Source: https://openjurist.org/134/f3d/104/hemmings-v-f-gorczyk-j-md
Timestamp: 2019-02-18 00:16:08
Document Index: 309678394

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1983', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1915', '§ 1983']

134 F3d 104 Hemmings v. F Gorczyk J Md | OpenJurist
134 F. 3d 104 - Hemmings v. F Gorczyk J Md
134 F3d 104 Hemmings v. F Gorczyk J Md
134 F.3d 104
Allan Bruce HEMMINGS, Plaintiff-Appellant,
John F. GORCZYK, Commissioner, Vermont Department of
Corrections; Keith Tallon, Southwest Regional Correctional
Facility; Keith Griffin, Supervisor; Thomas Terencini,
Supervisor; Dorothy Day, Correction Officer; Officer
Cripps, Correction Officer; Officer Ball, Correction
Officer; Thomas Griffin, Education Center Director; Dr.
Stickney, Medical Officer; Donna Young, Medical Department
Nurse; Robert J. Wallett, Supervisor; Scott Baker, Asst.
Supt.; Nurse Marsha, Medical Department; Mid-Vermont
Orthopaedics, Inc.; Joseph Vargas, M.D.; Rutland Regional
Medical Center, 160 Allen Street, Rutland, Vermont,
No. 226, Docket 96-3703.
Submitted Oct. 6, 1997.
Plaintiff-appellant Allan Bruce Hemmings, pro se, appeals from a judgment of the United States District Court for the District of Vermont (J. Garvan Murtha, Chief Judge ), dismissing his in forma pauperis civil rights complaint as frivolous under 28 U.S.C. § 1915. Hemmings claims, among other things, that the defendants violated his constitutional rights through their deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs. Apart from this claim of deliberate indifference, his complaint and his subsequent voluminous filings are replete with allegations of conspiracies to harm and harass him and his family, involving, among many others, the Central Intelligence Agency (where Hemmings was previously employed) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Hemmings' complaint alleges the following pertinent facts with respect to his medical treatment, which for purposes of this appeal only we consider in the light most favorable to Hemmings. See McEvoy v. Spencer, 124 F.3d 92, 95 (2d Cir.1997). On July 11, 1993, during a game of basketball, another inmate jumped up and landed on Hemmings' ankle, rupturing his Achilles tendon. Prison medical staff diagnosed the injury as a "bad sprain" that would go away, allegedly ignoring the severity of the condition. From mid-July until mid-September 1993, Hemmings' ankle remained swollen and painful, but despite Hemmings' repeated requests he was denied a referral to a specialist. Hemmings' ankle was x-rayed twice, revealing no fractures, but Hemmings allegedly was ignored--and no further diagnostic measures were pursued--when he told prison medical staff that he was sure he had a ruptured Achilles tendon and tissue damage. In August 1993, a prison nurse who is one of the defendants in this action, Donna Young, is alleged to have maliciously taken away one of Hemmings' crutches, causing him to have to place more weight on his injured ankle and allegedly resulting in additional pain and swelling.
By an order dated August 28, 1996, Chief Judge Murtha, to whom the case had been reassigned, dismissed the case against the State Defendants. He observed that the State Defendants "ha[d] not relied upon Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6) as a basis for their motion to dismiss," but that the court had the power, under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d) (1994),3 to dismiss an in forma pauperis complaint that is "frivolous or malicious." The court found that Hemmings had not sufficiently alleged deliberate indifference to his medical needs to establish a constitutional violation, and discredited Hemmings' "disturbing allegations" of far-flung and far-fetched conspiracies to violate his constitutional rights. The court therefore dismissed the complaint pursuant to § 1915(d). Plaintiff now appeals.
We affirm the district court's dismissal of Hemmings' suit against RRMC, Vargas, and MVO. RRMC and MVO are improper defendants, inasmuch as the only conceivable responsibility that could be attributed to them for any arguable constitutional injury suffered by Hemmings would be under a theory of respondeat superior in connection with actions taken by Dr. Vargas. However, respondeat superior cannot form the basis for a § 1983 claim. See Collins v. City of Harker Heights, 503 U.S. 115, 122-23, 112 S.Ct. 1061, 1067, 117 L.Ed.2d 261 (1992); Hendricks v. Coughlin, 114 F.3d 390, 394 (2d Cir.1997). Moreover, Hemmings' claims of inadequate treatment at RRMC and MVO, and by Dr. Vargas, are at most claims of negligence, which fall short of the "deliberate indifference" to serious medical needs required to establish an Eighth Amendment violation. See Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 105-06, 97 S.Ct. 285, 292, 50 L.Ed.2d 251 (1976); Hathaway v. Coughlin, 99 F.3d 550, 553 (2d Cir.1996).
