Faber v. Siddiqui et al

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IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF ILLINOIS
EARL FABER,
Plaintiff,
vs.
DR. SIDDIQUI, et al.,
Defendants.
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Case No. 3:23-CV-3628-MAB
MEMORANDUM AND ORDER
BEATTY, Magistrate Judge:
Presently before the Court is a Motion to Dismiss filed by Defendant Tawanna
King, M.D. (Doc. 84). For the reasons set forth below, Defendant King’s Motion to Dismiss
is DENIED (Doc. 84).
BACKGROUND
Plaintiff Earl Faber, an inmate of the Illinois Department of Corrections, filed this
action on November 8, 2023, pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 for deprivations of his
constitutional rights while incarcerated at Menard Correctional Center (see Docs. 1, 11).
Plaintiff’s Complaint alleges that he was denied or delayed adequate medical treatment
for an ankle injury that initially occurred in May 2021 (Doc. 11 at p. 2). As it relates to
Defendant King, the Complaint alleges Plaintiff saw Defendant King, then a nurse
practitioner, on August 23, 2021 (Id. at p. 3; see also Doc. 1 at p. 11). Plaintiff told Defendant
King of his ankle pain and advised her that he needed an MRI to confirm that his tendon
was injured (Doc. 11 at p. 3). However, Defendant King did not provide any aid to
Plaintiff (Id.).
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The Court conducted a preliminary review of Plaintiff’s Complaint pursuant to 28
U.S.C. § 1915A on May 14, 2024 (see generally Id.). At that time, Plaintiff was permitted to
proceed on the following claim:
Count 1: Eighth Amendment deliberate indifference claim against
Siddiqui, King, Hill, Moldenhauer, Crain, and Martin for delaying and/or
denying Plaintiff adequate medical care for his ankle injury.
(Id. at p. 5).
In response to Plaintiff’s Complaint, Defendant King filed the instant Motion to
Dismiss on March 25, 2025 (Doc. 84), which includes a supporting affidavit she prepared
on the same date (Id. at pp. 7-8). Plaintiff did not respond to Defendant King’s motion.
LEGAL STANDARD FOR MOTION TO DISMISS
A motion to dismiss under Rule 12(b)(6) addresses the legal sufficiency of the
plaintiff’s claim for relief, not the merits of the case or whether the plaintiff will ultimately
prevail. Camasta v. Jos. A. Bank Clothiers, Inc., 761 F.3d 732, 736 (7th Cir. 2014); Gibson v.
City of Chicago, 910 F.2d 1510, 1520 (7th Cir. 1990). In reviewing a motion to dismiss, the
Court accepts all well-pleaded facts as true and draws all reasonable inferences in the
plaintiff’s favor. See, e.g., Dix v. Edelman Fin. Servs., LLC, 978 F.3d 507, 512-13 (7th Cir.
2020). However, “legal conclusions and conclusory allegations . . . are not entitled to this
presumption of truth.” Id. at 513 (quoting McCauley v. City of Chicago, 671 F.3d 611, 616
(7th Cir. 2011)). See also Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (quoting Bell Atlantic Corp.
v. Twombley, 550 U.S, 555, 557 (2007)). “[W]hile a complaint does not need ‘detailed factual
allegations’ to survive a 12(b)(6) motion to dismiss, it must allege sufficient facts ‘to state
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a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.’” Dix, 978 F.3d at 512-13 (quoting League of
Women Voters of Chicago v. City of Chicago, 757 F.3d 722, 724 (7th Cir. 2014)).
Additionally, while “a plaintiff is not required to anticipate and refute defenses in
his complaint,” a complaint may be properly dismissed by the Court if “the allegations
of the complaint show that relief is barred by the applicable statute of limitations.”
