Opinion ID: 782877
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Exhaustion and the PLRA

Text: 14 By requiring prisoners who challenge the conditions of their confinement to exhaust first their state administrative remedies, the PLRA grants state prison systems the initial opportunity to address their internal problems. Whereas parts of the PLRA aim to ease the burden that meritless prisoner lawsuits impose on state law-enforcement officials and the federal docket, see, e.g., 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(c)(1) (permitting court to dismiss sua sponte prisoner suits that are obviously frivolous); id. § 1997e(f) (authorizing pretrial hearings via telephone or video conference rather than in-person appearance of the prisoner); id. § 1997e(g)(1) (permitting defendant to waive the right to reply to prisoner actions), nothing suggests that a goal of the act, and specifically, of the exhaustion requirement, was to defeat valid constitutional claims. Rather, the exhaustion requirement simply recognizes that unless a prisoner first presents his or her grievance to the state prison system, what will often be the most efficient mechanism to remedy a violation of federal law will be lost. See Porter v. Nussle, 534 U.S. 516, 525, 122 S.Ct. 983, 152 L.Ed.2d 12 (2002) (Congress afforded corrections officials time and opportunity to address complaints internally before allowing the initiation of a federal case.). The exhaustion requirement is therefore a benefit accorded to state prisons, an opportunity to satisfy those inmate grievances the state wishes to handle internally. See Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475, 492, 93 S.Ct. 1827, 36 L.Ed.2d 439 (1973) (Since these internal problems of state prisons involve issues so peculiarly within state authority and expertise, the States have an important interest in not being bypassed in the correction of those problems.). It is an accommodation of our federal system designed to give the State an initial opportunity to pass upon and correct alleged violations of its prisoners' federal rights. Picard v. Connor, 404 U.S. 270, 275, 92 S.Ct. 509, 30 L.Ed.2d 438 (1971). It is not, however, designed to permit state administrative timelines to handcuff the federal courts in adjudicating cases involving important federal rights. Accordingly, the PLRA does not contain any language regarding the timeliness of grievance filings or the application of procedural default; if the state forgoes an opportunity to decide matters internally whether for internal time constraints or any other reason, the PLRA has nonetheless served its purpose, and the prisoner may proceed to federal court. 15 Because the purpose of the exhaustion requirement is to provide states the first opportunity to resolve problems themselves, an inmate who has not pursued available administrative remedies may not yet proceed in federal court. Thus, we have clearly held that an inmate does not exhaust available administrative remedies when the inmate entirely fails to invoke the prison's grievance procedure, see Hartsfield v. Vidor, 199 F.3d 305, 308-09 (6th Cir.1999); Brown v. Toombs, 139 F.3d 1102, 1104 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 525 U.S. 833, 119 S.Ct. 88, 142 L.Ed.2d 69 (1998), or when the inmate filed such a grievance but did not appeal the denial of that complaint to the highest possible administrative level, Wright v. Morris, 111 F.3d 414, 417 n. 3 (6th Cir.), cert. denied, 522 U.S. 906, 118 S.Ct. 263, 139 L.Ed.2d 190 (1997); see also Freeman v. Francis, 196 F.3d 641, 645 (6th Cir.1999). However, we have not previously ruled in a published opinion 1 that an inmate fails to exhaust his or her available administrative remedies when the inmate invokes the prison's grievance system initially and appeals the denial of that grievance, but is time barred by the prison's administrative procedures. 16 Our precedent demonstrates only that, in keeping with the plain language of § 1997e(a), a prisoner does not exhaust his administrative remedies when he fails to commence the grievance process or to run the gamut of potential appeals. In Hartsfield, we dismissed a prisoner's § 1983 suit because the disappearance of the prisoner's grievance form, the lack of any evidence demonstrating that a grievance was actually filed, and the failure of the prisoner to refile a grievance did not support the argument that the prisoner ever began the grievance process. 199 F.3d at 308-09; see also Jones v. Smith, 266 F.3d 399, 400 (6th Cir.2001) (affirming dismissal of § 1983 suit because plaintiff prisoner was not vigilant enough in obtaining a grievance form after his initial request for one was denied and because the prisoner never made any other attempt to obtain a form or to file a grievance without a form). In Freeman, the exhaustion requirement was not met because the prisoner jumped the gun, and despite making some attempts to follow the proper grievance procedures, filed a federal complaint before completing all of the stages of the internal grievance process. 196 F.3d at 645. In Wright v. Morris, one prisoner filed an initial grievance, but then failed to appeal the denial of this grievance through the entire process. 111 F.3d at 417 n. 3; see also Harper v. Jenkin, 179 F.3d 1311, 1312 (11th Cir. 1999) (dismissing § 1983 claim because the inmate did not appeal the denial of the grievance, thus failing to give the state a full chance to hear the grievance). These cases thus address the situation in which the prisoner is attempting to bypass the exhaustion requirement by declining to file administrative complaints and then claiming that administrative remedies are time-barred and thus not then available. Wright, 111 F.3d at 417 n. 3. 17 Here, however, Thomas filed a grievance in the prison's formal grievance process, and once that grievance was denied, Thomas appealed as far as he could. He had quite literally exhausted his ability to go any further within the internal prison system. There were no more avenues to travel within the state prison system. If Thomas had failed to file, the state prison system would never have had any opportunity to review the claim. However, by filing, Thomas gave the state an opportunity to hear the claim and, by appealing, Thomas gave the state the opportunity to reconsider its decision. Thomas received the benefit of the potential that the state would hear his grievance by waiving the procedural guidelines, which the state could have done if it wanted to avoid federal court. The state received the benefit of dealing with the case internally if it so desired. The defendants, however, argue that exhaustion also requires more, and specifically, that it requires compliance with state administrative deadlines. Yet such an outcome would extend our established precedent beyond its present boundaries.