Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caed-1_15-cv-01360/USCOURTS-caed-1_15-cv-01360-0/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

JARED M. VILLERY,

Plaintiff,

v.

JAY JONES, et al.,

Defendants.

No. 1:15-cv-1360-DAD-MJS (PC)

ORDER GRANTING IN PART AND 

DENYING IN PART MOTION FOR 

RECONSIDERATION

(Doc. No. 10)

THIRTY (30) DAY DEADLINE

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

U.S.C. § 1983. (Doc. No. 1.) The matter was referred to a United States Magistrate Judge 

pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(B) and Local Rule 302 of the United States District Court for 

the Eastern District of California. On June 16, 2016, the assigned magistrate judge screened 

plaintiff’s complaint and found that it stated only a cognizable First Amendment retaliation claim 

against defendants Jones, Schmidt, Yerton, and Escarcega and no other cognizable claims. (Doc. 

No. 9.) Accordingly, plaintiff was ordered to either file an amended complaint or notify the court 

of his willingness to proceed only on the First Amendment retaliation claim against defendants 

Jones, Schmidt, Yerton, and Escarcega found to be cognizable. (Id. at 11-12.) Plaintiff instead 

filed the instant motion for reconsideration. (Doc. No. 10.) 

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For the reasons stated below, plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration will be granted in part 

and denied in part.

I. LEGAL STANDARD

Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 72(a) authorizes parties to file objections to orders issued 

the by a magistrate judge addressing nondispositive matters. “The district judge in the case must 

consider timely objections and modify or set aside any part of the order that is clearly erroneous 

or is contrary to law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(a). Similarly, Local Rule 303(c) allows parties to seek 

reconsideration by the assigned district judge of a magistrate judge’s pretrial rulings. Local Rule 

303(c). The assigned district judge shall review all such requests for reconsideration under the 

“clearly erroneous or contrary to law” standard set forth in 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(A). Local Rule 

303(f) (citing Fed. R. Civ. P. 72(a)).

II. DISCUSSION

Plaintiff contends that the magistrate judge erred in concluding that several of the 

allegations of his complaint failed to state cognizable claims for relief.

A. Plaintiff’s Allegations

The allegations of plaintiff’s original complaint are lengthy. Accordingly, the court will 

summarize only the allegations that are pertinent to the instant motion for reconsideration. With 

that caveat, in his complaint, plaintiff alleges as follows with respect to the conditions of his 

confinement while incarcerated at California Correctional Institution (“CCI”) in Tehachapi, 

California. Plaintiff suffers from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (“PTSD”) after being stabbed 

and beaten in 2007. As a result, he finds it extremely difficult to live in a double-occupancy cell 

with another inmate, which repeatedly leads to problems between him and his cell mates. On 

January 21, 2014, approximately one week after arriving at CCI, plaintiff discussed these 

concerns and symptoms with a mental health caseworker. Upon returning to his cell, plaintiff 

was confronted by defendant Schmidt who stated that there was no room for single-cell 

assignments on the yard, that plaintiff’s mental health issues didn’t matter, and that his housing 

concerns were not a mental health issue. Defendant Schmidt accused plaintiff of making threats 

based on his expressed concerns to mental health staff about living with other inmates despite the 

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fact that plaintiff had no cellmate at the time and had only described his problems caused by 

PTSD. Schmidt attempted to place plaintiff in Administrative Segregation (“AdSeg”) that night

and the following night, but could not because AdSeg was full. After Schmidt’s second attempt 

to place plaintiff in AdSeg was unsuccessful, plaintiff was interviewed by defendants Schmidt 

and Jones. They told plaintiff that he would be placed on C-status (a highly restrictive 

disciplinary designation) for manipulation of staff. They stated that plaintiff would be disciplined 

if he continued to seek single cell status.

On January 22, 2014, plaintiff submitted two administrative grievances regarding 

conditions at CCI. On January 23, 2014, he submitted an administrative grievance regarding the 

alleged actions of defendants Jones and Schmidt.

On January 24, 2014, Schmidt fabricated a disciplinary report against plaintiff. Defendant 

Jones classified the report and authorized the disciplinary charge to be issued. Plaintiff eventually 

was found guilty of a prison rules violation. On February 1, 2014, plaintiff had his yard activities 

restricted due to an unrelated disciplinary charge. This limited his ability to access the law 

library.

