United States District Court, D. Connecticut
INITIAL REVIEW ORDER AND RULING ON PLAINTIFF'S
MOTION FOR APPOINTMENT OF COUNSEL
CHARLES S. HAIGHT, JR., SENIOR UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE
Plaintiff
Jesse Campbell, III, is a convicted prisoner currently
incarcerated at the Northern Correctional Institution
(“Northern”), a level five, maximum security
institution. Northern is run by the Connecticut State
Department of Correction (“DOC”). Plaintiff has
filed a civil rights complaint pro se under 42
U.S.C. § 1983, Title II of the Americans with
Disabilities Act (“ADA”), 42 U.S.C. § 12131,
et seq., and section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act
of 1973 (“Rehabilitation Act”), 29 U.S.C. §
794(a), against District Administrator Angel Quiros,
Commissioner Scott Semple, Deputy Commissioner Monica
Rinaldi, Director Karl Lewis, former Warden William Mulligan,
Dr. Mark Frayne, Dr. Gerard Gayne, Director Craig Burns,
Administrator Brian Libel, former Commissioner Theresa Lantz,
former Commissioner Brian Murphy, former Commissioner Leo
Arnone, former Commissioner James Dzurenda, former Warden
Wayne Choinski, former Warden Jeffrey McGill, former Warden
Edward Maldonado, former Warden Anne Cournoyer, former
Director Suzanne Ducate, former Administrator Richard Furey,
Dr. Heather Gaw, FNU Pettinger, and former Director Fred
Levesque (collectively, the “Defendants”). Doc. 1
(“Complaint”) ¶¶ 3-24.[1] Plaintiff alleges
that, in their individual and official capacities, Defendants
(1) violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to procedural due
process; (2) violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to equal
protection of the laws; (3) were deliberately indifferent to
his medical needs in violation of the Eighth Amendment; (4)
subjected him to cruel and unusual punishment in violation of
the Eighth Amendment based on the conditions of his
confinement; and (5) violated his rights protected by the ADA
and Rehabilitation Act. Id. ¶¶ 35-124. He
seeks a declaratory judgment, an injunction, and money
damages. Id. at 30 ¶¶ 1-3. For the
following reasons, Plaintiff's Complaint is dismissed in
part.
Also
pending before the Court is Plaintiff's Motion for
Appointment of Counsel, requesting that the Court appoint
pro bono counsel to represent him. Doc. 4
(“Motion for Appointment of Counsel”). For the
reasons discussed herein, that Motion is denied without
prejudice to re-filing.
I.
STANDARD OF REVIEW
Under
28 U.S.C. § 1915A, the Court must review a
prisoner's civil complaint and dismiss any portion that
“(1) is frivolous, malicious, or fails to state a claim
upon which relief may be granted; or (2) seeks monetary
relief from a defendant who is immune from such
relief.” 28 U.S.C. § 1915A(b)(1), (2). Although
highly detailed allegations are not required, the complaint
“must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as
true, to ‘state a claim that is plausible on its
face.'” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662,
678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly,
550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)).[2] “A claim has facial plausibility
when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the
court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is
liable for the misconduct alleged.” Iqbal, 556
U.S. at 678. The complaint must provide “more than the
unadorned, the-defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me
accusation.” Id. “A pleading that offers
‘labels and conclusions' or ‘a formulaic
recitation of the elements of a cause of action will not
do.'” Id. (quoting Twombly, 550
U.S. at 555).
“[W]hether
a complaint states a plausible claim for relief will
[ultimately] . . . be a context-specific task that requires
the reviewing court to draw on its judicial experience and
common sense.” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 663-64. When
“well-pleaded factual allegations” are present,
“a court should assume their veracity and then
determine whether they plausibly give rise to an entitlement
to relief.” Id. at 679. Factual disputes do
not factor into a plausibility analysis under Iqbal
and its progeny.
“Although
all allegations contained in the complaint are assumed to be
true, this tenet is ‘inapplicable to legal
conclusions.'” LaMagna v. Brown, 474
Fed.Appx. 788, 789 (2d Cir. 2012) (quoting Iqbal,
556 U.S. at 678); see also Amaker v. New York State Dept.
of Corr. Servs., 435 Fed.Appx. 52, 54 (2d Cir. 2011)
(same). Accordingly, the Court is not “bound to accept
conclusory allegations or legal conclusions masquerading as
factual conclusions.” Faber v. Metro. Life Ins.
