The opinion
NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
DISTRICT OF NEW JERSEY
CHARLES MCCOY,
Plaintifl Civil Action No, 23-21272 (KMW) (EAP)
‘ OPINION
BECKY SCOTT, et al.,
Defendants.
WILLIAMS, District Judge:
This matter comes before the Court on the Court’s sua sponte screening of Plaintiff Charles
McCoy’s complaint. (ECF No. 1.) As Plaintiff paid the applicable filing fee and is a prisoner
who seeks redress from the employees of a governmental entity, this Court is required to screen
his complaint pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915A and dismiss any claim which is frivolous, malicious,
fails to state a claim for which relief may be granted, or seeks relief from an immune defendant.
For the reasons set forth below, Plaintiff's complaint shall be dismissed without prejudice.
IL. BACKGROUND
Plaintiff is a state prisoner currently confined in the Hudson County jail. (ECF No. 1 at 3.)
He is currently detained on drug charges arising out of controlled purchase of controlled substances
made by a state police source in October 2022. (See ECF No. 2 at 1-19.) In his current complaint,
Plaintiff seeks to raise civil rights claims against the warden of the jail and a multitude of
employees of the New Jersey State Police based on his belief that these figures “utilized various
acts of official misconduct and or condoned; overlooked or conspired to commit such acts as
tainted/falsified documents, use of tainted [confidential sources]; illegal search [and] seizure and
etc.” Ud. at 4-10.) Plaintiff's complaint is devoid of specific allegations as to what Defendant
took what actions, and he fails to specify in what way he believes various documents or testimony
against him was “tainted” or “false,” but it appears he believes that at least some of the Defendants
conspired to trump up the charges against him by “tainting” or “falsifying” documents including
police reports, laboratory reports, and evidence receipts, resulting in his current criminal charges.
at 6-10.) Although Plaintiff attaches various police reports, evidence slips, and lab reports to
his complaint (see ECF No. 2), nothing in those reports indicates what about them Plaintiff believes
to be false or tainted, or in what way they are allegedly inaccurate. Plaintiff also provides a list of
names of other prisoners he believes have suffered similar misconduct, and while Plaintiff appears
to believe that some may be interested in pursuing their own claims through the form of a class
action, none of the listed additional prisoners have signed his complaint or expressed a direct
interest in joining Plaintiff. (See ECF No. 2 at 18-19.)
IL. LEGAL STANDARD
Because Plaintiff is a prisoner who seeks redress from employees of governmental entities,
this Court is required to screen his complaint pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915A. Pursuant to the
statute, this Court must sua sponte dismiss any claim that is frivolous, malicious, fails to state a
claim upon which relief may be granted, or seeks monetary relief from a defendant who is immune
from such relief. Jd The legal standard for dismissing a complaint for failure to state a claim
pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915A is “identical to the legal standard employed in ruling on [Rule]
12(b)(6) motions.” Courteau v. United States, 287 F. App’x 159, 162 (3d Cir. 2008).
In deciding a motion to dismiss pursuant to Fed. R. Civ. P, 12(b)(6), a district court is
required to accept as true all factual allegations in the complaint and draw all reasonable inferences
from those allegations in the light most favorable to the plaintiff, see Phillips v. Cnty. of Allegheny,
515 F.3d 224, 228 (3d Cir. 2008), but need not accept as true legal conclusions couched as factual
allegations. Papasan y. Allain, 478 U.S. 265, 286 (1986). A complaint need not contain “detailed
factual allegations” to survive a motion to dismiss, but must contain “more than an unadorned, the-
defendant-unlawfully-harmed-me accusation.” Ashcroft v. Igbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009). A
complaint “that offers ‘labels and conclusions’ or ‘a formulaic recitation of the elements of a cause
of action will not do,”” and a complaint will not “suffice” if it provides only “naked assertion|s]’
devoid of ‘further factual enhancement.”” Jd. (quoting Bell Atlantic v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544,
555, 557 (2007)). “To survive a motion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual
matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Jd, (quoting
Lwombly, 550 U.S. at 570). “A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual
content that aliows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the
misconduct alleged.” Jd. (quoting Twombly, 550 U.S. at 556). A complaint that provides facts
“merely consistent with” the defendant’s liability “stops short of the line between possibility and
plausibility” and will not survive review under Rule 12(b)(6). fd. (quoting Twombly, 555 U.S. at
557). While pro se pleadings are to be liberally construed in conducting such an analysis, pro se
litigants must still “allege sufficient facts in their complaints to support a claim.” Mala v. Crown
Bay Marina, Inec., 704 F.3d 239, 245 (3d Cir. 2013).
