Anderson v. Redman, Civ. A. No. 76-364.
| Decision Date | 16 February 1977 |
| Docket Number | Civ. A. No. 76-364. |
| Citation | 429 F. Supp. 1105 |
| Parties | Henry ANDERSON et al., Plaintiffs, v. Walter REDMAN et al., Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Delaware |
COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED
Gary A. Myers and H. William Schab, Jr., Community Legal Aid Society, Inc., Georgetown, Del., for plaintiffs.
Norman A. Barron, Keith A. Trostle and John A. Parkins, Jr., Dept. of Justice, Wilmington, Del., for defendants.
This civil rights action brought under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 and various State statutes by and on behalf of convicted State inmates and pre-trial detainees held at the Delaware Correctional Center (DCC) seeks injunctive relief to alleviate the overcrowded living conditions at DCC. Defendants, sued only in their official capacity, are the Warden of DCC and the Acting Director of the Department of Correction of the State of Delaware.
Although there was a seven day trial which concluded on December 3, 1976,1 there was virtually no disagreement as to the operative facts. Lack of factual controversy is attributable to the parties having entered into a comprehensive stipulation of facts2 and most of plaintiffs' primary trial witnesses having been DCC and Department of Correction personnel. Nevertheless, a detailed statement of the facts is essential to understand plaintiffs' challenge to the overcrowded conditions at DCC.
DCC is located two miles north of Smyrna, Delaware. It was constructed during 1970-71 and initially was occupied in April of that year. At that time the DCC complex encompassed seven structures:
Thereafter, a gymnasium was constructed and in 1975, two prefabricated buildings (hereinafter MA-1 and MA-2) were constructed in the minimum compound adjacent to the minimum security building. Aside from MA-1 and MA-2 no other residency units have been erected since 1971.
The receiving room consists of four cells, a shower room, hallway and two storerooms. The receiving room is separated from pre-trial by a solid steel door which is normally locked. The cells are adjacent and each measures thirteen (13) feet eight (8) inches in length, nine (9) feet nine (9) inches in width and eleven (11) feet four (4) inches in height. Each cell has one combination sink and toilet in a corner and one exterior window seven (7) feet high and two (2) feet wide. The front face of the cells consists of a barred opening with a barred door allowing a person in the hallway to look directly into the cells. The shower facilities consist of a room with three shower heads located across the hallway from the cells. Each receiving cell contains one hundred thirty-three (133) square feet of living space.
Each cell was equipped at time of trial with two sets of bunk beds, an additional single bed, and some mattresses placed on the floor. Persons in the cells are allowed access to the showers only when the two correctional officers assigned to the receiving room, who also have responsibility for intake processing, discharges, and preparation of men for court, have an opportunity to supervise the showers. No television is available for viewing in the receiving room cells nor are facilities provided for the storage of personal belongings.
The receiving room cells were not designed or originally intended to be used to house inmates for extended periods. Each cell or "bull pen" was to hold no more than two men during the initial commitment processing. The processing is done to ascertain the inmate's physical and mental condition to ensure that he would not present a threat to himself or to the general population. Individuals were to be held in the cells only during the initial commitment process. Shortly after DCC opened, the population pressure forced abandonment of the original plan and three additional bunks were installed in each receiving cell. Subsequently, continued overcrowding caused the receiving room cells to be used for not only pre-trial detentioners and newly sentenced inmates, but also convicted inmates. However, the majority of the inmates in the receiving cells are pre-trial detentioners.
Although the receiving room population fluctuates, during the months of September, October and November of 1976, there were numerous instances of 60 or more inmates being held in the four receiving cells during the day with 24 sleeping in the four cells during the night. While inmates reside in the receiving room cells an average of two weeks, some have stayed for as long as six months.
Except for meals and the recreation periods given persons in pre-trial, inmates housed in the four receiving room cells are locked in the four separate cells during their waking hours. During this period, assuming 16 inmates per receiving room cell, each inmate has slightly over eight (8) square feet. At night the square footage allotment increases to slightly over twenty-two square feet per inmate, since only six inmates sleep in each cell. The remainder sleep on mattresses on the walkway floors of pre-trial tiers B and C.
As originally designed, the pre-trial section, intended for residence of pre-trial detainees, consisted of a small television room, library room, dining-day room and 90 cells arranged in three tiers (A, B and C tiers).5 In general, an inmate moves from the receiving room cells to the television room and then to the library room. Thereafter, when vacancies appear on the pre-trial cell tiers, persons housed in the library room (and television room) are moved to a cell on the basis of seniority.