Co., 648 F.3d 98, 104 (2d Cir. 2011) (quoting Rolon
v. Henneman, 517 F.3d 140, 149 (2d Cir. 2008) (internal
quotation marks omitted)). Consequently, “[t]hreadbare
recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by
mere conclusory statements, do not suffice.”
Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (citing Twombly, 550
U.S. at 555).
With
respect to pro se litigants, it is well-established
that “[p]ro se submissions are
reviewed with special solicitude, and ‘must be
construed liberally and interpreted to raise the strongest
arguments that they suggest.'” Matheson v.
Deutsche Bank Nat'l Tr. Co., 706 Fed.Appx. 24, 26
(2d Cir. 2017) (quoting Triestman v. Fed. Bureau of
Prisons, 470 F.3d 471, 474 (2d Cir. 2006) (per
curiam)); see also Abbas v. Dixon, 480 F.3d
636, 639 (2d Cir. 2007) (in reviewing a pro se
complaint, the court must assume the truth of the
allegations, and interpret them liberally to “raise the
strongest arguments [they] suggest[]”).
Despite
being subject to liberal interpretation, a pro se
plaintiff's complaint still must “state a claim to
relief that is plausible on its face.” Mancuso v.
Hynes, 379 Fed.Appx. 60, 61 (2d Cir. 2010) (quoting
Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678). Therefore, even in a
pro se case, “threadbare recitals of the
elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory
statements, do not suffice.” Chavis v.
Chappius, 618 F.3d 162, 170 (2d Cir. 2010) (citation and
internal quotation marks omitted). Nor may the Court
“invent factual allegations” that the plaintiff
has not pleaded. Id.
II.
FACTUAL ALLEGATIONS
These
factual allegations, accepted as true only for the purposes
of this Order, are taken from the Complaint and its exhibits.
Plaintiff
has a history of documented psychiatric disabilities. In
1995, when a juvenile court assigned Plaintiff to a
residential treatment program, Plaintiff was diagnosed with
Conduct Disorder. Doc. 1-1, at 10. Additionally, shortly
after Plaintiff began serving his term of incarceration in
2000, a DOC mental health screening “resulted in an
initial diagnosis of adjustment disorder with depression and
anxiety, and borderline personality and antisocial
personality disorder.” Id. In a 2001
evaluation, a DOC psychologist diagnosed Plaintiff with a
“psychotic disorder, ” which was based on
Plaintiff's “disorganized thinking and auditory
hallucinations, ” as well as antisocial personality
disorder. Id. at 10-11. Thereafter, a 2004 report by
a Yale University professor and psychologist concluded that
Plaintiff has a “schizotypal personality disorder,
which makes him vulnerable to brief psychotic episodes and
impaired social functioning.” Id. at 20.
Plaintiff has also been diagnosed with dysthymia, or
persistent depressive disorder. Doc. 1 ¶ 29.
Plaintiff
has been incarcerated since 2000 and an inmate at Northern
since 2006. Id. at 10 ¶ 36. Northern is a
high-security state prison which houses the state's male
inmates serving long sentences for violent crimes. Plaintiff
was on “death row” at Northern, having been
convicted for murder. The Connecticut legislature abolished
the death penalty in 2012, however. See Campbell v.
Quiros, No. 17-cv-946 (CSH), 2018 WL 888723, at *2 n.1
(D. Conn. Feb. 13, 2018) (discussing Connecticut's
abolition of the death penalty). Plaintiff's current
sentence is for life imprisonment without the possibility of
release. See Order Amending Initial Review Order,
Campbell v. Quiros, No. 3:17-cv-946 (CSH) (D. Conn.
May 21, 2018), ECF No. 31.
When
Plaintiff was transferred to Northern, he received an
“automatic placement” on Restrictive Status, and,
in particular, on Administrative Segregation Status
(“Administrative Segregation”). Id.
¶ 39.[3] In connection with that classification,
Plaintiff was placed in a Restrictive Housing Unit
(“RHU”), which Plaintiff refers to as solitary
confinement. Id. ¶¶ 37-38.[4] This
classification process occurred without “due process,
” according to Plaintiff. Id. ¶
109.[5]
Plaintiff
remains on Administrative Segregation and in the RHU.