Limestone Dev. Corp. v. Vill. of Lemont, Ill., 520 F.3d 797, 802 (7th Cir. 2008) (internal
quotation marks and citations omitted). In other words, “[o]nly when the plaintiff pleads
itself out of court—that is, admits all the ingredients of an impenetrable defense—may a
complaint that otherwise states a claim be dismissed under Rule 12(b)(6).” Xechem, Inc. v.
Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., 372 F.3d 899, 901 (7th Cir. 2004); see also Fulgham v. Admire, 23-
2986, 2025 WL 1511099, at *2 (7th Cir. May 28, 2025) (“Although a plaintiff need not
anticipate or rebut a statute-of-limitations defense in his complaint, dismissal is
appropriate if the allegations in the complaint show that the statute of limitations is an
impenetrable bar to recovery. But dismissal (rather than judgment on the pleadings or
summary judgment) for untimeliness is the exception, not the rule[.]”).
DISCUSSION
Defendant King argues that Plaintiff’s claim against her must be dismissed
because it is barred by the applicable statute of limitations (see generally Doc. 84). More
specifically, Defendant King contends that she treated Plaintiff once on August 23, 2021,
and had no further interactions with him prior to leaving her position at Menard on
October 8, 2021 (Id. at pp. 3, 7-8). As a result, Defendant King asserts that Plaintiff’s claim
against her accrued, at the latest, on October 8, 2021 (Id.). Consequently, she argues
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Plaintiff’s claim against her is facially untimely under the applicable two-year statute of
limitations because his Complaint was not filed until November 8, 2023 (Id.).
The statute of limitations to bring claims under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 is determined by
state law. See Brown v. Dart, 876 F.3d 939, 940 (7th Cir. 2017). Thus, “[u]nder Illinois law,
a plaintiff has two years to bring a § 1983 claim.” Id. (citing 735 ILCS 5/13-202).
Meanwhile, the date a claim begins to accrue is determined by federal law. Id. Under
federal law, a section 1983 claim begins to accrue “when the plaintiff knows or should
know that his or her constitutional rights have been violated.” Gekas v. Vasiliades, 814 F.3d
890, 894 (7th Cir. 2016) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted); see also Devbrow
v. Kalu, 705 F.3d 765, 768 (7th Cir. 2013) (“A § 1983 claim to redress a medical injury
arising from deliberate indifference to a prisoner’s serious medical needs accrues when
the plaintiff knows of his physical injury and its cause.”). In addition, “[f]or continuing
Eighth Amendment violations, the two-year period starts to run (that is, the cause of
action accrues) from the date of the last incidence of that violation, not the first.” Turley
v. Rednour, 729 F.3d 645, 651 (7th Cir. 2013). However, even under a continuing violation
theory, “if a defendant leaves the institution altogether, his [or her] involvement in the
alleged wrong is over. The date of the defendant’s departure thus marks the last possible
time when the claim might have accrued.” Wilson v. Wexford Health Sources, Inc., 932 F.3d
513, 518 (7th Cir. 2019).
Moreover, the Court is bound to apply state tolling rules. See McNeal v. Bryant, No.
18-CV-1468-MJR, 2018 WL 4362579, at *2 (S.D. Ill. Sept. 13, 2018). In Illinois, “the
operation of 735 ILCS 5/13-216 has the effect of tolling the limitation period while a
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prisoner completes the administrative grievance process.” Id. See also Johnson v. Rivera,
272 F.3d 519, 521 (7th Cir. 2001) (“There can be no question that a federal court applying
Illinois law must toll the statute of limitations if a ‘statutory prohibition’ exists that
prevents a plaintiff’s cause of action.”). Therefore, Plaintiff’s claims were tolled while he
was completing the IDOC’s administrative grievance process.
Dispositively, Defendant King has not identified any point in Plaintiff’s Complaint
wherein he alleges when Defendant King left her position at Menard (see generally Doc.
