[DO NOT PUBLISH]

In the

United States Court of Appeals

For the Eleventh Circuit

____________________

No. 21-13298

____________________

WILLIE B. SMITH, III, 

Plaintiff-Appellant,

versus

COMMISSIONER, ALABAMA DEPARTMENT OF 

CORRECTIONS, 

WARDEN, HOLMAN CORRECTIONAL FACILITY, 

Defendants-Appellees.

____________________

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Alabama

D.C. Docket No. 2:19-cv-00927-ECM-SMD

____________________

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Before WILSON, JORDAN, and JILL PRYOR, Circuit Judges.

WILSON, Circuit Judge:

Willie B. Smith III is an Alabama death row inmate. He appeals the district court’s sua sponte dismissal of his claim under the 

Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) regarding the statutory election of his method of execution for lack of Article III standing.

Smith contends that he pleaded the facts necessary to support standing and that the district court erroneously considered the 

merits of the case in its sua sponte ruling. The Commissioner of 

the Alabama Department of Corrections (ADOC), Jefferson Dunn, 

and the Warden of Holman Correctional Facility, Terry Raybon, 

(collectively, Defendants) argue that the district court correctly 

concluded that Smith did not have standing because he failed to 

show he would have elected nitrogen hypoxia as his method of execution during June 2018, among other reasons. 

Upon review, and with the benefit of oral argument, we conclude that the district court erred because Smith sufficiently alleged

standing in his complaint. Accordingly, we vacate the district 

court’s sua sponte dismissal and remand for the consideration of 

the preliminary injunction motion on the merits.

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I.

Smith is presently incarcerated at Holman Correctional Facility (Holman) and is scheduled to be executed by the State of Alabama via lethal injection on October 21, 2021. On June 1, 2018, 

Senate Bill 272, which authorized Alabama’s usage of nitrogen hypoxia for the purposes of execution, went into effect. The statute

provided inmates subject to the death penalty with the option to 

elect execution by nitrogen hypoxia in lieu of the default method 

of execution—lethal injection. Eligible inmates had a statutory period of 30 days (from June 1, 2018) to elect nitrogen hypoxia as their 

method of execution; otherwise the election was considered 

waived. 

At some point between June 26, 2018 and the statutory deadline, the ADOC adopted, for its own use and distribution, an election form created by the Federal Defenders. The former Warden 

for Holman, Cynthia Stewart, acting under the “direction of someone above her at the ADOC,” ordered the distribution of the election form to all death row inmates with instructions to sign, date, 

and return the form if they wished to be executed by nitrogen hypoxia. 

Smith received the form, but he did not make the election 

during the opt-in period. Because Smith suffers from “significant 

cognitive deficiencies,” he alleges he was unable to “enjoy the benefit of the statute and the election form” without being aided with 

comprehension of the form and its contents. Neither Holman nor 

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the ADOC provided an accommodation to Smith to help him to 

understand the form during the statutory opt-in period. 

On November 25, 2019, Smith filed a complaint alleging the 

violation of his rights under the ADA with respect to the enforcement and implementation of the statute. In his complaint, Smith 

notably argues that, because of Defendants’ alleged ADA violations, he has been foreclosed from having the meaningful opportunity to make the choice to which he was entitled under statute.

The district court issued a scheduling order and began discovery 

soon after.

On July 14, 2021, Smith filed a motion for preliminary injunction to enjoin his execution by any method aside from nitrogen 

hypoxia until his ADA claim was resolved. The district court ordered an evidentiary hearing and oral argument on the motion but

struck the submissions and rescheduled the hearing following the 

close of briefing. The district court then ordered supplemental 

briefing from the parties with instructions to address jurisdiction, 

specifically: “whether the Plaintiff has standing, whether the injury 

alleged by the Plaintiff is redressable in this litigation, and/or 

whether this case is moot in light of the fact that the statutory period of election has closed.”

The district court heard the parties’ arguments and made a 

determination—despite Defendants’ concessions on the point—

finding that Smith failed to establish all three elements of Article III 

standing. Consequently, the district court dismissed Smith’s ADA 

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21-13298 Opinion of the Court 5

suit for lack of Article III standing, and, therefore, jurisdiction. This 

appeal followed. 

II.

This Court reviews de novo a district court’s dismissal of a 

case for lack of standing. Sierra v. City of Hallandale Beach, 996 

F.3d 1110, 1112 (11th Cir. 2021); see also Burdick v. Kennedy, 700 

F. App'x 984, 986 (11th Cir. 2017) (per curiam) (providing this court 

reviews a sua sponte dismissal for lack of standing de novo) (citing 

Scott v. Taylor, 470 F.3d 1014, 1017 (11th Cir. 2006) (per curiam)). 