Id. at ¶ 37. As a result, Plaintiff does not
have access to mental health units to treat his psychiatric
disabilities. Id. ¶ 41. Plaintiff is also
unable to participate in other activities that would
presumably alleviate some of the symptoms of his
disabilities. Id. ¶¶ 54-58.[6] This is the case
even though Defendants have known about Plaintiff's
disabilities for a considerable amount of time. For example,
early on Defendants were provided with Plaintiff's
medical and psychological records which documented his
disabilities. Id. ¶ 90. And they received
repeated written communications from Plaintiff in which they
were informed of his medical conditions. Id.
¶¶ 92-93.
Nonetheless,
Plaintiff has failed to receive proper medical care for his
disabilities. For example, Plaintiff experiences headaches, a
lack of energy, lethargy, and a lack of concentration.
Id. ¶ 62. Plaintiff has had “thoughts
that are disorganized at times, ” a “lack of
ability to focus, ” and he has been “emotionally
flat[, ] delusional, [and he has possessed] false
beliefs.” Id. ¶ 67. His disabilities
“cause[] him to withdraw” and he is unable to
“sustain his sanity and calmness of mind.”
Id. ¶ 70. Yet, Defendants failed to provide
Plaintiff “with adequate mental health care and
treatment”-they have “ignored Plaintiff's
mental illnesses as punishment for being on death row”
and have “intentionally allow[ed] Plaintiff's
mental health to worsen and . . . deteriorate.”
Id. ¶¶ 63, 66, 77.
Defendants'
failure to sufficiently treat Plaintiff has exacerbated the
symptoms of his disabilities. He has suffered from
depression, loss of interest and anxiety attacks, heart
palpitations. Id. ¶ 84-85. He has suffered from
“self-mutilation, withdrawal, and obsessive
ruminations.” Id. ¶ 86. And, the
conditions of Plaintiff's confinement have substantially
limited his ability to participate in major life activities,
such as communicating, eating, sleeping, concentrating, and
caring for himself. Id. ¶ 87.
III.
DISCUSSION
Plaintiff
brings a number of claims against Defendants. First,
Plaintiff claims that Defendants Lantz, Murphy, Ducate,
Levesque, Semple, Mulligan, Burns, Lewis, Rinaldi, and Frayne
violated his rights to procedural due process under the
Fourteenth Amendment by transferring him to Northern without
a hearing. Id. ¶¶ 105, 123.[7] Plaintiff also
claims that Defendants Lantz, Murphy, Ducate, Levesque, and
Choinski denied him procedural due process because he was
transferred to Administrative Segregation without a hearing.
Id. ¶ 109. Additionally, Plaintiff claims that
Defendants Lantz, Murphy, McGill, Choinski, Ducate, Furey,
Gaw, and Pettinger violated his procedural due process rights
by failing to provide him with a mental health hearing before
or after his transfer to Northern. Id. ¶ 113.
Next, Plaintiff claims that he was denied equal protection of
the laws in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment in
connection with the transfer. Id. ¶ 117. He
brings such claims against Lantz, Murphy, Levesque, Ducate,
Choinski, and McGill, id. at 28 ¶ 120, as well
as against Semple, Mulligan, Burns, Lewis, Rinaldi, and
Frayne, id. ¶ 123; see also Id. ¶
117. Plaintiff also argues that all Defendants were
deliberately indifferent to his medical needs, based on their
failure to provide Plaintiff with adequate mental healthcare,
in violation of the Eighth Amendment, id. ¶ 98,
and that Defendants Lantz, Arnone, Dzurenda, Semple, Murphy,
Choinski, McGill, Quiros, Maldonado, Cournoyer, Mulligan,
Lewis, Rinaldi, Ducate, and Burns should be held liable for
the same based on supervisory liability, id. ¶
101.[8]
Plaintiff also claims that the conditions of his confinement-
particularly the requirement that he is placed in restraints
and is strip searched when he leaves his cell (among other
allegations)-constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.
Id. ¶¶ 54-58, 123. Lastly, Plaintiff
appears to bring claims under the ADA and Rehabilitation Act
based on Defendants' failure to provide him with
sufficient mental health care. Id. at 30 ¶ 1.
A.
