Hadix v. Johnson, s. 96-2567

Citation230 F.3d 840
Decision Date13 June 2000
Docket Number96-2586,96-2568,96-2588,Nos. 96-2567,s. 96-2567
Parties(6th Cir. 2000) Everett Hadix, et al. (96-2567/2568); Mary Glover, et al. (96-2586/2588), Plaintiffs-Appellees/Cross-Appellants, v. Perry M. Johnson, et al., Defendants-Appellants/Cross-Appellees, United States of America, Intervenor. Argued:
CourtUnited States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (6th Circuit)

Deborah A. LaBelle, LAW OFFICE OF DEBORAH LABELLE, Ann Arbor, Michigan, Michael J. Barnhart, Detroit, Michigan, Patricia A. Streeter, Detroit, Michigan, for Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant in 96-2567, 96-2568.

Deborah A. LaBelle, LAW OFFICE OF DEBORAH LABELLE, Ann Arbor, Michigan, for Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant in 96-2586, 96-2588.

Leo H. Friedman, OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, CORRECTIONS DIVISION, Lansing, Michigan, for Appellant/Cross-Appellee.

Daniel Kaplan, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE, CIVIL DIVISION, Washington, D.C., for Intervenor.

Todd R. Marti, OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL, CORRECTIONS DIVISION, Columbus, Ohio, for Amicus Curiae.

Before: KENNEDY, JONES, and SUHRHEINRICH, Circuit Judges.

KENNEDY, J., delivered the opinion of the court, in which SUHRHEINRICH, J., joined. JONES, J. (pp. 847-48), delivered a separate dissenting opinion.

OPINION

KENNEDY, Circuit Judge.

We are presented with the issue of whether the attorney fee cap set forth in § 803(d)(3) of the Prison Litigation Reform Act violates plaintiffs' constitutional rights under the implied Equal Protection Provision of the Fifth Amendment. Plaintiffs seek attorney fees for post-judgment compliance monitoring and argue that by capping the fees they may recover, § 803(d)(3) deprives them of the equal protection guaranteed by the Constitution. The district court concluded that § 803(d)(3) does not violate plaintiffs' equal protection rights and plaintiffs appealed. Because plaintiffs have failed to show that § 803(d)(3) is not rationally related to any conceivable legitimate legislative purpose we affirm the district court.

I.

These appeals were previously consolidated for oral argument before this Court on the issue of whether the attorney fee limitations set forth in § 803(d)(3) of the Prison Litigation Reform Act ("PLRA" or the "Act"), 42 U.S.C. § 1997e(d)(3), limited attorney fees earned after the Act's passage in cases which preexisted the Act. This Court held that the PLRA's attorney fees provisions were inapplicable to fees earned following the enactment of the PLRA, in cases filed before the Act's passage. See Hadix v. Johnson, 143 F.3d 246 (6th Cir. 1998). Because we concluded that the fee provisions of the PLRA were inapplicable to plaintiff, we declined to reach plaintiff's argument that § 803(d)(3) was unconstitutional. Id. at 250 n.1.

Following our decision, defendants petitioned the United States Supreme Court for certiorari. The Court granted defendants' petition and affirmed in part and reversed in part, concluding that while the fee provisions of the PLRA could not be retroactively applied to services performed prior to the Act's passage, the provisions would apply to any fees earned following the passage of the Act. See Martin v. Hadix, 527 U.S. 343, 144 L. Ed. 2d 347 (1999). The Court did not address the constitutionality of § 803(d)(3) and remanded the case to this Court for further proceedings.

II.

We are now squarely confronted with the question of whether § 803(d)(3) of the PLRA results in a deprivation of the Equal Protection guaranteed by the implied equal protection provision of the Fifth Amendment.1 Section 803(d) provides in relevant part:

(d) Attorney's fees

(1)In any action brought by a prisoner who is confined to any jail, prison, or other correctional facility, in which attorney's fees are authorized under section 1988 [FN1] of this title, such fees shall not be awarded, except to the extent that--

(B)(ii) the fee was directly and reasonably incurred in enforcing the relief ordered for the violation. . . .

(3)No award of attorney's fees in an action described in paragraph (1) shall be based on an hourly rate greater than 150 percent of the hourly rate established under section 3006A of Title 18, for payment of court-appointed counsel.

We review de novo plaintiffs' challenge of the constitutionality of this federal statute. See United States v. Brown, 25 F.3d 307, 308-09 (6th Cir. 1994).

A.

Plaintiffs argue that § 803(d)(3) violates the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution by capping the hourly rate for attorney fees that prisoners may recover, while leaving other civil rights plaintiffs free to recover reasonable attorney fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988 at the prevailing market rate2. We begin our analysis of plaintiff's claimed equal protection violation by determining the level of scrutiny to apply to the classifications Congress made in enacting § 803(d)(3).