The television room in pre-trial measures eighteen (18) feet three (3) inches in length and twenty-five (25) feet seven (7) inches in width. The single metal door to the room has two windows, and is located across the hallway from the door to C tier walkway. The television room originally was designed for indoor recreation, television viewing and hobbies. Not surprisingly, it has no toilet, shower or wash basin facilities. Nonetheless, the room has been used for residency purposes for approximately one year. The television room generally houses 12 persons on single beds, the majority of whom are pre-trial detentioners. The square footage per resident inmate in the television room is 38.73 square feet.
Persons housed in the television room are locked in the room approximately 16 hours out of every 24 hour period. They are released only during recreation, commissary and library times and for meals. If a person secured6 in the television room desires to use a toilet or wash basin, he must first orally summon a correctional officer to unlock the television room door and the door to C tier, since the toilet facilities of C tier are designated for use by inmates housed in the television room. The television room has no correctional officer assigned to it, and thus a secured inmate who desires to use the bathroom somehow must attract the attention of a correctional officer stationed elsewhere in the pre-trial building. This lack of any plumbing facility also dictates that inmates in the television room may take showers only at specified times.
The library room measuring twenty-four (24) feet five (5) inches in width and fifteen (15) feet five and one-half (5½) inches in length was designed originally for use as a library by pre-trial detainees. The library room has not been used as a library for over one year. The room has within it six sets of double bunk beds, approximately 18 inches apart, and has been generally used to house 12 persons. As in the television room, there is a mixture of pre-trial detentioners and convicted persons. The single metal door to the library is separated from the correctional officer's station by a distance of somewhere between twenty (20) to thirty (30) feet, and is on a different hallway from the three cell tiers. The library has no mechanical or electrical device for summoning correctional officers and has no toilet, shower or wash basin facilities. Inmates are locked in the library for approximately the same period as those in the television room, and encounter similar problems when desiring to use any bathroom facilities. The allotment of space for an inmate living in the pre-trial library is approximately thirty-two (32) square feet.
The individual pre-trial cells measure ten (10) feet in length, six (6) feet six (6) inches in width, and eight (8) feet nine (9) inches in height.7 The cells in each tier face a tier walkway measuring one hundred-one (101) feet in length and eight (8) feet in width. All three cell tiers are secured by a locked door on one end and a lockable door which opens into the central hallway on the other end. Each tier has one shower room with three shower heads. Cells on tiers A and B contain in one corner a combination basin and toilet. Cells on C tier have no toilet or basin, but at the end of C tier is a bathroom consisting of three wash basins, two toilets and three urinals. The doors to cells on A and B tiers must be opened electronically by a correctional officer while the cell doors on C tier are under the control of the occupant who is given a key to the door of his individual cell.
Each cell in pre-trial was designed and intended for occupancy by a single person, providing approximately sixty-five (65) square feet of living space. Accordingly, the design capacity for the pre-trial section is 90 persons. As early as 1972, however, the design capacity was exceeded when 15 additional bunks were installed in the cells on the left side of A tier to accommodate the population increase. This reduced the...
To continue reading
Request your trial
-
Reece v. Gragg, Civ. A. No. 82-1970.
...Ahrens v. Thomas, 434 F.Supp. 873 (W.D. Mo.1977) (court ordered new jail to provide 70 square feet per inmate); Anderson v. Redman, 429 F.Supp. 1105 (D.Del.1977) (constitutional compliance required the provision of 75 square feet per inmate); Ambrose v. Malcolm, 414 F.Supp. 485 (S.D.N.Y. 19......
-
Rhodes v. Chapman
...v. Lamm, 639 F.2d 559 (CA10 1980), cert. denied, 450 U.S. 1041, 101 S.Ct. 1759, 68 L.Ed.2d 239 (1981); Delaware, see Anderson v. Redman, 429 F.Supp. 1105 (Del.1977); Florida, see Costello v. Wainwright, 397 F.Supp. 20 (MD Fla.1975), aff'd, 525 F.2d 1239 (CA5), vacated on rehearing on other ......
-
Ruiz v. Estelle
...at 333; Laaman v. Helgemoe, 437 F.Supp. at 319, 324; Barnes v. Government of Virgin Islands, 415 F.Supp. at 1235; Anderson v. Redman, 429 F.Supp. 1105, 1121 (D.Del. 1977). Second, as was underscored in both Newman and Bowring, treatment must entail more than segregation and close supervisio......
-
Ramos v. Lamm
...Consolidated Civil Action No. 74-A-926 (D.Colo. April 3, 1978). Cf. Palmigiano v. Garrahy, 443 F.Supp. at 980-82; Anderson v. Redman, 429 F.Supp. 1105, 1121-22 (D.Del.1977). It is well-established that "due process is flexible and calls for such procedural protections as the particular situ......