Redding v. Schnell

Background

Nico Redding, who was incarcerated at the Minnesota Correctional Facility in Stillwater, sued several Minnesota Department of Corrections officials and Centurion of Minnesota, LLC. He challenged the defendants’ handling of conditions at the prison and their response to the COVID-19 pandemic. His claims were brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a federal civil-rights law that allows claims involving violations of constitutional rights by state actors.

Because Redding was a prisoner bringing a claim about prison conditions, federal law required him to complete available prison grievance procedures before filing suit. The Minnesota Department of Corrections’ ordinary process required multiple steps under Department of Corrections Policy 303.100. Redding did not claim that he had followed that process.

Exhaustion dispute

The defendants sought dismissal based on Redding’s failure to complete the grievance process. The magistrate judge concluded that Redding could not use the policy’s expedited procedure, which allowed some grievances involving threats to an inmate’s physical safety or danger at the facility to go directly to the Department of Corrections’ central office.

Redding argued that the expedited procedure should apply because his claims involved serious and potentially life-threatening COVID-19 risks. He also argued that the ordinary process was unavailable under the “dead end” exception recognized in Ross v. Blake. That exception applies when a grievance process cannot provide relief because officials are unable or consistently unwilling to do so.

Judge Menendez agreed with the magistrate judge that Redding had not shown that the ordinary grievance procedure was unavailable. The fact that Redding could not use the expedited procedure did not establish that the ordinary procedure could not be used. The record also contained no evidence that prison officials were consistently unwilling to provide relief or that the ordinary process was otherwise incapable of use.

Ruling

The court found no clear error or other error in the magistrate judge’s Report and Recommendation and accepted it. The court overruled Redding’s objections.

The order states that Centurion’s motion to dismiss was granted in part and denied in part. It also states that the Minnesota Department of Corrections defendants’ motion for summary judgment was granted in part and denied in part. The court dismissed the action without prejudice for failure to exhaust administrative remedies. The order’s footnote explains that the magistrate judge recommended denying the defendants’ underlying motions to the extent they sought dismissal with prejudice, and no party objected to that aspect of the recommendation.