Williams v. Branker
| Decision Date | 20 January 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. 11-6329,11-6329 |
| Parties | MICHAEL ANTWON WILLIAMS, Plaintiff - Appellant, v. G.J. BRANKER, Warden; ROBERT C. LEWIS, Director of Prisons, Defendants - Appellees, and MICHAEL A. MUNNS, Deputy Warden; R. WELLMAN, Assoc. Warden of Operation, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
UNPUBLISHED
Appeal from the United States District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina, at Raleigh. James C. Dever III, District Judge. (5:09-ct-03139-D)
Before WILKINSON and DUNCAN, Circuit Judges, and Richard M. GERGEL, United States District Judge for the District of South Carolina, sitting by designation.
ARGUED: James Phillip Griffin, Jr., NORTH CAROLINA PRISONER LEGAL SERVICES, INC., Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellant.
Elizabeth F. Parsons, NORTH CAROLINA DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: Ann Ferrari, NORTH CAROLINA PRISONER LEGAL SERVICES, INC., Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellant. Roy Cooper, Attorney General, Raleigh, North Carolina, for Appellees.
Unpublished opinions are not binding precedent in this circuit.
Appellant Michael Williams, an inmate at Central Prison in Raleigh, North Carolina, sought declaratory and injunctive relief under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that prison officials violated his Eighth Amendment rights by failing to effectively treat his mental illness and imposing upon him conditions of confinement that exacerbated it. Appellees are G.J. Branker, warden of Central Prison, and Robert C. Lewis, director of prisons for the North Carolina Department of Prisons. Williams sued appellees in their official capacities. The district court granted appellees' motion for judgment on the pleadings and dismissed Williams's suit. For the reasons that follow, we affirm.
The following facts are taken from Williams' Third Amended Complaint. For purposes of our review, we assume them to be true. See McVey v. Stacey, 157 F.3d 271, 274 (4th Cir. 1998).
In 1993, at the age of 16, Williams began serving a 20-year prison sentence in facilities run by the North Carolina Department of Corrections ("DOC"). Throughout his incarceration, Williams has suffered from severe mental illness and was diagnosed with, among other disorders, psychoticdisorder, schizophrenia, borderline personality disorder, and intermittent explosive disorder. Williams's mental illness has manifested itself through, inter alia, behavioral outbursts as well as "thoughts of suicide [and the] ingesting or inserting [of] foreign bodies[] and severe self lacerations." J.A. 7. "He has [had] numerous stays in an inpatient psychiatric setting due to his extensive history of ingesting or inserting foreign bodies, and severe self lacerations that have required emergency medical attention." Id.
As a result of his mental illness and its manifestations, at the time of his complaint in 2010, Williams had spent approximately 10 years of his incarceration in "segregated confinement." J.A. 8. Williams described his segregated confinement as follows:
[A] small cell whose dimensions are approximately twelve feet by six feet. The floor, walls, and ceiling of the cell are concrete. There is a narrow window that looks out only on the hallway outside the cell. There is a slot through which food trays and other materials may be passed, and through which [Williams] must extend his hands to be cuffed before the steel door is opened.
Id. Beyond the spartan nature of his confinement, Williams was also subject to several lifestyle restrictions. For example, Williams was only "allowed to leave his cell for one hour on five days of each week"; was "kept indoors constantly" and has not had "outdoor recreation [for] several years"; was allowedminimal contact with other inmates; could not participate in religious, work, rehabilitative, or other activities; and was not allowed "access to a television, and ha[d] very limited access to reading materials." J.A. 8-9. In addition to these restrictions, Williams was subject to additional punishment at times, including being placed in "restraints in a concrete cell alone for four hour periods[,] caus[ing] pain and mental distress." J.A. 9.
