Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-2_17-cv-00319/USCOURTS-caed-2_17-cv-00319-24/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 

FOR THE EASTERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA 

LUIS MANUEL GARCES, 

Plaintiff, 

v. 

J. PICKETT, et al. 

Defendants. 

No. 2:17-cv-0319 JAM AC P 

ORDER 

 Plaintiff is a state prisoner proceeding pro se with a civil rights action pursuant to 42 

U.S.C. § 1983. Pending before the court is defendants Pickett and Chapman’s motion for 

judgment on the pleadings, ECF No. 66, which plaintiff opposes, ECF No. 96. 

I. Procedural History 

The complaint alleged that defendants Pickett, Barton, Schaake, Chapman, Hurbert, 

Lopez, Briggs, and Voong violated plaintiff’s constitutional rights. ECF No. 1 at 2-13. On 

screening pursuant to the Prison Litigation Reform Act, the undersigned recommended that 

plaintiff’s claims against Barton, Schaake, Hurbert, Lopez, Briggs, and Voong be dismissed 

without leave to amend, ECF No. 21 at 8, and the District Judge adopted the recommendation in 

full, ECF No. 33. Service was found to be appropriate for defendants Pickett and Chapman on 

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plaintiff’s claim that they failed to protect him,1 ECF No. 21 at 7-8, and defendants now move for 

judgment on the pleadings, ECF No. 66. 

II. Plaintiff’s Allegations 

Plaintiff alleges that defendants Pickett and Chapman deliberately housed him with a 

known enemy, inmate Zamora, who then assaulted plaintiff two days later. ECF No. 1 at 5, 12. 

He further alleges that his C-file and the “Prison DMS” list the 25ers gang and its members as 

plaintiff’s enemies, and that the defendants knew inmate Zamora was a member of the 25ers 

when they forced plaintiff to house with him. Id. at 12. 

III. Motion for Judgment on the Pleadings 

A. Legal Standard for Judgment on the Pleadings 

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c), “[a]fter the pleadings are closed—but early 

enough not to delay trial—a party may move for judgment on the pleadings.” In a Rule 12(c) 

motion, the court “assume[s] that the facts that [plaintiff] alleges are true.” Jackson v. Barnes, 

749 F.3d 755, 763 (9th Cir. 2014) (citing United States ex rel. Cafasso v. Gen. Dynamics C4 Sys., 

Inc., 637 F.3d 1047, 1053 (9th Cir. 2011)). “‘Judgment on the pleadings is properly granted 

when [, accepting all factual allegations in the complaint as true,] there is no issue of material fact 

in dispute, and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.’” Chavez v. United 

States, 683 F.3d 1102, 1108 (9th Cir. 2012) (alteration in original) (quoting Fleming v. Pickard, 

581 F.3d 922, 925 (9th Cir. 2009)). 

“Analysis under Rule 12(c) is substantially identical to analysis under Rule 12(b)(6) 

because, under both rules, a court must determine whether the facts alleged in the complaint, 

taken as true, entitle the plaintiff to a legal remedy.” Id. (citation and internal quotation marks 

omitted). Under that standard, to survive dismissal, the complaint must contain more than “a 

formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause of action;” it must contain factual allegations 

sufficient to “raise a right to relief above the speculative level.” Bell Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 

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 The undersigned also found that plaintiff’s property and grievance claims against defendants 

Pickett and Chapman should be dismissed without leave to amend, but inadvertently failed to 

recommend their dismissal. ECF No. 21 at 4-5, 8. It will therefore be recommended that these 

claims be dismissed. 

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U.S. 544, 555 (2007) (citations omitted). “[T]he pleading must contain something more . . . than 

. . . a statement of facts that merely creates a suspicion [of] a legally cognizable right of action.” 

Id. (alternation in original) (quoting 5 Charles Alan Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice 

and Procedure § 1216 (3d ed. 2004)). “[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, 678 (2009) (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570). “A claim has facial plausibility when 

the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the 

defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id. (citation omitted). 

