# Sadler

> District Court, S.D. Illinois · December 29, 2025

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/11232815

## Case

- **Full name:** Larry D. Johnson v. Bradley Sadler, Jared Phillips, Aaron Taylor, Troy Slinkard, Tyler Robinson, Tyler Choate, Anthony Wills, Matthew Dulaney, Jane Doe
- **Court:** District Court, S.D. Illinois
- **Decided:** December 29, 2025
- **Opinion:** 100trialcourt
- **Cited by:** 0 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/11232815

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- finding the process unavailable where mixed messages about how to proceed made the process obscure
- finding that the jail grievance process was unavailable to an inmate who was hospitalized after excessive force and had no information about how to file a grievance
- discussing an inmate’s ability to understand the process in light of his IQ, as well as the possibility the inmate was given misinformation about the process

## Opinion text

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS

LARRY D. JOHNSON, M22661, )
)
Plaintiff, )
)
vs. )
) Case No. 24-cv-1385-DWD
BRADLEY SADLER, )
JARED PHILLIPS, )
AARON TAYLOR, )
TROY SLINKARD, )
TYLER ROBINSON, )
TYLER CHOATE, )
ANTHONY WILLS, )
MATTHEW DULANEY, )
JANE DOE, )
)
Defendants. )

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

DUGAN, District Judge:
Plaintiff Larry Johnson, an inmate of the Illinois Department of Corrections
(IDOC) currently incarcerated at Pontiac Correctional Center, brings this action pursuant
to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for alleged deprivations of his constitutional rights at Menard
Correctional Center (Menard). Plaintiff alleges that the Defendants used excessive force
against him and that Defendant Wills failed to take action in response to grievances about
the incident. Defendants filed a Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. 51) on the issue of
whether Plaintiff exhausted his administrative remedies prior to filing this lawsuit, as
required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a). Plaintiff timely replied
(Doc. 52) and the matter is now ripe for consideration. For reasons explained,
Defendants’ Motion is denied, and this case may proceed to merits discovery.
BACKGROUND

Plaintiff initiated this lawsuit by filing a Complaint on May 24, 2024, and by filing
an amended complaint (Doc. 7) on June 6, 2024. Plaintiff alleged that on October 10, 2023,
Defendants Sadler, Phillips, Taylor, Slinkard, and Robinson used excessive force against
him while he was on the prison yard. (Doc. 7 at 10). He specifically alleges that they
sprayed him with insprajet and mace, shot him with pepper balls, and otherwise
physically battered him. During the fracas, Defendant Dulaney grabbed and squeezed
his genitals and also tore out some of his dreadlocks. (Doc. 7 at 11). Plaintiff was escorted

to a room where he was cuffed to a stool that was attached to the floor. Defendant Sadler
then entered the room and struck Plaintiff’s face with a closed fist. Defendant Choate
also entered and sprayed Plaintiff’s face with mace while Plaintiff was restrained. (Doc.
7 at 11). Plaintiff alleges that Jane Doe nurse entered the room to check his blood pressure
but otherwise refused care despite his pleas for help and his visible injuries. (Doc. 7 at

11).
Plaintiff alleges he filed multiple grievances about the incident and his desire for
medical care, but as of April of 2024 he had not received the care he desired. He argues
that Defendant Wills must have been aware of his condition because some of the
grievances were submitted as emergencies and Wills was a signatory on those grievances.

Plaintiff also contacted the Governor’s Office about the lack of a response from the prison,
and in December of 2023 he got a responsive memorandum from Wills indicating an
investigation was ongoing and that Plaintiff would be notified of the outcome. (Doc. 7 at
12, 30). Plaintiff’s complaint included additional allegations that were severed into
separate lawsuits because they concerned temporally distinct incidents.

