Ali v. District of Columbia, 00-5282.

• Decision Date: 29 January 2002
• Docket Number: No. 00-5282.,00-5282.
• Citation: 278 F.3d 1
• Parties: Abdus-Shahid M.S. ALI, Appellant, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, et al., Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — District of Columbia Circuit

278 F.3d 1

Abdus-Shahid M.S. ALI, Appellant, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, et al., Appellees.

No. 00-5282.

United States Court of Appeals, District of Columbia Circuit.

Argued December 3, 2001.

Decided January 29, 2002.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Columbia (No. 99cv01348).

Robert N. Weiner, appointed by the court, argued the cause and filed the briefs as amicus curiae for appellant.

Abdus-Shahid M.S. Ali, appearing pro se, was on the briefs for appellant.

Mark R. Davis, Senior Assistant Attorney General, State of Virginia, argued the cause and filed the brief for appellees Commonwealth of Virginia, et al.

Robert R. Rigsby, Corporation Counsel, Charles L. Reischel, Deputy Corporation Counsel, and Carl J. Schifferle, Assistant Corporation Counsel, filed the brief for appellees District of Columbia, et al.

Before: GINSBURG, Chief Judge, and RANDOLPH and TATEL, Circuit Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge TATEL.

TATEL, Circuit Judge:

A District of Columbia inmate claims that following his transfer from the District's Lorton Correctional Facility to a Virginia prison pursuant to an interstate compact, Virginia officials used excessive force in restraining him, required him to register under his birth name rather than his religiously inspired legal name, and neglected to give him the insulin he required, resulting in his leg becoming dangerously infected. The inmate also claims that the District denied him access to the courts by failing to transport certain legal documents with him to the Virginia prison, sending them instead to his home. The inmate filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, naming as defendants the Commonwealth of Virginia, various Virginia officials, the District of Columbia, various District officials, and the Attorney General of the United States. Affirming the district court's dismissal of the complaint, we find that (1) all claims against Virginia, its agencies and its officers in their official capacities are either barred by sovereign immunity or mooted by the inmate's transfer back to a District prison, (2) the district court lacked personal jurisdiction over Virginia officials in their personal capacities, (3) the inmate lacks standing to bring a denial of court access claim, and (4) neither the District nor its officials can be held liable for torts committed by Virginia officials.

I.

Appellant Abdus-Shahid M.S. Ali is a District of Columbia inmate serving concurrent sentences for first-degree murder convictions in 1964 and again in 1986. Ali's claims arise from his April 1999 transfer from the District's Lorton Central Facility, located in Lorton, Virginia, to Virginia's Sussex II prison in Waverly, Virginia. The transfer took place pursuant to a contract, authorized by the Interstate Corrections Compact, VA.CODE ANN. § 53.1-216; D.C.CODE ANN. § 24-1001, between the District of Columbia Department of Corrections and the Virginia Department of Corrections.

According to Ali, during a strip-search undertaken in preparation for his transfer, Virginia prison official D. Davis "hit [him] in the stomach," prompting Ali to punch Davis, at which point several other officers leapt on Ali and wrestled him to the ground. Compl. ¶¶ 10-11. Ali claims that his "face was swollen up and at least four teeth were loosened of which one had to be pulled...." Pl.'s Opp'n. to Va. Defs.' Mot. to Dismiss ¶ 30.

Ali also contends that Virginia prison officials humiliated him when, after he arrived at Sussex II, they held a stun gun to his head and forced him to register under his birth name, James C. Long, rather than his legal name, Abdus-Shahid M.S. Ali. Although originally convicted under his birth name, Ali changed his name in 1979 for religious reasons. According to Ali, not only did he find the registration under his birth name religiously offensive, but as a result of his incarceration under the name James Long, Sussex II officials neglected for fifteen days to give him the insulin shots required to treat his diabetes. Sussex II medical staff apparently confused another inmate's file, labeled "James Long #268-200" and containing no diabetes diagnosis, with Ali's file, labeled "Ali #136-476." Compl. ¶ 16. As a result of this "medical malpractice," Ali alleges, his fingers became "numb," Compl. ¶¶ 16,17, and his right leg, which became infected, "burst open" and "may (in time) ... require amputation," Pl's Opp'n. to Va. Defs.' Mot. to Dismiss ¶ 11.

Finally, Ali contends that District prison officials "forced him" to send certain legal documents home rather than transporting them along with his other belongings to the Sussex II prison. Compl. ¶ 22. As a result, he experienced a "set-back" in litigation pending in the District of Columbia Superior Court. Compl. ¶ 23.

