Fuentes v. New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision

Background

Jesus Fuentes sued under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal law allowing claims against government officials for constitutional violations. He proceeded without a lawyer and without paying the filing fee. He alleged that, despite a 2006 policy banning indoor smoking in New York State Department of Corrections and Community Supervision facilities, he was exposed to unreasonably high levels of environmental tobacco smoke at several facilities. He sought monetary, declaratory, and injunctive relief.

Fuentes also challenged the Humane Alternatives to Long-Term Solitary Confinement Act, alleging that the Act reduced penalties for smoking-related offenses and therefore increased the risk that incarcerated people would smoke indoors. The defendants moved to dismiss under Federal Rules of Civil Procedure 12(b)(1), which addresses subject-matter jurisdiction, and 12(b)(6), which addresses failure to state a legally sufficient claim.

Rulings on the HALT Act claim and official-capacity claim

The court dismissed Fuentes’s challenge to the HALT Act because he lacked Article III standing. Standing requires an actual injury that is fairly traceable to the defendants’ conduct and likely to be remedied by the requested relief. The court found Fuentes’s alleged future injury speculative because it depended on unknown inmates violating smoking policies and possibly causing him harm. The court also found that he had not adequately connected that potential injury to the defendants’ conduct. Because standing concerns subject-matter jurisdiction, the court dismissed this claim without prejudice.

The court also dismissed under Rule 12(b)(1) Fuentes’s claims against Edward Burnett in his official capacity to the extent they sought relief barred by the Eleventh Amendment. The court explained that the Eleventh Amendment generally prevents suits in federal court against a state or a state employee acting in an official capacity. This ruling did not affect Fuentes’s claims against Burnett in his individual capacity.

Deliberate-indifference claims

Fuentes’s second claim alleged that defendants were deliberately indifferent to his health and safety in violation of the Eighth Amendment by creating or maintaining a policy allowing or encouraging indoor smoking and by failing to enforce the smoking ban. A deliberate-indifference claim requires allegations that the conditions posed a substantial risk of serious harm and that the defendant personally knew of and unreasonably disregarded that risk.

The court dismissed the claims against Kimberly Lawrence because Fuentes had not exhausted available prison grievance procedures as required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act. His grievance concerned a supposed DOCCS-wide smoking policy and did not provide prison officials with notice that he was complaining about Lawrence. The court dismissed these claims with prejudice.

The court dismissed the claims against Glenn S. Goord and Brian Fischer as barred by the three-year statute of limitations applicable to these § 1983 claims. Fuentes alleged that Goord’s conduct ended in August 2006 and Fischer’s ended in May 2013. The court rejected Fuentes’s arguments based on a continuing violation, administrative-exhaustion tolling, and COVID-19-related tolling. These claims were dismissed with prejudice.

The court denied the motion as to the timely portions of Fuentes’s claims against Anthony J. Annucci, Leroy Fields, and Edward Burnett. It held that Fuentes plausibly alleged their personal involvement by claiming that they created or maintained an unconstitutional smoking policy, knew of serious smoking-related risks, and disregarded those risks. It also held that his allegations of unreasonably high smoke exposure were sufficient at the motion-to-dismiss stage because, if supported by evidence, a reasonable jury could find an unreasonable risk to his health. The court further allowed the official-capacity claim for prospective relief to proceed against Daniel F. Martuscello, Annucci’s successor as DOCCS Commissioner.

Disposition

The court granted in part and denied in part Defendants’ motion to dismiss. It granted the motion as to Fuentes’s first claim concerning the HALT Act and as to his second claim concerning Lawrence, Goord, and Fischer. It denied the motion as to the second claim concerning Annucci, Fields, Burnett, and Martuscello. The court directed Annucci, Fields, Burnett, and Martuscello to answer the complaint within 14 days and directed the clerk to terminate Lawrence, Goord, and Fischer as defendants.