Cir. 2009). Prisoners proceeding pro se in civil rights actions are entitled to 

have their pleadings liberally construed and to have any doubt resolved in their favor, 

Hebbe v. Pliler, 627 F.3d 338, 342 (9th Cir. 2010) (citations omitted), but nevertheless, 

the mere possibility of misconduct falls short of meeting the plausibility standard, Iqbal, 

556 U.S. at 678; Moss, 572 F.3d at 969. 

III. PLAINTIFF’S ALLEGATIONS

Plaintiff is currently being held at the Stanislaus County Public Safety Center in 

Modesto, California. His custodial status is unclear; he does not specify whether he is 

being held pre-trial or post-conviction. Plaintiff brings this action against Sheriff’s 

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Department Deputy T. Singh and Classification Officer Wigt (“Defendants”) for violating 

his rights under the First and Eighth Amendments of the United States Constitution. 

Plaintiff’s complaint is difficult to decipher. From what the Court can tell, the facts 

and allegations may be summarized as follows: At some point in time, Defendant Singh 

threatened physical violence against Plaintiff, including a threat to shove Defendant 

Singh’s baton “up [Plaintiff’s] ass.” While Plaintiff was at the County Jail on December 

25, 2015, Plaintiff received an inmate request form that included racist slurs including the 

words “homos hav[e] no rights.” Plaintiff alleges he was chained down without bathroom 

breaks for a complete shift and had no choice but to “defile” himself. Plaintiff generally 

alleges a course of cruel and unusual punishment, terrorist threats, discrimination, and 

hate crimes while at the County Jail in or around the month of December 2015. Although 

the complaint does not clearly so say, the Court proceeds on the assumption that Plaintiff 

attributes all this ill treatment to Defendant Singh.

Plaintiff further alleges that Defendant Wigt “singl[ed] Plaintiff out” in retaliation for

Plaintiff filing a claim1. Plaintiff also alleges that Defendant Wigt was sexist towards 

Plaintiff while Plaintiff was at the Public Safety Center in January. 

Plaintiff seeks injunctive relief and unspecified monetary damages.

IV. ANALYSIS

A. Cruel and Unusual Punishment 

Plaintiff’s custodial status is unclear.

2 However, the Court will evaluate his 

allegations of cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth Amendment which protects 

prisoners from inhumane methods of punishment and from inhumane conditions of 

confinement. Morgan v. Morgensen, 465 F.3d 1041, 1045 (9th Cir. 2006). 

 

1

Plaintiff does not indicate what claim he filed or against whom.

2

If Plaintiff files an amended complaint, he should specify whether he is pre- or post-trial.

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1. Conditions of Confinement Claim

Extreme deprivations are required to make out a conditions of confinement claim, 

and only those deprivations denying the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities 

are sufficiently grave to form the basis of an Eighth Amendment violation. Hudson v. 

McMillian, 503 U.S. 1, 9 (1992) (citations and quotations omitted). To maintain an Eighth 

Amendment claim, a prisoner must show that prison officials were deliberately indifferent 

to a substantial risk of harm to his health or safety. See, e.g., Farmer v. Brennan, 511 

U.S. 825, 847 (1994); Thomas v. Ponder, 611 F.3d 1144, 1150-51 (9th Cir. 2010); Foster 

v. Runnels, 554 F.3d 807, 812-14 (9th Cir. 2009); Morgan, 465 F.3d at 1045; Johnson, 

217 F.3d at 731; Frost v. Agnos, 152 F.3d 1124, 1128 (9th Cir. 1998). “Deliberate 

indifference describes a state of mind more blameworthy than negligence” but is satisfied 

by something “less than acts or omissions for the very purpose of causing harm or with 

knowledge that harm will result.” Farmer, 511 at 835. 

Plaintiff alleges that Defendant Singh subjected him to inhumane conditions of 

confinement when Defendant Singh chained him down for an entire shift without a 

bathroom break, forcing Plaintiff to urinate and/or defecate on himself. However, 

Plaintiff’s allegations do not include facts from which one could conclude that, in so 

acting, Defendant Singh was deliberately indifferent to a substantial risk to Plaintiff’s 

health or safety. Farmer, 511 U.S. at 839 (holding “that a prison official cannot be found 

liable under the Eighth Amendment for denying an inmate humane conditions of 

confinement unless the official knows of and disregards an excessive risk to inmate 

health or safety.”). Plaintiff must show that Defendant Singh was aware of, but 

disregarded, some substantial risk to Plaintiff’s health or safety arising from the use of 

restraints. Plaintiff has not alleged facts to support his claim of deliberate indifference.

