United States Court of Appeals
FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT
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No. 10-1473
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Jack Daniel Reynolds, *
*
Appellant, *
* Appeal from the United States
v. * District Court for the
* Western District of Missouri.
Dave Dormire, Warden, in individual *
and official capacity; CO1 King; CO1 *
Bommorito; Scott Adams; John Doe I; *
John Doe II; Jane Doe I; and Jane Doe *
II, in individual capacities, *
*
Appellees. *
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Submitted: October 19, 2010
Filed: February 18, 2011
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Before WOLLMAN, COLLOTON, and GRUENDER, Circuit Judges.
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GRUENDER, Circuit Judge.
Missouri inmate Jack Reynolds appeals pro se from the district court’s
preservice dismissal of his complaint for failure to state a claim. 28 U.S.C. § 1915A.
Reynolds brought his claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, pleading various Eighth
Amendment violations. In his complaint, Reynolds alleged that two Northeast
Correctional Center correctional officers (“COs”) refused to remove his restraints
during a day-long journey to Jefferson City Correctional Center (“JCCC”) for a
medical appointment and refused his requests to use the restroom without restraints.
He also alleged that five JCCC COs were deliberately indifferent to his safety by
parking the prison van too close to a sally port pit1 and by failing to help him exit the
van, which resulted in his falling approximately five feet into the pit and sustaining
injuries. Finally, Reynolds claimed that Dave Dormire, the warden of JCCC, violated
his Eighth Amendment rights by failing to eliminate the obviously hazardous nature
of the sally port pit and failing to better train his subordinates.2
To state a claim under § 1983, “a plaintiff must plead that each Government-
official defendant, through the official’s own individual actions, has violated the
Constitution.” Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. ---, 129 S. Ct. 1937, 1948 (2009). We
review the district court’s dismissal for failure to state a claim de novo, accepting as
true all of the factual allegations contained in the complaint and affording the plaintiff
all reasonable inferences that can be drawn from those allegations. Crooks v. Lynch,
557 F.3d 846, 848 (8th Cir. 2009). Additionally, while “[o]rdinarily, only the facts
alleged in the complaint are considered in [determining whether it states a
claim,] . . . materials attached to the complaint as exhibits may be considered in
1
A sally port serves as a secure entryway into the prison. According to
Reynolds, the “sally port pit” is a trench designed to facilitate visual inspections of
vehicle undercarriages.
2
Reynolds’s pro se notice of appeal designated only the district court order
dismissing his complaint, but in his brief he also addresses the magistrate judge’s
order denying his motion for appointment of counsel. As appellees address both
orders in their brief and it seems no prejudice would result, we accept the parties’
invitation to review the magistrate judge’s order, see Greer v. St. Louis Reg’l Med.
Ctr., 258 F.3d 843, 846 (8th Cir. 2001), and hold that the court did not abuse its
discretion in denying Reynolds’s motion for appointment of counsel, see Davis v.
Scott, 94 F.3d 444, 447 (8th Cir. 1996) (affirming that trial court has broad discretion
in deciding whether to appoint counsel to indigent civil litigants and discussing
factors).
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construing the sufficiency of the complaint.” Morton v. Becker, 793 F.2d 185, 187
(8th Cir. 1986); see also Hughes v. Banks, 290 Fed App’x 960, 961 n.1 (8th Cir. 2008)
(unpublished per curiam); Fed. R. Civ. P. 10(c).
“The Eighth Amendment standard for conditions of confinement is whether the
defendants acted with deliberate indifference.” Davis v. Oregon Cnty., Mo., 607 F.3d
543, 548 (8th Cir. 2010) (quoting Nelson v. Corr. Med. Servs., 583 F.3d 522, 528 (8th
Cir. 2009) (en banc)). A prison official is deliberately indifferent if he “knows of and
disregards” a substantial risk of serious harm to an inmate. Farmer v. Brennan, 511
U.S. 825, 837 (1994). “There is both an objective component and a subjective
component to a claim of deliberate indifference . . . : (1) whether a substantial risk to
the inmate’s safety existed, and (2) whether the officer had knowledge of the
substantial risk to the inmate’s safety but nevertheless disregarded it.” Davis, 607
F.3d at 548. “The subjective component requires that the official was both aware of
facts from which the inference could be drawn that a substantial risk of serious harm
existed, and he must also draw the inference.” Id. at 548-49 (quoting Norman v.
Schuetzle, 585 F.3d 1097, 1104 (8th Cir. 2009)). “[D]eliberate indifference includes
something more than negligence but less than actual intent to harm; it requires proof
of a reckless disregard of the known risk.” Crow v. Montgomery, 403 F.3d 598, 602
(8th Cir. 2005) (quoting Jackson v. Everett, 140 F.3d 1149, 1152 (8th Cir. 1998))
(alteration in the original and internal quotation marks omitted).
We conclude that Reynolds failed to state an Eighth Amendment claim with
regard to his allegations against the two Northeast Correctional Center COs. His
pleadings are devoid of any allegation suggesting that the two COs acted with
deliberate indifference to his safety in restraining him throughout the day. Also, to
the extent that Reynolds alleged that the restraints prevented him from relieving
himself, his complaint acknowledged that he could have used the bathroom, albeit
with some difficulty, at any time during his sojourn at JCCC.
