Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-casd-3_15-cv-02156/USCOURTS-casd-3_15-cv-02156-5/pdf.json

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

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT

SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA

GREGORY FLETCHER,

Plaintiff,

v.

c/o QUIN, et al.,

Defendants.

Case No.: 3:15-cv-2156-GPC-NLS

ORDER GRANTING MOTION TO 

DISMISS WITH LEAVE TO AMEND 

WITHIN SIXTY DAYS

[ECF No. 35]

Before the court is a motion to dismiss filed by Defendants S. Sanchez, M. Lopez, 

F. Grisez, L. Romero, and W. Soriano.1 (ECF No. 35.) The motion seeks the dismissal 

of Plaintiff’s claims against Defendant Soriano. (ECF No. 35-1 at 1.) Plaintiff has not 

filed an opposition. Because the operative complaint fails to allege any involvement by 

Defendant Soriano in any alleged violation of Plaintiff’s constitutional rights, the Court 

GRANTS the motion.

1. Background

Plaintiff, a prisoner, filed this action pro se on September 24, 2015. (ECF No. 1.) 

After the Court dismissed Plaintiff’s complaint in light of Plaintiff’s failure to pay the 

 

1 Defendants’ motion indicates that the complaint misspells Defendant Grisez’s name as “Grisson” and 

Defendant Soriano’s name as “Sarrano.” (ECF No. 35-1 at 1.)

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filing fee, Plaintiff filed the operative Amended Complaint on December 8, 2015. (ECF 

No. 6.) The Amended Complaint asserts causes of action relating to the denial of 

medical care, cruel and unusual punishment, and violations of his freedoms of 

association, speech, and religion. (Id. at 3–5.) 

The Amended Complaint’s only mention of Defendant Soriano is found in Count 

One, which asserts a denial of medical care and cruel and unusual punishment. (Id. at 3.) 

Plaintiff alleges in Count One that after he met with a “woman from the Attorney General 

Office,” an inmate named King told Defendant Romero to “get” Plaintiff. (Id.) 

Defendant Romero pushed Plaintiff, and later assaulted Plaintiff in Plaintiff’s cell. (Id.) 

When Plaintiff attempted to escape his cell, Defendant Grisez said “no,” and Defendant 

Romero continued to push Plaintiff from behind. (Id.) Plaintiff was then punched in the 

chest and pushed so hard that at some point he broke his left thumb. (Id.) Plaintiff told 

Defendants Grisez and Romero that he needed medical attention. (Id.) In response, 

Defendants Grisez and Romero told Plaintiff that they did not care if Plaintiff died; that 

they would not help Plaintiff; that Plaintiff “didn’t know who [he] was fucken [sic] with”; 

and that no one “messes” with Defendants Grisez, Romero, or Soriano, or inmate King. 

(Id.) Plaintiff alleges that these individuals are “part of the Greenwall Officer Mafia 

Group,” and that they are dangerous, corrupt, and have covered up murders and beatings. 

(Id.)

2. Legal Standard

“To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual 

matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’” Ashcroft 

v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 679 (2009) (quoting Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 

544, 570 (2007)). While “detailed factual allegations” are unnecessary, the complaint 

must allege more than “[t]hreadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, 

supported by mere conclusory statements.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678. “In sum, for a 

complaint to survive a motion to dismiss, the non-conclusory ‘factual content,’ and 

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reasonable inferences from that content, must be plausibly suggestive of a claim entitling 

the plaintiff to relief.” Moss v. U.S. Secret Serv., 572 F.3d 962, 969 (9th Cir. 2009).

Because Plaintiff is proceeding pro se, “his complaint must be held to less 

stringent standards than formal pleadings drafted by lawyers.” Hebbe v. Pliler, 627 F.3d 

338, 342 (9th Cir. 2010). While the court must “construe [Plaintiff’s] pleadings 

liberally,” id., “vague and conclusory allegations of official participation in civil rights 

violations are not sufficient to withstand a motion to dismiss,” Ivey v. Bd. of Regents, 673 

F.2d 266, 268 (9th Cir. 1982).

3. Discussion

Defendants contend that Plaintiff fails to state a claim against Defendant Soriano 

because the Amended Complaint does not allege any facts suggesting Defendant Soriano 

was personally involved in the violation of Plaintiff’s constitutional rights. The Court 

previously dismissed Plaintiff’s claims against Defendant Quinn for the same reason. 

