Prisoner claims related to a dog allergy; Eighth Amendment’s cruel & unusual punishment prohibition; Qualified immunity; Clearly established right; Lack of case law specifically addressing the issue; Distinguishing cases involving prisoners exposed to tobacco smoke; Hunt v Reynolds; Helling v McKinney; Claims under Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act (RA) & Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA); Finley v Huss; Failure to accommodate; Medical documentation; Tchankpa v Ascena Retail Group, Inc; Kennedy v Superior Printing Co; Johnson v Dobbins (Unpub 6th Cir); Intentional discrimination; The McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework; Michigan Department of Corrections (MDOC)

[This appeal was from the WD-MI.] The court held that defendant-prison counselor (Pancheri) was entitled to qualified immunity on plaintiff-prisoner’s (Miles-El) cruel and unusual punishment claim where no case “clearly established that the Eighth Amendment required Pancheri to transfer Miles-El to a prison without a dog program.” It also held that the other defendants were properly granted summary judgment on his ADA and RA failure to accommodate and intentional discrimination claims. He has “asthma and an alleged allergy to dogs. While incarcerated, he sued over his exposure to dogs at” defendant-MDOC’s facilities. He asserted that “Pancheri’s failure to isolate him from dog dander violated the” Eighth Amendment, and that the MDOC and other state entities violated Title II of the ADA and Section 504 of the RA, among other things. To overcome Pancheri’s qualified immunity defense, Miles-El had to show a violation of a right that was clearly established at the time of the challenged conduct. The right he asserted was “that an officer violates the Eighth Amendment ‘by declining to transfer a prisoner with asthma to a facility without a dog program or by transferring that prisoner to a facility with a dog program.’” But the closest cases he cited for clearly established law were “two decisions involving prisoners exposed to tobacco smoke[,]” Hunt and Helling. The court found that they concerned “situations afield from the facts here.” It concluded that neither “case clearly established that the Eighth Amendment required Pancheri to transfer Miles-El to a prison without a dog program.” Miles-El’s chronic-care report only documented “his asthma generally and identified ‘animals’ as one of several aggravating factors[.]” The court noted that it “also indicated that inhalers relieved his symptoms. That was the very remedy that prison officials provided.” As to his ADA and RA failure to accommodate claim, the court held that it failed “because he did not sufficiently document a health condition that required the prison to accommodate him by completely isolating him from dogs.” Finally, the intentional discrimination claim failed because he did not point to any “evidence connecting either his transfer to Alger or the denial of his requested transfer to discriminatory animus based on his disability.” Thus, he did not establish a prima facie case. Affirmed.