The Court allowed Plaintiff to proceed on the following claims:
Claim 1: Eighth Amendment excessive force claim against
Defendants Sadler, Dulaney, Phillips, Taylor, Slinkard,
Robinson, and Choate, for their conduct on October 10,
2023;

Claim 2: Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim against
Jane Doe 1 for denying Plaintiff medical care on October 10,
2023;

Claim 3: Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim against
Defendant Wills for failing to thoroughly investigate
Plaintiff’s multiple grievances;

(Doc. 12).
The parties undertook discovery on the exhaustion of administrative remedies,
and in doing so they have identified one grievance relevant to the exact claims in this
case. They have also identified other grievances that are tangentially related. Plaintiff
has submitted a response accompanied by relevant exhibits that detail his efforts to
follow the status of his grievances.
FINDINGS OF FACT

On October 18, 2023, Plaintiff filed grievance K4-1023-0914 as an emergency, but
on October 25, 2023, Warden Wills deemed the grievance a non-emergency. The
grievance alleges:
I am grieving the fact that on 10/10/23 at around 2pm on the restrictive
housing yard #5 I was extracted by tactical team members by excessive
force. During the extraction I was punched, kicked, sprayed with multiple
cans of mace, the insprajet and shot with multiple pepper balls. Once I was
detained and in cuffs on the ground the tact team members continued to
punch and kick me in my face, head, and body. One tact team member even
intentionally pulled some of my dreadlocks out of the back of my head and
told he me is keeping them as a souvenir and trophy. Once removed from
the yard the officers escorting me inside of the North 2 building’s infirmary
the officers deliberately ran my head into the gate opening before going
inside the building. Once inside the infirmary I was taken to the interview
room to the furthest left and cuffed to the floor and ordered to sit there and
don’t move. Then Lt. B. Sadler entered the room in a rage and hit me in the
face while I was cuffed, shackled, and chained to the floor. Then he left and
a few minutes later another tact team member came and stood at the door
of the interview room I was in and sprayed mace into my face while I was
cuffed, shackled and chained to the floor.

(Doc. 51-7 at 3-4). The grievance was stamped as received for first level of review on
October 26, 2023, and for second level review on November 13, 2023. (Doc. 51-7 at 3). On
July 1, 2024,1 a grievance officer recommended that the grievance be deemed resolved
because the matter was pending investigation by internal affairs. (Doc. 51-7 at 1). On
July 9, 2024, Warden Kevin Reichert concurred with the grievance officer’s response. The
Administrative Review Board (ARB) received Plaintiff’s grievance on July 17, 2024, and
a member of the ARB declared that on July 31, 2024, the grievance was still awaiting a
disposition from the ARB. (Decl. of Paige Long, Doc. 51-6 at p.4 ¶ 11). In response to the
Motion for Summary Judgment, Plaintiff supplied a final disposition from the ARB for
grievance K4-1023-0914, dated August 6, 2024. The disposition indicated the ARB
deemed the matter “Resolved. The investigation into this matter is ongoing.” (Doc. 52 at
26).

1 The grievance officer’s response had a “date of review” of April 29, 2024, but the grievance officer’s electronic
signature on the recommendation line was dated July 1, 2024. (Doc. 51-7 at 1).
In relation to grievance K4-1023-0914, Plaintiff also tendered handwritten request
slips that he submitted at the prison inquiring about the status of the grievance. On April

18, 2024, he was informed that grievance K4-1023-0914 had been answered on November
1, 2023, and returned to him. (Doc. 52 at 22). When he inquired a second time, on April
25, 2024, he was informed that the grievance was pending second level review. (Doc. 52
at 23). These queries and the responses from the prison are also cataloged in Plaintiff’s
CHAMPS counseling summary. (Doc. 51-4 at 4). Plaintiff also tendered copies of
correspondence from the Governor’s Office from December 4, 2023, acknowledging

