Gollnick v. Michigan

• Decision Date: 09 July 2020
• Docket Number: Case Number 20-10645
• Parties: STEVEN JOHN GOLLNICK, Plaintiff, v. STATE OF MICHIGAN, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Michigan

STEVEN JOHN GOLLNICK, Plaintiff, v. STATE OF MICHIGAN, et al., Defendants.

Case Number 20-10645

UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN NORTHERN DIVISION

July 9, 2020

Honorable Thomas L. Ludington

ORDER GRANTING APPLICATIONS TO PROCEED WITHOUT PREPAYMENT OF FEES AND COSTS [2, 5], DIRECTING PAYMENT OF THE INITIAL PARTIAL FILING FEE AND SUBSEQUENT PAYMENTS, AND SUMMARILY DISMISSING THE COMPLAINT [1]

Plaintiff Steven John Gollnick filed a pro se complaint and an application to proceed without prepaying fees and costs on March 10, 2020. Plaintiff brings this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and Bivens v. Six Unknown Named Agents of Fed. Bureau of Narcotics, 403 U.S. 388 (1971). Many of the defendants do not appear to have acted under color of law. Other defendants enjoy immunity from suit, and Plaintiff's allegations fail to state a plausible claim for which relief may be granted. Accordingly, the Court will grant leave to proceed without prepayment of the fees and costs for this action and summarily dismiss the complaint.

I.

Plaintiff is a state prisoner at the Central Michigan Correctional Facility in St. Louis, Michigan. The defendants are the State of Michigan, the Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC) Food Service, the MDOC Bureau of Health Care Services, Friends of Court in Hillsdale and Coldwater, Michigan, the United States Tax Court, two law firms, the Police Department for the City of Dry, Michigan, a few judges and attorneys, and dozens of other individuals who appear to be private citizens. The Court understands the complaint to allege that Judges Michael R. Smith and Valerie R. White sent Plaintiff to jail or prison. In the meantime, some of the defendants stole vehicles and other personal property from Plaintiffs' homes, stole financial assets from the estate of Plaintiff's parents, and took Plaintiff's Social Security disability income. Compl., ECF No. 1, PageID. 7 - 8.

In an unrelated claim, Plaintiff alleges that some defendants fired gunshots at him. Id., PageID. 16-17. In still another unrelated claim, Plaintiff alleges that he broke his arm in the Central Michigan Correctional Facility and later fell out of a van driven by two officers who were on drugs. As a result, he injured his neck, back, arms, and legs. Id., PageID. 8, 10, 18.

For relief, Plaintiff seeks the return of his stocks and bonds, the child support payments he made, federal and state taxes he paid for forty-four years, his Social Security disability payments, and his vehicles and other personal property. He also requests money damages for every year that he has spent in jail or prison. Id., PageID. 8, 18.

II.

Plaintiff filed an application to proceed without prepaying fees or costs for this action when he filed his complaint on March 10, 2020. ECF No. 2. Because he did not submit a certified statement summarizing the activity in his trust fund account at the Central Michigan Correctional Facility, the magistrate judge entered a deficiency order on March 13, 2020. ECF No. 3. Plaintiff then filed another application to proceed without prepaying fees or costs, ECF No. 5, but he still did not submit a certified statement of his trust fund account.

Although the Court will allow Plaintiff to proceed without prepayment of the filing fee, the full filing fee must be paid for this action because he is a prisoner. 28 U.S.C. § 1915(b)(1). The Court must assess and, if funds exist, collect an initial partial filing fee consisting of twenty percent(20%) of the greater of (1) the average monthly deposits to Plaintiff's trust fund account at the prison, or (2) the average monthly balance in Plaintiff's trust fund account for the six-month period immediately preceding the filing of the complaint. Id. After Plaintiff pays the initial partial filing fee, he must make monthly payments of twenty percent (20%) of the preceding month's income credited to his account at the prison. 28 U.S.C. § 1915(b)(2).

Because Plaintiff has not submitted a certified statement of his prison trust fund account, the Court will direct the Michigan Department of Corrections to: (1) calculate and withdraw or set aside an initial partial filing fee from Plaintiff's prison trust fund account; (2) forward that amount to the Clerk of this Court when funds exist; and (3) in subsequent months, or from time to time, forward payments consisting of twenty percent (20%) of the preceding month's income credited to Plaintiff's account until Plaintiff has paid the entire filing fee of $350.00.

III.

