Opinion
C. A. 2:22-cv-0739-DCN-MHC
11-15-2023
Altony Brooks, Plaintiff, v. Scott Allan Zorn and John Doe, Defendants.
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION AND ORDER
MOLLY H. CHERRY UNITED STATES MAGISTRATE JUDGE.
Before the Court is Plaintiff's Motion for Preliminary Injunction and Restraining Order (“Motion”), filed on October 19, 2023. ECF No. 81. Defendants each filed a Response in Opposition to the Motion, ECF Nos. 84 & 86, and Plaintiff filed a Reply, ECF No. 92.
Also before the Court is Plaintiff's “Motion in Affidavit for Injunction for Counsel and to Set Aside Order for Proper Objection and Amendment of Claims,” which the clerk docketed as a Motion for Miscellaneous Relief. ECF No. 91.
All pretrial proceedings in this case were referred to the undersigned pursuant to the provisions of 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1)(A) and (B) and Local Civil Rule 73.02(B)(2) (D.S.C.). This Report and Recommendation is entered for review by the District Judge.
I. BACKGROUND
Plaintiff, proceeding pro se and in forma pauperis, filed a verified Complaint in March 2022. ECF No. 1. The allegations in his Complaint arise out of a March 3, 2020 traffic stop. Id. Plaintiff alleges that Defendant Zorn, who at the time was an officer with Defendant Saint Stephen Police Department, pulled Plaintiff over for a traffic stop, demanded Plaintiff get on the ground, and then shot his taser at Plaintiff that went through Plaintiff's jacket. Id. at 5. According to Plaintiff, he then ran around a wood line, got back into his vehicle and drove toward the Saint Stephen Police Department to speak to the mayor. Id. When he did not see the mayor's car, Plaintiff drove home and walked into his house. Id.
Plaintiff alleges that officers of Defendant Berkeley County Sheriff's Office, including Defendant John Doe, and Defendant Zorn arrived at his house and said they were coming in to get Plaintiff. Id. at 6. Plaintiff advised them that they did not have a search warrant, and he alleges Defendants Zorn and Doe said they did not need one. Id. According to Plaintiff, Defendant Zorn said he would shoot into the house if Plaintiff did not come out. Id. Plaintiff alleges that he came outside and that “Berkeley County Sheriff's officers grabbed [him] by the arm and snatched him off the porch and forcefully took him and put him in the police cruiser,” taking him to the Hill Finklea Detention Center, where he stayed for several days. Id.
In his Complaint, Plaintiff raises federal constitutional claims pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, as well as various state law claims. ECF No. 1. By Order dated June 20, 2023, the District Court dismissed Berkeley County Sheriff's Office and the Saint Stephen Police Department as Defendants in this case. ECF No. 64. The District Court allowed the following claims to proceed against Defendants Zorn and Doe in their individual capacities: (1) a § 1983 claim for excessive use of force in violation of the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution; and (2) a § 1983 claim for false arrest and imprisonment in violation of the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The District Court also allowed the state law claims for false arrest, assault, battery, and abuse of power to proceed against Defendant Zorn. Id.
II. MOTION FOR PRELIMINARY INJUNCTION
On October 19, 2023, Plaintiff filed a Motion for Preliminary Injunction and Restraining Order. ECF No. 81. In his Motion, Plaintiff alleges that he has been detained in the Hill Finklea Detention Center, which is run by the Berkeley County Sheriff's Office, since May 4, 2023. Id. at 1. He further asserts that he is being held as a result of a retaliatory “intentional illegal arrest of Plaintiff and false imprisonment.” Id. Plaintiff asserts that since his confinement, he has been unable to retrieve discovery of the video in this case or timely object to Defendants' discovery responses. Id. He further states that “more recently [he] has been denied the right for his father to give defendants B.C.S.O. staff Ofc. Bracewell a copy of the DVD that was provided by defendants in their supplemental response dated August 31st[,] 2023.” Id. at 1-2 (further stating that his father brought the envelope and video to the jail and that “Ofc. Bracewell and Major Fyall denied Plaintiff[']s father from giving them the video to give to Petitioner”). Plaintiff contends that “this denial denies him the right to present an adequate response to any summary judgment motion in this case, it denies Plaintiff the right to prosecute this case as he [i]s denied the discovery to prepare for summary judgment.” Id. at 2. He further contends that “the illegal arrest of Plaintiff has hindered Plaintiff in litigating this case.” Id.
