Williams v. Henagan

• Decision Date: 28 January 2010
• Docket Number: No. 07-30997.,07-30997.
• Citation: 595 F.3d 610
• Parties: John D. WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Buddy HENAGAN, In His Individual Capacity; Gary Cooper, Mayor, In His Official Capacity; Mike Suchanek, Individually and In His Official Capacity; Louisiana Department of Corrections; C. Paul Phelps Correctional Center; Joann Peshoff, Individually and In Her Official Capacity; Clarence Snyder, Individually and In His Official Capacity; Jean McCaig, Individually and In Her Official Capacity, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

595 F.3d 610

John D. WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Buddy HENAGAN, In His Individual Capacity; Gary Cooper, Mayor, In His Official Capacity; Mike Suchanek, Individually and In His Official Capacity; Louisiana Department of Corrections; C. Paul Phelps Correctional Center; Joann Peshoff, Individually and In Her Official Capacity; Clarence Snyder, Individually and In His Official Capacity; Jean McCaig, Individually and In Her Official Capacity, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 07-30997.

United States Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

January 28, 2010.

Franz L. Zibilich, Martiny & Associates, Metairie, LA, Christian Wayne Helmke, Leonard L. Levenson (argued), Leonard L. Levenson, P.L.C., New Orleans, LA, for Williams.

Bradley Charles Myers, Katie Deranger Bell (argued), Lana Davis Crump, Kean, Miller, Hawthorne, D'Armond, McCowan & Jarman, L.L.P., Baton Rouge, LA, for Henagan.

Joy C. Rabalais, Borne & Wilkes, L.L.P., Lafayette, LA, for Henagan, Suchanek and Cooper.

John Fayne Wilkes, III (argued), Borne & Wilkes, L.L.P., Lafayette, LA, for Suchanek and Cooper.

Jeannie H. Cheng (argued), LA Dept. of Justice, Lafayette, LA, for LA Dept. of Corrs., C. Paul Phelps Correctional Ctr., Peshoff, Snyder and McCaig.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana.

Before JONES, Chief Judge, ELROD, Circuit Judge, and GUIROLA, District Judge^*.

PER CURIAM:

John D. Williams ("Williams"), a former Louisiana inmate, brought a handful of claims against various state defendants and defendants from DeQuincy, Louisiana ("DeQuincy defendants")¹ for alleged injuries arising out of his confinement in the state's Phelps Correctional Center ("Phelps") and the DeQuincy, Louisiana, City Jail ("DeQuincy"). The district court held that Williams failed to exhaust his prison administrative remedies and dismissed all of his claims against the state defendants and all but two of Williams's claims against the DeQuincy defendants. The court later granted summary judgment for former Mayor Buddy Henagan² and Police Chief Mike Suchanek on Williams's Fair Labor Standards Act ("FLSA") and Thirteenth Amendment claims. Williams appeals. We affirm the district court's judgment.

BACKGROUND

On November 21, 1996, Williams pled guilty to simple burglary and was sentenced as an habitual offender to eight years of hard labor. Williams arrived at Phelps Correctional Center in December 1997 and was transferred from Phelps to the DeQuincy City Jail on October 7, 2000. As part of his sentence, Williams worked for the city. His duties largely included maintaining city property and facilities such as City Hall, the railroad museum, ball parks, and even the police station. Williams was a trusty and the only inmate at DeQuincy who performed work of this nature. As a result, Williams also enjoyed certain privileges unavailable in most prisons.³

Williams asserts that Buddy Henagan, then the mayor of DeQuincy, and Michael Suchanek, DeQuincy's Chief of Police, forced Williams to work additional hours beyond the regular work week and sometimes for their private gain. Henagan had him wax the floors of Henagan's church; work 20 hours a day during the city's railroad festival and cook barbecued chicken continuously for over 26 hours at various local fundraisers. Up to twice a month, he was required to ride around the city with Henagan between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. to count burned out street lights. Henagan took Williams to Texas once to transport furniture Henagan had been given. Suchanek required him to work off-hours for Suchanek's private businesses, sometimes until midnight or later and often on weekends. These ventures included Suchanek's space jump⁴ rental and his grass cutting business. Williams admits he was paid occasionally for work he performed for Henagan and Suchanek.

During incarceration at DeQuincy and Phelps, Williams contends he experienced various constitutional deprivations. Williams filed two administrative grievances pursuant to the prison's Administrative Remedy Procedure ("ARP"). See generally La. Admin. Code tit. 22, pt. 1 § 325 (establishing administrative remedy procedures). Williams's first ARP requested incentive pay or wages for work he had performed while at DeQuincy. The second ARP requested the reason why Williams was transferred back to Phelps. Williams asserts that he filed a third ARP in October 2003. None of the claims yielded relief of any kind. Williams was released from custody on April 29, 2004.