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As to the Eighth Amendment claims arising from his fall at the sally port, we
conclude that Reynolds failed to state a claim against three of the five JCCC
COs—John Doe II, Jane Doe I, and Jane Doe II—who, according to Reynolds’s
complaint, violated his constitutional rights simply by being on duty in the vicinity of
his accident at the time he injured himself. See Martin v. Sargent, 780 F.2d 1334,
1338 (8th Cir. 1985) (holding that, in order for a claim to be cognizable under § 1983,
plaintiff must allege that the defendant “was personally involved in or had direct
responsibility for incidents that injured him”).
Reynolds’s claims against the remaining two JCCC COs, defendants King and
John Doe I, are a different matter, however. King was tasked with transporting
prisoners within JCCC and, according to Reynolds’s complaint, parked the van too
close to the sally port pit. John Doe I was the CO on duty at the sally port supervising
the prisoners exit the van when Reynolds fell. As an initial matter, there appears to
be no dispute that Reynolds made sufficient factual allegations that a substantial risk
to his safety existed. See Compl. ¶¶ 25-31, 35. The only question is whether his
pleadings could support an inference that the defendants manifested deliberate
indifference to that risk. Although “naked assertion[s]” that King and John Doe I
“knew . . . that in all probability plaintiff would back-up and fall” do not state a claim
to relief that is plausible on its face, see Iqbal, 129 S. Ct. at 1949 (quoting Bell Atl.
Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 557 (2007)), Reynolds’s complaint and attached
copies of grievances he had submitted contain sufficient allegations to withstand
dismissal. The complaint alleged that King parked “approximately three feet” from
the edge of the sally port pit. The complaint then alleged that Reynolds, his legs
shackled and his arms secured by a “black box,”3 was obliged to back out of the van,
using a stool to descend from the vehicle. As Reynolds exited the van, John Doe I
3
The “black box” is a restraint device that “is applied over the chain and lock
area of conventional handcuffs to form a rigid link between the two wristlets.” Moody
v. Proctor, 986 F.2d 239, 240 n.3 (8th Cir. 1993).
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allegedly “started backing away” rather than assisting him, at which point Reynolds
lost his footing and fell into the pit.
While such allegations, standing alone, appear to support a finding of mere
negligence, Reynolds’s complaint also alleged that “[f]urther, investigation will more
than likely show that plaintiffs [sic] falling into this pit is not an isolated incident.”
In his grievance attached to the complaint, Reynolds elaborated that “the JCCC
corrections personel [sic] knew about the hazard of this JCCC sally-port pit, as one
other person had already, that very same day, fell [sic] into this very same JCCC sally-
port pit.” Moreover, the grievance also alleged that, immediately following the
accident, an unnamed correctional officer said, “I warned you people[] that this would
happen, if you parked so close to the sally-port pit.” Taking all these allegations as
true and drawing all reasonable inferences in the plaintiff’s favor, we conclude that
Reynolds sufficiently alleged that King and John Doe I were aware of the substantial
risk to his safety and that they recklessly disregarded that risk by parking the van too
close to the sally port pit (in King’s case) and by failing to help Reynolds descend
from the van (in John Doe I’s case).
Finally, we conclude that the district court properly dismissed Reynolds’s
claims against JCCC’s Warden Dormire. With regard to Reynolds’s claim against the
warden in his individual capacity, the complaint first alleged that the warden neglected
to eliminate or warn of the hazardous conditions at the sally port. It is settled,
however, that “a warden’s general responsibility for supervising the operations of a
prison is insufficient to establish personal involvement.” Ouzts v. Cummins, 825 F.2d
1276, 1277 (8th Cir. 1987) (per curiam). And to the extent Reynolds pleaded that
Warden Dormire personally failed to rectify the sally port conditions, he made no
allegation permitting an inference that the warden himself knew of, but recklessly
disregarded, the risk of accident. The claim that the warden inadequately trained his
staff also was properly dismissed; as above, Reynolds alleged no facts suggesting that
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the risk of serious harm due to the negligence of the personnel on duty at the sally port
was so obvious to the warden that he acted in a deliberately indifferent manner by
failing to better train them.
As to Reynolds’s claim against the warden in his official capacity, we observe
that Reynolds does not contest the district court’s determination that equitable
remedies are unavailable in this case. Accordingly, the claim against Warden Dormire
in his official capacity persists as a claim for damages alone and is thus barred by the
Eleventh Amendment. See Kentucky v. Graham, 473 U.S. 159 (1985).4
For the foregoing reasons, the order of the district court is affirmed in part and
reversed in part, and the case is remanded to the district court for further proceedings
not inconsistent with this opinion.
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4
Reynolds also challenges the constitutionality of the district court’s dismissal
of his complaint, arguing that the relevant provision of the Prison Litigation Reform
Act violates the Equal Protection Clause and the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment. We do not agree. The Equal Protection Clause “requires that all persons
subjected to . . . legislation shall be treated alike, under like circumstances and
conditions, both in the privileges conferred and in the liabilities imposed.” Engquist
v. Or. Dept. of Agric., 553 U.S. 591, 602 (2008) (quoting Hayes v. Missouri, 120 U.S.
68, 71-72 (1887)). Here, the district court dismissed Reynolds’s complaint for failure
to state a claim, and Reynolds has pointed to no class of plaintiffs whose claims in
federal court would not be subject to identical scrutiny. See Sanders v. Sheahan, 198
F.3d 626, 626 (7th Cir. 1999). Thus, because Reynolds has not shown that anyone is
treated differently from him, the Equal Protection Clause is not implicated. As his due
process challenge appears to rest on the same theory, it is likewise unavailing.
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