Plaintiff “moves to restrain defendants from denying his father to bring the video of this case so he can prepare a response[, and to] restrain defendants from preventing him from seeing the video and to orchestrate a date and time and location for him to see the video to enable Plaintiff to prepare for summary judgment.” Id.
The substantive standards for granting a request for a temporary restraining order and entering a preliminary injunction are the same. See Virginia v. Kelly, 29 F.3d 145, 147 (4th Cir. 1994) (applying preliminary injunction standard to a request for temporary restraining order). A preliminary injunction is “an extraordinary remedy involving the exercise of a very far-reaching power, which is to be applied only in the limited circumstances which clearly demand it.” Centro Tepeyac v. Montgomery Cty., 722 F.3d 184, 188 (4th Cir. 2013) (quoting Direx Israel, Ltd. v. Breakthrough Med. Corp., 952 F.2d 802, 811 (4th Cir. 1991)) (internal quotation marks omitted). The decision whether to grant a preliminary injunction is committed to the equitable discretion of the district court. See Salazar v. Buono, 559 U.S. 700, 714 (2010); Christopher Phelps & Assocs., LLC v. Galloway, 492 F.3d 532, 543 (4th Cir. 2007).
A plaintiff seeking a preliminary injunction must establish all four of the following elements: (1) he is likely to succeed on the merits; (2) he is likely to suffer irreparable harm in the absence of preliminary relief; (3) the balance of equities tips in his favor; and (4) an injunction is in the public interest. Winter v. Nat. Res. Def. Council, Inc., 555 U.S. 7, 20 (2008). A plaintiff must make a clear showing that he is likely to succeed on the merits of his claim. Id. at 22. Similarly, he must make a clear showing that he is likely to be irreparably harmed absent injunctive relief. Id. at 20-23. Only then may the court consider whether the balance of equities tips in the plaintiff s favor. Finally, the court must pay particular regard to the public consequences of employing the extraordinary relief of injunction. Id. at 24.
As an initial matter, Plaintiff is not entitled to the injunctive relief he seeks because the wrong or wrongs that Plaintiff's requested injunctive relief would protect against fall outside the scope of the Complaint, which concerns alleged excessive force and false arrest and imprisonment by Defendants Zorn and Doe during a March 3, 2020 traffic stop. See ECF No. 1. A “party moving for a preliminary injunction must necessarily establish a relationship between the injury claimed in the party's motion and the conduct asserted in the complaint.” Bessellieu v. Hollis, C/A No. 8:20-cv-03189-MGL-JDA, 2021 WL 1299565, at *3 n.4 (D.S.C. Feb. 22, 2021) (quoting Devose v. Herrington, 42 F.3d 470, 471 (8th Cir. 1994)), report and recommendation adopted, No. CV 8:20-03189-MGL, 2021 WL 1299106 (D.S.C. Apr. 7, 2021). “The purpose of interim equitable relief is to protect the movant, during the pendency of the action, from being harmed in the manner in which the movant contends it was or will be harmed through the illegality alleged in the complaint.” Martin v. Stokes, No. 8:17-3391-MGL-JDA, 2017 WL 6888826, at *2 (D.S.C. Dec. 20, 2017), report and recommendation adopted, 2018 WL 368962 (Jan. 11, 2018). “Thus, a preliminary injunction may never issue to prevent an injury or harm which not even the moving party contends was caused by the wrong claimed in the underlying action.” Id.