84). The Court has also independently reviewed the Complaint and found no such
pleading (see generally Doc. 1). This alone dooms Defendant King’s motion under Rule
12(b)(6) because, rather than relying upon any allegations in Plaintiff’s Complaint or
documents attached to that pleading, Defendant King’s motion instead relies upon an
affidavit that she prepared on March 25, 2025 (i.e., over a year and four months after
Plaintiff filed his Complaint), and attached to her Motion to Dismiss (see Doc. 84 at pp. 7-
8). See Wright v. Associated Ins. Companies Inc., 29 F.3d 1244, 1248 (7th Cir. 1994)
(“[D]ocuments attached to a motion to dismiss are considered part of the pleadings if
they are referred to in the plaintiff’s complaint and are central to his claim.”). For this
reason, Defendant King’s employment-based accrual argument is not appropriately
raised in a motion to dismiss. See Bartole v. Goldsmith, 2:23-CV-407-PPS-APR, 2024 WL
4433452, at *2 (N.D. Ind. Oct. 4, 2024) (“Notably, the motion to dismiss relies on the
affidavit of the assistant jail commander, which suggests that the arguments in this
motion are more appropriately raised at the summary judgment stage.”). Thus, because
Defendant King has not attempted to establish that anything in Plaintiff’s Complaint
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unequivocally demonstrates that Plaintiff’s claim against her is facially barred by the
statute of limitations, Defendant King’s Motion to Dismiss is DENIED (Doc. 84).
Nevertheless, even if the Court were to convert Defendant King’s 12(b)(6) motion
into a motion for summary judgment under Rule 561―other documents attached to
Plaintiff’s Complaint rebut Defendant King’s statute of limitations defense by
demonstrating that Plaintiff’s claim against Defendant King was subject to tolling for a
period of more than one month.2 Specifically, Plaintiff’s Complaint included Grievance
No. 195-10-21 as an exhibit (see Doc. 1 at pp. 27-30). That grievance, dated October 16,
2021, challenges the medical care Plaintiff experienced and specifically discusses his
appointment with Defendant King on August 23, 2021 (Id. at p. 28). It then continues by
stating that Defendant King could have referred him for an MRI and she was “obligated
to provide [Plaintiff] with adequate medical treatment for my serious medical needs.” (Id.
1 Tregenza v. Great Am. Communications Co., 12 F.3d 717, 719 (7th Cir. 1993) (“A complaint that on its face
reveals that the plaintiff’s claim is barred by a statute of limitations or repose can be dismissed on a motion
to dismiss, in accordance with the principle noted above that a plaintiff can plead himself out of court; and
if the suit is not vulnerable to such disposition only because the complaint omits the date at which the
statutory period began to run, the defendant can supply that fact by an affidavit attached to his motion to
dismiss. The motion will then be treated as a motion for summary judgment, Fed. R. Civ. P. 12(b), 56, and
if the date is uncontestable and no tolling rule is possibly applicable, the suit will be dismissed in the blink
of an eye.”).
2 In other words, the Court has briefly analyzed Grievance No. 195-10-21 because it demonstrates that
Plaintiff’s claim was tolled for more than one month while he was exhausting his administrative remedies.
To be clear, however, Plaintiff’s Complaint did not need to include these records to anticipate Defendant
King’s statute of limitations defense. See, e.g., Owens v. Acevedo, 13-CV-0594-MJR-SCW, 2014 WL 13133855,
at *6 (S.D. Ill. Nov. 10, 2014), aff'd sub nom. Owens v. Evans, 878 F.3d 559 (7th Cir. 2017) (“The effect of those
apparently incomplete grievances/appeals is unclear, and dismissing Plaintiff’s claims based on an
assumption—even a reasonable one—that Plaintiff should have filed suit sooner would amount to
construing facts against Plaintiff, something courts are forbidden to do at the dismissal stage.”). Instead, the
Complaint only needed to avoid pleading or attaching documents that alleged facts which facially
established that Plaintiff’s claim against Defendant King was barred by the statute of limitations. See Foss
v. Bear, Stearns & Co., Inc., 394 F.3d 540, 542 (7th Cir. 2005) (“[T]he period of limitations is an affirmative
defense that a complaint need not address. Unless the complaint alleges facts that create an ironclad
defense, a limitations argument must await factual development.”).
