Pyles v. Nwaobasi

Dist. Ct. erred in granting defendants-prison officials’ motion for summary judgment in plaintiff-prisoner’s section 1983 action, alleging that defendants provided plaintiff with constitutionally inadequate medical care, where basis for said ruling was finding that plaintiff had not exhausted internal administrative remedies prior to filing instant lawsuit. While plaintiff had filed one grievance two days late, plaintiff established good cause for said delay, where delay was caused by prison library’s failure to make timely copies of said grievances. Also, with respect to second grievance, record did not support Dist. Ct.’s finding that plaintiff was not credible in his contention that he had not timely received prison’s response to his grievance, and defendants provided no evidence that they had timely transmitted to plaintiff any response to said grievance. As such, defendants failed in their burden to show that plaintiff failed to exhaust his administrative remedies, and plaintiff was entitled to have his grievances be heard on their merits.