A nonsmoking prisoner filed a suit under 42 U.S.C. sec. 1983 claiming that prison officials violated his Eighth Amendment right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment by subjecting him to environmental tobacco smoke.  The district court dismissed the suit because he alleged only that he suffers from minor ailments not arising to an “excessive risk to inmate health” as necessary to constitute and Eighth Amendment violation.  Furthermore, Knapp’s admitted in his complaint that the defendants had in place procedures to remedy this condition of confinement — whenever he complained about being confined in a cell with a chain-smoker, the officials moved him to a new cell or paired him with a new cellmate.  The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the judgment of the district court.

(U.S.C.A 7th Cir. 1999), 1999 U.S. App. LEXIS 8295.