Jones v. Cordova
- Louis Stanton
- 1:21-cv-01471
- U.S. District Court · Southern District of New York
- 15
In Jones v. Cordova, Judge Stanton found the complaint inadequate and allowed Rafael A. Jones to amend it within 60 days.
Rafael A. Jones, also known as Rafael A. Jones Sr.; the order directly affected his claims against C.O. Mike Cordova, Warden Hallett, the Anna M. Kross Center, and the City of New York.
What happened
Rafael A. Jones v. C.O. Mike Cordova, et al. concerns allegations that a correction officer tampered with Jones’s food at the Anna M. Kross Center, causing him to become ill, and that other officials were involved in additional wrongdoing. Jones, who was detained and represented himself, sought money damages from the officer, the warden, the jail, and New York City.
The court screened the complaint and found that it did not adequately state constitutional claims. It dismissed the claims against the Anna M. Kross Center because the jail could not be sued as a separate entity. The court also found that the allegations against the correction officer, the city, and the warden were insufficient as currently written, including because the complaint did not plausibly show a known food-related risk, a city policy, or the warden’s personal involvement.
Judge Louis L. Stanton granted Rafael A. Jones leave to file an amended complaint within 60 days. The order instructed Jones to provide specific facts about each defendant’s actions, the events, his injuries, and the relief sought; it stated that failure to comply could result in dismissal for failure to state a claim.
The detailed version
- Jones v. Cordova · No. 1:21-cv-01471
- Louis Stanton
- Mar. 10, 2021
Background
Rafael A. Jones, who was detained at the Anna M. Kross Center on Rikers Island and represented himself, sued Correction Officer Mike Cordova, Warden Hallett, the Anna M. Kross Center, and the City of New York. He sought money damages. The complaint alleged, among other things, that Cordova tampered with a food tray on January 23, 2021, causing Jones to vomit repeatedly; that Jones later learned he would need a tube placed into his stomach for the rest of his life; and that Cordova, an unnamed person called “Mike Doe,” Warden Hallett, and the city were involved in various alleged attacks, threats, supervision failures, or other wrongdoing.
The court treated the constitutional claims against the state actors as claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, a law allowing a person to seek damages for violations of federal rights by someone acting under state authority. Because Jones was a pretrial detainee when the relevant events occurred, the court treated the food allegation as a Fourteenth Amendment conditions-of-confinement claim. To state that claim, Jones had to allege both a seriously harmful condition and facts showing that defendants should have known the condition posed an excessive risk to his health or safety.
Screening and Claims
The court screened the complaint under the Prison Litigation Reform Act, which requires courts to review prisoner complaints and dismiss claims that are frivolous, malicious, fail to state a claim, seek money from an immune defendant, or fall outside the court’s jurisdiction. The court also applied the requirement that a complaint provide enough factual detail to make liability plausible.
Anna M. Kross Center
The court dismissed all claims against the Anna M. Kross Center for failure to state a claim. It held that the jail is an agency or facility of the New York City Department of Correction and is not an entity that can be sued separately.
Conditions of confinement
The court found that the complaint, as written, did not state a conditions-of-confinement claim against Cordova. Jones’s allegation that Cordova tampered with the food was speculative, the court said, and was contradicted by another allegation placing Cordova at a different location during the same period. The allegation that Cordova was present when food was delivered also did not show that he prepared or touched the food or should have known of a serious risk caused by it.
Municipal liability
The court found that the complaint did not state a claim against the City of New York. A city is not liable under § 1983 merely because one employee allegedly committed wrongdoing; the complaint must allege a city policy, custom, or practice that caused the constitutional violation. The court held that the alleged single incident involving Cordova was insufficient to show such a policy.
Supervisory liability
The court found that the complaint did not state a claim against Warden Hallett. Jones alleged that Hallett failed to supervise Cordova, but did not allege facts showing Hallett’s direct and personal involvement in a constitutional violation. The court explained that a supervisor cannot be held liable under § 1983 solely because a subordinate allegedly violated someone’s rights.
Disposition
Judge Louis L. Stanton granted Jones leave to file an amended complaint within 60 days of the order. The amended complaint had to provide a short and plain statement of the facts supporting each claim, identify each defendant’s actions or omissions, describe the relevant dates and locations, explain the injuries, and state the requested relief. The order stated that no summons would issue at that time and that, if Jones failed to amend within the allowed period without showing good cause, the complaint would be dismissed for failure to state a claim. The opinion itself does not state that the claims against Cordova, the City of New York, or Hallett were dismissed at that point.
Read the full 15-page opinion on CourtListener, the free public archive maintained by the Free Law Project.