Jacob Howard v. Bernadette Gambino

MEMORANDUM

Jacob Howard appeals pro se from the district court’s judgment dismissing his 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action alleging excessive force and deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs while a pretrial detainee at Los Angeles County Jail. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 . We review de novo the district court’s dismissal for failure to exhaust under the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(a) (“PLRA”). Wyatt v. Terhune, 315 F.3d 1108, 1117 (9th Cir.2003). We reverse and remand.

Defendants have not met their burden of proving that Howard’s action should be dismissed for failure to exhaust administrative remedies, where they relied on a declaration by their attorney stating that she reviewed documents contained in her office file, rather than conducting a complete search of the jail’s tracking system for inmate grievances and their dispositions. See id. at 1116-17, 1119-20 (the PLRA does not impose a pleading requirement but a defense, and an incomplete record is inadequate to establish nonex-haustion). Defendants also failed adequately to address Howard’s arguments that he did not receive a response to his excessive force grievance and that…