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at pp. 28-29). After being deemed an emergency, the Warden concurred in the Grievance
Officer’s recommendation on October 25, 2021 (Id. at pp. 31-32). And significantly,
Plaintiff also attached ARB records to his Complaint which reflect that his appeal of
Grievance No. 195-10-21 was denied by the ARB on November 18, 2021 – one month and
two days later (Id. at p. 34).3
Thus, the exhibits attached to Plaintiff’s Complaint demonstrate a tolling period
of no less than one month and two days (Id. at pp. 27-34). Therefore, even if the Court
were to construe Defendant King’s motion as one for summary judgment, Plaintiff’s
claim against Defendant King is not barred by the applicable statute of limitations
because that claim was tolled for a period of no less than one month and two days while
Plaintiff exhausted his administrative remedies (see Id.).4 See also Harmon v. Jordan, 12-CV-
0021-MJR-SCW, 2013 WL 4410995, at *3 (S.D. Ill. Aug. 15, 2013) (“The tolling of a
3 Furthermore, that ARB decision was postmarked as being received by Menard on December 2, 2021 (see
Doc. 1 at p. 34). Therefore, even assuming Plaintiff received the ARB’s decision on the same day it arrived
at Menard, the statute of limitations would also be tolled for the two-week period in which Plaintiff was
waiting to receive that decision. See Walker v. Porter, 21-CV-1171-NJR, 2023 WL 403946, at *4 (S.D. Ill. Jan.
25, 2023) (“The tolling period starts when the prisoner files his grievance and ends when the administrative
review process is over.”); Watkins v. Mohan, 144 F.4th 926, 943 (7th Cir. 2025) (Explaining that equitable
tolling could apply to the period of time after an inmate’s suit was dismissed until the date he actually
received notice of that dismissal, following Covid-19 related prison mailing delays, because, “[u]ntil
Watkins was notified of the dismissal of Watkins I, he did not have any reason to believe he needed to do
anything more to preserve his FTCA claim.”); Donald v. Cook Cnty. Sheriff’s Dept., 95 F.3d 548, 562 (7th Cir.
1996) (stating that inadequate notice was a factor that may justify equitable tolling).
4 The Seventh Circuit recently declined to address the related question of whether “the gap between claim
accrual and grievance filing is included in the tolling period.” Schlemm v. Pizzala, 94 F.4th 688, 690 (7th Cir.
2024). While other Seventh Circuit opinions and Judge Hamilton’s concurrence in Schlemm would appear
to indicate that tolling begins as soon as a claim accrues, the Court need not address that question here
because Plaintiff’s claim was tolled for a sufficient length of time under either approach. See Id. at 692-695
(Hamilton, J., concurring); Bowers v. Dart, 1 F.4th 513, 518 (7th Cir. 2021); Johnson v. Rue, 3:21-CV-00779-
NJR, 2025 WL 2771329, at *3 (S.D. Ill. Sept. 26, 2025) (“Because either method gives us the same result in
this case, the Court assumes without deciding that the more generous approach—that the limitations
period is tolled from the time a claim accrues until the end of the grievance process—should be applied.”).
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prisoner’s statute of limitations is a well-established legal principle that should be
accounted for every time an institutional defendant raises a statute of limitations
defense—especially where, as here, the plaintiff attaches so much grievance material to
the complaint.”). For this additional reason, Defendant King’s Motion to Dismiss is
DENIED (Doc. 84).
CONCLUSION
For the reasons discussed above, Defendant King’s Motion to Dismiss is DENIED
(Doc. 84). Defendant King shall file her Answer to the Complaint on or before January 20,
2026.
IT IS SO ORDERED.
DATED: January 6, 2026
s/ Mark A. Beatty
MARK A. BEATTY
United States Magistrate Judge
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