Ulloa v. Jacobsen

Background

Robert Ulloa, an inmate at Pelican Bay State Prison proceeding without a lawyer, brought a civil-rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against employees at Pelican Bay. The court determined that the complaint, read broadly, appeared to assert two Eighth Amendment claims: an excessive-force claim against Correctional Officers C. Vick and J. Hendrix for shooting Ulloa during an incident on May 24, 2017, and a deliberate-indifference-to-serious-medical-needs claim against Doctor C. Jacobsen. The medical claim concerned the alleged failure to remove bullets from Ulloa’s limbs, provide physical therapy, and house him in the clinic after his return from the hospital.

The defendants moved for summary judgment based on failure to exhaust administrative remedies. Summary judgment is a procedure for deciding a claim without a trial when the evidence shows there is no genuine dispute requiring a trial. In prisoner cases, federal law requires an inmate to complete available prison grievance procedures before bringing a federal action about prison conditions.

Exhaustion Evidence

For the excessive-force claim, Ulloa filed a grievance concerning the officers who shot him. The grievance received a second-level response on July 20, 2017, and that response instructed him to submit any third-level appeal within 30 calendar days. Ulloa submitted the appeal in September 2017. The third-level office canceled it because it was late. The court explained that canceling the appeal did not exhaust the administrative process. The record also showed that Ulloa did not file a separate appeal challenging the cancellation.

For the medical claim, Ulloa filed two health-care appeals concerning the treatment of his wounds, his placement after returning from the hospital, his crutches, and related medical care. The record showed that he did not appeal either first-level response to the second or third levels of review.

Ulloa had not filed an opposition to the motion. The court therefore treated the defendants’ evidence as undisputed. The evidence also showed that Ulloa had access to the prison law library, had reviewed the appeal regulations, understood that appeals had to proceed through three levels, and had received notices describing the deadlines and the ability to appeal the cancellation. The court found that the defendants proved available administrative remedies existed and that Ulloa did not complete them. Ulloa did not provide evidence showing that the grievance process was effectively unavailable to him.

Ruling

Because the undisputed evidence showed that Ulloa failed to exhaust the administrative remedies for both his excessive-force and medical claims, the court granted the defendants’ motion for summary judgment. The order states that it terminated docket number 19 and directed the clerk to issue a separate judgment and close the file. Judge Haywood S. Gilliam, Jr. signed the order on January 21, 2020.