receipt of correspondence from him, and a December 8, 2023, memorandum from
Defendant Wills indicating he had received correspondence from the Governor’s Office
and that an investigation into Plaintiff’s allegations was ongoing and that he would be
notified of the decision. (Doc. 52 at 42-43).
Aside from grievance K4-1023-0914, Plaintiff submitted two additional grievances

on October 18, 2023—grievances K4-1023-0906 and K4-1023-0916. Grievance K4-1023-
0916 concerned Defendant Dulaney’s alleged conduct of grabbing and squeezing
Plaintiff’s genitals during the yard incident. (Doc. 52 at 38-39). On October 25, 2023,
Defendant Wills expedited the grievance for emergency processing, and on October 26,
2023, a grievance officer recommended the grievance be deemed resolved because it was

forwarded to internal affairs for investigation and PREA protocol was initiated. (Doc. 52
at 36. Wills concurred with this recommendation on November 3, 2023. (Doc. 52 at 36).
On March 19, 2024, the ARB denied grievance K4-1023-0916 because the internal affairs
investigation concluded the allegations were unsubstantiated. (Doc. 52 at 41). Plaintiff
also included a March 25, 2024, memorandum from Warden Wills informing him that his
allegations were found to be unsubstantiated and that he could grieve that finding if he

wished to challenge it. (Doc. 52 at 44).
By contrast, grievance K4-1023-0906 was deemed a non-emergency and was
forwarded to the counselor for a first level response on October 26, 2023. (Doc. 52 at 35).
This grievance described Plaintiff’s injuries from the battering and his desire for care.
(Doc. 52 at 54-55). In the grievance, Plaintiff clearly described the interaction with Jane
Doe 1 whom he alleges took his blood pressure but otherwise refused treatment despite

his visible injuries. Plaintiff explained that he was unable to get Jane Doe 1’s name
because she refused to give it to him, and he could not see due to the mace in his eyes.
He also explained he is legally blind without special contact lenses, and the mace
impaired the function of his contacts. (Doc. 52 at 55). On February 5, 2025, a memo was
sent from the nursing supervisor to the counselor/grievance office concerning grievance

K4-1023-0906. The nursing supervisor indicated she was writing in response to the
grievance transmitted to her office for a response on November 1, 2023. She indicated
that Plaintiff was seen for chemical exposure on October 10, 2023, and for right side pain
on November 24, 2023. She noted he was seen by the doctor on July 1, 2024. In sum, she
indicated that Plaintiff’s medical needs had been addressed as of the writing of the memo

on February 5, 2025. (Doc. 52 at 56). The Menard grievance log submitted by the
Defendants reflects that grievance K4-1023-0906 still had not yet been returned by the
grievance office to Plaintiff, and the log contains no final disposition for the grievance.
(Doc. 51-2 at 2). This is in contrast to grievances K4-1023-0914 and K4-1023-0916, which
both show on the log dates for processing at all levels of Menard review, as well as final
dispositions. (Doc. 51-2 at 2). The original copy of grievance K4-1023-0906 indicates that

the counselor signed off on the grievance for it to be returned to Plaintiff on February 11,
2025. (Doc. 52 at 54).
Plaintiff also included a July 26, 2024, memorandum from Defendant Wills
indicating that he was in receipt of concerns Plaintiff sent to the Governor’s office about
grievance processing. (Doc. 52 at 69). In the memo, Wills indicated that grievance records
showed Plaintiff’s grievances had been received and were being processed. Plaintiff was

advised to send written correspondence to the grievance office if he wished to know the
status of a specific grievance. (Doc. 52 at 69).
CONCLUSIONS OF LAW
A. Legal Standards

Summary judgment is proper if there is no genuine issue as to any material fact
and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. FED. R. CIV. P. 56(a). In
determining a summary judgment motion, the Court views the facts in the light most
favorable to, and draws all reasonable inferences in favor of, the nonmoving party. Apex
Digital, Inc. v. Sears, Roebuck & Co., 735 F.3d 962, 965 (7th Cir. 2013) (citation omitted).
Courts generally cannot resolve factual disputes on a motion for summary judgment. See
Tolan v. Cotton, 572 U.S. 650, 656 (2014) (“[A] judge’s function at summary judgment is
not to weigh the evidence and determine the truth of the matter but to determine whether
there is a genuine issue for trial.”) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted).