Here, Plaintiff seeks an order restraining the actions of B.C.S.O. detention center employees, including Ofc. Bracewell and Major Fyall. However, none of these employees are parties in this action. Generally, “a court may not enter an injunction against a person who has not been made a party to the case before it.” Pew v. Wetzel, No. 3:12-CV-1984, 2015 WL 10474859, at *4 (M.D. Pa. Oct. 30, 2015) (quoting Additive Controls & Measurement Sys., Inc. v. Flowdata, Inc., 96 F.3d 1390, 1394 (Fed. Cir. 1996)), report and recommendation adopted, No. 3:12-CV-1984, 2016 WL 948878 (M.D. Pa. Mar. 14, 2016); see also Abdullah-Malik v. Bryant, No. 1:14-cv-109-RBH, 2015 WL 225740, at *3 (D.S.C. Jan. 16, 2015) (“[T]o the extent [Plaintiff] seeks to enjoin persons who are not parties to this lawsuit, Plaintiff's motion is improper.”); U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Comm'n v. Amaranth Advisors, LLC, 523 F.Supp.2d 328, 334 (S.D.N.Y. 2007) (denying defendant's motion for a preliminary injunction against the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission because it was not a party to the suit and it was not an “officer, agent, servant, employee, or attorney” of any party). Accordingly, to the extent Plaintiff seeks to enjoin persons who are not parties to this lawsuit, the Motion should be denied.
Moreover, to the extent Plaintiff seeks relief against any Defendant, the Motion is inappropriate because the injunction seeks “[r]relief that is not requested [in the Complaint] or at all related to the remaining claims.” Pew, 2015 WL 10474859, at *3 (citation and internal quotation marks omitted); see Devose v. Herrington, 42 F.3d 470, 471 (8th Cir. 1994) (holding that plaintiff was not entitled to a preliminary injunction where motion raised issues entirely different from those presented in plaintiff's complaint); Spencer v. Stapler, No. 04-1532, 2006 WL 2052704, at *9 (D. Ariz. July 21, 2006) (“Plaintiff's motion [for injunctive relief] concerns events that are unrelated to the subject of his complaint and that concerns conduct of persons other than the defendants. Plaintiff's request will therefore be denied.”); Westbank Yellow Pages v. BRI, Inc., No. 96-1128, 1996 WL 255912, at *1 (E.D. La. May 13, 1996) (“A preliminary injunction is not an appropriate vehicle for trying to obtain relief that is not even sought in the underlying action.”). In his Motion, Plaintiff seeks an order to enjoin non-parties from preventing him from obtaining mail from his father during his current detention following his May 2023 arrest. The claims in his Complaint, however, pertain to alleged excessive force and false arrest occurring in March 2020. ECF No. 1. Because Plaintiff is seeking relief that does not pertain to the claims asserted in his Complaint, the Motion should be denied.
Finally, Plaintiff has not shown that he can satisfy the test articulated in Winter. Although he signed his Motion under penalty of perjury, ECF No. 60, the statements in his Motion pertain to non-parties and events arising from his detention following his May 2023 arrest. As addressed above, those statements fall outside the scope of the Complaint and do not support the issuance of an injunction or restraining order in this action. Accordingly, the undersigned recommends that Plaintiff's request for injunctive relief be denied.
III. MOTION FOR MISCELLANEOUS RELIEF
On November 8, 2023, Plaintiff filed a Motion for Miscellaneous Relief, which he titled “Motion in Affidavit for Injunction for Counsel and to Set Aside Order for Proper Objection and Amendment of Claims.” ECF No. 91. In his Motion, Plaintiff asks the District Court to set aside the Order affirming the Report and Recommendation on the Motion to Dismiss (ECF No. 64), on the basis that he drafted an objection but detention center staff did not mail it for him. ECF No. 91 at 1, 7. He also seeks to supplement his Complaint to allege new claims arising from an arrest on November 23, 2022, by Cpl. Mathew Johnson, Corporal John Latton, Julio Santos, K-9 Dixie, and Hannah Reed of the Berkeley County Sheriff's Office (BCSO). ECF No. 91 at 1. He alleges that these newly named individuals arrested him in retaliation for his filing civil suits against BCSO and “to cause default and frustration in all of [his] filings in the courts as well as this case.” Id. He further alleges that he was released in January 2023 but was arrested again in May 2023 and was subsequently denied access to the courts due to interference with his legal mail by Lt. Dobbs, Miss Shuler, and Sgt. Greene. Id. at 5-6.
