Nonnette v. Small

• Decision Date: 26 December 2002
• Docket Number: No. 00-55702.,00-55702.
• Citation: 316 F.3d 872
• Parties: Narvis G. NONNETTE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Larry SMALL; R. Schelke; E. Castro; D. Johnson; M.A. Corbin; J. Builtman, Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Ninth Circuit

316 F.3d 872

Narvis G. NONNETTE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. Larry SMALL; R. Schelke; E. Castro; D. Johnson; M.A. Corbin; J. Builtman, Defendants-Appellees.

No. 00-55702.

United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Argued and Submitted May 9, 2002.

Filed December 26, 2002.

Peter R. Afrasiabi (argued), Turner Green Afrasiabi & Arledge LLP, Costa Mesa, California; Brett J. Williamson, Elizabeth Lemond, O'Melveny & Myers, LLP, Newport Beach, CA, for the plaintiff-appellant.

Randall A. Pinal, Deputy Attorney General, San Diego, CA, for the defendants-appellees.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of California; Anthony J. Battaglia, Magistrate Judge, Presiding. D.C. No. CV-98-01716-AJB.

Before: LAY,^* CANBY and PAEZ, Circuit Judges.

CANBY, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff Narvis Nonnette brought this civil rights action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, alleging that officials of the Calipatria State Prison in California violated his constitutional rights by: (1) miscalculating his prison sentence and (2) revoking 360 days of his good-time credits and imposing 100 days of administrative segregation in a disciplinary proceeding without supporting evidence. The district court dismissed the miscalculation claims and granted summary judgment for the defendants on the disciplinary claim. The district court based both rulings on the fact that Nonnette was a state prisoner and that his civil rights claims necessarily challenged the validity of the underlying decisions that caused his continued confinement. Because those determinations had not been set aside, the district court held that Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477, 114 S.Ct. 2364, 129 L.Ed.2d 383 (1994), precluded Nonnette from maintaining his § 1983 action.

Nonnette appeals the district court's rulings. He points out that he has now completed serving the incarceration portion of his sentence (including the additional year that resulted from his disciplinary proceeding) and has been released to parole. He argues that, because any direct challenge to his disciplinary proceeding would be moot, see Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 118 S.Ct. 978, 140 L.Ed.2d 43 (1998), he must be allowed to maintain his § 1983 action. We conclude that he is correct, and we therefore vacate the decision of the district court and remand for further proceedings.

Background

Nonnette's disciplinary proceeding arose out of an inmate fight in July 1998. Nonnette was found to have stabbed another inmate, despite his contention that all of the evidence indicated that the inmate had been stabbed before Nonnette joined the fight. Nonnette was assessed 360 days loss of good-time credits, and was placed in administrative segregation for 100 days.¹

Nonnette filed a complaint in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California alleging three due process violations pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983.² The first two claims asserted that Nonnette's release date initially had been improperly calculated, and that he wrongfully had been denied work credits that would have led to an earlier release. The third cause of action asserted that his due process rights were violated by his disciplinary proceeding and the ensuing loss of good-time credits and administrative segregation. The complaint sought injunctive relief and damages.

The district court dismissed Nonnette's first two causes of action for failure to state a claim. See Fed.R.Civ.P. 12(b)(6). The court held that, because the claims challenged the validity of the decisions underlying Nonnette's confinement, Nonnette was required to proceed first in habeas corpus, see Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475, 488-90, 93 S.Ct. 1827, 36 L.Ed.2d 439 (1973), and could not bring a § 1983 action for damages until he had succeeded in invalidating his confinement through habeas. See Heck, 512 U.S. at 486-87, 114 S.Ct. 2364. The district court declined to dismiss Nonnette's third claim, because Nonnette asserted that he had received a paper invalidating his disciplinary proceeding. Upon the State's later motion for summary judgment, however, the evidence indicated that the disciplinary ruling remained in force, and the district court accordingly granted summary judgment on the third claim on the authority of Heck.

Discussion

Both parties concentrate their arguments on the summary judgment ruling, indicating that those arguments will also apply to the dismissals of the first two claims. We follow the same course in our analysis. We review de novo both grants of summary judgment and dismissals for failure to state a claim. Balint v. Carson City, 180 F.3d 1047, 1050 (9th Cir.1999) (en banc) (summary judgment); Berry v. Valence Technology, Inc., 175 F.3d 699, 706 (9th Cir.1999) (Rule 12(b)(6) dismissal).

