Sarinana v. Soto

Background

Armando Sarinana, a California state prisoner proceeding without a lawyer, brought a civil-rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The complaint initially asserted claims against S. Soto, D. Osborn, and Botello. The court had already dismissed some claims during its initial review.

On March 31, 2018, Sarinana tried to enter his housing unit at the California Training Facility, but the door was locked. He looked through a window where several officers, including Soto, were present. According to the complaint, Soto shoved his hand against the window, breaking it, and a tiny piece of glass, approximately the size of a grain of sand, entered Sarinana’s eye. Sarinana requested medical help and rinsed his eye with water. He later asked Soto again for medical assistance and was taken to an emergency medical facility at approximately 6:30 p.m. A nurse examined him. The opinion states that Sarinana did not have blurry or changed vision, tearing, swelling, or bleeding, and that he reported no pain during the examination, although he alleged severe pain in the complaint.

Sarinana alleged that Soto was deliberately indifferent to his safety and medical needs in violation of the Eighth Amendment. He alleged that Osborn was deliberately indifferent to his medical needs and that Botello retaliated against him for filing administrative grievances, violating the First Amendment.

Earlier rulings and remaining claim

The court had granted judgment on the pleadings to Osborn and Soto on the medical claims because the complaint and attachments did not indicate a serious risk of injury from the tiny piece of glass or deliberate indifference to medical needs. The court had also granted summary judgment to Botello for lack of exhaustion. The remaining claim was Sarinana’s allegation that Soto was deliberately indifferent to his safety.

Rule 12(b)(6) standard

Soto moved to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6), which allows dismissal when a complaint does not state a legally sufficient claim. The court explained that a complaint must provide enough factual allegations to make relief plausible, rather than relying only on labels or conclusions. Because Sarinana was proceeding without a lawyer, the court said it would interpret his pleading liberally, but it would not accept conclusory allegations or unreasonable inferences as true.

Eighth Amendment analysis

The court explained that an Eighth Amendment safety claim requires both an objectively sufficiently serious deprivation and subjective deliberate indifference. Deliberate indifference means that the official knew of and disregarded an excessive risk to the prisoner’s health or safety. Negligence or gross negligence is not enough; the official must have been aware of facts suggesting a substantial risk of serious harm and must have drawn that inference.

The court held that Sarinana’s allegations did not support a reasonable inference that Soto had more than a mere suspicion that his conduct would cause harm. The court found that shoving a hand against a window once did not obviously create a substantial risk that the glass would break and injure Sarinana. It also noted that there was no allegation that Soto punched the window, hit it hard, or used an object that would obviously break glass. The court further stated that Soto’s liability required actual awareness of the risk, not merely what he should have known.

The court separately concluded that the alleged injury was not sufficiently serious to meet the objective part of the Eighth Amendment test. It emphasized that the glass was tiny, about the size of a grain of sand, and that the records did not show bleeding, tearing, swelling, or lasting injury even though the glass remained in Sarinana’s eye for several hours.

The court stated that the allegations failed both parts of the Eighth Amendment claim. It did not reach Soto’s qualified-immunity argument.

Disposition

The court granted Soto’s motion to dismiss. It also granted Sarinana’s motion for an extension of time to file his opposition. Because the Soto claim was the sole remaining claim, the court directed the clerk to enter judgment and close the file.