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SUBMITTED MAY 25, 2011

Before POSNER, COFFEY, and FLAUM, Circuit Judges.

The plaintiff, an inmate of an Illinois state prison, brought suit against two guards under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 claiming that they had used excessive force against him in an altercation in the prison cafeteria, in violation of his constitutional right to be free from cruel and unusual punishments. The district judge dismissed the claim, without waiting for any response by the defendants, on the authority of Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994). With that claim the plaintiff had joined a claim against medical personnel at a different prison (to which he had been transferred immediately after the altercation) for willful disregard of the injuries that he’d sustained from the alleged use of excessive force against him. The district judge granted summary judgment for the medical personnel. That ruling was clearly correct, so we say no more about it. The dismissal of the excessive-force claim presents a closer question.

 
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