INDIANAPOLIS (Legal Newsline) - A judge improperly dismissed an inmate’s lawsuit after jail officials confiscated personal photographs that were sent to him in the mail, an appeals court ruled, finding that Indiana law requires the plaintiff get another chance to amend his complaint.
Tracey Wheeler sued officials at Branchville Correctional Facility after they confiscated photographs, including pictures of him graduating from vocational school and one with his daughter, that a woman mailed to him. The personal photographs violated Indiana Dept. of Corrections rules prohibiting inmates from having pictures of themselves, the officials said.
Wheeler filed a grievance and then sued the prison for negligence and other claims, saying they had lost his property. The government filed a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim, which the trial court granted with prejudice, meaning no further claims could be filed, in October 2020.
Wheeler, who was representing himself, then filed an appeal. The Indiana Court of Appeals reversed and remanded in an Oct. 18 decision, ruling that the judge shouldn’t have dismissed his case with prejudice when Indiana law allowed Wheeler one chance as of right to amend his complaint within 10 days of dismissal.
“Neither the trial court nor this Court owes Wheeler any inherent leniency simply by virtue of being self-represented,” the appeals court ruled, acknowledging the inmate “makes several confusing claims in his brief.”
A motion to dismiss under Indiana Trial Rule 12(b)(6) tests only the legal sufficiency of a claim, however, not whether the facts, the court noted. Since the law gives plaintiffs the right to amend their complaint at least once after a 12(b)(6) dismissal, the court ruled, “it is indisputable that the trial court erred both in dismissing Wheeler’s complaint with prejudice and in failing to rule on (effectively denying) his motion to amend.”
“No matter how we view his odds of success on the merits down the road, he deserves, at the very least, the right to amend his complaint,” the court concluded. In a footnote, the judges said that “moving forward,” the trial judge might want to screen Wheeler’s claims under Indiana’s Frivolous Prisoner Claim Statute, which is designed to halt meritless prisoner lawsuits.