Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca7-19-02485/USCOURTS-ca7-19-02485-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Phillip Friedrich
Appellee
Roland Price
Appellant

Document Text:

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit

Chicago, Illinois 60604

Submitted May 28, 2020*

Decided June 5, 2020

Before

FRANK H. EASTERBROOK, Circuit Judge

DIANE S. SYKES, Circuit Judge

AMY J. ST. EVE, Circuit Judge

No. 19‐2485

ROLAND PRICE,

Plaintiff‐Appellant,

v.

PHILLIP FRIEDRICH,

Defendant‐Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District

Court for the Eastern District of Wisconsin.

No. 15‐cv‐774‐pp

Pamela Pepper,

Chief Judge.

O R D E R  

Roland Price, a Wisconsin prisoner, believes that prison officials denied him

access to the courts when they seized his legal materials in retaliation for grievances he

filed against a correctional officer. The district court entered summary judgment against

him, concluding that he did not exhaust administrative remedies regarding his

* We agreed to decide this case without oral argument because the briefs and

record adequately present the facts and legal arguments, and oral argument would not

significantly aid the court. See FED. R. APP. P. 34(a)(2)(C).

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1

NONPRECEDENTIAL DISPOSITION

To be cited only in accordance with Fed. R. App. P. 32.1

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No. 19‐2485    Page 2

retaliation claim and that he had not shown prejudice regarding his claim of denial of

access to the courts. We affirm.  

This case arises from Price’s time in restrictive housing at the Wisconsin Secure

Program Facility where Phillip Friedrich, the defendant, was a property officer

responsible for managing confiscated property. Price had been placed in restrictive

housing, and his property inventoried, while being investigated on charges that he was

paid for helping another inmate with legal work. Price’s property was inventoried

twice—on the day before he went into the restrictive unit and the day after—and Price

signed both inventory forms to ensure that all his property was accounted for. He was

allowed to keep one box of legal materials with him in restrictive housing. He later was

found guilty of the charges.  

After Price served his time in restrictive housing, Friedrich and another officer

sorted and inventoried his property. Price was allowed to keep his legal materials, but

Friedrich confiscated other property that was covered in tape (in violation of prison

rules) or in excess of allowed limits (i.e., too many pairs of clothing or too many

photographs). Friedrich listed all confiscated items on a property receipt form, which

Price signed. This confiscated property was then put in the property room while Price

determined what he wanted to do with it.  

During the next month, Price filed five grievances about his confiscated property.

He complained that certain items should not have been confiscated (i.e., his Bible and

handmade rosary), that he was missing legal transcripts, and that Friedrich was going

to destroy some items before Price could exhaust administrative remedies.  

The institution’s complaint examiner then contacted Friedrich, who said that he

searched the property room but did not find Price’s legal materials. Friedrich denied

taking any legal materials and maintained that he had confiscated only property listed

on the form Price had signed.  

Over the next couple months, Price sought to arrange to send the confiscated

items to his mother before they would be destroyed. At Price’s request Friedrich tried to

mail the property to Price’s mother, but Friedrich mislabeled her address and the

property was returned to the prison. By this time Price did not have enough money to

send the items to her. A little over a month later, Friedrich determined that there was

not enough room to store Price’s property indefinitely and ordered it destroyed.

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Nearly four years later, Price brought this civil‐rights suit against Friedrich. The

district court screened the complaint, see 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(a), and permitted him to

proceed on two claims: first, that Friedrich had seized his legal property in retaliation

for grievances he had filed against one of Friedrich’s fellow officers; and, second, that

Friedrich had denied him access to the courts by depriving him of the legal transcripts

that he needed to appeal his criminal case in Wisconsin state court and to timely

petition the state trial court for a writ of certiorari to contest the dismissal of his

grievance about the prison disciplinary decision.  

The judge granted Friedrich’s partial motion for summary judgment based on

the affirmative defense that Price had not exhausted administrative remedies with

regard to his retaliation claim. The judge determined that none of Price’s grievances

alerted the prison to Price’s belief that his legal materials were destroyed in retaliation

for grievances he had filed against Friedrich’s colleague. The judge noted Price’s

statements in two grievance appeals that Friedrich had taken his legal materials as

“retribution” and that Price was being “abuse[d] for filing complaints.” However, the

judge explained that Price did not “clearly identify the issue[s]” in his underlying

grievances as required by section 310.09(1)(e) of the Wisconsin Administrative Code,

WIS. ADMIN. CODE DOC § 310.09(1)(e) (2010), so the complaint examiner had no

opportunity to investigate and determine the facts of his retaliation claim.  

The judge then granted Friedrich’s motion for summary judgment on Price’s

claim of denial of access to the court. She determined that no reasonable jury could

conclude that the loss of any of these legal materials—even if Friedrich had taken and

destroyed them—prevented Price from proceeding in his court cases. Importantly, Price

had not explained how the allegedly missing legal transcripts would have changed the

outcome of either challenge.  

Regarding his retaliation claim, on appeal Price asserts that the judge held him

to a “heightened pleading standard” because “retaliation is not a factual detail; rather it

is a legal theory or conclusion.” But for purposes of exhaustion, the Prison Litigation

Reform Act requires prisoners to provide a prison with “notice of, and an opportunity

to correct, a problem.” Schillinger v. Kiley, 954 F.3d 990, 995–96 (7th Cir. 2020) (quoting

Turley v. Rednour, 729 F.3d 645, 650 (7th Cir. 2013)); see also Jones v. Bock, 549 U.S. 199, 219

(2007). As the judge here appropriately concluded, Price failed to apprise the complaint

examiner of his claim by first mentioning it in any of his underlying grievances.

Price next argues in response to the court’s ruling that he was prejudiced in two

ways with respect to his access‐to‐courts claim. First, he argues that the loss of his legal

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materials prevented him from being able to file effective briefs or conduct legal

research. But Price has not identified how he was specifically prejudiced with respect to

his criminal case by, for instance, missing court deadlines or failing to make timely

filings. See Ortloff v. United States, 335 F.3d 652, 656 (7th Cir. 2003). Second, Price argues

that the loss of his legal materials caused him to miss the deadline to file his state‐court

petition for a writ of certiorari. But these were not the same legal materials that he

alleged Friedrich to have confiscated (indeed, he says that key documents—including

the Department of Corrections’ final decision—had been withheld by the prison’s

mailroom). Because he does not suggest what role (if any) Friedrich played in this

alleged withholding, no liability may arise under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 without Friedrich’s

personal involvement. See Williams v. Shah, 927 F.3d 476, 482 (7th Cir. 2019).  

We have considered Price’s other arguments and none has merit.

AFFIRMED

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