Plaintiff-appellant James Pettus is a prisoner in New York State, where he is serving a sentence of six to twelve years for grand larceny in the third degree, welfare fraud in the third degree, offering a false instrument for filing in the first degree, and forgery in the second degree. He is also a frequent litigant in this Circuit, who appears on this Court’s docket sheet as an appellant, movant, or petitioner in over sixty matters and in countless matters before the district courts.
See, e.g., Pettus v. Brown,
No. 9:06-cv-152,
Pettus filed this suit in the United States District Court for the Western District of New York, asserting two principal claims: (1) that the People of the City and State of New York and the judges and district attorneys involved in his criminal trial did not follow proper procedures and sentenced him harshly, irrationally, without evidence, and out of racial animus; and (2) that various New York State Department of Correctional Services (“DOCS”) employees who were involved with adjudicating alleged disciplinary infractions lodged against him at the Elmira Correctional Facility or who transferred him from Elmira to the Southport Correctional Facility, a so-called supermax facility for especially violent offenders, were biased and incorrectly classified him. Pettus’s complaint also alleges that at Southport he has been surrounded by hostile, aggressive, violent inmates who beat, rob, assault, extort, and sexually abuse him, and that he has been denied access to needed medi *296 cation. However, the complaint does not seek any relief specifically related to the abusive conditions Pettus allegedly is enduring at Southport. Pettus does not appear to name anyone at Southport as a defendant, instead naming defendants, with one possible exception, involved in his original criminal trial or in the subsequent disciplinary proceedings brought against him at Elmira.
The district court (Arcara, C.J.) held that Pettus did not qualify for § 1915(g)’s “imminent danger” exception permitting so-called three-strike litigants to proceed IFP because there was no nexus between the claims Pettus sought to pursue in this action and the imminent danger of serious physical injury alleged in his complaint. Pettus appealed, and we appointed amicus curiae counsel to argue in support of his position. The Attorney General of the State of New York submitted a letter brief, as amicus curiae, on behalf of the various named defendants (who were not served before the complaint was dismissed). We agree with the district court that § 1915(g) allows a three-strikes litigant to proceed IFP only when there exists an adequate nexus between the claims he seeks to pursue and the imminent danger he alleges. For the following reasons, we conclude that such a nexus exists when the three-strikes litigant seeks to redress an imminent danger of serious physical injury that is fairly traceable to a violation of law that the complaint asserts.
* * *
We begin, as we must, with the plain text of the Prison Litigation Reform Act (“PLRA”).
United States v. Gayle,
In no event shall a prisoner bring a civil action or appeal a judgment in a civil action or proceeding under this section if the prisoner has, on 3 or more prior occasions, while incarcerated or detained in any facility, brought an action or appeal in a court of the United States that was dismissed on the grounds that it is frivolous, malicious, or fails to state a claim upon which relief may be granted, unless the prisoner is under imminent danger of serious physical injury.
28 U.S.C. § 1915(g). This Court has previously held that for a prisoner to qualify for the imminent danger exception, the danger must be present when he files his complaint — in other words, a three-strikes litigant is not excepted from the filing fee if he alleges a danger that has dissipated by the time a complaint is filed.
Malik v. McGinnis,
The amicus supporting Pettus argues that, by its terms, § 1915(g)’s “imminent danger” exception imposes no nexus requirement. In its view, as long as the prisoner claims to be under imminent danger of serious physical injury, he can pro
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ceed IFP on any claim. We disagree. This position disregards our duty to consider the text
and the context
of the statute. The amicus essentially is asking us to construe the exception clause
verbatim ac litteratim,
ignoring the exception’s place in the overall statutory framework. But when construing the plain text of a statutory enactment, we do not construe each phrase literally or in isolation. Rather, we attempt to ascertain how a reasonable reader would understand the statutory text, considered as a whole.
See Robinson v. Shell Oil Co.,
As we have previously noted, “Congress adopted the Prison Litigation Reform Act with the principal purpose of deterring frivolous prisoner lawsuits and appeals.”
Nicholas v. Tucker,
Instead, we adopt the view of the district court that there must be a nexus between the imminent danger a three-strikes prisoner alleges to obtain IFP status and the legal claims asserted in his complaint. We thus confront the question of what this nexus might be.
Cf. United States v. Santos,
The law of standing provides the most natural analogy for giving content to the
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nexus requirement because the statute identifies a particular injury-in-fact (i.e., the imminent danger of serious physical injury) that Congress singled out for special protection. In the standing context, courts have used the redressability and causation requirements as a means of ensuring that there is an appropriate nexus between a plaintiffs alleged injury-in-fact and the claim for relief that the plaintiff wishes to assert.