lil. DESCUSSION
In his current complaint, Plaintiff seeks to sue the warden of the jail in which he is housed
and a number of state police employees for alleged “tainting” and “falsifying” of documents and
testimony in his state criminal proceedings. Plaintiff's complaint, however, is devoid of any details
as to who he believes falsified or tainted those documents, how they are false or tainted, and in
what way those alleged issues impacted him other than to result in his pending criminal
proceedings and current imprisonment,
To plead a plausible claim for relief under § 1983, a plaintiff must plead facts which would
show that the named defendants had personal involvement in the alleged wrongs; a claim may not
be based solely on a vicarious theory of supervisory liability. Chavarriaga v. N.J. Dep’t of Corr,
806 F.3d 210, 222 Gd Cir, 2015) (citing Rode v. Dellarciprete, 845 F.2d 1195, 1207 (3d Cir.
1988)). A supervisor’s “[p]ersonal involvement can be shown through allegations of personal
direction or of actual knowledge and acquiescence. Allegations of participation or actual
knowledge and acquiescence, however, must be made with appropriate particularity.” Rode, 845
F.2d at 1207. Alternatively, a plaintiff seeking to show personal involvement for a supervisor may
plead facts which show that the alleged constitutional violation is the result of a policy, practice,
or custom put into effect by the supervisor. See Natale v. Camden Cnty, Corr. Facility, 318 F.3d
575, 583-84 (3d Cir. 2003). A policy, practice, or custom will be the cause of an alleged violation
where it is the “moving force” behind the violation. City of Canton v. Harris, 489 U.S, 378, 389
(1989); see also Los Angeles Cnty. v. Humphries, 562. U.S. 29, 35-36 (2010).
. A plaintiff may not plead personal involvement by way of group pleading — i.e., naming a
litany of defendants all of whom held different positions and were presumably involved in different
ways and alleging wrongs as to each member of this group of Defendants without specifically
pleading how each was involved. See, e.g, Galicki v. New Jersey, No. 14-169, 2015 WL 3970297
at *2 (D.N.J. June 29, 2015) (citing Aruanno v. Main, 467 F. App'x 134, 137-38 (3d Cir, 2012));
Falat v. County of Hunterdon, 2013 WL 1163751 at * 3 (D.N.J. Mar. 19, 2013). A Plaintiff must
actually plead facts as to “which defendants engaged in what wrongful conduct.” Fala, 2013 WL
1163751 at *3. Blanket allegations of conspiracy will also be insufficient to show personal
involvement absent direct factual allegations as to the elements of a conspiracy for each named
Defendant — agreement and concerted action. See Startzell v. City of Phila., 533 F.3d 183, 205 (3d
Cir. 2008). The “bare allegation of an agreement is insufficient to sustain a conspiracy claim,”
Brown vy. Deparlos, 492 F. App’x 211, 215 (3d Cir. 2012), and a Plaintiff may not show a
conspiracy by merely asserting that two parties’ actions had the same result or were the result of
even “conscious parallelism” without specific allegations supporting agreement and concerted
action as to each defendant. Desposito v. New Jersey, No. 14-1641, 2015 WL 2131073, at *14
(D.N.J. May 5, 2015).
In this case, although Plaintiff asserts that the Defendants “conspired” to taint evidence in
the investigation that led to his arrest, he fails to plead actual facts supporting agreement and
concerted action for each named Defendant. His complaint likewise relies entirely on group
pleading — he does not identify what Defendant took what action, he does not allege how each was
personally involved, and he does not identify how the evidence against him was “tainted” or
“falsified,” or how said taint violated his rights.! As Plaintiff has thus failed to plead the personal
involvement of the named Defendants, and has failed to adequately plead a conspiracy, his
complaint fails to state a plausible claim for relief even had Plaintiff actually pled more than a
conclusory allegation as to allegedly falsified evidence.’ Plaintiff's complaint shall therefore be
dismissed without prejudice for failure to state a plausible claim for relief at this time?
' That a confidential source had a criminal record or intended to buy drugs, for example, does not
render actions taken on his information fundamentally improper. See, e.g., United States v. Brown,
No, 21-9, 2022 WL 17834065, at *4 (M.D, Pa. Dec. 21, 2022). .
* Generally, it is the use of fabricated evidence at trial, rather than mere fabrication or tainting of
evidence, that will result in an actionable constitutional violation. See, e.g., Halsey v. Pfeiffer,
750 F.3d 273, 294-95 (3d Cir. 2014). If Plaintiff can plead facts indicating how the alleged taint
and/or fabrications rendered search or arrest warrant applications faulty, however, he may yet be
able to plead a plausible claim for relief under the Fourth Amendment.
3 Because Plaintiffs complaint will be dismissed without prejudice in its entirety, this Court need
not address Plaintiff's suggestion that his complaint could become a vehicle for a class or group
action against the state police at this time. The Court notes, however, that even assuming the other
prisoners Plaintiff identified were interested in such an action, Plaintiff's complaint pleads no
specific allegations regarding how anyone other than himself was in any way subjected to improper
IV. CONCLUSION
For the reasons expressed above, Plaintiff's complaint (ECF No. 1) is DISMISSED
WITHOUT PREJUDICE in its entirety. An order consistent with this Opinion will be entered.
on) Karen M. Williams,
United States District Judge
action by the New Jersey State Police, and thus does not even attempt to plead a group or class
action.
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