Davila v. Gladden

• Decision Date: 09 January 2015
• Docket Number: No. 13–10739.,13–10739.
• Citation: 777 F.3d 1198
• Parties: Anthony DAVILA, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. Robin GLADDEN, National Inmate Appeals Coordinator, et al., Defendants–Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

777 F.3d 1198

Anthony DAVILA, Plaintiff–Appellant,

v.Robin GLADDEN, National Inmate Appeals Coordinator, et al., Defendants–Appellees.

No. 13–10739.

United States Court of Appeals, Eleventh Circuit.

Jan. 9, 2015.

John Christopher Amabile, Schiff Hardin, LLP, Atlanta, GA, for Plaintiff–Appellant.

Anthony Davila, Jesup, GA, pro se.

Scott Grubman, Rogers & Hardin, LLP, Atlanta, GA, Sanjay S. Karnik, Melissa Stebbins Mundell, R. Brian Tanner, Edward J. Tarver, U.S. Attorney's Office, Savannah, GA, for Defendants–Appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Georgia.

D.C.Docket No. 2:12–cv–00005–LGW–JEG.

Before MARTIN, JULIE CARNES, and ANDERSON, Circuit Judges.

MARTIN, Circuit Judge:

Anthony Davila, a federal prisoner and a Santeria priest, filed a pro se complaint against a number of prison employees (the Defendants¹) in their official and individual capacities.He alleges violations of the First Amendment and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA),42 U.S.C. § 2000bb, and seeks injunctive and monetary relief.Mr. Davila has alleged that his religious beliefs require him to wear a unique set of beads and shells that are infused with the spiritual force Ache.His lawsuit asserts that the Defendants violated his rights by refusing to allow him to receive his personal beads and shells from his goddaughter.The District Court dismissed Mr. Davila's claims for money damages under RFRA.It also granted summary judgment to the Defendants on Mr. Davila's First Amendment claims and on his claim for injunctive relief under RFRA.Mr. Davila, now counseled, asks us to reverse.After careful consideration, and having the benefit of oral argument, we conclude that the District Court erred in granting summary judgment on Mr. Davila's claim for injunctive relief under RFRA.We affirm the remainder of the District Court's holdings.

I.BACKGROUND AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

This case involves the Santeria faith, a belief system that has been a recurring subject of litigation in federal courts.Briefly, “[t]he basis of the Santeria religion is the nurture of a personal relation with ... orishas [spirits], and one of the principal forms of devotion is an animal sacrifice.”Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. City of Hialeah,508 U.S. 520, 524, 113 S.Ct. 2217, 2222, 124 L.Ed.2d 472(1993)(emphasis omitted).“According to Santeria teaching, the orishas are powerful but not immortal.They depend for survival on the sacrifice.”Id. at 525, 113 S.Ct. at 2222.In particular, “[s]acrifices are performed ... for the initiation of new members and priests.”Id.

Mr. Davila is a long-time practitioner of Santeria.During his seven-day initiation ceremony to become a priest, he received a set of personal Santeria beads and Cowrie shells that were infused with a spiritual force called “Ache,” which he believes to be the spiritual presence of an orisha.According to Mr. Davila, Ache is infused into the beads and shells during this ceremony by soaking the beads and shells in animal blood, and then rinsing them in an “elixir” containing dozens of plants and minerals.Mr. Davila states that he now wears these unique beads and shells “for personal protection and spiritual guidnaces [sic] as an essential element of [his] faith.”For Mr. Davila, wearing beads and shells that have not been infused with Ache would be useless, if not blasphemous.

In June 2011, Mr. Davila, then and now a prisoner at the Federal Correctional Institution in Jesup, Georgia, made a request under the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) regulations to have his personal Santeria necklaces and Cowrie shells delivered to him in prison by his goddaughter, who is a Santeria priestess.Dr. Cox, the prison's Supervising Chaplain, denied the request, stating that religious items must be received only from “approved vendors” listed in the prison catalog, and that “[f]or the purpose of security, authorization to grant family members, friends, and acquaintances send in [sic] religious articles for inmates will be prohibited.”

Mr. Davila appealed this decision, first to the prison warden, and then to the BOP Regional Director.Both denied his request.The Regional Director cited the BOP's Program Statement concerning Religious Beliefs and Practices, which says that religious items “will be purchased either from commissary stock or through an approved catalog[ ] source using the Special Purpose Order process.”BOP Program Statement 5360.09, Religious Beliefs and Practices, ¶ 14(a).While the existing catalog offers bead necklaces and Cowrie shells, these items have not been infused with Ache through animal sacrifice.

