Bagley v. Rogerson, s. 92-3245N

Decision Date16 November 1993
Docket NumberNos. 92-3245N,92-3343NI,s. 92-3245N
Citation5 F.3d 325
PartiesHughes Anderson BAGLEY, Jr., Appellee/Cross-Appellant, v. Russell ROGERSON and Patsy Bozarth, Appellants/Cross-Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Susie Berregaard Thomas, Des Moines, IA, for appellants.

Andrew T. Orr, Sioux City, IA, for appellee.

Before RICHARD S. ARNOLD, Chief Judge, JOHN R. GIBSON and FAGG, Circuit Judges.

RICHARD S. ARNOLD, Chief Judge.

Iowa prison officials Russell Rogerson and Patsy Bozarth appeal from an order of the District Court denying their motion for summary judgment on their defense of qualified immunity. We reverse. We take this occasion to emphasize again that an allegation of a violation of state law, statutory or decisional, does not, in itself, state a claim under the federal Constitution or 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983.

I.

This appeal arises from a Section 1983 action filed by Hughes Anderson Bagley, Jr. In 1977 and 1979, Bagley was convicted of various federal drug and firearms charges in the Western District of Washington. After serving thirty-nine months of his sentence, in January 1984, he was transferred to the State of Iowa to face drug charges. In December 1984, Bagley was sentenced to five years in prison on these state charges. After sentencing, he was returned to federal custody in the Northern District of Iowa because of additional firearms charges. In December 1985, he was acquitted of those charges and returned to state custody. In January 1986, Bagley was released on bond from state custody pending appeal of his state conviction. However, as a result of a federal detainer, Bagley was then returned to federal custody to serve the remainder of his federal sentences from the Western District of Washington. Later, his state conviction was affirmed.

In September 1986, the Ninth Circuit reversed Bagley's 1977 drug conviction. Bagley v. Lumpkin, 798 F.2d 1297 (9th Cir.1986). In October 1986, Bagley wrote to the Iowa prison inquiring whether it had a policy on the "void sentence doctrine." Bagley explained he believed he was entitled to credit against his state sentence for the time he had served on the federal sentence that had been vacated. In January 1988, the Ninth Circuit reversed all but one of Bagley's 1979 firearms convictions. United States v. Bagley, 837 F.2d 371 (9th Cir.), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 924, 109 S.Ct. 304, 102 L.Ed.2d 323 (1988). Bagley had by that time served his sentence on the remaining count. However, he remained in federal custody, in the Northern District of Iowa, because of yet other federal charges.

On February 8, 1988, Iowa prison officials lodged a detainer against Bagley, to ensure that he would be returned to their custody, whenever his federal confinement should cease, in order to serve the remainder of his 1984 Iowa drug sentence. On April 15, 1988, Bagley wrote to Iowa officials demanding credit against his state sentence for the time he had served on the vacated federal convictions. If this credit were given, Bagley's state sentence would be fully satisfied, and the state detainer would have to be withdrawn. State officials did not grant this request at once. But on May 23, 1988, they agreed to settle a state-court suit brought by Bagley by giving him the credit in question. As a consequence, the state sentence was treated as fully satisfied, and the state detainer was withdrawn on June 1. On June 16, 1988, the federal court released Bagley on bail. About a month later, the federal charges were dismissed.

Bagley then filed this Section 1983 action for damages against the defendants, two Iowa prison officials, alleging that by lodging the detainer they deprived him of liberty without due process of law. Absent the detainer, Bagley claimed, the federal court would have admitted him to bail earlier. Both sides moved for summary judgment. Bagley argued that the detainer was unlawful because at the time it was lodged he had satisfied his state sentence. He claimed the officials should have credited him with the time he had served on the vacated federal convictions. The officials argued that Bagley was not entitled to the credit because of Iowa Code Sec. 903A.5, which provides that "[a]n inmate shall not receive credit ... for time served in an institution or jail of another jurisdiction during any period of time the person is receiving credit upon a sentence of that other jurisdiction." Moreover, the officials argued that Bagley had failed to state a claim under Section 1983 and, at most, had alleged a violation of state law. They also argued that they were entitled to qualified immunity. The District Court denied the officials' motion for summary judgment, and this appeal followed.

II.