Official Capacity Claims and Damages
As to
individual defendants acting in their official
capacities, “the eleventh amendment immunity protects
state officials sued for damages.” Minotti v.
Lensink, 798 F.2d 607, 609 (2d Cir. 1986) (citing
Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159, 169-70 (1985));
see also Will v. Michigan Dep't of State Police,
491 U.S. 58, 71 (1989) (“[N]either a State nor its
officials acting in their official capacities are
‘persons' under § 1983.”); Quern v.
Jordan, 440 U.S. 332, 342 (1979) (holding that claims
for damages against defendants in their official capacities
are barred by the Eleventh Amendment). To the extent that
Plaintiff seeks damages from state officials in their
official capacity, his section 1983 claims are barred by the
Eleventh Amendment and will be dismissed.[9]
B.
Request for Declaratory Judgment and Injunctive
Relief
Plaintiff
also seeks a declaratory judgment and injunctive relief. Doc.
1, at 30 ¶ 1-2. Declaratory relief operates
prospectively “to enable parties to adjudicate disputes
before either side suffers great damage.” In re
Combustion Equip. Assocs., Inc., 838 F.2d 35, 37 (2d
Cir. 1988). In particular, “[t]o obtain prospective
relief, such as a declaratory judgment or an injunction, a
plaintiff must show, inter alia, ‘a sufficient
likelihood that he [or she] will again be wronged in a
similar way.'” Marcavage v. City of New
York, 689 F.3d 98, 103 (2d Cir. 2012), cert.
denied, 568 U.S. 1212 (2013) (quoting City of Los
Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 111 (1983)). “That
is, a plaintiff must demonstrate a ‘certainly
impending' future injury.” Id. (citing
Whitmore v. Arkansas, 495 U.S. 149, 158 (1990)).
As for
injunctions, the Supreme Court held that the Eleventh
Amendment does not prohibit the issuance of an injunction.
See Ex Parte Young, 209 U.S. 123, 160 (1908). Where
a plaintiff invokes the doctrine established in Ex Parte
Young, the suit “is not deemed to be an action
against the state. Instead, such an action proceeds against
the state officer who, by acting contrary to federal law,
acts without authority and therefore, under these
circumstances, does not act in a representative
capacity.” Lowrance v. Coughlin, 862 F.Supp.
1090, 1097 (S.D.N.Y. 1994) (footnote omitted).
In this
action, Plaintiff brings claims concerning alleged
prior violations of constitutional law-in
particular, Plaintiff's transfer to Northern in 2006, and
whether he received due process in connection with his
transfer and classification. A request for declaratory
judgment with respect to those prior allegations cannot
properly be characterized as “prospective, ”
because Plaintiff does not allege how such relief would
remedy a future constitutional violation by these defendants.
However, Plaintiff also claims that he is experiencing
ongoing suffering-that he still lacks access to proper
medical care in connection with his psychiatric disabilities.
Therefore, some, but not all, of his claims for declaratory
relief will be dismissed.
Additionally,
the law will not bar injunctive relief here as
Plaintiff seeks prospective relief. Plaintiff seeks an order
from the Court directing Defendants to transfer Plaintiff,
Doc. 1, at 30 ¶ 2, presumably to an impatient
hospitalization program, id. ¶ 45. However,
this leaves the question of whether Plaintiff's request
for injunctive relief is cognizable, which the Court will
address infra in connection with his Fourteenth
Amendment procedural due process challenge to Defendants'
failure to provide Plaintiff with a mental health hearing.
C.
Procedural Due Process Claims under the Fourteenth
Amendment
1.
Transfer to Northern
Plaintiff
first alleges that Defendants violated his right to due
process under the Fourteenth Amendment by failing to provide
him with a hearing in connection with his transfer to
Northern. Doc. 1 ¶¶ 105, 123.
The
standard analysis for a procedural due process claim proceeds
in two steps. See Swarthout v. Cooke, 562 U.S. 216,
219 (2011) (per curiam). A court first “ask[s]
whether there exists a liberty or property interest of which
a person has been deprived, and if so . . . whether the
procedures followed by the State were constitutionally
sufficient.” Id.
