Brown v. Johnson

• Decision Date: 11 September 1984
• Docket Number: No. 82-1768,82-1768
• Citation: 743 F.2d 408
• Parties: Kenneth L. BROWN, Plaintiff, Juan Inosencio, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Perry JOHNSON and Charles E. Egeler, Defendants-Appellees,
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

Page 408

743 F.2d 408

Kenneth L. BROWN, Plaintiff, Juan Inosencio, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Perry JOHNSON and Charles E. Egeler, Defendants-Appellees,

No. 82-1768.

United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

Argued April 10, 1984.

Decided Sept. 11, 1984.

John Eshleman Wahl, argued, San Francisco, Cal., David Piontkowsky, Susan Winshall & Associates, Southfield, Mich., for plaintiffs-appellants.

Frank J. Kelley, Atty. Gen. of Mich., David G. Edick, argued, Lansing, Mich., for defendants-appellees.

Before ENGEL and MARTIN, Circuit Judges, and WEICK, Senior Circuit Judge.

BOYCE F. MARTIN, Jr., Circuit Judge.

The issue presented here is whether state prison officials may prohibit inmates affiliated with the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Churches, a Christian church which has a special ministry to the spiritual and religious needs of homosexuals, from participating in group worship services within the prison, while permitting other churches to hold such worship services.

Plaintiffs, state prisoners, the Detroit Metropolitan Community Church and certain Church officials, appeal a decision of the district court finding that the defendants, prison officials at the Jackson State Prison for Southern Michigan, did not act unreasonably or overreact when it prohibited congregate worship services by the Church at the prison. See Inosencio v. Johnson, 547 F.Supp. 130 (E.D.Mich.1982).

Prison officials recognized the Church as a bona fide religion in 1976. Following this recognition prison officials have allowed the Church's ministers to meet with inmates on an individual basis and to mail religious literature to them. Church officials have not, however, been permitted to conduct congregate worship services within the prison. Plaintiffs began this action in February 1977. They challenged the blanket prohibition against congregate worship services within the prison by the Church. The Church is a member of the Universal Fellowship of Metropolitan Community Church and differs from other Protestant churches principally in not condemning homosexuality. One of its purposes is to minister to the spiritual needs of homosexual persons in and out of prison; the Church, however, does not encourage homosexual behavior.

The plaintiffs initially argued that the prison's blanket prohibition against congregate worship services by the Church violated the first amendment because inmates of other faiths and their respective churches, which were not supportive of the spiritual needs of homosexual inmates, were permitted to conduct congregate worship services, while the plaintiffs were not. This claim was rejected by the district court.

After an appeal to this court, we remanded the district court's summary judgment order to allow plaintiffs "an opportunity to present evidence concerning the effect of the Church's congregational services in prison and on the treatment of the Church's ministers in prison." Inosencio v. Johnson, 658 F.2d 418, 419 (6th Cir.1981). Following the presentation of additional testimony, the district court again found for the defendants. This appeal followed.

Here, plaintiffs assert that the prison's blanket prohibition against the Church's holding congregate worship services violates their first amendment right to religious freedom. They also argue they were denied equal protection of the law because other inmates and churches were permitted to hold group worship services, while they were denied the same privilege. In considering these claims our starting point must be Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 60 L.Ed.2d 497 (1979). In Bell the Court articulated four principles to consider when a challenged prison rule or regulation is attacked on constitutional grounds. First, it is clear that "convicted prisoners do not forfeit all constitutional protections by reason of their conviction and confinement in prison." Id. at 545, 99 S.Ct. at 1877. See also Wolfel v. Bates, 707 F.2d 932, 934 (6th Cir.1983) (per curiam) (prison administrators do not have "an overriding interest in the indiscriminate suppression of peacefully communicated inmate complaints") (emphasis in original). A prisoner retains those rights that are "not inconsistent with his status as a prisoner or with the legitimate penalogical objectives of the corrections system." See Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 822, 94 S.Ct. 2800, 2804, 41 L.Ed.2d 495 (1974). Second, merely because prisoners "retain certain constitutional rights does not mean that these rights are not subject to restrictions and limitations.... There must be a 'mutual accommodation' between institutional needs and objectives and the provisions of the Constitution that are of general application." Bell, 441 U.S. at 546, 99 S.Ct. at 1878 (quoting Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 556, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 2974, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974)). See also Meadows v. Hopkins, 713 F.2d 206, 209-210 (6th Cir.1983) (prison regulations infringing on inmates constitutional rights must be evaluated in light of the central objectives of prison administrators). Third, "maintaining institutional security and preserving internal order and discipline are essential goals that may require limitation or retraction of the retained constitutional rights" of convicted prisoners. Bell, 441 U.S. at 546, 99 S.Ct. at 1878. And finally, because the daily operation of a correctional facility poses difficult and unique management problems, prison officials should be accorded substantial deference in the adoption and implementation of policies and practices that in "their judgment are needed to preserve internal order and discipline and to maintain institutional security. 'Such considerations are peculiarly within the province and professional expertise of corrections officials, and, in the absence of substantial evidence in the record to indicate that the officials have exaggerated their response to these considerations, courts should ordinarily defer to their expert judgment in such matters.' " Bell at 547-48, 99 S.Ct. at 1878 (quoting Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 827, 94 S.Ct. 2800, 2806, 41 L.Ed.2d 495 (1974)). Applying these principles, in Bell the Court found that a prison's prohibition against inmate receipt of hardback books not mailed directly from publishers did not violate the inmates' first amendment rights because the prohibition was a rational response to an obvious security problem, the rule was executed in a neutral fashion, and there were alternative means available for inmates to obtain reading material. Bell, 441 U.S. at 550-52, 99 S.Ct. at 1880-81.

