Antonelli v. Sheahan

• Decision Date: 16 September 1994
• Docket Number: No. 93 C 3955.,93 C 3955.
• Citation: 863 F. Supp. 756
• Parties: Michael ANTONELLI, Plaintiff, v. Michael SHEAHAN, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois

863 F. Supp. 756

Michael ANTONELLI, Plaintiff, v. Michael SHEAHAN, et al., Defendants.

No. 93 C 3955.

United States District Court, N.D. Illinois, Eastern Division.

September 16, 1994.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Michael Carmie Antonelli, pro se.

Terry L. McDonald, Douglas Staser Steffenson, Cook County State's Attys., Chicago, IL, for defendants Michael Sheahan, Sheriff, J.W. Fairman, Director, Superintendent Waznis, Brian Benewate, Ivory Avory.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

HOLDERMAN, District Judge:

Plaintiff Michael Antonelli brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against defendants Michael Sheahan, J.W. Fairman, Superintendent Waznis, Brian Bennewate, Ivory Avery, Officer Peterson and Officer Hernandez for alleged constitutional deprivations while he was incarcerated as a pretrial detainee at the Cook County Jail. Defendants Sheahan, Fairman, Waznis, Bennewate, and Avery have filed a joint motion to dismiss plaintiff's complaint. For the reasons stated below, defendants' motion to dismiss is granted.¹

BACKGROUND

Plaintiff was a pre-trial detainee incarcerated with the Cook County Department of Corrections at Cook County Jail. Plaintiff's complaint contains twenty counts in which he challenges the confinement conditions at Cook County Jail. Plaintiff's claims are summarized as follows: 1) plaintiff was forced to sleep on a mattress on the floor of his unit because the jail was overcrowded; 2) prison officials opened his mail before he received it; 3) plaintiff was allowed outdoor exercise once every two weeks for no longer than one hour at a time; 4) plaintiff's unit had a cockroach and rodent problem; 5) prison officials did not properly maintain the law library; 6) prison officials did not properly maintain the commissary; 7) plaintiff's diet was nutritionally deficient and sometimes the food was spoiled; 8) plaintiff's unit had inadequate lighting and improper temperature regulation; 9) prison officials denied plaintiff's requests to attend religious services; 10) plaintiff received inadequate medical care; 11) plaintiff's unit was inordinately noisy which caused his sleep to be interrupted; and 12) prison officials took some of plaintiff's personal items including pens, bags of coffee and a soap dish. Defendants seek to dismiss plaintiff's complaint in its entirety on the grounds that plaintiff has not stated any claims upon which relief can be granted. The court will address each of plaintiff's allegations in turn.

ANALYSIS

I. Standard of Review

In ruling on a motion for dismissal, the court must presume all of the well-pleaded allegations of the complaint to be true. Miree v. DeKalb County, 433 U.S. 25, 27 n. 2, 97 S.Ct. 2490, 2492 n. 2, 53 L.Ed.2d 557 (1977). In addition, the court must view those allegations in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Gomez v. Illinois State Bd. of Educ., 811 F.2d 1030, 1039 (7th Cir.1987). Dismissal is proper only if it appears "beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957).

Although plaintiff cites the Eighth Amendment in his complaint, plaintiff's § 1983 claims must be analyzed under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because of plaintiff's status as a pretrial detainee. Due process protects the right of a pretrial detainee not to be punished while the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment is applicable only to those criminals who are serving a sentence after a formal adjudication of guilt. Salazar v. City of Chicago, 940 F.2d 233, 239 (7th Cir.1991); Anderson v. Gutschenritter, 836 F.2d 346, 348-49 (7th Cir.1988). Unlike a pretrial detainee, a sentenced inmate may be punished but that punishment may not be cruel and unusual under the Eighth Amendment. Anderson, 836 F.2d at 348 (citing Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 535 n. 16, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 1872 n. 16, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979)). The Supreme Court recognized the distinction in Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977):

Eighth Amendment scrutiny is appropriate only after the State has complied with the constitutional guarantees traditionally associated with criminal prosecutions.... The State does not acquire the power to punish with which the Eighth Amendment is concerned until after it has secured a formal adjudication of guilt in accordance with due process of law. Where the State seeks to impose punishment without such an adjudication, the pertinent constitutional guarantee is the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Id. at 671-72 n. 40, 97 S.Ct. at 1412-13 n. 40.

Therefore, the proper inquiry for a Fourteenth Amendment claim is whether the challenged conduct amounted to any kind of punishment. Salazar, 940 F.2d at 239-40. The standards for analyzing claims regarding conditions of confinement under both the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, however, are very similar. See Id. at 240 ("Punishment is punishment, and there is no reason why the term should mean two different things in the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment contexts.").

