Stanley v. Barone

Decision Date25 January 2022
Docket NumberAC 43889
Citation269 A.3d 946,210 Conn.App. 239
Parties Steven K. STANLEY v. Kristine BARONE et al.
CourtConnecticut Court of Appeals

Steven K. Stanley, self-represented, the appellant (plaintiff).

James W. Donohue, assistant attorney general, with whom, on the brief, was William Tong, attorney general, for the appellees (defendants).

Bright, C. J., and Alvord and Norcott, Js.

PER CURIAM.

The self-represented plaintiff, Steven K. Stanley, appeals from the judgment of the trial court granting the motion to dismiss filed by the defendants,1 employees of the Department of Correction (department), on the basis of statutory and qualified immunity.

The plaintiff claims that the court improperly dismissed his complaint because the immunities relied on by the court do not bar his claims brought against the defendants in their individual capacities. We affirm the judgment of the court.

The following factual, legal, and procedural history is relevant to our analysis. In 2013, the plaintiff was convicted of, inter alia, 100 counts of criminal violation of a protective order, and the court sentenced him to 18 years of imprisonment with 12 years of special parole. See State v. Stanley , 161 Conn. App. 10, 14, 125 A.3d 1078 (2015), cert. denied, 320 Conn. 918, 131 A.3d 1154 (2016). While incarcerated, the plaintiff initiated several actions in federal court, and he owes portions of the filing fees for those actions to the federal court.

"In the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PLRA), 110 Stat. 1321–66, Congress placed several limitations on prisoner litigation in federal courts. Among those limitations, Congress required prisoners qualified to proceed in forma pauperis nevertheless to pay an initial partial filing fee. That fee is statutorily set as ‘20 percent of the greater of’ the average monthly deposits in the prisoner's account or the average monthly balance of the account over the preceding six months. ... Thereafter, to complete payment of the filing fee, prisoners must pay, in monthly installments, ‘20 percent of the preceding month's income credited to the prisoner's account.’ ... The initial partial filing fee may not be exacted if the prisoner has no means to pay it ... and no monthly installments are required unless the prisoner has more than $10 in his account ...." (Citations omitted.) Bruce v. Samuels , 577 U.S. 82, 84, 136 S. Ct. 627, 193 L. Ed. 2d 496 (2016). Under title 28 of the United States Code, § 1915 (b) (2), "[t]he agency having custody of the prisoner shall forward payments from the prisoner's account to the clerk of the court each time the amount in the account exceeds $10 until the filing fees are paid."

In Bruce v. Samuels , supra, 577 U.S. at 86–87, 136 S.Ct. 627, a federal inmate who owed filing fees for multiple cases claimed that the monthly installments for his most recent case would not become due until his prior obligations were satisfied. The United States Supreme Court rejected his claim and held "that § 1915 (b) (2) calls for simultaneous, not sequential, recoupment of multiple filing fees." Id., at 87, 136 S. Ct. 627.

In the present case, the plaintiff brought an action against the defendants in their individual capacities by way of a one page complaint, which is difficult to understand. The complaint, titled "Civil Tort Claims Act," provides: "I Steven K. Stanley ... filed a (1983) civil suit in the federal court2 and was granted to proceed in a PLRA account to deduct (only) 20 percent from my account on all money being on this account to each time money is put on this account the federal court granted and stated (only) 20 percent will be deducted and (only) one case at a time on April of 2019, [the department] has overcharged this account to take ... 40 percent from my account I have [repeatedly] filed to Macdougal, inmate account and even filed grievances to this fact [the department] inmate account cites a Connecticut case law trying to overrule the federal rules of practice and at no time did I give an[y] permission to take any more than the ... 20 percent I was granted to file on a [§] 1983 PLRA account [the department] cites Bruce v. Samuels , [supra, 577 U.S. 82, 136 S.Ct. 627 ] case law that does not [apply] to this case being filed prior to this case law [the department repeatedly] denied to return this extra money there this civil tort claims act is being generated in a claim to relief Connecticut General Statutes § 52-91." (Emphasis omitted; footnote added.) Reasonably construed, the plaintiff alleged that the defendants improperly exacted more than 20 percent of available funds from his inmate account to pay for filing fees owed to the federal court.