Similarly, in Jones v. North Carolina Prisoners' Labor Union, Inc., 433 U.S. 119, 97 S.Ct. 2532, 53 L.Ed.2d 629 (1977), the Court held that neither the first amendment nor the equal protection clause were impermissibly infringed when state prison officials prohibited a prisoners' union from soliciting other inmates to join the union, barred all meetings of the union, and refused to deliver packets of union publications that had been mailed in bulk to several inmates for redistribution among other prisoners, even though similar privileges were extended to other organizations within the prison. Addressing the union's first amendment associational claims, the Jones Court noted that first amendment rights "may be curtailed whenever the institution's officials in the exercise of their informed discretion, reasonably conclude that such associations, whether through group meetings or otherwise, possess the likelihood of disruption to prison order or stability, or otherwise interfere with the legitimate penalogical objectives of the prison environment." Jones, 443 U.S. at 132, 97 S.Ct. at 2541 (emphasis added). Regarding the union's equal protection challenge, the Court noted that prison authorities should be given the "full latitude of discretion" concerning "a decision as to which of many groups should be allowed to operate within the prison walls, ... unless it can be firmly stated that the two groups are so similar that discretion has been abused." Id. at 136, 97 S.Ct. at 2543.

In Weaver v. Jago, 675 F.2d 116, 118 (6th Cir.1982), and Jihaad v. O'Brien, 645 F.2d 556, 564 (6th Cir.1981), we have interpreted the decisions in Bell and Jones, as well as Pell v. Procunier, 417 U.S. 817, 94 S.Ct. 2800, 41 L.Ed.2d 495 (1974) (prison regulation prohibiting media interviews with specific individual inmates did not abridge inmates freedom of speech where alternative channels of communication available), to require that a court balance the competing interests at stake when a prisoner constitutionally challenges the validity of a specified prison rule. Although a prisoner "does not have an absolute right to practice his religion in accord with his desires," he is entitled to have a court balance his constitutional claims against legitimate state interests in operating its prisons. Jihaad, 645 F.2d at 564; Weaver v. Jago, 675 F.2d at 118. ¹ Accord Meadows v. Hopkins, 713 F.2d at 210; Thompson v. Commonwealth of Kentucky, 712 F.2d 1078, 1080 (6th Cir.1983).

Here, the district court was required to balance the needs of the prison authorities with internal security and inmate discipline against the right of the inmates and Church to exercise their religious freedom. Governmental interference with a prisoner's religious practices cannot be justified merely because a particular faith is sympathetic to the religious needs of homosexuals. Lipp v. Procunier, 395 F.Supp. 871, 876 (N.D.Cal.1975) (three-judge panel); cf. Gay Students Org. of Univ. of New Hampshire v. Bonner, 509 F.2d 652, 662 (1st Cir.1974). "[R]easonable opportunities must be afforded to all prisoners to exercise the religious freedom guaranteed by the First and Fourteenth Amendments without fear of penalty." Cruz v. Beto, 405 U.S. 319, 322 n. 2, 92 S.Ct. 1079, 1081 n. 2, 31 L.Ed.2d 263 (1972) (emphasis added). Where an inmate's religious freedom is at stake, correctional...