An immediate appeal lies from an order denying a claim of qualified immunity. See Duckworth v. Ford, 995 F.2d 858, 861 (8th Cir.1993). On such an appeal, it is appropriate for us to decide whether the complaint states a claim at all. "[T]he threshold question in analyzing a qualified immunity claim is whether the plaintiff has alleged a violation of a constitutional right." Cole v. Bone, 993 F.2d 1328, 1332 (8th Cir.1993) (citing Siegert v. Gilley, 500 U.S. 226, ----, 111 S.Ct. 1789, 1793, 114 L.Ed.2d 277 (1991)).

The parties spend a great deal of time arguing about the meaning of Iowa Code Sec. 903A.5. Bagley spent a certain amount of time in federal custody serving sentences that were ultimately reversed. While serving this time, was he "receiving credit upon" these federal sentences? The defendants argue that while Bagley was serving the time, and before his appeals were decided, federal officials were crediting him for this service. If the convictions had stood up, the time that Bagley had served would have counted towards satisfaction of his sentences. Bagley argues, on the other hand, that an illegal sentence, a sentence that never should have been imposed to begin with, a sentence that was, in the end, reversed, is not a sentence upon which one can receive credit. His time in federal custody did not give him credit for anything. Under the Iowa statute, credit against an Iowa sentence is not given for service in another jurisdiction if the prisoner is receiving credit for that service against a sentence of that other jurisdiction. The District Court agreed with Bagley. It held that he received no credit, within the meaning of Iowa Code Sec. 903A.5, for time spent in federal custody as a result of the reversed sentences. Therefore, under the statute, at least by negative implication, Iowa owed Bagley credit for this time.

We have no reason to quarrel with the District Court's interpretation of the state statute, an interpretation which, as it happens, is entirely consistent with the interpretation given by the state court in which Bagley's suit, later settled, was filed. We assume for present purposes that the state statute did require that Bagley be given the credit he requested. It is fundamental, however, that this does not amount to a Section 1983 claim. We have held several times that a violation of state law, without more, does not state a claim under the federal Constitution or 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983. See, e.g., Meis v. Gunter, 906 F.2d 364, 369 (8th Cir.1990), cert. denied, 498 U.S. 1028, 111 S.Ct. 682, 112 L.Ed.2d 673 (1991).

There is a body of law, to be sure, holding that state law may create a "liberty interest" protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. If, for example, a state statute gives "specific directives to the decision maker that if the [statute's] substantive predicates are present, a particular outcome must follow," a "liberty interest" protected by the Fourteenth Amendment is created. Kentucky Department of Corrections v. Thompson, 490 U.S. 454, 463, 109 S.Ct. 1904, 1910, 104 L.Ed.2d 506 (1989). As we explained in Meis v. Gunter, supra, however, this language is meaningful only in the context of procedural-due-process claims. If a state law gives me the right to a certain outcome in the event of the occurrence of certain facts, I have a right, by virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment, to whatever process is due in connection with the determination of whether those facts exist. This is not at all the same thing as saying that the federal Constitution guarantees me all rights created or conferred upon me by state law. Such a doctrine would turn every state-law violation into a substantive-due-process claim, a result that would obliterate completely the distinction between state law and the federal Constitution. As we said in Meis v. Gunter, supra, 906 F.2d at 368-69:

Furthermore, this is not the kind of state statute that would create a liberty interest as that term has come to be used in Fourteenth Amendment jurisprudence. The terms liberty interest and property interest are used in the context of procedural-due-process claims. Thus, if the state says that an inmate is entitled to be paroled if certain substantive factual predicates are established, the inmate has a liberty interest in parole, and it cannot be denied until some appropriate sort of hearing has been held at which the inmate will be allowed to show that the requisite factual predicates exist. Greenholtz v. Inmates of Nebraska Penal and Correctional Complex, 442 U.S. 1, 99 S.Ct. 2100, 60 L.Ed.2d 668 (1979). It is commonly said that no liberty interest of this kind is created unless the state statute or regulation involved uses mandatory language and imposes substantive limits on the discretion of state officials. Dace v. Mickelson, 816 F.2d 1277 (8th Cir.1987) (en banc). The statute [involved here] certainly uses mandatory language, but it does not create a certain right or entitlement subject to specified factual findings. Rather, it is a direct command that certain [action be taken]. There is no question here of procedural due process. It is not claimed, for example, that...

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