Williams brought suit against appellees under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, claiming that "[i]nstead of [receiving] effective treatment for his mental illness" he was "being punished with atypical and significant hardships over and above those imposed under his sentence." J.A. 8. Williams alleged that these hardships were a result of policies created and implemented by appellees and were in violation of his right under the Eighth Amendment to be provided with adequate medical care and humane conditions of confinement. Specifically, Williams alleged that "[t]he social isolation, arbitrary punishments, lack of exercise and other conditions of the confinement imposed on him by policies created and maintained by [appellees] have caused [him] serious and unnecessary pain and suffering." J.A. 10.
As Williams described it, his mental illness caused him to act out, which in turn led to additional restrictions. Healleges the existence of a pernicious circle. As these restrictions mounted, they aggravated his mental illness, causing him to misbehave further. Williams was "told he will be allowed additional privileges when he is able to remain infraction free for long periods of time, yet the effect of [the restrictions] effectively prevents him from remaining infraction free." Id. Williams has alleged that this cycle was exacerbated by the fact that Id. As to the appellees, Williams further alleged:
Williams sought a declaration that his treatment violated the Eighth Amendment and an injunction barring DOC officials and employees from treating Williams in a similar fashion in the future.
Appellees filed an answer with various exhibits attached, and moved for judgment on the pleadings pursuant to Federal Ruleof Civil Procedure 12(c).1 The district court granted appellees' motion, concluding that "although [Williams's] conditions of confinement are unpleasant, they do not deprive Williams of basic human needs." J.A. 182. In its opinion, the district court relied on some of the exhibits to appellees' answer, including portions of the DOC Policy and Procedure Manual and select reports from Williams's inmate file regarding his mental health status. In doing so, however, the district court did not indicate that it was converting appellees' motion for judgment on the pleadings to a motion for summary judgment.
On appeal, Williams argues that the district erred both procedurally and substantively in granting appellees' motion for judgment on the pleadings. Williams argues that the district court erred procedurally in considering exhibits to the appellees' answer, thereby constructively converting appellees' Rule 12(c) motion into a Rule 56 summary judgment motion without giving Williams notice or a reasonable opportunity to respond. Williams asserts that the district court's conclusion was substantively flawed in that his complaint contained factualallegations sufficient to state a claim for Eighth Amendment violations on its face.
We first consider Williams's argument that by relying on attachments to the appellees' answer, the district court improperly converted appellees' motion for judgment on the pleadings to a motion for summary judgment without giving notice to Williams. We review a district court's actions in converting a Rule 12 motion into a motion for summary judgment for abuse of discretion. See Baker v. Provident Life & Acc. Ins. Co., 171 F.3d 939, 943 n.* (4th Cir. 1999).
Matters outside of the pleadings are generally not considered in ruling on a Rule 12 motion. Am. Chiropractic Ass'n v. Trigon Healthcare, Inc., 367 F.3d 212, 234 (4th Cir. 2004). Matters--such as exhibits--are outside the pleadings if a complaint's factual allegations are not expressly linked to and dependent upon such matters. See id. A court may convert a Rule 12 motion into a summary judgment proceeding in order to consider matters outside of the pleadings. Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(d); Bosiger v. U.S. Airways, 510 F.3d 442, 450 (4th Cir. 2007). In doing so, however, the court must assure that the parties are on notice of the changed status of the motion. Davis v. Zahradnick, 600 F.2d 458, 460 (4th Cir. 1979). Nevertheless, it is widely accepted that if the plaintiff'sallegations, taken as true, do not state a claim for relief, any error caused by such a conversion without notice is harmless. See, e.g., Renchenski v. Williams, 622 F.3d 315, 341 (3d Cir. 2010); Colbert v. Potter, 471 F.3d 158, 168 (D.C. Cir. 2006); United States v. Stevens, No. 95-6739, 1995 WL 559524, at *1 (4th Cir. September 21, 1995) (unpublished).
Here, the district court considered both the DOC Policy and Procedure Manual and select reports from Williams's inmate file regarding his mental health status. Although Williams's allegations are arguably dependent on and linked to the DOC's policies and procedures, we are troubled by the district court's reliance on reports from Williams's inmate file handpicked by the defendants, because the complaint is not dependent on such reports. Nonetheless, in reviewing the district court's order to dismiss, we...
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