With respect to the State Defendants, we affirm the district court's dismissal of Hemmings' in forma pauperis complaint under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d) insofar as Hemmings attempts to implicate these defendants in wide-ranging conspiracies, clearly without foundation, to violate his constitutional rights. The federal in forma pauperis statute, presently codified at 28 U.S.C. § 1915, is designed to provide indigent litigants meaningful access to the federal courts. Mindful of the fact that litigants who can file lawsuits free of cost will not have the same incentive as paying litigants to avoid filing meritless suits, Congress enacted § 1915(d), which authorized a court to dismiss a complaint filed in forma pauperis if it is "satisfied that the action is frivolous or malicious." "[T]he statute accords judges not only the authority to dismiss a claim based on an indisputably meritless legal theory, but also the unusual power to pierce the veil of the complaint's factual allegations and dismiss those claims whose factual contentions are clearly baseless." Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 327, 109 S.Ct. 1827, 1833, 104 L.Ed.2d 338 (1989). A district court need not rely on judicially noticeable facts contradicting a plaintiff's factual allegations in order to find them to be baseless. See Denton v. Hernandez, 504 U.S. 25, 33, 112 S.Ct. 1728, 1733, 118 L.Ed.2d 340 (1992). Our review of the district court's dismissal of Hemmings' complaint under § 1915(d) is for abuse of discretion. See id. Based on our review of the record, we are persuaded that the district court did not abuse its discretion by refusing to indulge Hemmings' fanciful allegations.
Hemmings' claim of deliberate indifference to his medical needs by the State Defendants, however, should not have been dismissed under § 1915(d) inasmuch as Hemmings has advanced at least a colorable claim warranting further development of the facts. The standard for establishing an Eighth Amendment violation based on deliberate indifference to a prisoner's medical needs contains both an objective and a subjective prong. "Objectively, the alleged deprivation must be sufficiently serious, in the sense that a condition of urgency, one that may produce death, degeneration, or extreme pain exists. Subjectively, the charged official must act with a sufficiently culpable state of mind." Hathaway, 99 F.3d at 553 (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). The required state of mind, equivalent to criminal recklessness, is that the official " '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 inference.' " Id. (quoting Farmer v. Brennan, 511 U.S. 825, 837, 114 S.Ct. 1970, 1979, 128 L.Ed.2d 811 (1994)).
Congress amended 28 U.S.C. § 1915 in 1996. Former subsection (d) was redesignated as subsection (e), which now provides that "the court shall dismiss the case at any time if the court determines that ... the action or appeal ... is frivolous or malicious; ... fails to state a claim on which relief may be granted; or ... seeks monetary relief against a defendant who is immune from such relief." 28 U.S.C. § 1915(e)(2)(B) (1996) (emphasis supplied). There is no indication in the statutory text that Congress intended this amendment to be applied retroactively to pending cases, but we need not resolve the question of retroactivity as the outcome of this appeal would be the same under either version of the statute
We note that Hemmings' complaint contains only minimal and vague references to the personal involvement of the various State Defendants other than Dr. Stickney and Nurse Young in exercising deliberate indifference to his medical needs. We reemphasize that respondeat superior cannot form the basis for a § 1983 claim, see, e.g., City of Harker Heights, 503 U.S. at 122-23, 112 S.Ct. at 1067, and that in order to prevail against any defendant in this action Hemmings will be obliged to prove that he or she was personally involved in the constitutional violation. The district court should require Hemmings to file a new amended complaint, limited to the claim of deliberate indifference, specifying the acts of which he complains as to each of the State Defendants. If, as to any such defendant, Hemmings fails to include an allegation which, if proven, would permit a reasonable trier of fact to infer that that individual was personally involved in the deliberate indifference to his medical needs, the district court may dismiss the complaint as to that individual. The new amended complaint should, of course, be "construe[d] ... liberally, applying less stringent standards than when a plaintiff is represented by counsel." Branham v. Meachum, 77 F.3d 626, 628-29 (2d Cir.1996) (internal quotation marks omitted)