I

It has been clear for over thirty years that a state prisoner seeking injunctive relief against the denial or revocation of good-time credits must proceed in habeas corpus, and not under § 1983. See Preiser, 411 U.S. at 489, 93 S.Ct. 1827. Nonnette also seeks damages, however, and that issue was addressed by the more recent decision of Heck v. Humphrey. There, the Court held that a state prisoner's damages claims that necessarily implied the invalidity of his conviction or sentence could not be maintained under § 1983 unless the prisoner proved "that the conviction or sentence has been reversed on direct appeal, expunged by executive order, declared invalid by a state tribunal authorized to make such determination, or called into question by a federal court's issuance of a writ of habeas corpus." Id. at 486-87, 114 S.Ct. 2364 (citation omitted).

The Supreme Court subsequently held that the Heck rule applied to a state prisoner who was seeking damages for unconstitutional deprivation of good-time credits, so long as the alleged constitutional violation would, if established, imply the invalidity of the deprivation of good-time credits.³ Edwards v. Balisok, 520 U.S. 641, 648, 117 S.Ct. 1584, 137 L.Ed.2d 906 (1997). There is no question in this case that Nonnette seeks damages for the unconstitutional deprivation of the good-time credits themselves, and that if he succeeded in showing that the prison officials acted contrary to all of the evidence, a finding in his favor would imply the invalidity of the revocation and administrative segregation. In that regard, Nonnette's case parallels Heck and Edwards.

Nonnette's case in its present posture differs, however, from Heck and Edwards in one respect that we conclude to be critical. After the district court entered its decision, Nonnette was released from the incarceration of which he complains, and is now on parole. Were he to seek a writ of habeas corpus, his petition would present no case or controversy because establishing the invalidity of his disciplinary proceeding could have no effect on the 360 days of additional incarceration or the 100 days of administrative segregation that resulted from it. Nor could such relief have any effect on the term of his parole.⁴ As a consequence, his petition for habeas corpus would have to be dismissed as moot. See Spencer v. Kemna, 523 U.S. 1, 118 S.Ct. 978, 140 L.Ed.2d 43 (1998). In Spencer, the Supreme Court held that, although a prisoner who has completed his sentence can challenge his conviction in habeas corpus because of the collateral consequences that survive his release, no such collateral consequences attended the prisoner's incarceration imposed for violation of parole. Id. at 14-16, 118 S.Ct. 978. Accordingly, the prisoner's petition was moot because he had served the term of incarceration resulting from his parole revocation. See id. at 18, 118 S.Ct. 978.

We see no relevant distinction between the collateral consequences attending parole revocation and those attending Nonnette's deprivation of good-time credits. We are satisfied, therefore, that if he now filed a petition for habeas corpus attacking the revocation of his good-time credits and the imposition of administrative segregation (as well as the administrative calculation of his release date), his petition would have to be dismissed for lack of a case or controversy because he has fully served the period of incarceration that he is attacking.

That point brings us to the crucial question in this appeal: Does the unavailability of a remedy in habeas corpus because of mootness permit Nonnette to maintain a § 1983 action for damages, even though success in that action would imply the invalidity of the disciplinary proceeding that caused revocation of his good-time credits? Although the answer is not entirely clear under Heck and its progeny, we join the Second and Seventh Circuits in concluding that, in these circumstances, a § 1983 claim may be maintained.

Admittedly, there is language in Heck suggesting that the prior overturning of an underlying conviction is invariably a prerequisite for a § 1983 action that implies the conviction's invalidity. Heck's analogy to malicious prosecution, which requires favorable termination of criminal proceedings as an element of the civil claim, is perhaps the strongest example. See Heck, 512 U.S. at 484, 114 S.Ct. 2364. But Heck dealt with a prisoner who was still incarcerated, and thus where a remedy in habeas corpus was available.

Spencer, on the other hand, dealt with a prisoner who had completed his term; indeed, that completion caused his habeas petition challenging revocation of parole to be dismissed as moot. Spencer, 523 U.S. at 18, 118 S.Ct. 978. One argument raised by Spencer was that his case should not be considered moot because, under Heck, his habeas action would be a prerequisite to a civil suit under § 1983. Justice Scalia's opinion for the Court characterized this argument as "a great non-sequitur, unless one believes (as we do not) that a § 1983 action for damages must always and everywhere be available." Id. at 17, 118 S.Ct. 978. But, if Justice Scalia's statement means that a § 1983 action is precluded even...