(ECF No. 26 at 6–8.) In fact, Defendant Soriano’s position here is exactly the same as 

Defendant Quinn’s position when he moved to dismiss Plaintiff’s claims against him: as 

with Defendant Soriano, the only allegations relevant to Defendant Quinn in the 

Amended Complaint were that (1) Defendant Romero told Plaintiff he should not mess 

with Defendant Quinn, and (2) Defendant Quinn is part of the Greenwall Officer Mafia 

Group. (Id. at 7.) For the same reasons set forth in the Court’s order dismissing the 

claims against Defendant Quinn, the Court now concludes that Defendant Soriano is 

entitled to dismissal.

Because the Amended Complaint’s only mention of Defendant Soriano appears in 

Count One, the Court construes the Amended Complaint to assert claims that Defendant 

Soriano violated Plaintiff’s Eighth Amendment rights. (See id. at 9 n.6 (“There is no 

reasonable basis for arguing that Plaintiff has stated a First Amendment claim against 

Defendant Galvan, as Galvan’s name is not mentioned at all in Plaintiff’s First 

Amendment allegations.”).) The relevant allegations can be construed to assert two 

theories: (1) excessive force and (2) deliberate indifference. As to the first theory, an 

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officer’s application of force against a prisoner can violate the Eighth Amendment if the 

force was applied “maliciously and sadistically to cause harm.” Hudson v. McMillian, 

503 U.S. 1, 7 (1992). As to the second theory, “[a] prison official’s ‘deliberate 

indifference’ to a substantial risk of serious harm to an inmate violates the Eighth 

Amendment.” Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 828 (1994). To successfully assert a 

deliberate indifference claim, a prisoner must show (1) that the deprivation suffered is 

objectively, sufficiently serious and (2) that the official has a sufficiently culpable state of 

mind to implicate the Eighth Amendment’s protection against the “unnecessary and 

wanton infliction of pain.” Id. at 834. “Deliberate indifference occurs when the official 

acted or failed to act despite his knowledge of a substantial risk of serious harm.” Solis v. 

Cty. of Los Angeles, 514 F.3d 946, 957 (9th Cir. 2008) (internal quotation marks 

omitted). 

To assert such claims against a particular official, however, the prisoner must show 

that the official somehow participated in the deprivation of Plaintiff’s constitutional 

rights. Taylor v. List, 880 F.2d 1040, 1045 (9th Cir. 1989) (“Liability under section 1983 

arises only upon a showing of personal participation by the defendant.”). Plaintiff can 

satisfy this showing by either demonstrating the defendant’s “[p]ersonal participation in 

the deprivation,” or that the defendant set “in motion a series of act by other which the 

[defendant] knows or reasonably should know would cause others to inflict the 

constitutional injury.” Gilbrook v. City of Westminster, 177 F.3d 839, 854 (9th Cir. 

1999).

Under these standards, the Amended Complaint does not state a plausible claim 

against Defendant Soriano. Other than another officer’s statement that Defendant 

Soriano should not be “messed” with, and the allegation that Defendant Soriano is a 

member of some sort of “mafia group,” there is nothing to suggest that Defendant 

Soriano (1) engaged in conduct that was malicious or sadistic; (2) intended to impose an 

unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain; or (3) either engaged in conduct that violated 

Plaintiff’s Eighth Amendment rights or set in motion a series of acts that led to the 

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violation of Plaintiff’s Eighth Amendment rights. And Defendant Soriano’s group 

affiliation, alone, cannot establish an Eighth Amendment violation. See, e.g., Leer v. 

Murphy, 844 F.2d 628, 634 (9th Cir. 1988) (“The prisoner must set forth specific facts as 

to each individual defendant’s deliberate indifference.”). Accordingly, Plaintiff has 

failed to state a cognizable Eighth Amendment claim against Defendant Soriano.

4. Leave to Amend

As with Plaintiff’s claim against Defendant Grisez (see ECF No. 26 at 10–11), the 

Court finds that Plaintiff may be able to remedy these defects in the Amended Complaint

if he offers additional allegations connecting Defendant Soriano’s conduct to the alleged 

constitutional violations. Accordingly, the Court grants Plaintiff leave to amend his 

allegations against Defendant Soriano.

5. Conclusion

For the reasons discussed above, the Court GRANTS Defendants’ motion to 

dismiss the claims against Defendant Soriano. If Plaintiff wishes to file a second 

amended complaint to allege additional facts relating to Defendant Soriano’s 

involvement in the violation of Plaintiff’s constitutional rights, Plaintiff may do so 

within sixty (60) days from the date of this order.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: October 10, 2017

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