Summary
The United States District Court for the Western District of Kentucky screened Karim Zein’s 42 U.S.C. § 1983 complaint under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A. The court dismissed the official-capacity, equal-protection, supervisory-liability, and verbal-threat claims, while allowing individual-capacity Eighth Amendment excessive-force and failure-to-protect claims and Fourth Amendment strip-search claims to proceed.
Topics
Practice areas
Questions Presented
- Whether the complaint stated claims under § 1983 sufficient to proceed past screening under 28 U.S.C. § 1915A.
- Whether the official-capacity claims for damages were cognizable under § 1983.
- Whether the allegations stated Eighth Amendment excessive-force and failure-to-protect claims.
- Whether alleged verbal threats and brandishing of a taser stated an Eighth Amendment claim.
- Whether the allegations stated a Fourteenth Amendment equal-protection claim.
- Whether the allegations stated Fourth Amendment unreasonable-search claims based on a strip search.
- Whether the allegations stated an individual-capacity supervisory-liability claim against the warden.
Holdings
- State officials sued in their official capacities for damages are not persons subject to suit under § 1983; Zein's official-capacity claims therefore fail to state a claim.
- The allegations that Nielsen and Duvall used excessive force, and that Duvall failed to protect Zein from Nielsen's excessive force, were sufficient to allow those individual-capacity claims to proceed past screening.
- Duvall's alleged verbal threats to use a taser, even accompanied by brandishing the taser, did not rise to the level of a constitutional violation and were dismissed for failure to state a claim.
- A conclusory assertion that the defendants' conduct denied Zein equal protection, without allegations of disparate treatment compared with similarly situated persons, failed to state an equal-protection claim.
- The allegations that Duvall and Nielsen conducted or ordered a strip search were sufficient to allow an individual-capacity Fourth Amendment unreasonable-search claim to proceed past screening.
- A § 1983 supervisor cannot be held liable under respondeat superior or based merely on a failure to act; because the allegations against Plappert rested on her supervisory role and failure to respond to grievances and reports, the individual-capacity claim failed.
Key quotations
“Section 1983 creates no substantive rights, but merely provides remedies for deprivations of rights established elsewhere.” (III)
“Supervisory liability “must be based on active unconstitutional behavior and cannot be based upon ‘a mere failure to act.’”” (III.B.4)
“The Court will allow the following claims to proceed against Defendants in their individual capacity: Eighth Amendment excessive force claim against Defendants Duvall and Nielsen; Eighth Amendment failure-to-protect claim against Defendant Duvall; Fourth Amendment strip-search claim against Defendants Duvall and Nielsen.” (Order ¶ 2)
Factual background
Zein is incarcerated at Kentucky State Penitentiary and alleged that Lieutenant Nielsen and Officer Duvall used excessive force while transporting him to strip-out cages. He alleged that Duvall failed to protect him from Nielsen and threatened him with a taser, and that Duvall and Nielsen conducted or ordered a strip search. He also sued Warden Plappert based on her supervisory position and response to reports of the alleged misconduct.
Procedural history
Karim Zein filed a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action against three Kentucky State Penitentiary officials in their official and individual capacities, seeking damages. On screening, the court dismissed the official-capacity claims, equal-protection claim, supervisory-liability claim against Warden Plappert, and verbal-threat claim, while allowing specified excessive-force, failure-to-protect, and strip-search claims to proceed.