The defendants moved to dismiss the complaint, claiming that the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over the action because each defendant was entitled to statutory immunity under General Statutes § 4-165 and, with respect to any federal claims raised in the plaintiff's complaint, qualified immunity. The defendants argued that "[t]he plaintiff fails to allege any facts which would indicate the defendants were acting outside the scope of their work or with the required mental state of recklessness or malice. In fact the allegations show the defendants were specifically following federal law per the instructions from the [United States] Supreme Court. As such the defendants are entitled to statutory immunity ...." They further argued that, insofar as the plaintiff asserted any federal law claims, those claims were barred by qualified immunity because the facts alleged by the plaintiff failed to allege that the defendants violated a clearly established constitutional right.

After hearing argument on the motion, the court granted the motion to dismiss. The court stated, "[t]he motion is granted for the reasons cited in the state's brief. [The] plaintiff's claim that withdrawals from his account may be taken at a rate of only 20 percent at a time is plainly no longer true. The law has changed and has been ruled on by the United States Supreme Court." This appeal followed.

After oral argument before this court, we ordered the trial court to articulate whether, in granting the motion to dismiss, it relied on the defendants’ claims of statutory and/or qualified immunity and to state the factual and legal bases for its order. The court issued an articulation on October 19, 2021, stating the following:

"[The plaintiff's] claim in this court was about prison officials taking money from his prison account to pay federal court filing fees related to lawsuits [the plaintiff] had filed. [The plaintiff] alleged that the law permitted [the defendants] to take only 20 percent of the relevant monthly balance in his prison account for filing fees regardless how many lawsuits he filed. He claimed that by taking more the defendants were violating his rights.

"This court dismissed [the plaintiff's] claims because this legal premise was false. As the United States Supreme Court held in ... Bruce v. Samuels , [supra, 577 U.S. 82, 136 S.Ct. 627 ], with some nuances not relevant here, prison officials may take 20 percent of a prisoner's relevant account balance for each lawsuit the prisoner files. ...

"Under [the plaintiff's] own allegations, the [defendants] were only doing their jobs. They were allowed by law to take from his relevant account balance money for fees in excess of a cumulative total of just 20 percent per month, and this is all he claims they did.

"Because [the plaintiff's] own claims show this to be so, the defendants are immune from suit under ... § 4-165, which protects the defendants from liability unless they caused ‘damage or injury’ by being ‘wanton, reckless or malicious.’ By alleging facts that show only that the defendants were following the law, [the plaintiff] claims no damage or injury nor wanton, reckless or malicious conduct. ...

"Courts must dismiss complaints against state officers or employees when the [factual] allegations show the defendants are immune from suit. ...

"This means the court was obliged to dismiss [the plaintiff's] state law claims. It also means that the court was obliged to dismiss any federal claims [the plaintiff] may have had. As the United States Supreme Court held ... in Taylor v. Barkes , [575 U.S. 822, 824, 135 S. Ct. 2042, 192 L. Ed. 2d 78 (2015) ], government officials are immune from civil damages under federal law unless they violated a statutory or constitutional right clearly established at the time of the challenged conduct. [The plaintiff's] own complaint alleges facts that, if true, mean the defendants violated none of [his] statutory or constitutional rights. Therefore, the court was obliged to dismiss any federal claims for the same reasons it dismissed the state claims." (Citation omitted; emphasis in original; footnotes omitted.) After the court issued its articulation, this court ordered the parties to file supplemental memoranda responding to the court's articulation.3

We begin with the applicable standard of review. "A motion to dismiss tests, inter alia, whether, on the face of the record, the court is without jurisdiction. ... [O]ur review of the court's ultimate legal conclusion and resulting [determination] of the motion to dismiss will be de novo. ... As we must in reviewing a motion to dismiss, we take the facts to be those alleged in the complaint, including those facts necessarily implied from the allegations, construing them in a manner most favorable to the pleader." (Internal quotation marks omitted.) Braham v. Newbould , 160 Conn. App. 294, 300–301, 124 A.3d 977 (2015).

In his principal brief to this court, the plaintiff claims that the trial court improperly determined that the holding of Bruce v. Samuels , supra, 577 U.S. 82, 136 S.Ct. 627, applies to him because he filed his federal cases before Bruce was decided. In the plaintiff's supplemental memorandum, which is not a model of clarity, he also claims that "facts...

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