However, when the motion for summary judgment pertains to a prisoner’s failure to
exhaust administrative remedies, the Seventh Circuit has instructed courts to conduct an
evidentiary hearing and resolve contested issues of fact regarding a prisoner’s efforts to

exhaust. Pavey v. Conley, 544 F.3d 739, 742 (7th Cir. 2008).2 After hearing evidence,
finding facts, and determining credibility, the court must decide whether to allow the
claim to proceed or to dismiss it for failure to exhaust. Wilborn v. Ealey, 881 F.3d 998, 1004
(7th Cir. 2018). The court is not required to conduct an evidentiary hearing if there is no
genuine dispute of material fact, and the determination is purely legal. See e.g., Walker v.
Harris, 2021 WL 3287832 * 1 (S.D. Ill 2021); Miller v. Wexford Health Source, Inc., 2017 WL

951399 *2 (S.D. Ill. 2017).
The Prison Litigation Reform Act (PLRA) provides that a prisoner may not bring
a lawsuit about prison conditions unless and until he has exhausted all available
administrative remedies. 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a); Pavey, 544 F.3d at 740. “The exhaustion
requirement is an affirmative defense, which the defendants bear the burden of proving.”

Pavey v. Conley, 663 F.3d 899, 903 (7th Cir. 2011). For a prisoner to properly exhaust his
administrative remedies, the prisoner must “file complaints and appeals in the place, and
at the time, the prison’s administrative rules require.” Pozo v. McCaughtry, 286 F.3d 1022,
1025 (7th Cir. 2002). “[A] prisoner who does not properly take each step within the
administrative process has failed to exhaust state remedies.” Id. at 1024.

2 The Supreme Court’s recent opinion in Perttu v. Richards, 605 U.S. 460 (2025), held that if the facts
necessary for a ruling on exhaustion are intertwined with the merits of the claim, a jury trial is required.
But the Perttu Court did not go so far as to extend the Seventh Amendment right to a jury trial to all
exhaustion disputes. In this case, there is no intertwinement of the facts, so Perttu does not require that this
issue be determined at a jury trial.
There are no exceptions to the exhaustion requirement, however, the Supreme
Court and Seventh Circuit have emphasized in recent years that the exhaustion process

must be available. An ”available” remedy is one that is “capable of use for the
accomplishment of a purpose” and “is accessible or may be obtained.” Crouch v. Brown,
27 F.4th 1315, 1320 (7th Cir. 2022) citing Ross v. Blake, 578 U.S. 632, 642 (2016). If
availability is at issue, the Court must resolve that issue before proceeding to the merits
of the exhaustion dispute. Wallace v. Baldwin, 55 F.4th 535, 539 (7th Cir. 2022) (the district
court must first consider the threshold question of if exhaustion was available). There

are three circumstances that might support a finding of unavailability: (1) a process may
be unavailable if it is so opaque that it becomes incapable of use; (2) a process may be
unavailable if administrators thwart an inmate from using it via machination,
misrepresentation, or intimidation; or, (3) a process may be unavailable if it operates as a
“dead end” with officers unable or consistently unwilling to provide any relief for

aggrieved inmates. Ross v. Blake, 578 U.S. 632, 643-44 (2016).
In Dole and Gooch, the Seventh Circuit considered situations where a process was
unavailable due to acts or misrepresentations by prison administrators. See Dole v.
Chandler, 438 F.3d 804, 809 (7th Cir. 2006) (finding that an inmate did all he could to
exhaust a grievance when he placed the appeal in his cell bars for mailing, but it got lost

