United States District Court, D. Connecticut
INITIAL REVIEW ORDER
Stefan
R. Underhill, United States District Judge.
On June
18, 2019, Kimorah Parker, an inmate currently confined at the
MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution in Suffield,
Connecticut, brought a complaint pro se and in
forma pauperis under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against seven
Connecticut Department of Correction (“DOC”)
officials: Warden Stephen Faucher, Lieutenant Muzykoski,
Correction Officer Yaqle, Lieutenant Cronin, Captain
Diloretto, Correction Officer Witherspoon, and Correction
Officer Miser. Compl., Doc. No. 1. Parker seeks damages
against the defendants in their individual capacities for
violating her[1] constitutional rights while she was
confined as a pretrial detainee[2] at Corrigan-Radgowski
Correctional Center in Uncasville, Connecticut. See
Id. at 6. For the following reasons, the complaint is
dismissed in part.
I.
Standard of Review
Under
28 U.S.C. § 1915A, I must review prisoner civil
complaints and dismiss any portion of the complaint that is
frivolous or malicious, that fails to state a claim upon
which relief may be granted, or that seeks monetary relief
from a defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C.
§ 1915A. Although detailed allegations are not required,
the complaint must include sufficient facts to afford the
defendants fair notice of the claims and the grounds upon
which they are based and to demonstrate a plausible right to
relief. Bell Atlantic v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544,
555-56 (2007). Conclusory allegations are not sufficient.
Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). The
plaintiff must plead “enough facts to state a claim to
relief that is plausible on its face.”
Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570. Nevertheless, it is
well-established that “[p]ro se
complaints ‘must be construed liberally and interpreted
to raise the strongest arguments that they
suggest.'” Sykes v. Bank of Am., 723 F.3d
399, 403 (2d Cir. 2013) (quoting Triestman v. Fed. Bureau
of Prisons, 470 F.3d 471, 474 (2d Cir. 2006)); see
also Tracy v. Freshwater, 623 F.3d 90, 101-02 (2d Cir.
2010) (discussing special rules of solicitude for pro
se litigants).
II.
Factual Allegations
Parker
alleges the following facts. On August 17, 2018, at
approximately 12:00 p.m., Officer Yaqle denied Parker a
shaving razor. Compl. ¶ 1. This caused Parker to suffer
“an emotional and mental health breakdown.”
Id. at ¶ 2. She asked to speak with someone
from the mental health unit, covered her cell window, and
then sat down in the corner of her cell. Id. A short
time later, Yaqle told Parker that the mental health unit had
been called, and Parker removed the window covering.
Id.
Later,
Lieutenant Muzykoski, Officer Witherspoon, and Officer Miser
entered Parker's cell and told her that she was being
sent to a restrictive housing unit (“RHU”).
Compl. ¶ 3. Parker stood in the back of the cell and
explained to the officers that she was emotionally
distraught. Id. Muzykoski told Parker that they
“will talk about it later” and then instructed
Witherspoon and Miser to handcuff her. Id. at ¶
4. Parker told the officers that she needed female staff
members to handcuff her because she was a transgender inmate,
but the officers pushed her against the wall and proceeded to
handcuff her. Id. Muzykoski then deployed chemical
mace on Parker and said that she was resisting, which was
false. Id. The officers then escorted her out of the
cell. Id. at ¶ 5. Due to her anxiety and
depression, Parker could not walk, which prompted the
officers to carry her down the stairs. Id.
When
they reached the RHU, Parker stood against the wall outside
the unit and once again tried to explain her situation to the
camera operator, but she only “s[u]nk deeper into [her]
pani[c] attack and fear.” Compl. ¶ 5. Witherspoon
and Miser then placed her in a wheelchair. Id. at
¶ 6. Although her feet were still touching the ground,
the officers spun the wheelchair around, which caused her to
feel as if she was falling backwards. Id. Out of
fear for her safety, Parker stood up out of the wheelchair
but was otherwise compliant. Id. Witherspoon then
“slamm[ed]” Parker onto the floor, causing Parker
to injure her head, and then placed his knee on her neck,
restricting her ability to breathe. Id. at ¶ 7.
Muzykoski then sprayed mace on her a second time.
Id. Parker said that she was unable to breathe, and
the officers told her to stop resisting, even though Parker
was compliant. Id. at ¶ 8.
The
officers escorted Parker to the medical unit where they
placed her on suicide watch. Compl. ¶ 9. There, Parker
informed medical personnel that she was suffering from
headaches and neck pain. Id. She also spoke with
Warden Faucher about the incident. Id. Faucher said
that he had seen the surveillance footage from the RHU unit
and would look into the incident, but he never conducted any
investigation. Id.
After
she was placed in the RHU, Parker continued to endure
headaches and neck pain. Compl. ¶ 10. She spoke with
Lieutenant Cronin and Captain Diloretto about what had
occurred. Id. Both officials stated that they would
investigate the incident and instructed Parker to write a
statement about it, but the officials “found
nothing.” Id.
III.
Analysis
Parker
is suing the defendants for subjecting her to
“excessive force, deliberate indifference, reckless
disregard, unnecessary force, cruel and unusual punishment,
target[ed] discrimination, ment[a]l distress, and emotional
distress.” Compl. at 6. Based on the allegations and
the fact that Parker was a pretrial detainee at the time of
the events, I construe her complaint as asserting claims of
excessive force and a violation of equal protection under the
Fourteenth Amendment and a state law claim of intentional
infliction of emotional distress.
A.
Excessive Force
“A
pretrial detainee's claims of unconstitutional conditions
of confinement are governed by the Due Process Clause of the
Fourteenth Amendment, rather than the Cruel and Unusual
Punishments Clause of the Eighth Amendment . . . because
‘pretrial detainees have not been convicted of a crime
and thus may not be punished in any manner - neither cruelly
and unusually nor otherwise.'” Darnell v.
Pineiro, 849 F.3d 17, 29 (2d Cir. 2017) (citations
omitted) (quoting Iqbal v. Hasty, 490 F.3d 143, 168
(2d Cir. 2007)); see also Shakir v. Derby Police
Department, 284 F.Supp.3d 165, 205 (D. Conn. 2018)
(analyzing claim challenging conditions of confinement during
pretrial detention under Fourteenth Amendment Due Process
Clause). “A detainee's rights are ...