LUCERO, Circuit Judge.
Mohamed Rashed Al-Owhali, an inmate in a federal high-security prison, brought a suit challenging several Special Administrative Measures ("SAMs") imposed upon him. The district court dismissed the suit, finding that Al-Owhali failed to allege plausible facts to support his claims. In light of concessions made by Al-Owhali before argument, we exercise jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291 and affirm the district court's dismissal.
Al-Owhali was convicted of several terrorism-related offenses stemming from the 1998 bombing of the United States embassy in Nairobi, Kenya. He is currently serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole at the United States Penitentiary, Administrative Maximum, in Florence, Colorado. Since his arrest, Al-Owhali has been subject to SAMs, which impose special restrictions on his imprisonment.
In 2009, Al-Owhali filed his second amended complaint in federal district court, alleging that these restrictions and others violated his constitutional rights. Invoking Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 129 S.Ct. 1937, 173 L.Ed.2d 868 (2009), the court concluded that Al-Owhali had not alleged sufficient facts to make his claim facially plausible and dismissed the complaint under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Al-Owhali then filed a motion to reconsider and a motion to file a third amended complaint, both of which were denied. He then appealed.
On the eve of oral argument, however, Al-Owhali conceded most of the arguments he had briefed. According to the concession, he continues to contest only the three restrictions listed above: the prohibitions on communication with his nieces and nephews, the two Arabic-language newspapers, and President Carter's book.
We review de novo a district court's dismissal of a claim under Fed. R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Khalik v. United Air Lines, 671 F.3d 1188, 1190 (10th Cir.2012). Under Iqbal, "a complaint must contain enough allegations of fact, taken as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face." 556 U.S. at 678, 129 S.Ct. 1937 (quotation omitted). "A claim has facial plausibility when the plaintiff pleads factual
In addition to the pleading burden imposed by Iqbal, inmates face additional hurdles when challenging a prison regulation as unreasonable. As a general matter, "when a prison regulation impinges on inmates' constitutional rights, the regulation is valid if it is reasonably related to legitimate penological interests." Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 89, 107 S.Ct. 2254, 96 L.Ed.2d 64 (1987). We use four factors to guide our Turner inquiry:
Beerheide v. Suthers, 286 F.3d 1179, 1185 (10th Cir.2002) (citing Turner, 482 U.S. at 89-91, 107 S.Ct. 2254). Among these factors, the first is the most important; as we have noted, it is "not simply a consideration to be weighed but rather an essential requirement." Boles v. Neet, 486 F.3d 1177, 1181 (10th Cir.2007) (quotation omitted).
Analysis of the four Turner factors is necessary at the summary judgment stage. See Jones v. Salt Lake Cnty., 503 F.3d 1147, 1153-59 (10th Cir.2007). But in ruling on a motion to dismiss, a court need only assess, as a general matter, whether a prison regulation is "reasonably related to a legitimate penological interest." Gee v. Pacheco, 627 F.3d 1178, 1187 (10th Cir. 2010). Thus, while it is critical that a complaint address Turner's core holding, the four Turner factors need not be part of the analysis at the pleading stage. See id.
Taken together, Iqbal and Turner require an inmate to "plead facts from which a plausible inference can be drawn that the action was not reasonably related to a legitimate penological interest." Gee, 627 F.3d at 1188. "This is not to say that [Al-Owhali] must identify every potential legitimate interest and plead against it." Id. However, he is required to "recite[] facts that might well be unnecessary in other contexts" to surmount a motion to dismiss under Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). Gee, 627 F.3d at 1185.
In his pleadings, Al-Owhali asserts that the 2004 SAMs prohibited him from writing letters to his nieces and nephews, even though he had previously been permitted to do so. He further pleads that
These deficiencies in his pleadings are especially clear given the government's proffered justifications for imposing SAMs. According to the 2008 SAMs extension,
In order to survive the government's 12(b)(6) motion, Al-Owhali was not required to substantively rebut the government's justifications for the new restrictions. See Gee, 627 F.3d at 1188 ("We do not intend that pro se prisoners must plead, exhaustively, in the negative in order to state a claim."). Rather, he simply needed to plead some plausible facts supporting his claim that the ban on communicating with his nieces and nephews did not serve the purpose of preventing future terrorist activity. See, e.g., Mohammed v. Holder, 07-CV-02697-MSK-BNB, 2011 WL 4501959 (D.Colo. Sept. 29, 2011) (concluding that an inmate's challenge to SAMs was plausible where his pleadings pointed to a recommendation from the warden that the inmate's privileges be expanded). Looking to his pleadings, the only supporting fact Al-Owhali offers is that he did not violate any SAMs before the new restrictions were imposed. This assertion fails to address whether the restriction was supported by a rational penal interest. Accordingly, dismissal of this claim was appropriate.
Al-Owhali's complaint also asserts that the 2004 SAMs violated his First Amendment rights by preventing him from subscribing to two Arabic-language newspapers — Al-Quds Al-Arabi and Al-Hayat. Although the government previously permitted Al-Owhali to receive these papers, the 2004 restrictions prevented him from accessing any media outlets other than television and radio news stations and USA Today. The 2008 SAMs explain that
As an initial matter, the government contends that this claim is moot because the SAMs currently in effect do not prohibit Al-Owhali from receiving these newspapers. This argument is problematic because it potentially allows for a constitutional violation that is "capable of repetition yet evades review." Murphy v. Hunt, 455 U.S. 478, 482, 102 S.Ct. 1181, 71 L.Ed.2d 353 (1982) (quotation omitted).
