Saddozai v. Davis

UPDATE: The Ninth Circuit sided with our client, holding that so long as a prisoner-plaintiff completes the prison’s grievance process before filing their amended complaint, they can’t be kicked out of court. We are proud that Mr. Saddozai will get his day in court and glad that the Ninth Circuit affirmed that basic principles of civil procedure apply even to our clients behind bars.

An incarcerated person seeking relief for constitutional violations in federal court must clear a number of hurdles before their claims are heard. One such hurdle is the exhaustion requirement of the Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA). Under § 1997e(a) of the PLRA, an incarcerated person must fully complete the institution’s grievance process, regardless of whether the redress they are seeking is available to them through that process. Only after completing each stage of the prison’s oftentimes opaque and confusing administrative review process can an incarcerated plaintiff bring their suit in federal court. If a court determines that the plaintiff has missed a step in the process, their case will be dismissed for a failure to exhaust. Should that plaintiff wish to continue pursuing their claims in federal court, they must pay hundreds of dollars in filing fees to re-file the exact same case—just at a later, post-exhaustion date.

After being transferred from protective custody, Shikeb Saddozai was brutally attacked and beaten by other incarcerated individuals. A correctional officer eventually intervened and shot Mr. Saddozai multiple times in the process. Mr. Saddozai brought suit in federal court, seeking relief for his injuries. However, his case was shortly dismissed by the district court under the PLRA’s exhaustion provision for his alleged failure to exhaust, even though the court concluded that he had ultimately exhausted his administrative remedies while his suit was pending and before the relevant amended complaint was filed.

We represent Mr. Saddozai on appeal before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. Our opening brief argues that because Ninth Circuit precedent and the ordinary federal rules of pleading dictate that an original complaint is superseded by subsequent amended complaints, Mr. Saddozai’s amended complaint – filed after he had fully exhausted his administrative remedies – should control a court’s exhaustion analysis. In other words, the only pleading that mattered for the district court’s exhaustion analysis was Mr. Saddozai’s amended complaint, and therefore his case should not have been dismissed for a failure to exhaust. In support of Mr. Saddozai’s argument, a broad coalition of organizations that advocate for the rights of incarcerated individuals filed an amicus brief authored by Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler highlighting the high costs associated with incarceration and the detrimental financial effects of requiring incarcerated plaintiffs to pay twice to file the same lawsuit.