Hluchan v. Fauver

Decision Date29 October 1979
Docket NumberCiv. A. No. 78-2481.
Citation480 F. Supp. 103
PartiesStephen HLUCHAN, Plaintiff, v. William H. FAUVER, Commissioner, New Jersey Department of Correction; Robert S. Hatrak, Superintendent, Rahway State Prison; and Classification Committee at Rahway State Prison, New Jersey, Defendants.
CourtU.S. District Court — District of New Jersey

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Stephen Hluchan (58932) pro se.

John J. Degnan, Atty. Gen., of New Jersey by Elaine W. Ballai, Deputy Atty. Gen., Dept. of Law and Public Safety Division of Law, Human Services & Corrections Section, Trenton, N. J., for defendants.

OPINION

STERN, District Judge.

This pro se prisoner's civil rights action, brought pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983, challenges the constitutionality of a New Jersey State Prison regulation which prevents state prison inmates who have been convicted of more than one "sex offense" from attaining "minimum custody status" and thus becoming eligible for certain benefits, such as work release and furlough programs. Both the plaintiff and the defendants have moved for summary judgment. After a careful review of the record, the Court concludes that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that summary judgment is appropriate.1 The Court holds that the challenged regulation violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, by failing to define "sex offense." The regulation thereby fails to ensure that those who are similarly situated will be similarly treated, and that there is a rational basis for denying the minimum custody status to one class of prisoners that is accorded to others.

Plaintiff Stephen Hluchan is currently confined at Rahway State Prison, serving fifteen-to-twenty years for rape and open lewdness. When he began serving his sentence in October 1976, he was placed in "maximum custody." On October 16, 1978, plaintiff filed this action, naming as defendants William H. Fauver, the Commissioner of the New Jersey Department of Correction; Robert S. Hatrak, the Superintendent of the New Jersey State Prison Rahway; and the Classification Committee at Rahway State Prison.2 Plaintiff complains that his Fourteenth Amendment rights to due process and equal protection are violated by the operation of the New Jersey Department of Corrections' Departmental Standard 853.278, which provides in pertinent part:

An inmate with more than one sex offense in his record is ineligible for minimum custody.3

Under that Standard, plaintiff, whose record contains two "sex offenses," will never be considered for minimum custody. He is simply ineligible.4

Plaintiff seeks (1) a declaratory judgment that the State Corrections' Standard violates his constitutional rights, (2) an injunction proscribing the enforcement of Standard 853.278, and (3) his costs of suit.

I. NEW JERSEY PRISONER CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM

The New Jersey State Prison system is maintained and operated by the New Jersey Department of Corrections, N.J.S.A. 30:1B-8, which is headed by the Commissioner of Corrections (hereinafter: Commissioner). N.J.S.A. 30:1B-4. Classification and transfer of state prisoners is confined to the Commissioner's sole discretion. N.J.S.A. 30:1B-6; 30-1B-9; 30:4-91.1; 30:4-91.2; 30:4-91.3; and 30:4-92. Pursuant to his authority, the Commissioner created the Inter-Institutional Classification Committee and separate Institutional Classification Committees for each institution to assign and reassign inmates to specific institutions and custody levels.5 To facilitate and standardize the decision-making process of these committees, the Commissioner promulgated a set of standards which set forth their duties and responsibilities as well as the criteria which are to guide their decision making.

Within the prison system, there are three custody levels to which the Classifications Committees may assign inmates: maximum, gang minimum, and minimum. The difference between these levels is set forth in Standard 853.271:

In maximum custody, inmates are assigned to a range of activities within the institution enclosure under constant supervision. In gang minimum custody, inmates are assigned to activities within the institutional grounds under the continuous surveillance of a supervisor. In minimum custody, inmates are assigned to activities and movements within the areas of institutional jurisdiction without constant supervision; or they are assigned to satellite units. Minimum custody is a prerequisite for considering the assignment of inmates to satellite units and community release programs such as work release and furlough.6

The criteria for minimum custody eligibility are described in Standard 853.7 Standard 853.273 sets forth certain "General Considerations for Reduced Custody." It prescribes that decisions on changes in custody are to be "based upon institutional reports and the criteria of eligibility of the custody level." Id. With respect to minimum custody it states:

An inmate is considered for minimum custody when he has made a satisfactory institutional adjustment and when he can meet all the criteria for eligibility. In addition, it must be the judgment of the Institutional Classification Committee that he can successfully benefit from reduced custodial supervision.8

One of the criteria for eligibility is the length of the sentence an inmate is serving. Inmates with maximum sentences in excess of ten years must spend some time incarcerated in maximum custody before they can be considered for minimum custody. The longer the sentence, the longer the required time in maximum custody. Standard 853.275. In addition, the inmate who has served some time in maximum custody must generally be placed in gang minimum custody prior to his assignment to full minimum and must show a satisfactory adjustment to the intermediate level before further reduction is considered. Standard 853.273.