Moreover, Plaintiff’s soiling himself during the course of one work shift, 

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presumably a period of no more than eight hours, does not necessarily constitute an 

excessive risk to Plaintiff’s health or safety. Though undoubtedly an uncomfortable and 

embarrassing event, Plaintiff has not shown that it caused any adverse health 

consequences or that Defendant Singh had reason to believe that Plaintiff would suffer 

such consequences. The Court is also unable to view such an event as so degrading as 

to amount to a constitutional violation. See Chappell v. Mandeville, 706 F.3d 1052, 1061

(9th Cir. 2013) (Court did not find a constitutional violation when Plaintiff was allegedly 

taped into two pairs of underwear and jumpsuits, placed in a hot cell with no ventilation, 

chained to an iron bed, shackled at the ankles and waist, and forced to eat like a dog.). 

Absent additional facts, this complaint fails to state a claim. Plaintiff will be given 

leave to amend. If he chooses to do so, he should specify whether he is being held 

pretrial or whether he already has been convicted. He also must allege facts which 

would support a finding that he was subjected to an objectively unreasonable and

substantial deprivation of the minimal civilized measure of life’s necessities and facts 

from which the Court could conclude that Defendant Singh was deliberately indifferent to 

the risks caused by these conditions. That is, he must show that Defendant Singh 

knowingly disregarded a substantial risk to Plaintiff’s health or safety.

2. Excessive Force Claim

For Eighth Amendment claims arising out of the use of excessive physical force, 

the issue is “whether force was applied in a good-faith effort to maintain or restore 

discipline, or maliciously and sadistically to cause harm.” Wilkins v. Gaddy, 559 U.S. 34, 

37 (2010) (per curiam) (citing Hudson, 503 U.S. at 7) (internal quotation marks omitted); 

Furnace v. Sullivan, 705 F.3d 1021, 1028 (9th Cir. 2013). The objective component of an 

Eighth Amendment claim is contextual and responsive to contemporary standards of 

decency, Hudson, 503 U.S. at 8 (quotation marks and citation omitted), and although de 

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minimis uses of force do not violate the Constitution, the malicious and sadistic use of 

force to cause harm always violates contemporary standards of decency, regardless of 

whether or not significant injury is evident, Wilkins, 559 U.S. at 37-8 (citing Hudson, 503 

U.S. at 9-10) (quotation marks omitted); Oliver v. Keller, 289 F.3d 623, 628 (9th Cir. 

2002).

Defendant Singh’s placing of Plaintiff in restraints is not, in itself, evidence of 

excessive force. Plaintiff has failed to show that Defendant Singh “applied force 

‘maliciously and sadistically for the very purpose of causing harm’ rather than in a goodfaith effort to restore discipline.” Parks v. Williams, 157 Fed. Appx. 5, 6 (9th Cir. 2005) 

(quoting Clement v. Gomez, 298 F.3d 898, 903-04 (9th Cir. 2002).

Plaintiff also alleges that Defendant Singh threatened Plaintiff with sodomy and 

physical violence and added racist and homophobic slurs to a form. He also alleges that 

Defendant Wigt was, in some unspecified manner, sexist in his dealings with Plaintiff.

Plaintiff does not allege that either Defendant acted on any of these threats or otherwise 

did more than use disgusting and degrading language. While such words may indeed be 

hateful and hurtful, “[v]erbal harassment or abuse . . . is not sufficient to state a 

constitutional deprivation under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.” Oltarzewski v. Ruggiero, 830 F.2d 

136, 139 (9th Cir. 1987) (quoting Collins v. Cundy, 603 F.2d 825, 827 (10th Cir. 1979)). 

The Court finds that Plaintiff has failed to make out cognizable Eighth Amendment

Claims against Defendant Singh or Wigt on the grounds of either Conditions of 

Confinement or Excessive Force, and those claims are dismissed with leave to amend.

B. Retaliation Claim

“Prisoners have a First Amendment right to file grievances against prison officials 

and to be free from retaliation for doing so.” Watison v. Carter, 668 F.3d 1108, 1114 (9th 

Cir. 2012) (citing Brodheim v. Cry, 584 F.3d 1262, 1269 (9th Cir. 2009)). Within the 

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prison context, a viable claim of First Amendment retaliation entails five basic elements: 

(1) An assertion that a state actor took some adverse action against an inmate (2) 

because of (3) that prisoner’s protected conduct, and that such action (4) chilled the 

inmate’s exercise of his First Amendment rights, and (5) the action did not reasonably 

advance a legitimate correctional goal.” Rhodes v. Robinson, 408 F.3d 559, 567-68 (9th 

Cir. 2005); accord Watison v. Carter, 668 F.3d at 1114-15; Silva v. Di Vittorio, 658 F.3d 

1090, 1104 (9th Cir. 2011); Brodheim v. Cry, 584 F.3d at 1269. 