and he had no direction on what to do about a lost grievance); Gooch v. Young, 24 F.4th
624 (7th Cir. 2022) (finding the grievance process was unavailable where prison staff
threatened Plaintiff and refused to give him the appropriate grievance form). In
Hernandez, Smallwood, and Reid the Seventh Circuit considered instances when a process
was unavailable due to complexity or an inmate’s inability to use the process. See
Hernandez v. Dart, 814 F.3d 836, 842-43 (7th Cir. 2016) (finding that the jail grievance

process was unavailable to an inmate who was hospitalized after excessive force and had
no information about how to file a grievance); Smallwood v. Williams, 59 F.4th 306 (7th Cir.
2023) (discussing an inmate’s ability to understand the process in light of his IQ, as well
as the possibility the inmate was given misinformation about the process); Reid v. Balota,
962 F.3d 325, 330 (7th Cir. 2020) (finding the process unavailable where mixed messages
about how to proceed made the process obscure). Finally, in Wallace v. Baldwin, the

Seventh Circuit recently remanded a case to the district court for a more thorough
consideration of the availability in light of the inmates’ allegations that the process was a
dead end for their particular issue. 55 F.4th 535 (7th Cir. 2022) (finding that the district
court should have considered the inmates’ evidence that other inmates got no response
to grievances about double-celling, as well as the evidence the prison may simply reject

a double-celling grievance as lacking merit).
As an inmate in the IDOC, Plaintiff was required to follow the grievance process
outlined in the Illinois Administrative Code. 20 ILL. ADMIN. CODE § 504.800, et seq. (2017).
An inmate may request that a grievance be handled as an emergency by forwarding it
directly to the CAO. 20 ILL. ADMIN. CODE § 504.840. If it is determined that there exists a

substantial risk of imminent personal injury or other serious or irreparable harm, the
grievance is handled on an emergency basis, which allows for expedited processing of
the grievance. Id.
If the inmate is not satisfied with the CAO’s response, he can file an appeal with
the IDOC Director through the Administrative Review Board (ARB). 20 ILL. ADMIN. CODE

§ 504.850(a). The ARB must receive the appeal within 30 days of the date of the CAO’s
decision. Id. The inmate must attach copies of the responses from the grievance officer
and CAO to his appeal. Id. If an inmate is appealing a grievance that the CAO
determined to be of an emergency nature, then the ARB shall expedite processing of the
appeal. 20 ILL. ADMIN. CODE § 504.850(f).
B. Analysis

The Defendants contend that Plaintiff simply sued before exhausting his remedies,
while Plaintiff counters that the grievance process was not available. Specifically,
Plaintiff contends he did not know what to do about a grievance that was not garnering
a response, he feared his grievance was lost, and he believed the response would be a
dead end based on a similar response he got to a grievance filed the same day. The Court

must resolve the issue of availability before considering the substantive dispute about
exhaustion.
The Defendants contend that the grievance process was available by reference to
other grievances that Plaintiff filed and fully exhausted during the relevant timeframe.
They also provided evidence that in April of 2024, Plaintiff inquired multiple times about

the status of grievance K4-1023-0914, and on both occasions he was provided a timely
update indicating the grievance was still being processed.
By contrast, Plaintiff contends he encountered delayed response times on multiple
occasions with relation to the excessive force incident that is the subject of this lawsuit,
and he also received responses he perceived as indications the grievance process was a
dead end. First, as to delayed grievance processing, Plaintiff’s exhibits demonstrate that

he filed at least six grievances about the alleged incident of excessive force. Grievances
K4-1023-0906 (filed 10/18/23), K4-1123-1482 (filed 11/17/23), K4-1123-1593 (filed
11/19/23), and K4-1123-1772 (filed 11/29/23) all dealt with his desire for medical care
for his injuries. Grievance K4-1023-0914 (filed 10/18/23) dealt with the staff conduct
during the excessive force, and Grievance K4-1023-0916 (filed 10/18/23) dealt with an
alleged sexual assault by a defendant during the incident. The first three medical