See, e.g., Linda R.S. v. Richard D.,
We can presume that Congress legislated with these background legal principles in mind.
See, e.g., Nat’l Archives & Records Admin. v. Favish,
In sum, we hold that the complaint of a three-strikes litigant must reveal a nexus between the imminent danger it alleges and the claims it asserts, in order for the litigant to qualify for the “imminent danger” exception of § 1915(g). In deciding whether such a nexus exists, we will consider (1) whether the imminent danger of serious physical injury that a three-strikes *299 litigant alleges is fairly traceable to unlawful conduct asserted in the complaint and (2) whether a favorable judicial outcome would redress that injury. 1 The three-strikes litigant must meet both requirements in order to proceed IFP. This inquiry is not identical to our ordinary standing inquiry, but we believe it is sufficiently similar to afford guidance to courts considering the nexus question.
Given that both causation and redressability are components of § 1915(g)’s nexus requirement, a three-strikes prisoner cannot proceed IFP against law enforcement personnel involved in his criminal trial to whom prison conditions are not fairly traceable or in circumstances in which it is speculative to assert that judicial relief will actually redress these allegedly unlawful conditions. In Mr. Pettus’s case, we assume without deciding that his allegations rise to the level of an imminent danger of serious physical injury. The bulk of Pettus’s claims for relief are directed at asserted wrongs — such as his allegedly improper prosecution and inmate classification — that are much too attenuated from the imminent danger of serious physical injury he alleges to conclude that this danger may fairly be traced back to the asserted wrongs.
See Bennett v. Spear,
There is one possible exception to the preceding analysis. Pettus names as a defendant Glenn Goord, the Commissioner of DOCS. His complaint alleges that Pettus holds Goord responsible for “the hiring, practices, policies, customs, screening, training, supervising, controlling and disciplining” of DOCS employees. The threatening conditions that Pettus claims to face at Southport may be fairly traceable to Goord’s oversight of DOCS, of which Southport is a part. Granted, the complaint is most reasonably construed to assert that Goord failed to supervise and train the personnel at Elmira who incorrectly classified Pettus, and not any South-port personnel. But it perhaps could be argued that the complaint also seeks redress for Goord’s supervision of Southport.
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We need not decide this question, however, because even assuming that Pettus is entitled to proceed IFP, at least with regard to this aspect of his complaint, we still affirm the district court’s judgment of dismissal. Pettus has failed to allege that Goord was
personally
responsible for the conditions at Southport, which prevents Pettus from obtaining money damages from Goord, the only form of relief he seeks.
See Hayut v. State Univ. of N.Y.,
We note that Pettus has other lawsuits pending in which he
has
named prison officials as defendants and does seek relief for allegedly dangerous conditions in prison. Today’s decision does not hinder Mr. Pettus from pursuing these claims if they are properly presented in another action.
2
Given our conclusion that Pettus’s complaint was properly dismissed, both with regard to the bulk of its claims lacking any nexus to Pettus’s alleged imminent danger of serious physical injury and with regard to the single claim for which an appropriate nexus may have been established, we need not consider whether the existence of
one
claim establishing such nexus would allow him to proceed IFP on other, unrelated claims in the same complaint. At least one court of appeals has answered this question,
Andrews v. Cervantes,
For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the district court dismissing Pettus’s complaint is AFFIRMED.
Notes
. We thus reject amici’s alternative contention that only "but for” cause between an asserted illegality and an alleged imminent danger should be required. A "but for” causation test would undermine the purpose of § 1915(g) by allowing a three-strikes prisoner to proceed IFP against law enforcement officials or testifying victims who in some sense were a "but for” cause of the prisoner being in prison but whose connection to the actual imminent danger is remote. See 3 Richard J. Pierce, Jr., Administrative Law Treatise § 16.5, at 1154 (4th ed. 2002) ("Every significant act has a nearly infinite set of consequences as a result of the many complicated relationships documented by scientists and economists. Courts must limit the causal inquiry in some way for standing purposes.... [A] causal relationship is insufficient if it is insubstantial, remote, tenuous, or speculative.”). Consequently, we employ the concept of "fairly traceable” in its ordinary form, which requires more than mere "but for” causation.
We also reject amici’s contention that the canon of constitutional avoidance requires us to construe this statute narrowly. We have previously upheld the three-strikes rule against constitutional challenge,
see Polanco v. Hopkins,
. Under an order issued last year and still outstanding (although not applicable to this case, which predates the order), Pettus is not permitted to file any appeals in this Circuit until he satisfies unpaid sanctions totaling $300. See Pettus v. Brown, No. 08-3646-pr (2d Cir. Oct. 10, 2008). The district court has continued to accept filings from Pettus, however.