Brown v. Valoff
| Decision Date | 06 September 2005 |
| Docket Number | No. 03-16552.,No. 03-16502.,03-16502.,03-16552. |
| Citation | 422 F.3d 926 |
| Parties | Peter BROWN, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. J. VALOFF, Defendant-Appellant. Robert Hall, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. J.W. Fairman, Jr., Defendant, and J. Mattingly; A.C. Quinones; A. Valenzuela; C. Davis; L.R. Lopez; C. Smith; E. Tostado; G. Zinani, Defendants-Appellants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit |
Bill Lockyer, Attorney General of the State of California, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Frances T. Grunder, Senior Assistant Attorney General, James E. Flynn, Supervising Deputy Attorney General, and David A. Carrasco, Deputy Attorney General, Sacramento, CA, for the defendant-appellant in Case No. 03-16502.
Bill Lockyer, Attorney General of the State of California, Robert R. Anderson, Chief Assistant Attorney General, Frances T. Grunder, Senior Assistant Attorney General, Sara Tuner, Supervising Deputy Attorney General, and Barbara N. Sutliffe, Deputy Attorney General, San Francisco, CA, for the defendants-appellants in Case No. 03-16552.
Peter Brown, pro se, Vacaville, CA, plaintiff-appellee in Case No. 03-16502.
Thomas L. Riordan, Thadd Blizzard, and Charles L. Post, Weintraub Genshlea Chediak Sproul, Sacramento, CA, for the plaintiff-appellee in Case No. 03-16552.
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of California; Oliver W. Wanger, Anthony W. Ishii, District Judges, Presiding. D.C. Nos. CV-01-06526-OWW, CV-99-05780-AWI/SMS.
Before: REINHARDT, THOMPSON, and BERZON, Circuit Judges.
Opinion by Judge BERZON; Partial Concurrence and Partial Dissent by Judge REINHARDT.
We consider the application of the Prisoner Litigation Reform Act's ("PLRA") exhaustion requirement, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a), to circumstances in which an inmate has filed a grievance with a prison grievance system and, having received some relief before the final level of review, does not pursue his grievance further. In these two cases with similar but somewhat different factual backgrounds, the district courts certified interlocutory appellate review. We accepted jurisdiction and have consolidated them for purposes of decision. We conclude that Peter Brown adequately exhausted the available grievance process but Robert Hall did not.
We begin by providing a brief overview of the California Department of Corrections' ("Department") internal grievance system and of the factual background of each case.
1. Grievance system: California's Department of Corrections provides a four-step grievance process for prisoners who seek review of an administrative decision or perceived mistreatment. Within fifteen working days of "the event or decision being appealed," the inmate must ordinarily file an "informal" appeal, through which "the appellant and staff involved in the action or decision attempt to resolve the grievance informally." Cal.Code Regs., tit. 15, §§ 3084.5(a), 3084.6(c).1 If the issue is not resolved during the informal appeal, the grievant next proceeds to the first formal appeal level, usually conducted by the prison's Appeals Coordinator. Id. §§ 3084.5(b), 3084.6(c). Next are the second level, providing review by the institution's head or a regional parole administrator, and the third level, in which review is conducted by a designee of the Director of the Department of Corrections.2 Id. § 3084.5(e)(1)-(2).
2. Brown's case: Appellee Peter Brown's district court complaint states that Correctional Officer Valoff used tear gas and assaulted him on February 24, 1999. He claims that the alleged assault violated his Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process and equal protection and the Eighth Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.
Brown made the same allegations in his formal grievance filed with prison officials in the summer of 1999.3 In the "Action Requested" portion of the form, Brown stated simply: "I respectfully request to be compensated for these abuses, and blatant disregard for my constitutional rights." The response, on the same form that Brown submitted,4 was marked "Denied." The accompanying memorandum stated:
You have failed to provide compelling information to substantiate your allegations of staff misconduct. In the event of staff misconduct, the institutional supervisory and administrative staff will take the appropriate course of action. However, this would be confidential information, which would not be released to the appellant. Although the appellant has the right to submit an appeal as a staff complaint, the request for administrative action regarding the staff or the placement of documentation in a staff members [sic] personnel file is beyond the scope of the appeals process.
Brown pursued the second level of review within a week of receiving the first response. He continued to allege that Officer Valoff used excessive force against him.5 He received a second level, Warden's level decision on December 13, 1999, stating that the "Appeal Decision" was "Partially Granted."6 Identifying the "Appeal Issue" as "Staff Complaint," the attached memorandum stated:
A thorough investigation will be conducted into your allegations and evaluated in accordance with Departmental Policies and Institutional Procedures. The matter has been referred to the Office of Internal Affairs. You shall be notified by the Office of Internal Affairs of the disposition of your complaint upon completion of the investigation, in accordance with [California Penal Code §] 832.7 and the Department Operations Manual Section 31140.4.2.[7]
It is the Administration's responsibility to determine appropriate action taken against any employee, if deemed necessary. Additionally, inmates are not apprised of any disciplinary action that may have been taken against a staff member. It is beyond the scope of the appeals process to grant you monetary compensation.
