Facts

Thedford Leon Kersh was a California prisoner housed at California Men's Colony State Prison (CMC). On March 1, 2021, Kersh, proceeding pro se and granted in forma pauperis status, filed a civil rights complaint against Josie Gastelo, former warden of CMC, in her individual capacity, alleging constitutional violations. On April 14, 2022, Kersh filed a first amended complaint adding D. Samuel, Chief Deputy Warden at CMC, as a defendant. Kersh sought $75,000 in punitive and $75,000 in compensatory damages as well as an injunction ordering CMC to place all dorm beds four-feet apart to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and requiring two health inspectors to visit the dorms to evaluate the health and safety conditions.

PLAINTIFF'S CONTENTIONS: Plaintiff alleged that defendants violated his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment by failing to reduce dorm capacity from sixty inmates per dorm to twenty to decrease transmission of COVID-19. Additionally, plaintiff contended that defendants violated his Fourteenth Amendment rights by failing to follow state and federal guidelines to provide for six feet of distance between beds, which resulted in the rapid transmission of COVID within the prison and caused two preventable inmate deaths. Moreover, defendants acted with deliberate indifference by failing to require all beds to be placed six feet apart after a COVID outbreak in the East dorm and by allowing plaintiff's grievance appeal to expire so as to preclude CMC from being required to respond to plaintiff's claims. Additionally, plaintiff alleged that Gastelo mispresented the dorm configuration to the head office by ordering her staff to take photographs of an area of the dorm with beds placed six feet apart from one another when in actuality all the other beds in the room were placed two feet apart. Finally, plaintiff argued that defendants knew of the presence of black mold in dorm two, which along with the COVID transmissibility, created a dangerous living situation for inmates.

DEFENDANTS' CONTENTIONS: Defendants alleged that plaintiff failed to state a cognizable Eighth or Fourteenth Amendment claim because there was no casual connection between defendants' acts and plaintiff's harm and their alleged failure to impose social distancing was not enough to show deliberate indifference since CMC took other measures to decrease the transmission of COVID-19. Further, defendants contended that they are entitled to qualified immunity.

Result

The court granted defendants' motion for judgment on the pleadings and dismissed the action with prejudice.