In the
prison context, which involves persons whose liberty
interests have already been severely restricted because of
their confinement in a prison, a prisoner plaintiff cannot
show a cognizable deprivation of “liberty” unless
he can show that he was subject to an “atypical and
significant hardship . . . in relation to the ordinary
incidents of prison life.” Sandin v. Conner,
515 U.S. 472, 484 (1995). The Supreme Court further clarified
the principle in Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209
(2005): “After Sandin, it is clear that the
touchstone of the inquiry into the existence of a protected
state-created liberty interest in avoiding restrictive
conditions of confinement is not the language of regulations
regarding those conditions but the nature of those conditions
themselves ‘in relation to the ordinary incidents of
prison life.'” Id. at 223 (citation
omitted). The Second Circuit has also explained that courts
must examine the actual punishment received, as well as the
conditions and duration of the punishment. See Davis v.
Barrett, 576 F.3d 129, 133- 34 (2d Cir. 2009) (per
curiam); Palmer v. Richards, 364 F.3d 60, 64
(2d Cir. 2004).
Assuming
a protected interest exists, the Court must consider whether
the inmate received process that was constitutionally due,
which often depends on context. The procedural protections
that are due to a prison inmate facing a disciplinary
hearing, for example, are not as expansive as the due process
protections for a criminal defendant standing trial. See
Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 556 (1973); Sira
v. Morton, 380 F.3d 57, 69 (2d Cir. 2004). Of course,
protections are still in place for a disciplinary hearing. An
inmate must be given “advance written notice of the
charges against him; a hearing affording him a reasonable
opportunity to call witnesses and present documentary
evidence; a fair and impartial hearing officer; and a written
statement of the disposition, including the evidence relied
upon and the reasons for the disciplinary actions
taken.” Sira, 380 F.3d at 69 (citing
Wolff, 418 U.S. at 563-67). Moreover, there must be
at least “some evidence to support the findings made in
the disciplinary hearing.” See Washington v.
Gonyea, 538 Fed.Appx. 23, 25 (2d Cir. 2013) (citation
and internal quotation marks omitted).
Plaintiff
argues that he had a protected liberty interest in avoiding
transfer to Northern. Doc. 1 ¶ 104. This due process
claim must be dismissed. In Andrews v. Semple, No.
17-cv-1233 (SRU), 2017 WL 5606740 (D. Conn. Nov. 21, 2017),
Judge Underhill dismissed a similar claim, concluding that
the plaintiff possessed “a constitutional right to
adequate mental health treatment, ” but he had
“no constitutional right to be housed in any particular
correctional facility.” Id. at *4. Judge
Underhill also cited to Olim v. Wakinekona, 461 U.S.
238, 248 (1983), for the proposition that “inmates have
no right to be confined in a particular state or a particular
prison within a given state, ” as well as to
Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 225 (1976), for the
notion that an inmate's “transfer among
correctional facilities, without more, does not violate [an]
inmate's constitutional rights, even where conditions in
one prison are ‘more disagreeable' or prison has
‘more severe rules.'” Id.
The
same is true in the instant case. Plaintiff has no
constitutional right to be housed in any particular
correctional facility. See Id. Additionally, based
on Plaintiff's submissions, it appears that DOC policy
does not otherwise prohibit Plaintiff from being housed at
Northern. Doc. 1-1, at 63 (“Administrative Directives
and CMHC policies do not prohibit people with a mental health
score of 2 or 3 from being placed at Northern.”).
Therefore, Plaintiff's due process claims against Lantz,
Murphy, Ducate, and Levesque, Doc. 1 ¶ 105, as well as
Semple, Mulligan, Burns, Lewis, Rinaldi, and Frayne,
id. ¶ 123, based on his transfer to Northern,
must be dismissed.
2.
Administrative Segregation
Likewise,
Plaintiff claims that his due process rights were violated
when he was transferred to Administrative Segregation without
a hearing. Plaintiff appears to be arguing that he was not
afforded two types of procedures: (1) a general hearing prior
to his placement in Administrative Segregation, id.
¶ 109; and (2) a mental health hearing prior to his
placement in Administrative Segregation, id. ¶
113. The Court will address each, in turn.
Plaintiff
claims that when he was first transferred to Northern in
2006, he received an “automatic placement” on
Administrative Segregation Status. Id. ¶ 39.