On March 4, 2004, Williams filed a pro se complaint in federal court. Williams later retained counsel and filed an amended complaint. The amended complaint alleged a variety of claims falling into three general categories. A series of claims related to his confinement at both DeQuincy and Phelps including: inadequate medical treatment, inadequate supervision of inmates, and inadequate hiring, supervising, and training practices for city employees ("confinement claims").⁵ He also alleges that his work for Henagan's and Suchanek's private interests entitled him to both a minimum wage and overtime under the FLSA. Finally, he claims his work for Henagan and Suchanek violated the Thirteenth Amendment.

The state defendants moved to dismiss the claims against them. On June 6, 2005, the district court, accepting the magistrate judge's report and recommendations, dismissed the confinement claims for failure to exhaust state administrative remedies, as required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a). Williams filed a motion to clarify the judgment, contending that because administrative remedies were not available to him while he was confined in DeQuincy, the court should not dismiss claims arising there. The court denied the motion without an opinion. The court later granted summary judgment for Henagan and Suchanek on both the FLSA and Thirteenth Amendment claims.⁶ Williams appeals the rulings on these three types of claims— confinement, FLSA, and Thirteenth Amendment.

STANDARD OF REVIEW

We review a district court's grant of summary judgment de novo. Deville v. Marcantel, 567 F.3d 156, 163 (5th Cir. 2009). A party is entitled to summary judgment if "the pleadings, the discovery and disclosure materials on file, and any affidavits show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(c).

DISCUSSION

A. Confinement Claims

Williams appeals the June 6, 2005, dismissal of his "confinement" claims against the state defendants for failure to exhaust his administrative remedies. That same order effectively dismissed Williams's confinement claims against the DeQuincy defendants for the same reasons. Because Williams's brief does not challenge the dismissal of such claims against the DeQuincy defendants, the argument is waived. United States v. Thibodeaux, 211 F.3d 910, 912 (5th Cir.2000).

Before reaching the issue of exhaustion, the state defendants contend that Williams's notice of appeal was defective.⁷ The district court ruled in an opinion dated June 6, 2005, that "all defendants except Buddy Henagan and Mike Suchanek are dismissed," (emphasis added), but Williams's notice of appeal mistakenly indicated that he appealed this ruling only as to Henagan and Suchanek. It stated in relevant part that Williams appealed

3. The Opinion of the District Court rendered on June 6, 2005, dismissing the plaintiff's claims for inadequate medical treatment, conspiracy, and retaliation against defendants Mayor L.A. "Buddy" Henagan individually and in his official capacity as Mayor of the City of DeQuincy and Chief Michael Suchanek, individually and in his official capacity as Chief of Police of the City of DeQuincy for failure to exhaust administrative remedies.

As a result of this error, the notice of appeal did not name the three state defendants—Peshoff, Snyder and McCaig—at all. This court did not list them as appellees in its briefing notice, and the state defendants claim they had no notice that Williams intended to appeal the rulings concerning them until six months after the notice of appeal, when he filed his initial brief. In response to the brief, the state defendants filed a motion to dismiss the appeal as to them, or in the alternative for additional time to file a responsive brief. This court (not the present panel) denied the motion to dismiss, but granted the extension.

A party is not required to indicate the identity of any appellees in a notice of appeal,⁸ but there are grounds in our precedent to conclude that if a party names some but not all defendants, the unnamed defendants are excluded. Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 3(c)(1)(B) requires that a notice of appeal "designate the judgment, order, or part thereof being appealed." We have held that when an appellant "chooses to appeal specific determinations of the district court—rather than simply appealing from an entire judgment—only the specified issues may be raised on appeal." Finch v. Fort Bend Indep. Sch. Dist., 333 F.3d 555, 565 (5th Cir.2003). The panel majority does not disagree with the dissent that a similar principle applies when an appellant names some but not all opposing parties.

That does not end the matter, however, because "notices of appeal are liberally construed where `the intent to appeal an unmentioned or mislabeled ruling is apparent and there is no prejudice to the adverse party.'" Sec. and Exchange Comm. v. Van Waeyenberghe, 990 F.2d 845, 847 n. 3 (5th Cir.1993) (emphasis omitted) (citing C.A. May Marine Supply Co. v. Brunswick Corp., 649 F.2d 1049, 1056 (5th Cir.1981)). Even "where the plaintiff appealed only a portion of the judgment," we generously interpret the scope of the appeal, and require a showing of prejudice to preclude review of issues "fairly inferred" from the notice and subsequent filings.⁹ Morin v. Moore, 309 F.3d 316, 321 (5th Cir.2002). We consider not only the notice, but also the appellant's...