grievances were denied emergency status, and it does not appear from the record
evidence that they got any responses until at least February 11, 2025. Specifically,
grievances K4-1023-0906, K4-1123-1482, and K4-1123-1593 are all listed in the Defendants’
grievance processing chart as overdue for a response, with no indication that they ever
got responses even from the first level counselor stage. (Doc. 51-3 at 2). Despite the lack

of evidence from the Defendants about the four medical grievances, Plaintiff submitted
first level counselor responses accompanied by memorandums from the healthcare unit
that were all dated February 11, 2025. (Doc. 52 at 54-62). Grievance K4-1123-1772 was
submitted on November 29, 2023, concerning Plaintiff’s ongoing injuries from the alleged
excessive force and it was deemed an emergency by Warden Wills on December 1, 2023.

(Doc. 52 at 48-49). Despite being deemed an emergency by the Warden, the grievance
did not get a response from the grievance office until November 20, 2024, nearly an
ENTIRE YEAR after the Warden deemed it an emergency. (Doc. 52 at 47). Collectively,
the four medical grievances show a substantial delay or total non-response in the
processing of Plaintiff’s grievances about the excessive force incident.

Grievances K4-1023-0914 and K4-1023-0916 took a slightly different trajectory than
the medical grievances. Grievance K4-1023-0916 concerning the alleged sexual
misconduct by Defendant Dulaney was deemed an emergency by the Warden on October
25, 2023, and by November 3, 2023, it had completed the entire grievance process at
Menard. (Doc. 52 at 50-53). The institution recommended the grievance be resolved
because an investigation was ongoing into the alleged misconduct. On March 19, 2024,

the Administrative Review Board found the issue appropriately addressed by the prison
and denied the grievance because the internal investigation had determined the
allegations of sexual misconduct were not substantiated. (Doc. 52 at 41). On March 25,
2024, Warden Wills sent Plaintiff a memorandum summarizing the findings of the
internal investigation that indicated his concerns were unsubstantiated, but noted he had

a right to grieve the findings of the investigation. (Doc. 52 at 42).
By contrast, Grievance K4-1023-0914 about the alleged excessive force by staff was
denied emergency status on October 25, 2023. (Doc. 52 at 26). The grievance was
returned from the first level review by the counselor on November 3, 2023, and it was
received for grievance officer review on November 13, 2023. (Doc. 51-3 at 2). Plaintiff

wrote the Governor’s Office about the issue in December of 2023, and in December of
2023 Warden Wills wrote him a responsive memorandum indicating the investigation
was ongoing. (Doc. 52 at 42-43). On April 19, 2024, Plaintiff wrote his counselor for an
update and was told K4-1023-0914 had been returned to him in November. (Doc. 52 at
22). On April 25, 2024, he wrote for another update and was told K4-1023-0914 was
pending second level review. On July 9, 2024, K4-1023-0914 was deemed resolved by the

grievance officer and Warden because the internal investigation was ongoing. (Doc. 52
at 27). On August 6, 2024, the ARB deemed the grievance resolved because the
investigation by internal affairs was ongoing. (Doc. 52 at 30).
The facts Plaintiff has presented demonstrate characteristics of all three types of
unavailability. The four medical grievances, including one that was deemed an
emergency, took between a year and nearly sixteen months to receive responses. In the

approximately sixteen months, three of the medical grievances only received first level
counselor responses, with no indication in the records of if they have ever been fully
processed by the prison to date. Plaintiff’s grievance about the excessive force also took
nine months to be processed at all levels of review. While this is not quite as extreme, it
is noteworthy that he inquired about the status in December of 2023 and April of 2024

