United States of America, United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, 7 April 2022, Perry v. Clarke
Case overview
Country
Case ID
Decision date
Deciding body (English)
Type of body
Type of Court (material scope)
Type of jurisdiction
Type of Court (territorial scope)
Instance
Area
Vulnerability groups
Outcome of the decision
General Summary
Plaintiff filed an action against the Director of the Virginia Department of Corrections and the Warden of the Haynesville Correctional Center (HCC), the facility where he is an inmate and has tested positive for COVID-19, seeking monetary damages and injunctive relief. Plaintiff has argued that “staff and contractors have daily contact with individuals outside of their employment and are at risk of being unknowingly infected with COVID-19” and that the defendants failed “to restrict the movement of staff from facility to-facility and building-to-building within [HCC] to minimize the risk of the virus transmission by staff.” Defendants have filed a motion to dismiss based on the Prison Litigation Reform Act, which establishes that the Court must dismiss any action filed by a prisoner if the Court determines that the action (1) is frivolous or (2) fails to state a claim on which relief may be granted. The Court has analyzed the arguments of both parties and concluded that the Plaintiff has presented reasonable grounds for his action, thus denying the motion to dismiss.
Facts of the case
On December 7, 2020, Plaintiff tested positive for COVID-19. He argues that his infection resulted from the Defendants’ failure “to restrict the movement of staff from facility to-facility and building-to-building within [HCC] to minimize the risk of the virus transmission by staff.” He claims that he continues to suffer from the ill effects of the disease, including “chronic muscle pain . . ., shortness of breath, diarrhea, vision impairment and numbness in [his] right leg.” Over 300 staff members and inmates at the correctional facility have been infected with COVID-19.
Type of measure challenged
Measures, actions, remedies claimed
- Monetary damages
- Injunctive relief
Individual / collective enforcement
Nature of the parties
Claimant(s)
Private individualDefendant(s)
Public
Type of procedure
Reasoning of the deciding body
The Court has analyzed the motion to dismiss and has partially tackled the merits filed by the Plaintiff. According to the Court's reasoning, to state an Eighth Amendment claim, an inmate must allege facts that indicate (1) that objectively the deprivation of a basic human need was sufficiently serious, and (2) that subjectively the prison officials acted with a sufficiently culpable state of mind. Regarding the first requirement, the Court has argued that other courts have recognized that the “transmissibility of the COVID-19 virus in conjunction with [a prison's] dormitory-style housing—which places inmates within feet of each other—and [a] medically-vulnerable [inmate's] health risks, presents a substantial risk that [a medically-vulnerable inmate] will be infected with COVID-19 and have serious health effects as a result, including, and up to, death.” Therefore, the Court has stated that the question is whether the Plaintiff has pleaded sufficient facts to plausibly allege that the Defendants have acted with deliberate indifference to the risk of infection. The Court has concluded that Plaintiff has sufficiently presented the second requirement.
Conclusions of the deciding body
The Court has concluded that Plaintiff showed that both Defendants are aware of the past and present risks to him through his previous informal complaint, his present lawsuit, and their supervisory positions. Therefore, the Court has denied Defendants’ motion to dismiss.
Fundamental Right(s) involved
- Prisoners’ rights
- Right to health (inc. right to vaccination, right to access to reproductive health)
