Dalluge v. United States of America

Background

Michael D. Dalluge filed a petition under 28 U.S.C. § 2241, a procedure used to challenge certain aspects of federal detention. He alleged that staff at the Federal Medical Center in Rochester, Minnesota, violated his Eighth Amendment rights to medical care by prescribing Vivitrol to treat his opioid addiction and refusing to prescribe Suboxone. He asked the court to order his medical team to administer Suboxone and to change his primary-care physician.

Report and Recommendation and Objections

United States Magistrate Judge Elsa M. Bullard recommended dismissing the petition. The recommendation concluded that Dalluge was challenging the conditions of his confinement, rather than the validity of his conviction or the length of his detention. It therefore concluded that habeas relief was not the proper remedy and that Dalluge would need to bring his constitutional claims in a non-habeas civil action.

Dalluge timely objected, but his objections continued to argue the merits of his medical-treatment claim—specifically, that he should receive Suboxone instead of Vivitrol. The objections did not address the recommendation’s conclusion that his claims could not be brought in a habeas petition. The district court therefore reviewed the unchallenged basis of the recommendation for clear error, rather than conducting a fresh review of that issue.

Ruling

Judge Laura M. Provinzino found no clear error and adopted the Report and Recommendation in full. The court overruled Dalluge’s objections, denied the petition, and dismissed the action without prejudice. The order did not decide whether Suboxone was medically required or whether Dalluge’s Eighth Amendment claim would succeed in a different type of civil action.