This classification process occurred “without due
process, ” according to Plaintiff. Id. ¶
50. For purposes of this Order, the Court assumes that when
Plaintiff refers to “automatic placement” into
Administrative Segregation, he intends to convey that he did
not receive notice, a hearing, or the opportunity to present
witnesses, in accordance with a DOC directive. See
Directive 9.4 ¶ 12(A), (B).[10]
This
Court considered the question of whether Administrative
Segregation in Connecticut raised a protected liberty
interest in Ellerbe v. Jason, No. 12-cv-580 (MPS),
2015 WL 1064739 (D. Conn. Mar. 11, 2015). In
Ellerbe, Judge Shea reasoned:
The Constitution itself does not give an inmate a liberty
interest in avoiding more restrictive confinement such as
Punitive Segregation or Administrative Segregation.
Wilkinson v. Austin, 545 U.S. 209, 221-22, 125 S.Ct.
2384 (2005). But state policies regarding conditions of
confinement may create a liberty interest in avoiding more
restrictive confinement. Id. Such an interest may
arise if “statutes or regulations require, in
‘language of an unmistakably mandatory character,'
that a prisoner not suffer a particular deprivation absent
specified predicates.” Tellier v. Fields, 280
F.3d 69, 81 (2d Cir. 2000) (quoting Welch v.
Bartlett, 196 F.3d 389, 392 (2d Cir. 1999)).
Ellerbe, 2015 WL 1064739, at *3.
Judge
Shea went on to hold that Directive 9.4-which Plaintiff cites
in his Complaint, see Doc. 1 ¶ 50-provides
“the basis for a liberty interest in avoiding
Administrative Segregation, ” Ellerbe, 2015 WL
1064739, at *3. This liberty interest was invoked where the
inmate had spent 243 days in administrative segregation as
punishment. See Ellerbe, 2015 WL 1064739, at *5;
see also Palmer v. Richards, 364 F.3d 60, 64-65 (2d
Cir. 2004) (“Where the plaintiff was confined for an
intermediate duration-between 101 and 305
days-‘development of a detailed record' of the
conditions of the confinement relative to ordinary prison
conditions is required.”).
Based
on Plaintiff's assertion that he was immediately placed
on Administrative Segregation in 2006 and has since remained
under that classification, Plaintiff's Complaint shows
that he was committed to Administrative Segregation for more
than 101 days.[11] “Such a period of segregated
confinement would ordinarily preclude dismissing a claim
without fact-finding.” Ellerbe, 2015 WL
1064739, at *5. Plaintiff may therefore meet the first
Sandin requirement of a deprivation of a liberty
interest imposing an atypical and significant hardship; and,
further fact-finding is needed.
In
connection with the second requirement, the Court must
examine whether the procedures in place were constitutionally
sufficient. The purpose of confinement matters greatly.
“[N]otwithstanding the label ‘Administrative
Segregation,' if ‘the purpose of more restrictive
confinement is disciplinary or punitive,' then the
heightened procedural requirements of Wolff v.
McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539 (1974) apply.”
Id. If such is the purpose, the Supreme Court has
opined that inmates “should be allowed to call
witnesses and present documentary evidence in his defense
when permitting him to do so will not be unduly hazardous to
institutional safety or correctional goals.”
Wolff, 418 U.S. at 566.
Plaintiff
believes that his placement on Administrative Segregation
Status was punitive. At this stage then, the Court will
presume that Plaintiff was entitled to an Administrative
Segregation hearing during which Wolff procedures
were afforded to him. According to Plaintiff, Defendants
Lantz, Murphy, Ducate, Levesque, and Choinski “fail[ed]
to provide Plaintiff with a hearing[] before or after his . .
. placement on Administrative Segregation.” Doc. 1
¶ 109. Absent evidence that affording Plaintiff these
procedures was not unduly hazardous to institutional safety
or correctional goals, Defendants did not meet the
Wolff standard. The second step of the
Sandin test is thus met here. Plaintiff has
therefore stated a plausible claim that Defendants Lantz,
Murphy, Ducate, Levesque, and Choinski violated his
procedural due process rights with respect to his confinement
on Administrative Segregation Status.
3.
Mental Health Hearing
Plaintiff
next claims that his due process rights were violated when he
was transferred to Administrative Segregation without
providing him with a mental health hearing. Id.
ΒΆ 113. Plaintiff also appears to believe that he would
have been transferred out of Northern had he been afforded
the mental ...