In Wilson v. Seiter, 501 U.S. 294, 111 S.Ct. 2321, 115 L.Ed.2d 271 (1991), the Supreme Court stated that in cases challenging the conditions of confinement, determining whether certain conduct constitutes punishment involves both a subjective and objective component. Id. at 298-302, 111 S.Ct. at 2324-26. Therefore, to prevail on a Fourteenth Amendment claim, plaintiff must prove both that defendants acted with deliberate indifference to plaintiff's needs (the subjective component), and that the alleged deprivations were sufficiently severe to rise to the level of a constitutional violation (the objective component). Hines v. Sheahan, 845 F.Supp. 1265, 1267 (N.D.Ill.1994) (citing Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298, 111 S.Ct. at 2324).

II. Subjective Component

To satisfy the subjective component of the Fourteenth Amendment analysis, a plaintiff must allege the requisite level of a defendant's intent to punish plaintiff. The Seventh Circuit has held that a pretrial detainee alleging due process violations must show that the defendants acted with deliberate indifference to plaintiff's constitutional rights — meaning intentional or criminally reckless conduct. Salazar, 940 F.2d at 238.

Plaintiff in this case makes no claim that the defendants engaged in any of the alleged actions with the intent to punish plaintiff.² For example, plaintiff admits in Count I that the sleeping conditions complained of were due to the overcrowded conditions at Cook County Jail, rather than to any punitive intent on the part of defendants, thus demonstrating plaintiff's failure to meet the subjective component of the Fourteenth Amendment analysis.

III. Objective Component

Plaintiff also fails to allege sufficiently serious deprivations to satisfy the objective component of the due process analysis. The Seventh Circuit has stated that, while recognizing "the extraordinarily difficult task prison administrators face in maintaining an appropriate prison environment," and being aware of the court's limited role in matters involving a state penal institution, "clearly prison officials have a responsibility to provide inmates with a minima of shelter, sanitation and utilities — basic necessities of civilized life." Johnson v. Pelker, 891 F.2d 136, 139 (7th Cir.1989). "Inmates cannot expect the amenities, conveniences and services of a good hotel; however, the society they once abused is obliged to provide constitutionally adequate confinement." Harris v. Fleming, 839 F.2d 1232, 1235-36 (7th Cir.1988).

The objective component for the analysis of a due process claim therefore focuses on the nature of defendants' alleged acts and whether the conditions of confinement complained of by plaintiff "exceeded contemporary bounds of decency of a mature, civilized society." Lunsford v. Bennett, 17 F.3d 1574, 1579 (7th Cir.1994) (citing Jackson v. Duckworth, 955 F.2d 21, 22 (7th Cir.1992)).

A. Conditions of Confinement

1. Sleeping Conditions

In Count I plaintiff complains that he was forced to sleep on a mattress on the floor at Cook County Jail due to overcrowded conditions at the prison. Plaintiff alleges that these sleeping conditions violated his constitutional rights.

This court agrees with other courts in this district that "unless aggravating circumstances exist, the Constitution is indifferent as to whether the mattress a detainee sleeps on is on the floor or on a bed." Lynch v. Sheahan, 92 C 1087, 1992 WL 132525 at *3 (N.D.Ill. May 29, 1992) (Conlon, J.). See also, Hines v. Sheahan, 845 F.Supp. 1265, 1269 (N.D.Ill.1994) (Grady, J.); Chavis v. Fairman, No. 92 C 7490, 1994 WL 55719 at *4 (N.D.Ill. Feb. 22, 1994) (Aspen, J.); Powell v. Cook County Jail, 814 F.Supp. 757, 759 (N.D.Ill.1993) (Shadur, J.); Bowden v. Fairman, No. 92 C 7613, 1992 WL 366905 (N.D.Ill. Dec. 2, 1992) (Shadur, J.). In this case, plaintiff has not allege any aggravating circumstances regarding his sleeping conditions nor that he suffered any injuries as a result of sleeping on the floor. Therefore, the court finds that the sleeping conditions alleged in plaintiff's complaint do not rise to the level of a constitutional violation.

2. Correspondence Claim

In Count II plaintiff alleges that his constitutional rights were violated when prison employees opened some of his incoming mail, including documents from the court clerk, outside of plaintiff's presence before plaintiff received it.

A prison inmate has a constitutional right to be free from interference with his "privileged" mail, including communications from an inmate's attorney. See Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 577, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 2985, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974) (mail sent by an attorney to an inmate was privileged and could not be read by prison officials outside of an inmate's presence). The Wolff rationale does not extend, however, to...