Although the court must accept as true the allegations of the complaint, Jackson, 749 F.3d 

at 763, the court need not accept legal conclusions “cast in the form of factual allegations,” W. 

Mining Council v. Watt, 643 F.2d 618, 624 (9th Cir. 1981) (citations omitted). The court also 

construes the complaint in the light most favorable to the plaintiff and it resolves all doubts in the 

plaintiff’s favor. Jenkins v. McKeithen, 395 U.S. 411, 421 (1969) (citations omitted). The court 

will “presume that general allegations embrace those specific facts that are necessary to support 

the claim.” Nat’l Org. for Women, Inc. v. Scheidler, 510 U.S. 249, 256 (1994) (internal quotation 

marks omitted) (quoting Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 561 (1992)). 

B. Legal Standard for Deliberate Indifference 

“The Constitution does not mandate comfortable prisons, but neither does it permit 

inhumane ones.” Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 832 (1994) (internal quotation marks and 

citation omitted). “[A] prison official violates the Eighth Amendment only when two 

requirements are met. First, the deprivation alleged must be, objectively, sufficiently serious, a 

prison official’s act or omission must result in the denial of the minimal civilized measure of 

life’s necessities.” Id. at 834 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). Second, the prison 

official must subjectively have a sufficiently culpable state of mind, “one of deliberate 

indifference to inmate health or safety.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The 

official is not liable under the Eighth Amendment unless he “knows of and disregards an 

excessive risk to inmate health or safety; the official must both be aware of facts from which the 

inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of serious harm exists, and he must also draw the 

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inference.” Id. at 837. Then, he must fail to take reasonable measures to abate the substantial 

risk of serious harm. Id. at 847. Mere negligent failure to protect an inmate from harm is not 

actionable under § 1983, and even civil recklessness—failure to act in the face of an unjustifiably 

high risk of harm which is so obvious that it should be known—is insufficient to establish an 

Eighth Amendment claim. Id. at 835-37. 

A person can deprive another of a constitutional right within the meaning of § 1983 “not 

only by some kind of direct personal participation in the deprivation, but also by setting in motion 

a series of acts by others which the actor knows or reasonably should know would cause others to 

inflict the constitutional injury.” Johnson v. Duffy, 588 F.2d 740, 743-44 (9th Cir. 1978) (citation 

omitted). However, placing inmates of rival gangs in a cell, with nothing more, fails to satisfy the 

Eighth Amendment’s standard that prison officials must be aware of a specific risk to an inmate. 

Labatad v. Corr. Corp. of Am., 714 F.3d 1155, 1160 (9th Cir. 2013); see also Thompson v. Lee, 

No. 1:07-cv-1299 LJO GSA, 2015 WL 769683, at *8, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21407, at *20-21 

(E.D. Cal. Feb. 23, 2015) (generalized fear of another inmate based on membership in a rival 

gang, with nothing more, does not satisfy the Eighth Amendment). 

C. Discussion 

Defendants contend the allegations should be dismissed because plaintiff alleges no more 

than a “generalized risk of harm,” which is insufficient to establish a claim of deliberate 

indifference. ECF No. 66-1 at 3, 5. They argue that plaintiff did not allege any specific risk of 

harm they knew or should have known about besides inmate Zamora’s gang affiliation. Id. at 5-6. 

Further, defendants argue that their supervisory roles are insufficient to establish the requisite 

causal connection because plaintiff does not allege facts indicating their personal involvement or 

awareness of an alleged constitutional violation and the failure to prevent it. Id. at 6-8. 

The court has already screened plaintiff’s complaint under the applicable Rule 12(b)(6) 

standard and determined that the complaint pled sufficient allegations to state a claim. ECF No. 

21 at 2-4. For the reasons now explained, the undersigned reaffirms the original screening order 

and recommends the defendants’ instant motion be denied. 