The second element focuses on causation and motive. See Brodheim v. Cry, 584 

F.3d 1262, 1271 (9th Cir. 2009). A plaintiff must show that his protected conduct was a 

“‘substantial’ or ‘motivating’ factor behind the defendant’s conduct.” Id. (quoting 

Sorrano’s Gasco, Inc. v. Morgan, 874 F.2d 1310, 1314 (9th Cir. 1989). Although it can 

be difficult to establish the motive or intent of the defendant, a plaintiff may rely on 

circumstantial evidence. Bruce, 351 F.3d at 1289 (finding that a prisoner established a 

triable issue of fact regarding prison officials’ retaliatory motives by raising issues of 

suspect timing, evidence, and statements); Hines v. Gomez, 108 F.3d 265, 267-68 (9th 

Cir. 1997); Pratt v. Rowland, 65 F.3d 802, 808 (9th Cir. 1995) (“timing can properly be 

considered as circumstantial evidence of retaliatory intent”). 

In terms of the third prerequisite, filing a grievance is a protected action under the 

First Amendment. Valandingham v. Bojorquez, 866 F.2d 1135, 1138 (9th Cir. 1989). 

With respect to the fourth prong, “[it] would be unjust to allow a defendant to 

escape liability for a First Amendment violation merely because an unusually determined 

plaintiff persists in his protected activity . . . .” Mendocino Envtl. Ctr. v. Mendocino Cnty., 

192 F.3d 1283, 1300 (9th Cir. 1999). The correct inquiry is to determine whether an 

official’s acts would chill or silence a person of ordinary firmness from future First 

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Amendment activities. Rhodes, 408 F.3d at 568-69 (citing Mendocino Envtl. Ctr., 192 

F.3d at 1300).

With respect to the fifth prong, a prisoner must affirmatively allege that “‘the prison 

authorities’ retaliatory action did not advance legitimate goals of the correctional 

institution or was not tailored narrowly enough to achieve such goals.” Rizzo v. Dawson, 

778 F.2d 527, 532 (9th Cir. 1985).

Plaintiff fails to allege facts sufficient to support a First Amendment Retaliation 

claim. His allegations do not reflect (1) any adverse action taken against him or (2) any 

action taken against him because of (3) a grievance he filed or other protected activity (4)

or that any such action chilled the exercising of his rights (5) without serving a legitimate 

penological purpose. He merely alleges that Defendant Wigt “singled [him] out” in some 

unspecified manner in retaliation for an undefined claim filed by Plaintiff—against whom, 

for what, and when, the Court does not know. Without knowing what adverse action 

Defendant Wigt took, the Court cannot tell whether or not it served a legitimate 

penological goal. Plaintiff’s First Amendment retaliation claim against Defendant Wigt

fails to state a claim and is therefore dismissed with leave to amend.

V. CONCLUSION AND ORDER

Plaintiff’s complaint fails to state a cognizable claim against Defendants Singh and 

Wigt for cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Plaintiff’s 

complaint also fails to state a cognizable First Amendment Retaliation claim against 

Defendant Wigt. The Court will provide Plaintiff with the opportunity to file an amended 

complaint, if he believes, in good faith, he can cure the identified deficiencies. Akhtar v. 

Mesa, 698 F.3d 1202, 1212-13 (9th Cir. 2012); Lopez v. Smith, 203 F.3d 1122, 1130-31 

(9th Cir. 2000); Noll v. Carlson, 809 F.2d 1446, 1448-49 (9th Cir. 1987). If Plaintiff 

amends, he may not change the nature of this suit by adding new, unrelated claims in his 

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amended complaint. George v. Smith, 507 F.3d 605, 607 (7th Cir. 2007).

The Court advises Plaintiff an amended complaint supersedes the original 

complaint, Lacey v. Maricopa County, 693 F.3d 896, 907 n.1 (9th Cir. 2012) (en banc), 

and it must be “complete in itself without reference to the prior or superseded pleading,” 

Local Rule 220. 

Based on the foregoing, it is HEREBY ORDERED that:

1. Plaintiff’s complaint (ECF No. 1) is dismissed with leave to amend;

2. The Clerk’s Office shall send Plaintiff a blank civil rights complaint form and 

a copy of his complaint filed January 27, 2016;

3. Within thirty (30) days from the date of service of this order, Plaintiff must 

file an amended complaint curing the deficiencies identified by the Court in 

this order or a notice of voluntary dismissal;

4. If Plaintiff fails to file an amended complaint or notice of voluntary dismissal, 

the undersigned will recommend this action be dismissed, with prejudice, 

for failure to state a claim and failure to obey a court order, subject to the 

“three strikes” provision set forth in 28 U.S.C. § 1915(g).

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: March 25, 2016 /s/Michael J. Seng 

UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE

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