A. Motion for Injunction
Although Plaintiff titles his Motion, in part, as one for “for Injunction,” the body of Plaintiff's Motion does not make any arguments for injunctive relief. See generally ECF No. 91. Plaintiff also does not make any arguments related to his claims against Defendants Zorn or Doe for excessive force and illegal arrest occurring in March 2020, which is the subject of his Complaint in this action. To the extent Plaintiff seeks an injunction against newly named nonparties based on new claims unrelated to the March 2020 incident, his motion should be denied for the reasons set forth in Section II above. Moreover, to the extent he seeks an injunction against named Defendants Zorn and Doe, his motion should be denied for failure to satisfy the Winter test. See Winter, 555 U.S. at 20; see also Section II, supra.
B. Motion to Set Aside Order
Plaintiff also moves to set aside the District Judge's Order on the Motion to Dismiss, ECF No. 64. This appears to be a motion for relief from an order, made pursuant to Rule 60(b) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The undersigned notes that Plaintiff filed a similar motion on November 9, 2023. ECF No. 93. Because these motions seek to set aside an Order of the District Judge, these motions should be decided by the District Judge in the first instance.
C. Motion for Amendment of Claims
Finally, Plaintiff's Miscellaneous Motion seeks “Amendment of Claims” to join additional defendants and assert new claims that are unrelated to those asserted in his Complaint and that are based on incidents that have occurred since his Complaint was filed. See ECF No. 91. This amendment does not seek to add any defendants that are alleged to have committed the March 2020 violations described in the Complaint. Because it appears that Plaintiff seeks to supplement his Complaint, rather than replace his Complaint with an amended complaint, this Motion will be construed as a Motion to Supplement the Complaint pursuant to Rule 15(d) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 15(d) (“On motion and reasonable notice, the court may, on just terms, permit a party to serve a supplemental pleading setting out any transaction, occurrence, or event that happened after the date of the pleading to be supplemented.”).
Motions to supplement a complaint pursuant to Rule 15(d) generally “ought to be allowed as of course, unless some particular reason for disallowing them appears.” New Amsterdam Cas. Co. v. Waller, 323 F.2d 20, 28-29 (1963). “One reason motions pursuant to Rule 15(d) are denied is that the claims or defenses bear little relationship to the original pleading.” Nixon v. Maryland Dep't of Pub. Safety & Correcitonal Servs., No. CV DKC 17-442, 2018 WL 3728893, at *3 (D. Md. Aug. 6, 2018) (citing 6A Charles Alan Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice & Procedure § 1510 (3d ed. 2009); Sai v. Trans. Sec. Admin., 155 F.Supp.3d 1, 7 (D.D.C. 2016); and Albrecht v. Long Island R.R., 134 F.R.D. 40, 41 (E.D.N.Y. 1991)).
Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 18 provides that “[a] party asserting a claim, counterclaim, crossclaim, or third-party claim may join, as independent or alternative claims, as many claims as it has against an opposing party.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 18(a). Nevertheless, when a party seeks to bring multiple claims against multiple defendants, he must also satisfy Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 20, which provides:
(2) Defendants. Persons . . . may be joined in one action as defendants if:
(A) any right to relief is asserted against them jointly, severally, or in the alternative with respect to or arising out of the same transaction, occurrence, or series of transactions or occurrences; and
(B) any question of law or fact common to all defendants will arise in the action.Fed. R. Civ. P. 20(a)(2).