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With respect to defendants’ personal involvement, plaintiff’s complaint alleges that the 

defendant wardens were the ones who deliberately housed him with a known enemy that resulted 

in his assault. ECF No. 1 at 5, 12. The complaint alleges that defendants Pickett and Chapman 

forced plaintiff to house with inmate Zamora. Id. at 12. This allegation, which must be 

interpreted liberally, indicates that the defendants personally decided that plaintiff and Zamora 

would be housed together. To the extent plaintiff’s declaration supporting his opposition notes 

that two officers put him into the cell with Zamora and said they were following orders, ECF No. 

96 at 46, ¶ 15, these allegations are consistent with defendants making the decision. 

With respect to defendants’ states of mind, they argue that plaintiff alleges only an 

awareness of a “generalized risk of harm.” ECF No. 66-1 at 3-5. Defendants cite several cases 

for the proposition that placing inmates of opposite gangs, without a specific threat giving rise to 

an inference of risk, fails to satisfy the Eighth Amendment. ECF No. 66-1 at 4-6 (citing Labatad, 

714 F.3d 1155; Thompson, 2015 WL 769683, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21407; Fosselman v. 

Dimmer, No. 1:12-cv-1302 DAD SAB, 2017 WL 1254685, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23215 (E.D. 

Cal. Feb. 17, 2017)). As defendants acknowledge, these cases were resolved on summary 

judgment; they do not establish that plaintiff’s claims fail as a matter of law despite the allegation 

of personal knowledge. 

Of the cases cited by defendants, Thompson is the most analogous. In Thompson, the 

court screened the complaint and found that the plaintiff sufficiently pled a cognizable claim 

when he alleged that his file said he was not to be housed with gang members from the Bloods or 

Crips or with radical Muslims, but was housed with inmates with those affiliations anyway and 

assaulted each time. 2015 WL 769683, at *1-3, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21407, at *2-7. The 

complaint was not dismissed at the pleading stage, but defendants prevailed on summary 

judgment when the undisputed evidence showed only a generalized risk. 2015 WL 769683, at 

*7-17, 2015 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 21407, at *18-21, 23-26, 28-30, 33-35, 37-39, 41-43, 45-47. 

Labatad and Fosselman were similarly resolved in defendants’ favor on summary judgment, when 

the plaintiffs failed to present evidence of anything more than general risks of harm. Labatad, 

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714 F.3d at 1161; Fosselman, 2017 WL 1254685, at *19-20, 2017 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 23215, *52-

56. 

Contrary to defendants’ arguments, plaintiff has not simply alleged a generalized risk of 

harm from members of a gang. He has specifically alleged that CDCR recognized a particular 

gang—the 25ers—as his enemy, and documented in his file that he should not be housed with 

members of that gang. ECF No. 1 at 12. He further alleges that despite having this knowledge, 

defendants forcibly housed him with a member of the 25ers, which resulted in his assault. Id. at 

5, 12. Similar to the plaintiff in Thompson, plaintiff here has made sufficient allegations of 

deliberate indifference at the pleading stage. Whether plaintiff’s allegations can ultimately 

survive a challenge on a motion for summary judgment is yet to be determined, but the 

allegations are sufficient to state a claim. For these reasons, the court reaffirms its determination 

that plaintiff has plead sufficient factual content to demonstrate that the defendants may be liable 

for the misconduct alleged. 

IV. Conclusion 

For the reasons set forth above, IT IS HEREBY RECOMMENDED that: 

1. Defendants’ motion for judgment on the pleadings, ECF No. 66, be denied. 

2. The grievance and property claims against defendants Pickett and Chapman be 

dismissed without leave to amend for the reasons set forth in Section V of the screening order, 

ECF No. 21 at 4-6. 

These findings and recommendations are submitted to the United States District Judge 

assigned to the case, pursuant to the provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(l). Within twenty-one days 

after being served with these findings and recommendations, any party may file written 

objections with the court and serve a copy on all parties. Such a document should be captioned 

“Objections to Magistrate Judge’s Findings and Recommendations.” Any response to the 

objections shall be served and filed within fourteen days after service of the objections. The 

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parties are advised that failure to file objections within the specified time may waive the right to 

appeal the District Court’s order. Martinez v. Ylst, 951 F.2d 1153 (9th Cir. 1991). 

DATED: March 30, 2020 

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