The Standards also provide, however, that certain classes of inmates, despite the fact that they meet the general criteria for eligibility for minimum custody, may never attain that reduced status. Inmates serving sentences for "escape" or "attempted escape" (Standard 853.276), or who have specific kinds of detainers lodged against them (Standard 853.277), or who have more than one offense of arson, fire setting, or malicious destruction (involving arson) in their records (Standard 853.279) are ineligible for minimum custody. Finally, inmates with "more than one sex offense" in their records are excluded from consideration for minimum custody (Standard 853.278).

II. PLAINTIFF'S DUE PROCESS CLAIM

The "sex offense" exclusion is the only exclusion which affects plaintiff and which is challenged here.9 Plaintiff contends first that the Standard violates his right to due process of law. He asserts that he has a "liberty" interest of constitutional magnitude in the various rehabilitative programs, such as the Community Release Agreement Program, the Work Release Program and the Furlough Program, which are available only to inmates who have "graduated" to full minimum custody. Standard 853.271. Although he does not maintain that there is a constitutional right to rehabilitation in prison, he argues that once the state establishes rehabilitative programs, a "statutory right" to those programs is created and prison officials may not thereafter arbitrarily deny this right to any inmate. Plaintiff asserts that since he will eventually be paroled and reintegrated into society, defendants' denial of access to rehabilitative programs designed to introduce the inmate back into society, solely on the basis of the two convictions for "sex offenses," is irrational.

Our inquiry must begin with whether plaintiff has any "liberty" interest within the meaning of the Due Process Clause in the rehabilitative programs or in the minimum custody status for which he seeks the right to be considered. We find that plaintiff has no such interest. First, it is clear that prison inmates have no constitutional right to rehabilitation programs. See Newman v. Alabama, 559 F.2d 283 (5th Cir. 1977), rev'd in part on other grounds sub nom. Alabama v. Pugh, 438 U.S. 781, 98 S.Ct. 3057, 57 L.Ed.2d 1114 (1978); French v. Heyne, 547 F.2d 994 (7th Cir. 1976); Green v. United States, 157 U.S.App.D.C. 40, 481 F.2d 1140 (D.C. Cir. 1973).10 Thus, any liberty interest which plaintiff may have in such programs must be accorded to him by state law. Under New Jersey law, state prisoners have no right to be assigned to any particular custody level or to have access to rehabilitative programs. The state has placed the classification of prisoners and the decision as to what privileges they will receive solely within the discretion of the Commissioner of the Department of Corrections. N.J.S.A. 30:1B-6; 30:4-91.1 to 30:4-91.3; 30:4-91.6; 30:4-92. See Marnin v. Pinto, 463 F.2d 583, 586 (3rd Cir. 1972); State v. Rydzewski, 112 N.J.Super. 517, 271 A.2d 907 (App.Div.1970). Thus, any expectation an inmate may have in being considered for a particular classification or program is too insubstantial to rise to the level of due process protection. Cf. Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 96 S.Ct. 2532, 49 L.Ed.2d 451 (1976); Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U.S. 236, 96 S.Ct. 2543, 49 L.Ed.2d 466 (1976) (Due Process Clause not triggered by transfer of state prisoner from one institution to another where, under state law, prisoner had no right to remain in any specific prison and no justifiable expectation that he would not be transferred absent misconduct).

In Moody v. Daggett, 429 U.S. 78, 88 n. 9, 97 S.Ct. 274, 50 L.Ed.2d 236 (1976), the Supreme Court held that the Constitution does not guarantee federal prisoners the right to a particular classification or access to rehabilitative programs. In that case, the petitioner, a federal parolee imprisoned for crimes committed while on parole, claimed that he was entitled to an immediate parole revocation hearing where the Parole Board had lodged a parole violator warrant...

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