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Disability Discrimination: Prisoners

      In a class action lawsuit by disabled state prisoners and parolees, the state of California challenged a 2012 order modifying an earlier injunction, ordering the state to take specified actions to make sure that disabled inmates were given needed accommodations. The appeals court rejected arguments that the injunction was issued without giving it adequate notice of opportunity to respond. While a state statute had altered the balance of power between the state and its counties somewhat, it did not absolve the state of all of its disability discrimination obligations as to disabled parolees placed in county jails to serve state-imposed sentences. The modified injunction also did not violate the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3626. Armstrong v. Brown, #12-17103, 732 F.3d 955 (9th Cir. 2014).

Immigration Detainees

     Under the mandatory detention provisions of the Immigration and Nationality Act, 8 U.S.C. 1226(c), the federal government is required to take into custody any alien who has committed certain specified crimes when released from state custody. Such aliens are generally ineligible for bail. In this case, two aliens who committed specified offenses were not taken into federal custody, however, until years after being released from state custody. They filed habeas corpus petitions, arguing that their detentions without an opportunity for release on bond were legally unauthorized. A federal appeals court agreed, holding that they were not subject to mandatory detention under the specified section of the statute because they were not detained in a timely manner after their release under any reasonable interpretation of the law. The proper remedy was requiring an individualized bond hearing. Castaneda v. Souza, #13-1994, 2014 U.S. App. Lexis 19048 (1st Cir.).

     A U.S. citizen could pursue his claim against two immigration agents alleging that he wrongfully spent time in pre-trial detention on state criminal charges, unable to obtain the services of a bail bondsman because the agents had improperly lodged an immigration detainer against him, despite his citizenship status. Mendia v. Garcia, #12-16220, 2014 U.S. App. Lexis 18654 (9th Cir.).

Medical Care

     A prisoner claimed that he experienced excruciating pain from large and protruding keloids (scar tissue growths) on his hips, chest, and legs. He further claimed that he tested positive for a stomach infection from the bacterium helicobacter pylori, and that a prison's medical director ignored both his conditions, acting with deliberate indifference to his serious medical needs. The trial court ruled that the claim concerning the keloids could continue while dismissing the infection claim in light of the fact that blood tests that the plaintiff attached to his complaint revealed that he actually tested negative for the infection. The trial court also denied a motion that the medical director be immediately ordered to refer the plaintiff to a "suitable doctor." Upholding this result, a federal appeals court found that the record did not show that an immediate referral was warranted. The limited evidence in the case so far did not show that the prisoner would experience any irreparable harm without the issuance of a preliminary injunction, and also did not establish that his deliberate indifference claim against the defendant had a reasonable likelihood of success. Wheeler v. Talbot, #13-3294, 2014 U.S. App. Lexis 20090 (7th Cir.).

    A man claimed that he was beaten by police officers and sustained a fractured collarbone, a SLAP-type labral tear, and facial injuries leaving permanent scarring and requiring two nose surgeries. He also became legally deaf in one ear and has reduced hearing in the other. A federal appeals court reversed the dismissal of a deliberate indifference denial of medical care claim against the doctor at a hospital emergency room, finding that if the complaint were amended to allege two things claimed in the plaintiff's opposition to the doctor's motion to dismiss, it would show a sufficiently culpable state of mind for a constitutional violation. Those two things were that the officers falsely told the female doctor that one of the officers he allegedly attacked was a woman, and that he should therefore be "ignored and left alone." Nielsen v. Rabin, #12-4313, 746 F.3d 58 (2nd Cir. 2014).

Parole

     D.C. prisoners who were convicted of criminal acts committed before March 3, 1985 sued parole officials, claiming that they violated the Ex Post Facto Clause of the Constitution by applying to their cases parole guidelines that were issued in 2000, instead of the 1972 parole guidelines that were in effect at the time of their offenses. A federal appeals court reversed the dismissal of the lawsuit, finding that the plaintiffs had plausibly alleged that the application of the later guidelines created a "significant risk" that their incarceration would be prolonged. Daniel v. Fulwood, #12-5327, 766 F.3d 57 (D.C. Cir. 2014).

 Prison Litigation Reform Act: "Three Strikes" Rule

     An inmate sought to proceed as a pauper in a federal civil rights lawsuit, but the trial court denied them permission to do so and dismissed the complaint because the plaintiff had "three strikes" within the meaning of the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 28 U.S.C. Sec. 1915(g). The third of those cases had been dismissed after the trial court found that the sole named defendant was entitled to prosecutorial immunity. A federal appeals court ruled that cases dismissed on the basis of immunity are not among the types of dismissals listed as "strikes" in the statute, so that third dismissal was not a strike. The dismissal of the immediate case, therefore, was vacated. Castillo-Alvarez v. Krukow, #14-2263, 2014 U.S. App. Lexis 19335 (8th Cir.).