In order to fall within this exception to mootness, Al-Owhali must show that the SAMs are in effect for a "duration too short to be fully litigated prior to [their] cessation" and there is a "reasonable expectation that [he will] be subjected to the same action again." Jordan v. Sosa, 654 F.3d 1012, 1035 (10th Cir.2011). Based on the record before us, we have no trouble concluding that Al-Owhali has made both these showings, and that his claim is thus not moot. All SAMs expire, at the latest, one year after they are imposed. See 28 C.F.R. § 501.3(c) (permitting SAMs to "be imposed for up to 120 days or, with the approval of the Attorney General, a longer period of time not to exceed one year"). If we prohibited any challenge to a lapsed SAM, inmates would only have one year to litigate and appeal a case. This feat will often be impossible, as this case illustrates: Years have elapsed since Al-Owhali first brought his claim. Moreover, there is nothing preventing the government from introducing more restrictive SAMs in any given year. As this case shows, a prisoner can reasonably expect SAMs to change from year to year and fluctuate in severity. Given these facts, we refuse to cast Al-Owhali's challenge to older SAMs as moot.
Even though Al-Owhali's claim is properly before us, our precedent nonetheless dictates that dismissal was appropriate. In Gee, we held that an inmate's allegations that the prison "forced him to dispose of magazines to which he subscribed" failed to state a viable claim. 627 F.3d at 1190. Noting that such restrictions were common in the prison setting, we dismissed the claim because the inmate failed to offer plausible "allegations showing that the restrictions were imposed in violation of prison regulations or that the regulations invoked were unconstitutional in the circumstances." Id. As with the inmate in Gee, Al-Owhali pleads no facts indicating that the new restrictions were an abuse of the warden's broad discretion to limit incoming information. See Thornburgh v. Abbott, 490 U.S. 401, 415-19, 109 S.Ct. 1874, 104 L.Ed.2d 459 (1989) (upholding restrictions on prisoners' incoming mail); Van den Bosch v. Raemisch, 658 F.3d 778, 788 (7th Cir.2011) (permitting confiscation of newsletters in prison); Smith v. Maschner, 899 F.2d 940, 944 (10th Cir.1990) (stating that complaint about undelivered catalogues did not raise a constitutional issue). Nor does he address the government's logical safety rationale for limiting his access to Arabic-language media — namely, the need to prevent Al-Owhali from acting upon contemporary information or receiving coded messages.
Al-Owhali's third First Amendment claim, regarding his alleged inability
This vague allegation that he was "restricted from receiving the book" is lacking any factual context. We do not know if Al-Owhali even requested the book at all. If he did, the pleadings shed no further light on the matter. Instead, he implies the existence of a secret list of banned publications. We cannot credit such implications; they remain unfounded allegations reminiscent of the claims dismissed in Iqbal. See 556 U.S. at 682-83, 129 S.Ct. 1937 (allegation of existence of discriminatory policy, without facts supporting existence of policy, was insufficient); Twombly, 550 U.S. at 564-65, 127 S.Ct. 1955 (same for assertion that companies agreed to price-fix, without factual allegations that would show existence of agreement). Thus, by not including the most basic facts about the challenged restriction, Al-Owhali has failed to "nudge[] [his] claim[] across the line from conceivable to plausible." Twombly, 550 U.S. at 570, 127 S.Ct. 1955.
Al-Owhali did not face a high threshold to establish his claims. But a mere assertion that he believes that there is a secret policy in place that prevents him from obtaining the book is not enough. We emphasize that the facts that Al-Owhali was required to plead to push his claim past the plausibility threshold were minimal. For example, if he had indicated that prison officials had informed him that he could not receive the book or that he had explicitly requested it and received no response, Iqbal would pose no barrier to his claim going forward. However, by stating his belief that the book was banned while also admitting that he was not informed of the ban, Al-Owhali has merely highlighted the theoretical basis of his claim.
At bottom, Al-Owhali claims without substantiation that he believes there is a secret policy in place that prevents him from obtaining the book. Such a claim, without more, is simply too speculative.
Finally, Al-Owhali asserts that his Fifth Amendment right to due process was violated when prison officials imposed additional restrictions without specific explanations in the 2004 SAMs. We decline to consider this claim. In his concession, Al-Owhali states that the following claim remains viable in this appeal:
(emphasis added).
It is not enough that Claim 4 "re-alleges and incorporates by reference" all previous paragraphs. It is not ours to piece together Al-Owhali's arguments for him. United States v. Yelloweagle, 643 F.3d 1275, 1284 (10th Cir.2011); see Vaz Dos Reis v. Holder, 606 F.3d 1, 4 (1st Cir.2010) ("When a party disavows a particular theory of the case, it is not an appellate court's proper role to make the disavowed argument for him."). We do not engage in guessing games to determine which arguments Al-Owhali may be asserting. We take him at his word.
For the foregoing reasons, we