Thereafter, defendant Jones instituted a policy barring inmates from law library access if 

they were on yard restriction or C-Status, unless they had a legal deadline. According to plaintiff, 

this policy was not enforced until after plaintiff had submitted his January 2014 administrative 

grievances against defendants Jones and Schmidt. As a result, plaintiff was denied regular law 

library access despite having active cases and was able to visit the law library only four times in a 

three month period. Defendant Karlow denied plaintiff law library access, falsely stating that 

plaintiff was on C-status when in fact he was merely on yard restriction. Plaintiff filed other 

administrative grievances against defendant Jones during this time. One such grievance resulted 

in a finding that defendants Jones and Karlow violated CDCR policy by denying plaintiff library 

access and enforcing an illegal policy.

On June 18, 2014, inmate Jones was moved into plaintiff’s cell. Inmate Jones presented 

difficulties for plaintiff and plaintiff asked to have him moved from the cell. Plaintiff did not 

sleep for days due to these difficulties and his daily altercations with Jones. Plaintiff submitted 

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administrative grievances regarding his concerns in this regard. On June 28, 2016, plaintiff was 

moved to a different cell. 

On June 29, 2014, defendant Schmidt confronted plaintiff regarding his administrative 

grievance regarding inmate Jones. Schmidt threatened to file a disciplinary report against 

plaintiff for manipulation of staff if plaintiff continued to file administrative grievances seeking a 

cell change.

In addition to the above, plaintiff complains that, over a five-and-one-half month period, 

six of the administrative grievances he submitted disappeared. Plaintiff retains a copy of every 

administrative grievance submitted, and he submits them using a procedure by which he receives 

a signed receipt from staff for every grievance submitted. His administrative grievances began 

disappearing in January 2014. The missing grievances were submitted on: January 30, 2014; 

March 20, 2014; May 27, 2014; June 3, 2014; July 1, 2014; and July 15, 2014. Defendant Emard 

was responsible for collecting the January 31, 2014, grievance. Defendant Rhodes was 

responsible for collecting the March 20, 2014, May 27, 2014, June 3, 2014, and July 15, 2014, 

grievances. Defendant Yerton was responsible for collecting the July 1, 2014, grievance. None 

of these administrative grievances were ever seen again. The missing grievances were 

determined to have never been received by the Appeals Office.

B. Legal Standard – Retaliation

As the Ninth Circuit has recognized:

Within the 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).

The second element of a prisoner retaliation claim focuses on causation and motive. See 

Brodheim v. Cry, 584 F.3d 1262, 1271 (9th Cir. 2009). A plaintiff must allege and 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 

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

circumstantial evidence. Bruce v. Ylst, 351 F.3d 1283, 1288–89 (9th Cir. 2003) (finding that a 

prisoner establishes 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”).

The third prong of a viable retaliation claim can be satisfied by various activities. For 

instance, the filing of a grievance is a protected action under the First Amendment. 

Valandingham v. Bojorquez, 866 F.2d 1135, 1138 (9th Cir. 1989). Likewise, pursuing civil rights 

litigation is protected under the First Amendment. Rizzo v. Dawson, 778 F.2d 527, 532 (9th Cir. 

1985).

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 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 and show 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, 778 F.2d at 532.

C. Analysis

The assigned magistrate judge concluded that defendant Schmidt’s attempts to place 

plaintiff in Administrative Segregation (“AdSeg”) on January 21, and 22, 2014 did not constitute 

adverse action because the move was never accomplished.1In his motion for reconsideration 

plaintiff fails to show that this determination was clearly erroneous or contrary to law. While 

 

1

In the screening order, the magistrate judge attributes these attempts to both defendant Schmidt 

and defendant Jones. However, the allegations of plaintiff’s complaint appear to attribute these 

attempts only to defendant Schmidt. (Doc. No. 1 at 5.)

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plaintiff is correct that threats of adverse action may have a sufficient chilling effect to rise to the 

level of adverse action themselves, see Brodheim, 584 F.3d at 1270, it is not clear from the 

allegations of his complaint that defendant Schmidt threatened plaintiff with placement in AdSeg 

on these dates. Indeed, it is unclear from his complaint when or how plaintiff learned of any 

efforts to place him in AdSeg. It therefore is also unclear how plaintiff claims to have come to 

understand that he faced transfer to AdSeg if he continued to pursue the constitutionally protected 

activity. Plaintiff’s allegation therefore fails to state a cognizable claim as pled. The magistrate 

judge’s order specifically permits plaintiff to amend his complaint to cure these deficiencies if he

so chooses.

However, in the screening order the magistrate judge concluded that defendant Schmidt’s 

alleged June 29, 2014 threat to file disciplinary charges against plaintiff if he were to file an 

administrative grievance was “not sufficiently adverse.” (Doc. No. 9 at 9.) Plaintiff seeks 

reconsideration of this ruling arguing, essentially, that it is contrary to law. (Doc. No. 10 at 8-9.) 