“Rule 20 does not authorize a plaintiff to add claims against different parties that present entirely different factual and legal issues.” Sykes v. Bayer Pharmaceutical Corp., 548 F.Supp.2d 208, 218 (E.D. Va. 2008) (internal quotation marks omitted). Moreover, “Rule 20 gives courts wide discretion concerning the permissive joinder of parties,” and the court “has discretion to deny joinder if it determines that the addition of the party under Rule 20 will not foster the objectives of the rule, but will result in prejudice, expense, or delay.” Aleman v. Chugach Support Servs., Inc., 485 F.3d 206, 218 (4th Cir. 2007) (citing 7 Charles Alan Wright, Arthur R. Miller & Mary Kay Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure § 1652 (3d ed. 2001)); see Carroll v. United States, 5:14-cv-02167-JMC, 2015 WL 854927, at *10 (D.S.C. Feb. 27, 2015) (“[T]he court has discretion to disallow joinder when it is infeasible or prejudicial.”).
Here, Plaintiff's current claims are based on alleged excessive force and false arrest by Defendants Zorn and Doe occurring in March 2020. The new claims proposed in Plaintiff's Motion, however, are based on completely different events occurring over two years later by entirely different individuals. Because the Motion seeks to add new defendants based upon unrelated claims, the Motion is denied. See Abebe v. S.C. Dep't of Corr., No. C/A 0:09-3111-MBS-PJ, 2010 WL 2991595, at *2 (D.S.C. July 2, 2010) (denying, pursuant to Rule 20(a)(2), motions to amend complaint to add new defendants based on unrelated claims); see also Nixon, 2018 WL 3728893, at *3 (denying motion for leave to supplement where plaintiff sought to add a claim related to a different event in a different facility against a different defendant and a new theory of recovery).
To the extent Plaintiff seeks to pursue these unrelated claims, he may file a new civil rights complaint detailing these allegations and naming the proper defendants, if he believes his constitutional rights have been violated.
IV. TO THE CLERK OF COURT:
The Clerk shall mail a copy of this Report and Recommendation and Order, a Complaint for Violation of Civil Rights (Prisoner Complaint) form, and the proper form documents (a summons form and six Forms USM-285) to Plaintiff.
V. CONCLUSION
For the reasons set forth above, it is RECOMMENDED that Plaintiff's Motion for a Preliminary Injunction and Restraining Order (ECF No. 81) be DENIED and that any request for injunctive relief set forth in Plaintiff's Motion for Miscellaneous Relief (ECF No. 91) be DENIED. It is ORDERED that Plaintiff's request to amend or supplement his Complaint, as set forth in ECF No. 91, is DENIED.
Plaintiff's request to set aside the Order on the Motion to Dismiss, as set forth in ECF No. 91, pertains to an Order of the District Judge. Accordingly, it should be decided by the District Judge in the first instance, such that the undersigned expresses no opinion on the request.
Notice of Right to File Objections to Report and Recommendation
The parties are advised that they may file specific written objections to this Report and Recommendation with the District Judge. Objections must specifically identify the portions of the Report and Recommendation to which objections are made and the basis for such objections. “[I]n the absence of a timely filed objection, a district court need not conduct a de novo review, but instead must ‘only satisfy itself that there is no clear error on the face of the record in order to accept the recommendation.'” Diamond v. Colonial Life & Acc. Ins. Co., 416 F.3d 310 (4th Cir. 2005) (quoting Fed.R.Civ.P. 72 advisory committee's note).
Specific written objections must be filed within fourteen (14) days of the date of service of this Report and Recommendation. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Fed.R.Civ.P. 72(b); see Fed.R.Civ.P. 6(a), (d). Filing by mail pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 5 may be accomplished by mailing objections to:
Robin L. Blume, Clerk United States District Court Post Office Box 835 Charleston, South Carolina 29402
Failure to timely file specific written objections to this Report and Recommendation will result in waiver of the right to appeal from a judgment of the District Court based upon such Recommendation. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Thomas v. Arn, 474 U.S. 140 (1985); Wright v. Collins, 766 F.2d 841 (4th Cir. 1985); United States v. Schronce, 727 F.2d 91 (4th Cir. 1984).