Munt v. Schnell

Background

Joel Marvin Munt filed a civil-rights action concerning events at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Oak Park Heights. He alleged that prison employees retaliated against him because he used the prison grievance process and requested video evidence for court cases. He also alleged that some employees spread rumors about him, treated him differently from other prisoners, threatened him, and tried to cause him to be assaulted. The complaint sought declaratory and injunctive relief, compensatory damages, punitive damages, and other relief.

The court construed the amended complaint as asserting First Amendment retaliation claims against all defendants, conspiracy claims against all defendants, and Fourteenth Amendment equal-protection claims against Besonen, Desetelle, and Parker. Munt later reported that he had been transferred from Oak Park Heights to the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Rush City. The court concluded that the transfer made moot only his specific request not to be transferred from Oak Park Heights, and recommended dismissing that part of the requested relief without prejudice.

Motion to Amend, Stay, Strike, and Sanctions

The court denied Munt’s motion to file a second amended complaint. It reasoned that Munt had indicated he intended to seek another amendment, making the proposed amendment largely pointless, while stating that the ruling did not prejudge a later amendment request.

The court denied Munt’s requests for sanctions because they did not identify an applicable legal standard or satisfy the procedural requirements for sanctions under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 11. It also denied his request to stay the case until he returned to Oak Park Heights, finding that the transfer could make obtaining affidavits more difficult but had not been shown to make it impossible and that the proposed stay could be indefinite.

The court denied Munt’s motion to strike the defendants’ reply. It concluded that Rule 12(f) authorizes striking material from a pleading, while a reply supporting a motion to dismiss is not a pleading. It also rejected Munt’s argument that the defendants’ mootness discussion should be stricken, explaining that mootness concerns subject-matter jurisdiction and could be considered by the court.

Motion to Dismiss

The court recommended granting the motion to dismiss in part and denying it in part. It recommended dismissing all claims against Schnell, Reishus, Wheeler, and Austreng without prejudice. The allegations against Schnell, Wheeler, and Austreng described supervisory inaction or inadequate investigations but did not sufficiently allege that they personally violated Munt’s constitutional rights. The allegations against Reishus were too vague and depended on matters from another lawsuit that the court would not incorporate into this case.

The court recommended dismissing Munt’s claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1985(3) with prejudice. Section 1985(3) requires an invidious, class-based discriminatory motive. The court concluded that Munt alleged retaliation for exercising constitutional rights, not discrimination based on race or another qualifying class, and that prisoners are not a protected group under that statute. It also concluded that amendment could not plausibly cure this defect.

The court recommended dismissing Munt’s Fourteenth Amendment equal-protection claims without prejudice. Munt did not identify similarly situated prisoners who were treated differently because they engaged in different conduct, and he did not provide the specific comparisons required for either a class-based or “class-of-one” claim. The court also recommended dismissing the official-capacity claims without prejudice because Munt did not allege facts showing a widespread and persistent unconstitutional custom, policy, or failure to train or supervise.

The court recommended denying dismissal of the First Amendment retaliation claims against Besonen, Desetelle, Mosser, Parker, and Witter. It concluded that Munt sufficiently alleged protected activity, adverse action, and retaliatory motivation at the pleading stage. In particular, the alleged threat by Witter could qualify as adverse action because the relevant test asks whether the conduct could deter a person of ordinary firmness, not whether Munt was actually deterred. The allegations also connected the conduct of Besonen, Desetelle, Mosser, and Parker to Munt’s grievances and evidence requests.

The court likewise recommended allowing the 42 U.S.C. § 1983 conspiracy claims against Besonen, Desetelle, Mosser, Parker, and Witter to proceed. It found sufficient allegations of an agreement, overt acts, and injury for purposes of a motion to dismiss. It recommended dismissing the § 1983 conspiracy claims against Schnell, Reishus, Wheeler, and Austreng without prejudice because the complaint did not allege that they agreed to deprive Munt of constitutional rights.

The court did not recommend dismissing Munt’s punitive-damages claim at this stage. It also recommended that qualified immunity not be applied at this point to the remaining defendants, concluding that the right of prisoners to exercise First Amendment rights without retaliation was clearly established.

Temporary Restraining Orders and Preliminary Injunction

The court treated Munt’s amended temporary-restraining-order request as a request for a preliminary injunction because the defendants had notice and an opportunity to respond. It recommended denying the original request, its supplement, and the amended request. Although the possibility of interference with witnesses supported Munt on the irreparable-harm factor, the balance of harms, public interest, and likelihood-of-success factors favored denial. The court was particularly concerned that the requested relief would intrude substantially on Minnesota’s management of its prison system.

Disposition

The order portion of the ruling denied Munt’s motion to accept an amendment, denied the stay request in his second court requests, and denied his motion to strike. The report-and-recommendation portion recommended that the sanctions requests be denied; that the motion to dismiss be granted in part and denied in part with the claim-specific dispositions described above; and that the temporary-restraining-order requests be denied. Judge Wright stated that the report and recommendation was not directly appealable to the Eighth Circuit and that objections could be filed within 14 days after service.