only to be ambiguously told the investigation was ongoing with no projection about
when it might conclude. Together, these facts suggest a scenario where the grievance
process was practically unavailable due to the dilatory nature of the prison’s grievance
processing. Plaintiff argues that because the grievance process has an aspirational
deadline for grievances to be processed by the grievance officer within 2 months, that

these long processing times alone show unavailability. Though the 2-month timeframe
is not treated as concrete in the caselaw, it is fair to argue that processing that took
anywhere from 9-16 months is nowhere near the goal of completion within 2 months
when reasonably feasible. Plaintiff’s unavailability argument related to the timeliness of
grievance processing is well-placed and plausibly supports a finding the process was
unavailable because the prison refused to process the grievances for an inexcusably long

time.
Aside from the slow processing, Plaintiff also argues that the grievance process
was a dead end for grievance K4-1023-0914 because he knew from grievance K4-1023-
0916 that prison officials would merely state an investigation was ongoing without taking
any substantive action. This theory is supported by Plaintiff’s own experience in this case
because both grievances K4-1023-0916 and K4-1023-0914 got the boilerplate response

from prison officials at the local institutional level that the matter was being investigated
internally, and thus the grievance would be deemed resolved. This form of deference,
with no guidance on when the investigation might conclude or if Plaintiff could have any
input, is like getting no response at all or like officials refusing to address the issue for
non-substantive reasons. Since the Wallace case that set forth the standards for finding a

dead end in the grievance context, a handful of district courts have addressed the dead-
end theory3 and only one the undersigned located found that a dead end was established.
In Adamczyk v. IDOC, 2025 WL 2771380 at *5 (S.D. Ill. Sept. 29, 2025), a judge
concluded that the grievance process was a dead end for a civil detainee seeking to
challenge punitive conditions of his confinement because, in response, grievance officers

indicated that conditions were an administrative decision that they did not control. The

3 See e.g., Dagans v. Cecil, 2024 WL 3830275 (S.D. Ill. Aug. 15, 2024) (finding that Plaintiff’s conclusory
allegations that the officers did not respond to his grievances were not enough to demonstrate a dead end);
Austin v. Rhoades, 2023 WL 2374361 (S.D. Ill. Mar. 6, 2023) (finding that a Plaintiff did not substantiate the
dead end theory where he offered no evidence that he actually tried to grievance the strip search policy
before suing to no avail).
Adamczyk Court relied on just a single grievance wherein the counselor, grievance officer,
and warden, all agreed that the grievance should be denied because the conditions of

detention and placement for sexually dangerous civil detainees were administrative
decisions that the prison itself could not influence. Adamczyk v. IDOC, Case No. 22-cv-
863 (S.D. Ill.) (Doc. 134-2 at 25-28). Here, Plaintiff is similarly situated in that he has just
two grievances showing the situation he describes. Though the Seventh Circuit has said
that establishing a dead end is a tall task, the Court finds that Plaintiff’s evidence is
sufficient in this case to establish that he faced a dead end when grievances K4-1023-0914

and K4-1023-0916 both were deemed “resolved” at the prison level simply because an
internal investigation was going on, with no further commentary on if Plaintiff had any
recourse. By deeming the grievances resolved with no further guidance, the prison
grievance process in essence refused to address Plaintiff’s concerns and shirked the
responsibility to another department. This made the process a dead end.

The outcome of grievance K4-1023-0916 also leads to the third basis for potential
unavailability. This grievance concerned Plaintiff’s allegation that during the October 10,
2023, excessive force incident, Defendant Dulaney sexually assaulted him by grabbing
and gratuitously squeezing his genitals. The grievance was expedited as an emergency
and by November 3, 2023, all levels of the prison’s internal grievance process had deemed

the grievance “resolved” because an investigation was ongoing. By contrast, in March of
2024, the ARB denied the grievance because the internal investigation had concluded and
found Plaintiff’s allegations unsubstantiated. (Doc. 52 at The ARB’s ruling diverged
from the prison’s because instead of deferring to the internal investigation, it
substantively decided that the investigation results were correct. (Doc. 52 at 41). A few
weeks after the ARB ruled, Plaintiff got a memorandum from Warden Wills detailing the

