Chen v. The City of New York

Background

Long Chen, who was incarcerated at the Anna M. Kross Center on Rikers Island, filed this self-represented action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, which allows claims for violations of federal rights by state actors. The court had previously allowed him to proceed without prepaying filing fees. Because he was incarcerated and sued a governmental entity, the court screened the complaint under the Prison Litigation Reform Act.

Chen alleged that on February 9, 2023, he ate lunch and drank water provided by the City of New York, then became dizzy, blacked out, and later woke up surrounded by correction officers and emergency medical workers. He alleged that testing found fentanyl in his system, that staff administered four doses of Narcan, and that he suffered pain, long-term negative effects, and personal injury. He sought money damages.

Municipal-liability claim

The court explained that a city is not liable under Section 1983 merely because one of its employees allegedly acted wrongfully. A plaintiff must allege facts showing that a city policy, custom, or practice caused the constitutional violation. The court found that Chen’s complaint did not provide facts supporting an inference that a City policy, custom, or practice caused the events described.

Conditions and medical-care claims

The court construed the complaint as alleging that correction officials and medical staff were deliberately indifferent to dangerous conditions of confinement and failed to provide adequate medical care. Because Chen was a pretrial detainee during the relevant events, the court analyzed these claims under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

For such claims, a detainee must allege both a sufficiently serious risk to health or safety and that an official intentionally imposed the condition or recklessly failed to take reasonable care despite knowing, or having reason to know, of an excessive risk. The court stated that negligence alone is not enough for a federal constitutional claim.

The court concluded that the allegations did not show that the City or its employees knew, or should have known, of a specific serious risk to Chen and ignored it. The court also found that the allegations suggested the correction officers’ and emergency workers’ response was timely and adequate, rather than deliberately indifferent. The court therefore granted Chen leave to provide additional facts supporting a potentially viable deliberate-indifference claim; the opinion did not dismiss the federal claims at that point.

State-law claims

The court stated that the alleged facts could arguably support negligence or another state-law tort. It reserved the decision whether to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over those claims because it was allowing Chen to amend and had not dismissed the federal claims over which it had original jurisdiction.

Order and next steps

The court granted Chen 60 days from the date of the order to file an amended complaint. The amended complaint must replace the original complaint, so any facts or claims Chen wanted the court to consider had to be repeated in it. The court directed him to identify the relevant people, describe what each defendant did or failed to do, provide approximate dates and locations, describe his injuries, and state the relief sought.

The court stated that no summons would issue at that time. If Chen failed to amend within the allowed period and could not show good cause, the complaint would be dismissed for failure to state a claim, and the court would decline supplemental jurisdiction over any state-law claims. The court also certified that an appeal would not be taken in good faith and denied permission to appeal without prepaying fees.