Brown did not proceed to the third level of review, that of the Director of the Department of Corrections or his designee. He did, however, inquire about the status of the promised investigation by requesting information from the California Office of the Inspector General. He received a letter from that office stating,
This office contacted the California State Prison at Corcoran, and learned that an investigation was in fact conducted and completed. However, due to confidentiality laws, Corcoran investigators were unable to share the specific details of the investigation with you. Confidentiality laws also prevent us from further disclosing any information regarding this investigation.
Brown next proceeded, pro se and in forma pauperis, to federal court, under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. As noted above, his complaint alleged that Officer Valoff's actions on February 24, 1999 violated the Eighth Amendment and his rights to due process and equal protection under the Fourteenth Amendment. After the case was transferred to the district court for the Eastern District of California, Valoff filed a motion to dismiss, arguing that Brown had failed to comply with the PLRA exhaustion requirement.
Magistrate Judge O'Neill made findings and recommendations suggesting that the district court deny Valoff's motion. He reasoned that Brown's completion of second level review was sufficient to comply with the PLRA exhaustion requirement, as "[t]he response contains no language suggesting that plaintiff could appeal the decision to the third level of review[, and] it is unclear what would be left to appeal, as plaintiff's appeal was partially granted and an investigation was to be conducted."
Ruling on Valoff's objections to the Magistrate's report, the district court agreed that Valoff was "not entitled to dismissal of this action." The court explained that Brown had exhausted his claims within the Department's grievance system because "[p]laintiff's inmate appeal grieved the facts at issue in this suit," and "in granting plaintiff's appeal in part and referring the complaint for investigation by the Office of Internal Affairs, plaintiff was provided all of the relief that the administrative process could provide."
The district court granted Valoff's motion to certify his interlocutory appeal to this court, and we accepted the appeal.
3. Hall's case: Robert Hall is a former inmate of the Department's Corcoran Substance Abuse and Treatment Facility. On September 2, 1998, Hall and his cellmate were, allegedly, severely beaten and exposed to pepper spray during a forced removal from their cell. Hall claims that he suffered extensive injuries following the incident.
Hall filed a grievance, providing a detailed description of his alleged mistreatment, on September 8, 1998. Under the section marked "Action Requested," Hall listed: (1) a $35,000 fine imposed on Sergeant Valenzuela and his removal or demotion; (2) a $50,000 fine of the Corcoran Substance Abuse Treatment Facility, and (3) an investigation of the extraction team that assaulted him. Hall filed a second grievance on December 4, 1998, virtually identical to the first except that in the "Action Requested" section, Hall asked that Sergeant Valenzuela be fined $30,000 instead of $35,000. In both grievance forms Hall also complained that after the alleged mistreatment, he did not receive adequate medical treatment and his property was removed from his cell.
In response to Hall's grievances, prison officials bypassed the informal review level. Hall received a first level response to his grievances on January 26, 1999.8 The memorandum issued to Hall described the "Appeal Issue" as follows: "You request to have an Internal Affairs Investigation initiated and to hold responsible Officials accountable for their actions." In the section marked "Appeal Decision," the memorandum stated that Hall's requests were "Denied." The memorandum also described the treatment of "staff personnel matters." It...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Harbridge v. Hickman
...of the grievance process or through awaiting the results of the relief already granted as a result of that process." Brown v. Valoff, 422 F.3d 926, 937 (9th Cir. 2005) ref. Brown v. Croak, 312 F.3d 109, 112 (3d Cir.2002) (holding that because failure to exhaust is an affirmative defense und......
-
Kosilek v. Spencer
...notice of the Classification Manual, as it is a record of a state agency not subject to reasonable dispute. See Brown v. Valoff, 422 F.3d 926, 931 n. 7 (9th Cir.2005) (taking judicial notice of the California Department of Corrections Operations Manual and stating, “ ‘[w]e may take judicial......
-
City of S.F. v. Sessions
...as letters, memos, bulletins, or other reports or statements of public record are judicially noticeable. See, e.g., Brown v. Valoff , 422 F.3d 926, 933 n.9 (9th Cir. 2005) (taking judicial notice of government administrative bulletin); Fed. R. Evid. 201(b). Court records from other proceedi......
-
Kaemmerling v. Lappin
..."is more likely to inflame than to mollify passions, and thus is unlikely to `filter out some frivolous claims.'" Brown v. Valoff, 422 F.3d 926, 936 (9th Cir.2005) (quoting Porter, 534 U.S. at 525, 122 S.Ct. 983) (first quotation omitted). And prison administrators are unlikely to spend res......