UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF INDIANA SOUTH BEND DIVISION

CARL R WEBB II BOARDS,

Plaintiff,

v. CAUSE NO. 3:24-CV-358-CCB-SJF

BRIAN ENGLISH, SCOTT KENWORTHY, LUCKY, NUGEN, WALFER, LANE, BENNETT, DEBOERS, TRACY WARDEN, SCHAEFER, A. SANDERS, JOSH MORGAN, DOOLEY, WERDAL, INTERNAL INVESTIGATION OFFICER, BLAKE, UPCHURCH, SNAY, KIPP LONG, JAYDEN HOPSON, J. COY, MAKINZIE MALLOTT, AUTUMN FLOYD, ANN BRANT, HEATER, ANGELA HEISHMAN, PARKER, STEVE WHITE, MYERS, LAMBERT, SHANNON HEATER, RADEMAKER, PERDOMO, and DANIEL,

Defendants.

OPINION AND ORDER Carl R Webb II Boards, a prisoner without a lawyer, filed his second amended complaint that contains unrelated claims. ECF 19. He began this case by filing a complaint against 64 defendants, including defendants from the Hamilton County Jail, the Indiana Department of Correction’s Reception Diagnostic Center, Miami Correctional Facility, and Indiana Department of Correction’s Central Office. ECF 1. He was told he could not bring all those unrelated claims against defendants from different facilities in the same lawsuit, and so he needed to file an amended complaint that contained only related claims. ECF 14. In response, he filed an amended complaint that limited the defendants to those at Miami Correctional Facility, but still contained

unrelated claims. ECF 18. That amended complaint included allegations relating to (1) Boards’ access to the law library and the discovery material in his criminal case; (2) being kept in segregation and denied recreation and other privileges at various points of his detention; (3) being denied lunch and dinner on May 18, 2023; (4) being subjected to an allegedly false writeup on October 13, 2023; (5) being made to wait twenty minutes to receive toilet paper on November 8, 2023; (6) being tased and maced

on December 18, 2023; (7) being denied his kosher breakfast on several occasions, causing him to go 24 hours without food; (8) being placed in a cell with a mentally unstable cellmate; and (9) other matters. Id. He was told he needed to file another amended complaint that contained only related claims. In this amended complaint, Boards narrowed the claims, but he still included

unrelated claims. ECF 19. As he was told before, claims are related in a legal sense either if the same defendant is involved in each claim or if the claims all stem from the same transaction or occurrence and there is a common question of law or fact. FED. R. CIV. P. 18(a), 20(a)(2). The amended complaint contains allegations relating to (1) Boards’ access to the law library and the discovery material in his criminal case;

(2) being reclassified to a disciplinary dorm; (4) being subjected to an allegedly false writeup on October 13, 2023; (5) being tased by Sergeant Makinzie Mallot on December 18, 2023, after he questioned having to cuff up to go receive legal mail; (5) being maced on December 18, 2023, after questioning the legal mail procedure, and then being denied the ability to clean off the mace; (6) being reclassified to segregation on December 18, 2023, and forced to spend a night without a mat; and (7) missing part of

an attorney visit on August 8, 2024. “[U]nrelated claims against different defendants belong in different suits,” George v. Smith,

(7th Cir. 2007). When a plaintiff files a complaint with unrelated or mis-joined claims, the court may allow the plaintiff to decide which properly joined and related claims to pursue in the current case and when (or if) to bring the other claims in separate suits. See Wheeler v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc.,

(7th Cir. 2012) (District courts may direct a plaintiff “to file separate complaints, each confined to one group of injuries and defendants.”). Boards needs to narrow his complaint even further and decide which related claims to bring in this case. To do so, he must put this cause number on a Pro Se 14 (INND Rev. 2/20) Prisoner Complaint form which is available from his law library. If he wants to pursue any other

claims, he must file a separate complaint with a new case number for each unrelated group of claims. For these reasons, the court: (1) GRANTS Carl R Webb II Boards until March 19, 2025, to file an amended complaint that contains only related claims; and

(2) CAUTIONS Carl R Webb II Boards if he does not respond by the deadline, or if he files an amended complaint that still contains unrelated claims, the court will choose a claim for him and dismiss the rest. SO ORDERED on February 13, 2025. /s/Cristal C. Brisco CRISTAL C. BRISCO, JUDGE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT