Johnson v. United States Government, Civ. A. No. 3703-M.

• Decision Date: 09 September 1966
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 3703-M.
• Citation: 258 F. Supp. 372
• Court: U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Virginia
• Parties: John R. JOHNSON, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, Defendant.

258 F. Supp. 372

John R. JOHNSON, Plaintiff, v. UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT, Defendant.

Civ. A. No. 3703-M.

United States District Court E. D. Virginia, at Alexandria.

September 9, 1966.

John R. Johnson, pro se.

John D. Schmidtlein, Asst. U. S. Atty., Alexandria, Va., for defendant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

OREN R. LEWIS, District Judge.

This is a suit brought by the plaintiff against the United States under the Federal Tort Claims Act, seeking damages for injuries sustained from a stabbing and a subsequent beating inflicted by two different inmates while confined in the United States Penitentiary at Lewisburg, Pennsylvania.

The plaintiff is now in the Lorton Reformatory, Lorton, Virginia. He was transferred there subsequent to the alleged assaults.

The plaintiff prepared the complaint and originally filed it in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia. Leave was there granted to proceed in forma pauperis.

Upon hearing, that court transferred the case to this court.¹

Motion was here made for the appointment of counsel. The motion was denied, the Court being of the opinion that it should neither ask nor require attorneys² to represent indigent plaintiffs in such cases, either on a fee or contingent basis.

The Court did attempt to procure counsel for the plaintiff through the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia and of Alexandria, Virginia, the American Civil Liberties Union, the Health, Education and Welfare Department of the Government, Georgetown University Law School and other sources, all without success.

All documents and witnesses requested by the plaintiff, including prison inmates and officials, were subpoenaed at government expense. The plaintiff was given every opportunity to present his side of the case and was given such assistance by the Court as was reasonable and proper in his cross examination of government witnesses.

The material facts are not in dispute. The Government admits both the stabbing and the subsequent beating in the hospital section of the prison. The plaintiff admits that his allegation that the officials of Lewisburg had been warned by letter that he would be killed if not taken out of the general prison population was based solely on hearsay. (The prison officials denied receiving such a letter or having any knowledge of the alleged threat.)

The prison records that were introduced in evidence disclose that Johnson at the time of the initial stabbing (March 2, 1963) was a twenty-one year old, single, Negro, from Washington, D. C., then serving a three to ten-year sentence in the Lewisburg Penitentiary for robbery. His delinquency history extends back to around the age of ten. He has been in almost continuous confinement since that time. He started at the Industrial Home School in Washington, and in 1954 he was committed to the National Training School. In 1957 he was transferred to Petersburg after a sexual assault on another inmate at that school. While still in the A/O unit at Petersburg, he banded together with other aggressive District of Columbia Negroes and attempted to force white inmates into homosexual acts. He was immediately transferred to Danbury where the same type of behavior continued. In October 1958 he was in segregation for fighting with another inmate after approaching him for homosexual purposes. On April 7, 1959 he was involved with a gang who assaulted white inmates. A month later he ran out of his cell and attempted to assault a lieutenant. He was held in administrative segregation from April until December because of fear of retaliation against him by Puerto Rican inmates in the population.

On December 7, 1959 Johnson was sent back to the Training School. Reports from the Training School revealed he maintained a good adjustment until his sentence was vacated by the court on August 1, 1960. Two months later he committed the offense for which he is now serving time and was sent to the District of Columbia Reformatory at Lorton. In May of 1961 he sexually assaulted an inmate at Lorton, resulting in his transfer to Lewisburg on October 3, 1961.

After arriving at Lewisburg, Johnson was involved (December 5, 1961) with a group of aggressive Washington, D. C. colored youths who were then having difficulties with some of the white inmates. On August 16, 1962 Johnson was again involved in an incident between Black Muslims and other Negroes. With the exception of those two incidents Johnson's behavior at Lewisburg prior to the stabbing was reasonably good.

The evidence in this case discloses that Johnson was stabbed with an improvised knife on the stairway leading from the auditorium to the main corridor as he was leaving the movies with his buddies Cleveland Scott and Charles Jones. A homemade knife, about twelve inches in length, covered with blood, was found on the stairs by a guard a few minutes after the stabbing. Johnson says he does not know who stabbed him and cannot imagine why anyone would want to. Neither Scott nor Jones saw the stabbing or the knife. They claim they merely helped Johnson to the hospital after he had been stabbed.

A day or so prior to the stabbing Johnson approached a white inmate by the name of Miller in the paint shop at the request of Scott. He then thought that Miller had an "attitude" against him.

Inmates Miller, Hayes, Maila and Burchell (white) left the movies shortly after Johnson left. Miller admitted to the prison officials that he had a knife with him at the movies but denied he had stabbed Johnson. He says he gave the knife to Burchell about thirty minutes before the stabbing incident. Miller identified the weapon used on Johnson as being the one he had given Burchell.

Burchell, a friend of Miller, voluntarily gave a sharpened kitchen knife to a prison official the next evening, stating that he had it for protection. He told the guard he was the one who had stabbed Johnson on the stairway leading from the auditorium. He claimed the incident related back to the previous Thursday or Friday when Johnson and Scott made several approaches toward Miller, saying they wanted to make a "punk" out of him. As they Miller, Hayes, Maila and Burchell were leaving the movies, Burchell claims he came face to face with Johnson who then had a knife in his hand. He says Johnson made a swing at him, whereupon he automatically reached in his pocket, got the knife he had received from Miller, spun Johnson around, and stabbed him in the back as he was turning.

Johnson denies he had a knife and says the stabbing could not have happened the way Burchell says it did because no one could slip up behind him without his knowing it.

A prison inmate informant, who claims to have seen the stabbing, told one of the guards that Miller did the stabbing.

Johnson was taken to the prison hospital by Scott and Jones. He was immediately admitted and placed in a private room for treatment. The door was left unlocked at the request of the prison doctors. No inmates are allowed in the hospital except those receiving treatment and those assigned work duties. The hospital is separated from the general prison population by a locked gate constantly attended by a guard.

Shortly after being treated for his stab wound Johnson was assaulted in his room by one of the hospital clerks, a white inmate named Darnell. Darnell struck Johnson four or five times with a heavy steel rod³, inflicting deep cuts in his scalp, under his eyes and across his hands. Ten or twelve sutures were needed to close the wounds. Darnell was pulled off Johnson by an inmate then occupying an adjacent room.

Darnell readily admitted the assault. He stated Johnson had not approached him in any way but had been bothering many of his friends and his intention was to kill Johnson.

After treatment of the wounds inflicted by Darnell, Johnson was placed in isolation for several days for his own protection. He was then returned to the hospital and again placed in a room by himself. The door was then kept locked.

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