We review a district court’s legal conclusions, including those concerning subject-matter jurisdiction, under the same standard. Carmichael v. Kellogg, Brown & Root Servs., Inc., 572 F.3d 1271, 1279 

(11th Cir. 2009). At the dismissal stage of litigation, the court reviewing standing may not make determinations on the merits and 

must assume that the plaintiff will succeed on his claims. Culverhouse v. Paulson & Co., 813 F.3d 991, 994 (11th Cir. 2016) (citations 

omitted).

III.

Smith argues on appeal that the district court erred in dismissing his ADA claim for lack of Article III standing because he 

sufficiently alleged the requisite elements of standing in his

amended complaint. After review and with the benefit of oral 

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argument, we conclude that the district court erred because Smith 

sufficiently alleged standing in his pleadings.1

To establish Article III standing, a plaintiff must show: (1)

injury in fact; (2) causation; and (3) redressability. Sierra, 996 F.3d 

at 1112 (citing Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–61 

(1992)).

The party invoking federal jurisdiction bears the burden of 

establishing these indispensable elements. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 561. 

“[E]ach element must be supported in the same way as any other 

matter on which the plaintiff bears the burden of proof, i.e., with 

the manner and degree of evidence required at the successive 

stages of the litigation.” Id.

At the pleading stage, for instance, general factual allegations of injury resulting from the defendant’s conduct may suffice 

to establish standing. Id. Additionally, when assessing a motion to 

dismiss, “we presume that general allegations embrace those specific facts that are necessary to support the claim.” Id. (internal 

quotation marks omitted and alteration adopted). This presumption applies whether the court dismisses a plaintiff’s case following 

a motion to dismiss from the defendant or from the court itself. 

See Scott, 470 F.3d at 1017.

1 In addition to the pleadings, we accept as true the facts contained in discovery 

materials and the record for the purposes of the standing issue. See, e.g., Gladstone Realtors v. Village of Bellwood, 441 U.S. 91, 109 n.22 (1979).

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In concluding that Smith lacks Article III standing, the district court erroneously conflated the assessment of standing with 

the merits of Smith’s claim. When addressing the issue of standing, 

the court must assume that the plaintiff will win on the complaint 

without reaching the merits of the underlying claim in question. 

Culverhouse, 813 F.3d at 994. To be sure, district courts have an 

independent obligation to confirm jurisdiction, even in the absence 

of a challenge by the defendant. Alabama Legislative Black Caucus 

v. Alabama, 575 U.S. 254, 270 (2015). Nevertheless, we have explained that “when reviewing the standing question, the court 

must be careful not to decide the questions on the merits for or 

against the plaintiff, and must therefore assume that on the merits 

the plaintiff[] would be successful in [his] claim[].” Culverhouse, 

813 F.3d at 994. Smith has standing to bring his claim under the 

ADA because he adequately alleged (1) an injury in fact, (2) traceability (or causation), and (3) redressability. We address each element in turn.

To establish injury in fact, a plaintiff must show that he or 

she suffered “an invasion of a legally protected interest” that is 

“concrete and particularized” and “actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical.” Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560 (internal quotation 

marks omitted). 

An injury is particularized when it “affect[s] the plaintiff in a 

personal and individual way.” Sierra, 996 F.3d 1110 at 1113. To be 

concrete, the injury must be “real, and not abstract.” Id. In the 

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context of a preliminary injunction, a plaintiff must adequately 

demonstrate “that a future injury is imminent.” Id. This entails a 

showing “that there is a sufficient likelihood that the plaintiff will 

be affected by the allegedly unlawful conduct in the future.” Id. 

Here, the injury Smith alleged is the violation of his rights under 

the ADA. This injury then resulted in the future harm of his scheduled execution by lethal injection, a death which Smith contends is 

more painful than nitrogen hypoxia. 

Smith alleges that the ADOC failed to provide him a reasonable accommodation to allow him to meaningfully understand the 

form and the choice it provided regarding execution method. 

Smith proffers that such reasonable accommodations may have included, but are not limited to, the use of simple language or a comprehension check, additional time, or assistive technology. As provided in the complaint, Smith alleges that the denial of such reasonable accommodation violates the ADA. That violation, in turn, 

allegedly barred Smith from the benefit of electing a less painful 

method of execution: nitrogen hypoxia. Smith thus sufficiently alleges an injury in fact.