results of the same investigation that the ARB referenced, but the memorandum
specifically said that Plaintiff could grieve the outcome of the investigation if he was
unsatisfied. (Doc. 52 at 44). This bit of information makes the grievance process opaque
or difficult to understand with relation to internal investigations. Why did the ARB
substantively rule on the results of the investigation if the results had not even been
disclosed to Plaintiff yet, and if he was supposed to have an opportunity to substantively

grieve the results? If Plaintiff tried to submit a substantive grievance about the outcome
of the investigation, would it have been denied as duplicative? Why was Plaintiff not
informed at any earlier point in the grievance process when the investigation was
mentioned that he would eventually have a chance to appeal the outcome if he disagreed
with it? It seems that the ARB waited for the investigation to be concluded for grievance

K4-1023-0916 before it ruled, but then for grievance K4-1023-0914 it did not wait for the
investigation to conclude, instead just agreeing the grievance was “resolved” because the
investigation was ongoing. This disparate handling of two very similar grievances makes
it unclear if there is a standard process for handling a grievance linked to a pending
internal investigation, and it makes it unclear if inmates really can substantively appeal

an investigation once it is concluded.
For all of the foregoing reasons, the Court finds that the grievance process was not
available to Plaintiff for grievance K4-1023-0914. This finding is sufficient to cover Claims
1 and 3 against Defendants Sadler, Phillips, Taylor, Slinkard, Robinson, Choate, and
Wills. To the extent that Wills argues that grievance K4-1023-0914 did not mention him,
Plaintiff’s additional evidence about his efforts to contact Wills regarding grievance

processing are sufficient to demonstrate Wills was on notice of the issue with an
opportunity to respond. Defendant Dulaney did not raise the affirmative defense of
failure to exhaust, and it is clear grievance K4-1023-0916 exhausted the claim against him
prior to the filing of this suit.
This leaves Claim 2 against Jane Doe, the nurse that Plaintiff first saw for care on
October 10, 2023. By oversight of the parties and the Court, Jane Doe was omitted from

the John Doe identification process that occurred in the Fall of 2024. The Court will set a
new schedule to identify Jane Doe. It is apparent from the grievance records that
grievance K4-1023-0906, submitted on October 18, 2023, is sufficient to describe Jane Doe
because it identifies the very encounter described in the complaint. The Court finds it
unnecessary to reconsider the exhaustion process with relation to Jane Doe because the

records submitted with the current round of summary judgment briefing plainly show
that grievance K4-1023-0906 was left pending at the prison level from October 18, 2023,
until at least February 11, 2025. (Doc. 52 at 54-56). As the Court discussed in relation to
availability, this extreme lag of 16 months rendered the process unavailable. Therefore,
once Jane Doe is identified, served, and files an answer, she shall join the rest of the parties

at the merits stage of the case.
DISPOSITION

Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment (Doc. 51) on the issue of exhaustion
of administrative remedies is DENIED in full because the administrative remedy process
was not available for the reasons explained in this Order. This finding applies to all
Defendants named in all claims (Claims 1-3), including Jane Doe.

Plaintiff shall have 21 days to file a Notice containing as much descriptive
information as he possesses about Jane Doe. The Warden of Menard shall then have 21
days to tender responsive information and to file a Notice of Compliance. Plaintiff shall
have 21 days from the Warden’s Notice of Compliance to move to substitute Jane Doe. If
Plaintiff fails to meet this deadline, Jane Doe may be dismissed for failure to prosecute.
IT IS SO ORDERED.

Dated: December 29, 2025

/s/ David W. Dugan
______________________________
DAVID W. DUGAN
United States District Judge

---

Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/11232815. Public record. Not legal advice.