In the 

United States Court of Appeals 

For the Seventh Circuit ____________________ 

No. 19-3244 

FADEEL SHUHAIBER, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

v.

ILLINOIS DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS, 

Defendant-Appellee. 

____________________ 

Appeal from the United States District Court for the 

Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. 

No. 1:18-cv-03289 — Edmond E. Chang, Judge. 

____________________ 

SUBMITTED SEPTEMBER 17, 2020* —

DECIDED NOVEMBER 19, 2020 

____________________ 

Before HAMILTON, BRENNAN, and SCUDDER, Circuit Judges. 

SCUDDER, Circuit Judge. Fadeel Shuhaiber is confined to a 

wheelchair. Following the district court’s dismissal of claims 

*We have agreed to decide the 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. FED. R. APP. P. 

34(a)(2)(C). 
2 No. 19-3244 

he brought against the Illinois Department of Corrections under the Americans with Disabilities Act and Rehabilitation 

Act, Shuhaiber appealed and, based on his impoverished status, sought permission to proceed on appeal without prepaying the requisite filing fee. By the time he filed the appeal, 

Shuhaiber, a native of the United Arab Emirates, had been 

transferred to the custody of the Department of Homeland Security for removal from the United States. The change in custody matters because Shuhaiber, as a frequent filer of federal 

lawsuits, had accumulated more than three strikes under the 

Prison Litigation Reform Act for filing frivolous lawsuits, and 

therefore would have had to prepay the filing fee to appeal 

the district court’s dismissal of his claims. Doubting that 

Shuhaiber was still a “prisoner,” the district court granted his 

motion to proceed in forma pauperis. 

We agree and hold, in alignment with all other circuits to 

have addressed the question, that the appellate filing-fee bar 

does not apply where, as here, the appellant is being held by 

immigration authorities and thus no longer is a “prisoner” 

within the meaning of the PLRA. That conclusion does not 

lead very far for Shuhaiber, however, as the district court was 

also right to dismiss his claims, leaving us to affirm. 

I 

Shuhaiber’s complaint focused on events during his stay 

at the Stateville Northern Reception and Classification Center 

in Joliet, Illinois. He alleged that the institution failed to accommodate his disability by confining him to a cell unsuited 

to an inmate confined to a wheelchair. Not only was the cell 

too small to maneuver easily within, but, as Shuhaiber contended, he struggled to get into his lower bunk and use the 

table. He likewise complained of being transported to 
No. 19-3244 3

physical therapy appointments in vans that were not ADAcompliant, leaving him to depend on an officer to lift him into 

the vehicles. 

Invoking Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(b)(6), the Department of Corrections moved to dismiss Shuhaiber’s complaint. The district court granted the motion and dismissed 

the complaint without prejudice, determining that Shuhaiber 

failed to allege that he was deprived of access to facilities or 

services or that anything about the Department’s vans caused 

him to miss medical appointments. In so ruling, the district 

court gave Shuhaiber a month within which to file an 

amended complaint clarifying and more fully advancing his 

allegations. 

During the ensuing 30 days, Shuhaiber finished serving 

his sentence and was transferred to the custody of the Department of Homeland Security pending ongoing removal proceedings. This changed circumstance resulted in the district 

court giving Shuhaiber another month within which to file an 

amended complaint. After that new deadline passed, Shuhaiber sought another extension of time while simultaneously indicating he wanted to appeal the court’s prior dismissal order. 

We dismissed Shuhaiber’s appeal for non-payment of 

fees. Order, Shuhaiber v. Ill. Dep’t of Corr., No. 19-2344 (7th Cir. 

Oct. 4, 2019). The district court reacted by then entering a final 

order dismissing Shuhaiber’s case with prejudice on the basis 

that he had failed to respond to the prior order allowing an 

amended complaint. Shuhaiber appealed from that final order. Recognizing that Shuhaiber was no longer a prisoner 

serving a criminal sentence, the district court granted his request to proceed in forma pauperis. 
4 No. 19-3244 

II 

We begin by addressing whether Shuhaiber’s in forma pauperis status on appeal is proper. The Prison Litigation Reform 

Act, which everyone calls the PLRA, places several restrictions on prisoners’ access to federal civil litigation. Relevant here is the PLRA’s “three strikes” provision, which prevents prisoners from appealing a judgment in a civil action 

without the prepayment of the filing fee if they have accumulated three or more strikes and do not allege circumstances in 

which they face an imminent danger of physical harm. 