The undersigned agrees that this claim as alleged is not subject to dismissal at screening and that 

the magistrate judge’s ruling otherwise was contrary to law. See Watison v. Carter, 668 F.3d 

1108, 1114 (9th Cir. 2012) (“[T]he mere threat of harm can be an adverse action....”) (quoting

Brodheim, 584 F.3d at 1269); Brodheim, 584 F.3d at 1270 (allowing a retaliation claim to proceed 

when a grievance decider made an implicit threat of retaliation regarding use of the grievance 

process); Puckett v. Sweis, No.2:15-cv-0602 AC P, 2016 WL 632795, at *4 (E.D. Cal. Feb. 16, 

2016) (“[A]t the pleading stage, ‘allegations of harm [are] sufficient to ground a First Amendment 

retaliation claim without discussing whether that harm had a chilling effect.’”); see also Hines v. 

Gomez, 108 F.3d 265, 269 (9th Cir. 1997) (cognizable “adverse actions” may include false 

disciplinary charges).

Plaintiff also alleges that defendants Karlow and Jones retaliated against him for pursuing 

administrative grievances by fabricating a law library policy to deny plaintiff access thereto. The 

magistrate judge found that these allegations failed to state a cognizable claim. (Doc. No. 9 at 

10.) In his motion for reconsideration plaintiff identifies no error on the part of the magistrate 

judge in this regard. In his complaint, plaintiff alleges he was denied law library access because 

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he was on yard restriction. He alleges that this occurred pursuant to a “fabricated” policy that 

was not enforced until after he filed administrative grievances. The allegations of plaintiff’s

complaint in support of this claim are far from clear. Either plaintiff was the subject of a 

generalized policy that prohibited inmates on yard restriction from access to the law library at 

certain times, or there was no such policy and plaintiff was singled out for such restrictions. 

While plaintiff attempts to provide some clarity regarding these allegations in his motion for 

reconsideration, the complaint itself implies that plaintiff was the subject of an institution-wide 

policy applicable to inmates on yard restriction. Thus, the complaint fails to suggest that the 

restrictions on plaintiff’s library access were motivated by retaliation or lacked a legitimate 

penological purpose. Again, the magistrate judge granted plaintiff leave to amend this claims, 

and the others which were found to be not cognizable, if he wished to do so.

Finally, plaintiff alleged in his complaint that defendants Rhodes, Emard, and Yerton 

destroyed six administrative grievances he had submitted, and that they did so in retaliation.2The 

magistrate judge concluded that plaintiff’s allegations in this regard were based on mere 

speculation and failed to state a cognizable claim. Again, in his motion for reconsideration 

plaintiff has failed to identify in what way that determination was clearly erroneous or contrary to 

law. In his complaint, plaintiff alleges only that the named defendants were responsible for 

collecting administrative grievances from a locked collection box and taking them to the 

Sergeant’s office, where they were placed in an envelope and then delivered to the Captain’s 

office. He alleges that Sergeants and Captains would routinely read inmate’s administrative 

grievances, even though they were not supposed to do so. None of these allegations suggest that 

defendants Rhodes, Emard, or Yerton read plaintiff’s administrative grievances, destroyed them

or acted based on any retaliatory animus toward plaintiff due to his engagement in protected

activity. Thus, this claim as pled in the original complaint fails to state a cognizable claim. 

 

2

In his motion for reconsideration, plaintiff alleges that defendants Emard, Rhodes, and Yerton 

identified administrative grievances filed by plaintiff and advised defendant Jones of these 

grievances, so that Jones could destroy them. These allegations concerning defendant Jones, 

however, are not contained in plaintiff’s complaint. They thus cannot be considered in 

determining whether the complaint states a cognizable claim.

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III. CONCLUSION 

In addition to the claims found to be cognizable by the assigned magistrate judge, the 

undersigned has concluded that plaintiff’s complaint also states a cognizable retaliation claim 

against defendant Schmidt in relation to his alleged June 29, 2014 threat to file disciplinary 

charges against plaintiff in retaliation for plaintiff’s filing of administrative grievances. In all 

other respects, plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration of the screening order will be denied.

For the reasons explained above:

1. Plaintiff’s motion for reconsideration (Doc. No. 10) is granted in part and denied 

in part as stated above;

2. Within thirty (30) days of the date of service of this order, plaintiff must either:

a. File an amended complaint curing the deficiencies identified herein and in 

the screening order (Doc. No. 9), or

b. Notify the court in writing that he does not wish to file an amended 

complaint and is willing to proceed only on the claims found to be 

cognizable in this order and in the magistrate judge’s screening order; and

3. Any failure by plaintiff to comply with this order will result in this action being 

dismissed for failure to obey a court order.

IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: March 16, 2017 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE

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