Strict scrutiny of an alleged equal protection violation is only employed if the classification at issue discriminates on the basis of a suspect criterion or impinges upon a fundamental right. See City of Cleburne v. Cleburne Living Center, 473 U.S. 432, 439-47, 105 S. Ct. 3249, 3254-58, 87 L. Ed. 2d 313 (1985); San Antonio Independent School Dist. v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 1, 17, 93 S. Ct. 1278, 36 L. Ed. 2d 16 (1973). Prisoners are not a suspect class, see Wilson v. Yaklich, 148 F.3d 596, 604 (6th Cir. 1998) (citing Harris v. McRae, 448 U.S. 297, 323, 100 S. Ct. 2733, 65 L. Ed. 2d 784 (1980)), and plaintiffs have not alleged that a fundamental right is at issue. Consequently, as plaintiffs appear to concede, in order to establish a violation of equal protection, plaintiffs must show that § 803(d)(3) is not rationally related to any conceivable legitimate legislative purpose. See Lehnhausen v. Lake Shore Auto Parts Co., 410 U.S. 356, 364, 93 S. Ct. 1001, 1006, 35 L. Ed. 2d 351 (1973). Under this standard the statute will be afforded a strong presumption of validity and must be upheld as long as "there is a rational relationship between the disparity of treatment and some legitimate government purpose." Heller v. Doe, 509 U.S. 312, 320, 113 S. Ct. 2637, 2643, 125 L. Ed. 2d 257 (1993). The government has no obligation to produce evidence to support the rationality of its statutory classifications and may rely entirely on rational speculation unsupported by any evidence or empirical data. See FCC v. Beach Communications, Inc., 508 U.S. 307, 315, 113 S. Ct. 2096, 2098, 124 L. Ed. 2d 211 (1993). The legislature is not even required to articulate any purpose or rationale in support of its legislation. See Nordlinger v. Hahn, 505 U.S. 1,15, 112 S. Ct. 2326, 2334, 120 L. Ed. 2d 1 (1992). Consequently, plaintiffs bear the heavy burden of "negativ[ing] every conceivable basis which might support [the legislation], . . . whether or not the basis has a foundation in the record." Heller, 509 U.S. at 320, 113 S. Ct. at 2643. That being said, rational basis review is not a rubber stamp of all legislative action, as discrimination that can only be viewed as arbitrary and irrational will violate the Equal Protection Clause. See Vance v. Bradley, 440 U.S. 93, 97, 99 S. Ct. 939, 59 L. Ed. 2d 171 (1979) (stating that a law will fail rational basis review if "the varying treatment of different groups of persons is so unrelated to the achievement of any combination of legitimate purposes that [the court] can only conclude that the [legislature's] actions were irrational").

B.

Defendants, the United States as intervenor, and the State of Ohio as Amicus Curiae (collectively refered to as the "government" for convenience) contend that different treatment that § 803(d)(3) affords incarcerated civil rights litigants is rationally related to several legitimate legislative purposes. Namely, the government argues that the provisions serve to deter the filing of frivolous lawsuits by prisoners, reduce trivial or inconsequential suits, reduce judicial intervention into the management of prisons, prevent windfall fee awards, and protect the public fisc.

Plaintiffs agree that the Congress' intent in enacting the PLRA was to reduce the large number of frivolous lawsuits brought by prisoners. See 141 Cong. Rec. S7498-01(daily ed. May 25, 1995) (statement of Sen. Dole) ("We have witnessed an alarming explosion in the number of frivolous lawsuits filed by Stated and Federal prisoners . . . . Frivolous lawsuits filed by prisoners tie up the courts, waste valuable judicial and legal resources, and affect the quality of justice enjoyed by the law abiding population"); see also 141 Cong. Rec. S14316 (daily ed., Sept. 26, 1995) (statement of Sen. Abraham) (in addition to problems with "massive judicial interventions in state prison systems, we also have [the problem of] frivolous inmate litigation."). However, plaintiffs assert that the attorney fee provisions of the PLRA are unrelated to this goal, since only prevailing parties may collect attorney fees under 42 U.S.C. § 1988. Further, plaintiffs point out that the majority of prisoner lawsuits filed in federal court are pro se, with most frivolous suits being dismissed by the district court prior to appointment of counsel. Finally, plaintiffs argue that under Rinaldi v. Yeager, 384 U.S. 305, 86 S. Ct. 1497, 16 L. Ed. 2d 577 (1966), any intent on the part of Congress to deter frivolous litigation is illegitimate. In Rinaldi, the Supreme Court evaluated the constitutionality of a statute which singled out imprisoned indigent defendants by requiring them to pay for the cost of transcripts if their appeals were unsuccessful. Indigent defendants who were not incarcerated were not required to bear such costs. The state defended the law on the grounds that it was rationally related to the goal of deterring frivolous appeals. The Supreme Court held otherwise, noting that: "[b]y...

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