On January 9, 2012, Mr. Davila filed this suit in federal court.He alleged that the Defendants violated his rights under the First Amendment's Free Exercise Clause and RFRA.²He seeks an injunction and money damages against the Defendants in their individual and official capacities.The Defendants filed a motion to dismiss Mr. Davila's action, and the District Court granted that motion as to his claims for money damages under RFRA against the Defendants in their individual and official capacities.The District Court also dismissed Mr. Davila's First Amendment money damages claim against the Defendants in their official capacities.At that time, the District Court allowed the RFRA claim for injunctive relief and the remaining First Amendment claims to go forward.The Defendants then filed a motion for summary judgment on Mr. Davila's remaining claims, and the District Court granted that motion.We now consider Mr. Davila's appeal of those rulings.

II.STANDARDS OF REVIEW

We review “ de novoa district court's denial of summary judgment, applying the same legal standards that governed the district court.”Carter v. City of Melbourne, Fla.,731 F.3d 1161, 1166(11th Cir.2013)(per curiam).A court“shall grant summary judgment if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.”Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a).We“view the evidence and all factual inferences therefrom in the light most favorable to the non-moving party, and resolve all reasonable doubts about the facts in favor of the non-movant.”Carter,731 F.3d at 1166(quotingSkop v. City of Atlanta, Ga.,485 F.3d 1130, 1143(11th Cir.2007)).

Likewise, “[w]e review a district court order granting a motion to dismissde novo, applying the same standard as the district court.”Randall v. Scott,610 F.3d 701, 705(11th Cir.2010).We“accept as true the facts as set forth in the complaint and draw all reasonable inferences in the plaintiff's favor.”Id.

III.RFRA CLAIM FOR INJUNCTIVE RELIEF

We first address Mr. Davila's claim for injunctive relief under RFRA, on which the District Court entered summary judgment in favor of the Defendants.“Congress enacted RFRA ... in order to provide very broad protection for religious liberty.”Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc.,–––U.S. ––––, 134 S.Ct. 2751, 2760, 189 L.Ed.2d 675(2014).Under the statute, the “Government shall not substantially burden a person's exercise of religion even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability.”42 U.S.C. § 2000bb–1(a).If the Government takes action that substantially burdens a person's exercise of religion, it must “demonstrate[ ] that application of the burden to the person—(1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest.”§ 2000bb–1(b).We address each part of the test in turn.After careful review of the record in the light most favorable to Mr. Davila, we conclude that the District Court erred in granting summary judgment on Mr. Davila's RFRA claim for injunctive relief.

A.Substantial Burden on Mr. Davila's Religious Exercise

Under RFRA, a plaintiff must first show that the Government has substantially burdened his exercise of religion.In evaluating these claims, a district court must determine whether an inmate's (1) religious exercise is (2) substantially burdened by prison policy. § 2000bb–1(a).No one has seriously disputed that Mr. Davila's beliefs about his religious exercise were sincerely held.However, the Magistrate Judge who first considered this case found that the “Defendants' application of Program Statement 5360.09[did] not impose a substantial burden on [the]Plaintiff's exercise of his religion.”The District Court adopted that finding in full.Because we remand on this RFRA claim, we begin with the standard under RFRA's first prong.

First turning to religious exercise, the Supreme Court recently explained that “it is not for us to say that [a plaintiff's] religious beliefs are mistaken or insubstantial.Instead, our ‘narrow function ... in this context is to determine’ whether the line drawn [between conduct that is and is not permitted under one's religion] reflects an honest conviction.”Hobby Lobby,573 U.S. at ––––, 134 S.Ct. at 2779(emphasis added)(quotingThomas v. Review Bd. of Ind. Emp't Sec. Div.,450 U.S. 707, 716, 101 S.Ct. 1425, 1431, 67 L.Ed.2d 624(1981)).This rule minds the Supreme Court's warning that judges “must not presume to determine the place of a particular belief in a religion or the plausibility of a religious claim.”Emp't Div. v. Smith,494 U.S. 872, 887, 110 S.Ct. 1595, 1604, 108 L.Ed.2d 876(1990);see alsoThomas,450 U.S. at 716, 101 S.Ct. at 1431(insisting that judges not become “arbiters of scriptural interpretation”).A secular, civil court is a poor forum to litigate the sincerity of a person's religious beliefs, particularly given that faith is, by definition, impossible to justify through reason.SeeHernandez v. Comm'r,490 U.S. 680, 699, 109 S.Ct. 2136, 2148, 104 L.Ed.2d 766(1989)(“It is not within the judicial ken to question the centrality of particular beliefs or practices to a faith, or the validity of particular litigants'...