Because we find that Smith has demonstrated that he has 

suffered an injury in fact, our standing analysis proceeds to the 

traceability (or causation) element. Traceability requires Smith to 

show that his injury (the impending execution by lethal injection) 

is “fairly traceable to the challenged action” (i.e., the failure of 

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Defendants to offer him a reasonable accommodation as required 

by the ADA). See Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560 (alterations adopted).

The district court ruled that Smith failed to demonstrate 

traceability because Defendants did not cause the alleged injury. 

The district court reasoned that the election form was not the only 

method by which Smith could exercise his statutory right to elect

to be put to death by nitrogen hypoxia and that it was defense 

counsel who was responsible for informing Smith about the change 

in law. But by focusing on what Smith could have done differently, 

and what Alabama law required or allowed, the district court again 

conflated the merits with standing. In the process, the district court 

failed to recognize that a plaintiff need not “demonstrate a connection between the injur[y] [he] claim[s] and the . . . rights being asserted.” See Duke Power Co. v. Carolina Env’t Study Grp., 438 

U.S. 59, 78 (1978) (rejecting the argument that injuries that do not 

“directly relate[] to the constitutional attack” cannot “supply a 

predicate for standing”). 

Smith alleges in his complaint that Defendants were responsible for developing, implementing, and distributing the election 

form without providing an accommodation for his disability.2 

2 In their answer, Defendants admitted the allegation in Smith’s complaint that 

stated: “Jefferson Dunn, Commissioner of the Alabama Department of Corrections (“ADOC”), is responsible for the development and implementation of 

the protocol and procedures governing the execution of death-sentenced prisoners in the State of Alabama.” Doc. 36 at ¶ 7; Doc 58 at ¶ 7. Further, Smith 

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Moreover, Defendants’ amended answer and record testimony include concessions regarding the scope of their roles in connection 

to Smith’s alleged ADA violation. In ruling that Defendants had no 

duty to inform Smith about the opt-in period, the district court improperly addressed the merits of the ADA claim. Instead, if we assume—as we must—that Smith will succeed on his ADA claim, he 

has sufficiently alleged that his injury is traceable to, or caused by, 

the challenged actions or inactions of Defendants. 

Having established that Smith has shown the first two elements needed to meet “the irreducible constitutional minimum of 

standing,” we proceed to the third and final element: redressability. 

Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560 (1992). Redressability simply requires a 

plaintiff to seek a “remedy that is likely to redress [the] injury” 

which is fairly traceable to the challenged conduct. See Uzuegbunam v. Preczewski, 141 S. Ct. 792, 797 (2021). Smith successfully 

alleges redressability for his claimed injury by Defendants under 

the ADA.

Smith requests that Defendants redress his injury by reopening the 30-day statutory opt-in period to allow him an opportunity to understand and complete the form with the benefit of the 

accommodations he was previously denied. Defendants counter 

alleges that Warden Stewart oversaw the distribution of the election forms at 

Holman. The statute also explicitly provides that the inmates should deliver 

their completed election forms to the warden of the inmate’s correctional facility.

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that the statute does not grant them this power.3 But the ability of 

a federal court to fashion effective relief for a violation of federal 

law is not limited by what state law permits. See Guaranty Trust 

Co. v. York, 326 U.S. 99, 106 (1945) (“A federal court may afford an 

equitable remedy for a substantive right recognized by a State even 

though a State court cannot give it.”).

We find that “a favorable decision” from the court in this 

case “would amount to a significant increase in the likelihood that 

the plaintiff would obtain relief that directly redresses the injury 

suffered.” Fla. Wildlife Fed’n, Inc. v. S. Fla. Water Mgmt. Dist., 647 

F.3d 1296, 1303–04 (11th Cir. 2011). Because this is all that is required to show redressability, Smith has satisfied this element. 

IV.

After a thorough review of the record, we find sufficient factual allegations in Smith’s pleadings to establish standing. The district court erred in dismissing Smith’s action on the basis that he 

lacks standing by analyzing the merits of Smith’s ADA claim at this 

point in litigation.

3 This runs contrary to Defendants’ earlier concession to Smith’s allegation in 

his Amended Complaint that “Commissioner Dunn had the authority to alter, 

amend, or make exceptions to the protocol and procedures governing the execution of death-sentenced prisoners in the State of Alabama.”

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We vacate and remand to the district court to make an adjudication regarding the preliminary injunction motion on the 

merits.

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