Based on these allegations, Ali filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia against three categories of defendants: (1) the Commonwealth of Virginia and the Virginia Department of Corrections, as well as the Attorney General, the Governor, the Chief Warden of the Sussex II State Prison, and Corrections Officer D. Davis in their personal and official capacities; (2) the Mayor of Washington, D.C., the Warden of the Lorton Central Facility, and the District of Columbia Department of Corrections; and (3) the Attorney General of the United States. While Ali's handwritten complaint contains many claims, he alleges essentially four causes of action: (1) that corrections officers used excessive force in violation of his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment; (2) that the denial of insulin also violated his Eighth Amendment rights; (3) that forcing him to sign his birth name violated the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA), 42 U.S.C. §§ 2000bb to 2000bb-4; and (4) that the failure to transfer all his legal papers to the Virginia prison violated his First Amendment right to court access.

The district court dismissed Ali's complaint with prejudice. With respect to his claims against the Virginia defendants (except for the claim relating to the use of his birth name), the court concluded that Ali failed to exhaust his administrative remedies as required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA). As to the birth name issue, the district court held that "the mere fact that correctional authorities maintain an inmate's records in the name he used when convicted implicates no constitutional right." Ali v. District of Columbia, No. 99-1348, slip op. at 5 (D.D.C. July 11, 2000). Finding the claims against the District defendants and the Attorney General of the United States based on the actions of Virginia prison officials, the district court dismissed these claims as well. The district court also noted that "to the extent" Ali sought "injunctive and declaratory relief," such claims were "moot" in light of Ali's "transfer[] back to Lorton." Id. at 4.

Ali, supported by the amicus we appointed, now appeals the dismissal of his two Eighth Amendment claims (excessive force and denial of insulin), his First Amendment and RFRA claims (use of his birth name) and his access to court claim. Our review is de novo. See Moore v. Valder, 65 F.3d 189, 192 (D.C.Cir.1995) (reviewing "de novo a dismissal for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted").

II.

We begin with Ali's claims against the Virginia defendants. According to Virginia, the district court lacked subject matter jurisdiction because Ali failed to exhaust his administrative remedies as required by the PLRA. See 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a) ("No action shall be brought... until such administrative remedies as are available are exhausted."). Virginia argues that although Ali filed a complaint pursuant to the prison's grievance procedures, because he filed suit before those procedures were completed, he failed to exhaust his administrative remedies. See Jackson v. District of Columbia, 254 F.3d 262, 269 (D.C.Cir.2001) (holding that remedies must be exhausted at the time the complaint is filed). Alternatively, Virginia argues that the doctrine of sovereign immunity bars Ali's claims against the Commonwealth and its officials in their official capacities and that the district court lacked personal jurisdiction over the individual defendants in their personal capacities.

We start, as we generally do, by making sure we possess subject matter jurisdiction. See Ruhrgas AG v. Marathon Oil Co., 526 U.S. 574, 587-88, 119 S.Ct. 1563, 1571-72, 143 L.Ed.2d 760 (1999) (explaining that courts generally address subject matter jurisdiction even before personal jurisdiction unless the subject matter question raises a "difficult and novel" question of law). Virginia's subject matter jurisdiction argument depends on reading the PLRA's exhaustion requirement as a jurisdictional bar. Although we have never directly ruled that the requirement is not jurisdictional, in Jackson we rejected inmates' argument that the defendants had waived their exhaustion defenses, 254 F.3d at 267 (D.C.Cir.2001), an issue we never would have considered if exhaustion were jurisdictional. Removing any doubt, we now hold, as has every circuit to have considered the matter, that the PLRA's exhaustion requirement simply "governs the timing of the action" and does not contain the type of "`sweeping and direct'" language that would indicate a jurisdictional bar rather than a "mere codification[] of administrative exhaustion requirements." Chelette v. Harris, 229 F.3d 684, 688 (8th Cir.2000) (quoting Weinberger v. Salfi, 422 U.S. 749, 757, 95 S.Ct. 2457, 2462-63, 45 L.Ed.2d 522 (1975)). See also Wright v. Hollingsworth, 260 F.3d 357, 358 n. 2 (5th Cir.2001) ("The 42 U.S.C. § 1997e exhaustion requirement is not jurisdictional."); accord Basham v. Uphoff, No. 98-8013, 1998 WL 847689, at *3 (10th Cir. Dec. 8, 1998); Massey v. Helman, 196...