28 U.S.C. § 1915(g); see Kalinowski v. Bond, 358 F.3d 978, 978 

(7th Cir. 2004) (“[T]he ... three-strikes rule[] appl[ies] to prisoners only.”). 

The question is whether Shuhaiber, upon leaving the custody of the Department of Corrections and being detained by 

DHS (by which time he had accumulated five “strikes”), remained a “prisoner” within the meaning of the PLRA. Congress has answered the question by defining a “prisoner” as 

“any person incarcerated or detained in any facility who is 

accused of, convicted of, sentenced for, or adjudicated delinquent for, violations of criminal law or the terms and conditions of parole, probation, pretrial release, or diversionary 

program.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915(h) (emphasis added). The analysis 

from here is straightforward, for once Shuhaiber entered 

DHS’s custody on the immigration detainer he ceased being 

confined for any violation of criminal law—indeed, he had 

finished serving his Illinois sentence. What is more, “[immigration] removal proceedings are civil, not criminal,” in nature. Gutierrez-Berdin v. Holder, 618 F.3d 647, 652 (7th Cir. 

2010) (citing INS v. Lopez-Mendoza, 468 U.S. 1032, 1050–51 

(1984)). 
No. 19-3244 5

Like the three other circuits to have considered the question, we too now conclude that a person held only on an immigration detainer is not a “prisoner” within the meaning of 

the PLRA and therefore is not subject to its filing fee requirements. See Agyeman v. INS, 296 F.3d 871, 885–86 (9th Cir. 2002) 

(analyzing PLRA’s definition of prisoner and nature of deportation proceedings and reaching the same conclusion); LaFontant v. INS, 135 F.3d 158, 165 (D.C. Cir. 1998) (employing same 

reasoning and reaching the same conclusion); Ojo v. INS, 

106 F.3d 680, 682–83 (5th Cir. 1997) (same). 

The upshot is that allowing Shuhaiber to proceed in forma 

pauperis does not violate the PLRA. 

III 

On the merits, the district court was right to dismiss with 

prejudice Shuhaiber’s claims under the ADA and Rehabilitation Act. To state a claim under the ADA or Rehabilitation 

Act, Shuhaiber had to allege facts plausibly suggesting that he 

is a qualified person with a disability and “was denied the 

benefits of the services, programs, or activities” of the Center 

because of his disability. Wagoner v. Lemmon, 778 F.3d 586, 592 

(7th Cir. 2015) (citation and quotation marks omitted). He 

failed to do so. Although alleging difficulties with his cell, the 

showers, and the vans, Shuhaiber did not say anything about 

his particular circumstances or accommodations that kept 

him from accessing the Center’s facilities or services on the 

same basis as other inmates. See id. at 592–93; Jaros v. Ill. Dep’t 

of Corr., 684 F.3d 667, 672 (7th Cir. 2012). And, while invited 

by the district court to amend his complaint to add allegations 

about missing medical appointments because of the inadequacy of the Center’s vans, Shuhaiber never did so. See Wagoner, 778 F.3d at 593 (concluding that the inconvenience of 
6 No. 19-3244 

transport in a noncompliant van does not amount to denial of 

services). 

Further, Shuhaiber is mistaken with his contention that 

the district court held him to a fact pleading requirement at 

odds with Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a). Nothing in the 

district court’s orders even hints at a requirement that Shuhaiber plead facts corresponding to the elements of his ADA and 

Rehabilitation Act claims and theory of proof. See Chapman v. 

Yellow Cab Coop., 875 F.3d 846, 848 (7th Cir. 2017) (“To the extent the district court demanded that complaints plead facts—

not only facts that bear on the statutory elements of a claim, 

but also facts that bear on judicially established standards—it 

was mistaken.”). 

To be sure, Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(e) allows 

district courts to ask a plaintiff to provide “details that enable 

the defendants to respond intelligently and the court to handle the litigation effectively.” Id. at 849. If a plaintiff does not 

comply with a reasonable order for such details, a district 

court may dismiss the complaint with prejudice. Id. That is all 

that happened here, and, in the end, the district court committed no error in dismissing Shuhaiber’s case with prejudice. 

Finally, it is too late for Shuhaiber to use his appellate 

briefs to submit documents purporting to demonstrate that he 

missed three physical therapy appointments (out of thirtyeight) due to the lack of an ADA-compliant van. See id. These 

facts, if true, were known to Shuhaiber all along, and he 

should have included them in an amended complaint. The 

time has come and gone for him to do so, however. 

For these reasons, we AFFIRM.