United States District Court, S.D. Indiana, Indianapolis Division
ENTRY GRANTING DEFENDANTS' MOTION FOR SUMMARY
JUDGMENT AND ENTERING FINAL JUDGMENT
Hon.
Jane Magnus-Stinson, Chief Judge
I.
Background
In this
civil action, plaintiff Eddy Buchanan, an Indiana prisoner
incarcerated at the New Castle Correctional Facility alleges
that the defendants failed to protect him from multiple
assaults while he was incarcerated at the Wabash Valley
Correctional Facility (“Wabash Valley”).
Presently
pending before the Court is the motion for summary judgment
filed by defendants Brian Mifflin, Michael Petty, Richard
Brown, and David Thomson on December 1, 2017. Dkt. 23. This
motion is fully briefed.
The
defendants' motion argues that the claims alleged against
them are barred under the exhaustion provision of the Prison
Litigation Reform Act (“PLRA”), 42 U.S.C. §
1997e, that requires a prisoner to first exhaust his
available administrative remedies before filing a lawsuit in
court. Mr. Buchanan argues in response that attempts to
complete the grievance process were obstructed by Wabash
Valley staff to stop civil rights actions from being filed
and that the grievance process was therefore not available to
him. For the reasons set forth in this Entry, the
defendants' motion for summary judgment, dkt. [23], is
granted.
II.
Legal Standards
Summary
judgment should be granted “if the movant shows that
there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the
movant is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law.”
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). A “material fact”
is one that “might affect the outcome of the
suit.” Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477
U.S. 242, 248 (1986). The court views the facts in the light
most favorable to the non-moving party and all reasonable
inferences are drawn in the non-movant's favor. Ault
v. Speicher, 634 F.3d 942, 945 (7th Cir. 2011).
“The
applicable substantive law will dictate which facts are
material.” National Soffit & Escutcheons, Inc.,
v. Superior Systems, Inc., 98 F.3d 262, 265 (7th Cir.
1996) (citing Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248). The
substantive law applicable to this motion for summary
judgment is the PLRA, which requires that “[n]o action
shall be brought with respect to prison conditions under
section 1983 . . . until such administrative remedies as are
available are exhausted.” 42 U.S.C. § 1997e;
see Porter v. Nussle, 534 U.S. 516, 524-25 (2002).
“[T]he
PLRA's exhaustion requirement applies to all inmate suits
about prison life, whether they involve general circumstances
or particular episodes, and whether they allege excessive
force or some other wrong.” Id. at 532
(citation omitted). The requirement to exhaust provides
“that no one is entitled to judicial relief for a
supposed or threatened injury until the prescribed
administrative remedy has been exhausted.” Woodford
v. Ngo, 548 U.S. 81, 88-89 (2006) (citation omitted).
Exhaustion of available administrative remedies
“‘means using all steps that the agency holds
out, and doing so properly (so that the agency addresses the
issues on the merits).'” Id. at 90
(quoting Pozo v. McCaughtry, 286 F.3d 1022, 1024
(7th Cir. 2002)). Proper use of the facility's grievance
system requires a prisoner “to file complaints and
appeals in the place, and at the time the prison's
administrative rules require.” Pozo, 286 F.3d
at 1025; see also Dole v. Chandler, 438 F.3d 804,
809 (7th Cir. 2006).
“An
inmate . . . must exhaust available remedies, but need not
exhaust unavailable ones.” Ross v. Blake, 136
S.Ct. 1850, 1858 (2016). An administrative procedure is
unavailable when “it operates as a simple dead end,
” when it “might be so opaque that it becomes,
practically speaking, incapable of use” or when
“prison administrators thwart inmates from taking
advantage of a grievance process through machination,
misrepresentation, or intimidation.” Id. at
1860.
Because
exhaustion is an affirmative defense, “the burden of
proof is on the prison officials.” Kaba v.
Stepp, 458 F.3d 678, 680 (7th Cir. 2006). So here, the
defendants bear the burden of demonstrating that the
plaintiff failed to exhaust all available administrative
remedies before he filed this suit. Id. at 681.
III.
Discussion
A.
Undisputed Facts
The
following statement of facts was evaluated pursuant to the
standard set forth above. That is, this statement of facts is
not necessarily objectively true, but as the summary judgment
standard requires, the undisputed facts and the disputed
evidence are presented in the light reasonably most favorable
to Mr. Buchanan as the non-moving party with respect to ...