Religion

****Editor's Case Alert****

     A $1.925 million settlement has been reached in a case in which an atheist parolee was jailed after he complained about being compelled to participate in a faith-based drug rehab program that violated his beliefs. He served a year in prison on a narcotics conviction and was initially released on parole, but had that parole revoked following his complaints to parole officials about having to participate in a drug recovery program that would require him to acknowledge the existence of a "higher power." His lawsuit, filed after serving an additional three months in prison, sought damages from both the California Department of Corrections and the private substance abuse firm the state contracted with to carry out drug treatment programs for parolees. The state will pay the plaintiff $1 million under the settlement, while the private firm will pay $925,000. The California Department of Corrections also issued a directive that parolees who object to faith-based treatment programs should be referred to nonreligious programs. Hazle v. Crofoot, #2:08-cv-02295, U.S. Dist. Court, (E.D. Calif. Oct. 14, 2014). In a federal appeals court case prior to the settlement, Hazle v. Crofoot, #11-15354, 727 F.3d 983 (9th Cir. 2013), the court held that the plaintiff was entitled to compensatory damages because his First Amendment rights to religious freedom were violated when his parole was revoked because he refused to participate in the residential drug treatment program. He should have been granted a new trial after a jury awarded him nothing, the court ruled.

Retaliation

     A federal prisoner filed a lawsuit claiming that he had been placed in administrative detention for 60 days in unlawful retaliation in violation of the First Amendment for filing a claim under the Federal Tort Claims Act (FTCA), as well as a claim of failure to protect in violation of the Eighth Amendment based on an assault on him by another prisoner. The trial court granted summary judgment for the defendants, based on the plaintiff's alleged failure to exhaust available administrative remedies before suing, as required by the Prison Litigation Reform Act, 42 U.S.C. 1997e(a), as well as a ruling that the plaintiff's Eighth Amendment claim was barred by his decision to file a FTCA claim regarding the assault. A federal appeals court vacated the trial court's ruling, holding that the failure to exhaust available administrative remedies should be excused because of specific allegations that one of the defendants intimidated him from pursuing a grievance by a threat to transfer him to another facility where she said he would be attacked and placing him in a special housing unit after he filed his FTCA claim, and that the FTCA claim did not bar the Eighth Amendment claim because the FTCA claim was dismissed by the trial court for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and there was no judgment on the claim. Himmelreich v. Fed. Bureau of Prisons, #13-4212, 766 F.3d 576 (6th Cir. 2014).

Segregation: Administrative

     While imprisoned in a state facility, an inmate engaged in misconduct that resulted in an administrative sanction of a ten-year term in a segregated maximum security housing unit. He also faced a state criminal charge of armed assault with intent to murder. When the inmate finished his original criminal sentence, he remained incarcerated as a pretrial detainee for the new assault charges. He was convicted on that assault, and continued to serve out the balance of the ten-year administrative sanction on the segregated maximum security housing unit. A federal appeals court overturned an award of damages and equitable relief on the prisoner's claim that two high ranking prison officials violated his due process rights by continuing to confine him in the segregated unit both as a pretrial detainee and as a sentenced prisoner. The defendants were entitled to qualified immunity as they had not violated his clearly established constitutional rights. Reasonable prison officials would not have known that holding him in the segregated unit during his pretrial detention for an offense that occurred during a prior criminal sentence was unconstitutional. His subsequent release from the segregated unit made his request for equitable relief moot. Ford v. Bender, #12-1622, 2014 U.S. App. Lexis 18298 (1st Cir.).

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     Locator: Locate a Federal Prison, Federal Inmate, or Sex Offender (Nationwide), U.S. Department of Justice.

     Medical Care: Guidelines for Medical Management of Staff Exposure to Bloodborne Pathogens, Federal Bureau of Prisons (Sept. 22, 2014).

     Parole: Resource Package for Paroling Authorities on Offenders with Mental Illness and/or Substance Use Disorders, National Parole Resource Center. (NCJ 247983, BJA-Sponsored, August 2014).

     Parole: Resource Package for Paroling Authorities on Sex Offenders, National Parole Resource Center. (NCJ 248474, BJA-Sponsored, October 2014).

     Recidivism: Improving Recidivism as a Performance Measure, by Ryan King and Brian Elderbroom (NCJ 248387, BJA-Sponsored, October 2014).

     Statistics: Probation and Parole in the United States, 2013, by Thomas Bonczar and Erinn Herberman, Bureau of Justice Statistics (October 28, 2014 NCJ 248029).

Reference:

     • Abbreviations of Law Reports, laws and agencies used in our publications.

     • AELE's list of recently-noted jail and prisoner law resources.