Antonelli v. Sheahan

863 F. Supp. 756, 1994 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13303, 1994 WL 523938
CourtDistrict Court, N.D. Illinois
DecidedSeptember 16, 1994
Docket93 C 3955
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 863 F. Supp. 756 (Antonelli v. Sheahan) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, N.D. Illinois primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Antonelli v. Sheahan, 863 F. Supp. 756, 1994 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13303, 1994 WL 523938 (N.D. Ill. 1994).

Opinion

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

HOLDERMAN, District Judge:

Plaintiff Michael Antonelli brought this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against defendants Michael Sheahan, J.W. Fairman, Superintendent Waznis, Brian Bennewate, Ivory Avery, Officer Peterson and Officer Hernandez for alleged constitutional deprivations while he was incarcerated as a pretrial detainee at the Cook County Jail. Defendants Sheahan, Fairman, Waznis, Bennewate, and Avery have filed a joint motion to dismiss plaintiffs complaint. For the reasons stated below, defendants’ motion to dismiss is granted. 1

BACKGROUND

Plaintiff was a pre-trial detainee incarcerated with the Cook County Department of Corrections at Cook County Jail. Plaintiffs complaint contains twenty counts in which he challenges the confinement conditions at Cook County Jail. Plaintiffs claims are summarized as follows: 1) plaintiff was forced to sleep on a mattress on the floor of his unit because the jail was overcrowded; 2) prison officials opened his mail before he received it; 3) plaintiff was allowed outdoor exercise once every two weeks for no longer than one hour at a time; 4) plaintiffs unit had a cockroach and rodent problem; 5) prison officials did not properly maintain the law library; 6) prison officials did not properly maintain the commissary; 7) plaintiffs diet was nutritionally deficient and sometimes the food was spoiled; 8) plaintiffs unit had inadequate lighting and improper temperature regula *759 tion; 9) prison officials denied plaintiffs requests to attend religious services; 10) plaintiff received inadequate medical care; 11) plaintiffs unit was inordinately noisy which caused his sleep to be interrupted; and 12) prison officials took some of plaintiffs personal items including pens, bags of coffee and a soap dish. Defendants seek to dismiss plaintiffs complaint in its entirety on the grounds that plaintiff has not stated any claims upon which relief can be granted. The court will address each of plaintiffs allegations in turn.

ANALYSIS

I. Standard of Review

In ruling on a motion for dismissal, the court must presume all of the well-pleaded allegations of the complaint to be true. Miree v. DeKalb County, 433 U.S. 25, 27 n. 2, 97 S.Ct. 2490, 2492 n. 2, 53 L.Ed.2d 557 (1977). In addition, the court must view those allegations in the light most favorable to the plaintiff. Gomez v. Illinois State Bd. of Educ., 811 F.2d 1030, 1039 (7th Cir.1987). Dismissal is proper only if it appears “beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief.” Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45-46, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957).

Although plaintiff cites the Eighth Amendment in his complaint, plaintiffs § 1983 claims must be analyzed under the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment because of plaintiffs status as a pretrial detainee. Due process protects the right of a pretrial detainee not to be punished while the Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment is applicable only to those criminals who are serving a sentence after a formal adjudication of guilt. Salazar v. City of Chicago, 940 F.2d 233, 239 (7th Cir.1991); Anderson v. Gutschenritter, 836 F.2d 346, 348-49 (7th Cir.1988). Unlike a pretrial detainee, a sentenced inmate may be punished but that punishment may not be cruel and unusual under the Eighth Amendment. Anderson, 836 F.2d at 348 (citing Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 535 n. 16, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 1872 n. 16, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979)). The Supreme Court recognized the distinction in Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977):

Eighth Amendment scrutiny is appropriate only after the State has complied with the constitutional guarantees traditionally associated with criminal prosecutions____ [T]he State does not acquire the power to punish with which the Eighth Amendment is concerned until after it has secured a formal adjudication of guilt in accordance with due process of law. Where the State seeks to impose punishment without such an adjudication, the pertinent constitutional guarantee is the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

Id. at 671-72 n. 40, 97 S.Ct. at 1412-13 n. 40.

Therefore, the proper inquiry for a Fourteenth Amendment claim is whether the challenged conduct amounted to any kind of punishment. Salazar, 940 F.2d at 239-10. The standards for analyzing claims regarding conditions of confinement under both the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, however, are very similar. See Id. at 240 (“Punishment is punishment, and there is no reason why the term should mean two different things in the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment contexts.”).

In Wilson v. Setter, 501 U.S. 294, 111 S.Ct. 2321, 115 L.Ed.2d 271 (1991), the Supreme Court stated that in cases challenging the conditions of confinement, determining whether certain conduct constitutes punishment involves both a subjective and objective component. Id. at 298-302, 111 S.Ct. at 2324-26. Therefore, to prevail on a Fourteenth Amendment claim, plaintiff must prove both that defendants acted with deliberate indifference to plaintiffs needs (the subjective component), and that the alleged deprivations were sufficiently severe to rise to the level of a constitutional violation (the objective component). Hines v. Sheahan, 845 F.Supp. 1265, 1267 (N.D.Ill.1994) (citing Wilson, 501 U.S. at 298, 111 S.Ct. at 2324).

II. Subjective Component

To satisfy the subjective component of the Fourteenth Amendment analysis, a plaintiff must allege the requisite level of a *760 defendant’s intent to punish plaintiff. The Seventh Circuit has held that a pretrial detainee alleging due process violations must show that the defendants acted with deliberate indifference to plaintiffs constitutional rights — meaning intentional or criminally reckless conduct. Salazar, 940 F.2d at 238.

Plaintiff in this case makes no claim that the defendants engaged in any of the alleged actions with the intent to punish plaintiff. 2

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70 F. Supp. 2d 868 (N.D. Indiana, 1999)
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872 F. Supp. 498 (N.D. Illinois, 1994)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
863 F. Supp. 756, 1994 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 13303, 1994 WL 523938, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/antonelli-v-sheahan-ilnd-1994.