Because Plaintiff will be granted permission to proceed without prepayment of the fees and costs for this action, the Court is required to screen his complaint and dismiss the complaint if it is frivolous or malicious, fails to state a claim for which relief can be granted, or seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune from such relief. 28 U.S.C. §§ 1915(e)(2)(B) and 1915A; Grinter v. Knight. 532 F.3d 567, 572 (6th Cir. 2008). To prevail on a claim under either Bivens or § 1983, a plaintiff must prove two things: "(1) that he or she was deprived of a right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States; and (2) that the deprivation was caused by a person acting under color of law." Robertson v. Lucas, 753 F.3d 606, 614 (6th Cir. 2014).

Although a complaint "does not need detailed factual allegations," the "[f]actual allegations must be enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level on the assumption that all the allegations in the complaint are true (even if doubtful in fact)." Bell Atl. Corp. v.Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007) (footnote and citations omitted). In other words, "a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, 'to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.' " Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570).

"[T]he dismissal standard articulated in Iqbal and Trombly governs dismissals for failure to state a claim under [§§ 1915A(b)(1) and 1915(e)(2)(B)(ii)] because the relevant statutory language tracks the language in Rule 12(b)(6) . . . ." Hill v. Lappin, 630 F.3d 468, 470-71 (6th Cir. 2010). "Whether a complaint is factually frivolous under §§ 1915A(b)(1) and 1915(e)(2)(B)(i) is a separate issue from whether it fails to state a claim for relief." Id. at 471.

Under Twombly and Iqbal, a complaint is accepted as true, and "[a] claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual content that allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged." Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (citing Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). On the other hand, a complaint is frivolous if it lacks an arguable basis in law or in fact. Neitzke v. Williams, 490 U.S. 319, 325 (1989). As explained in Hill v. Lappin, 630 F.3 at 471,

[s]tatutes allowing a complaint to be dismissed as frivolous give "judges not only the authority to dismiss a claim based on an indisputably meritless legal theory, but also the unusual power to pierce the veil of the complaint's factual allegations and dismiss those claims whose factual contentions are clearly baseless." Neitzke, 490 U.S. at 327, 109 S.Ct. 1827 (interpreting 28 U.S.C. § 1915). Unlike a dismissal for failure to state a claim, where a judge must accept all factual allegations as true, Iqbal, 129 S.Ct. at 1949-50, a judge does not have to accept "fantastic or delusional" factual allegations as true in prisoner complaints that are reviewed for frivolousness. Neitzke, 490 U.S. at 327-28, 109 S.Ct. 1827.

A.

Plaintiff's complaint is frivolous and fails to state a plausible claim for several reasons. First, his complaint does not articulate a clear claim for relief. "A complaint need not set down in detail all the particularities of a plaintiff's claim against a defendant." Westlake v. Lucas, 537 F.2d 857, 858 (6th Cir. 1976). But "Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2) requires . . . 'a short andplain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief,' in order to 'give the defendant fair notice of what the . . . claim is and the grounds upon which it rests,' Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 47, 78 S. Ct. 99, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957)." Twombly, 550 U.S. at 555. Although the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals has

not "articulated precisely" what a party must do (or how much it must say) in the district court to "raise" an argument, Scottsdale [Ins. Co. v. Flowers, 513 F.3d 546, 553 (6th Cir. 2008)], [the Sixth Circuit has] identified some guideposts. At a minimum, a litigant must state the issue with sufficient clarity to give the court and opposing parties notice that it is asserting the issue. Id. at 552; Barner v. Pilkington N. Am., Inc., 399 F.3d 745, 749 (6th Cir. 2005). Yet notice by itself does not suffice. Otherwise, a litigant could preserve an issue merely by summarily mentioning it, and . . . conclusory allegations and perfunctory statements, unaccompanied by citations or some effort at legal argument, do not meet this standard. See Bldg. Serv. Local 47 [Cleaning Contractors Pension Plan v. Grandview Raceway, 46 F.3d 1392, 1398-99 (6th Cir. 1995)]; Tele-Comm., Inc. v. Comm'r of Internal Revenue, 104 F.3d 1229, 1233 (10th Cir. 1997). To preserve the argument, then, the litigant not only must identify the issue but also must provide some minimal level of argumentation in support of it.

United States v. Huntington Nat. Bank, 574 F.3d 329, 332 (6th Cir. 2009).

Here, Plaintiff has not sufficiently explained the facts or set forth his claims in a clear manner. He has not alleged when and where the various incidents occurred, and it is not clear how the dozens of defendants named in the complaint were involved in those incidents. It is also unclear whether the Court even has jurisdiction over all the defendants. Thus, the complaint fails to state a plausible claim for which relief may be granted.

B.

Some defendants can be dismissed for additional reasons. For example, the Eleventh Amendment bars...