Beatham v. Manson

• Citation: 369 F. Supp. 783
• Decision Date: 26 December 1973
• Docket Number: Civ. No. H-111.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut
• Parties: Owen BEATHAM and Donald J. LaReau, and all others similarly situated v. John R. MANSON, Commissioner of Corrections, State of Connecticut, Richard M. Steinert, Superintendent, CCI, Enfield.

369 F. Supp. 783

Owen BEATHAM and Donald J. LaReau, and all others similarly situated

v.

John R. MANSON, Commissioner of Corrections, State of Connecticut, Richard M. Steinert, Superintendent, CCI, Enfield.

Civ. No. H-111.

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

December 26, 1973.

Owen Beatham, pro se.

Robert K. Killian, Atty. Gen., Stephen J. O'Neill, Asst. Atty. Gen., Hartford, Conn., for defendant.

RULING ON MOTION FOR SUMMARY JUDGMENT

BLUMENFELD, Chief Judge.

Plaintiff¹ is an inmate at the Connecticut Correctional Institution, Enfield (hereinafter "Enfield"), having been transferred to Enfield from the Connecticut Correctional Institution, Somers (hereinafter "Somers"). Plaintiff alleges that the Connecticut Department of Correction pays prisoners who satisfactorily complete work assignments at rates which vary from 38 cents to 74 cents per working day. While at Somers plaintiff had worked up to a 59 cents-per-day pay rate. Upon his transfer to Enfield, plaintiff found himself returned to a 38 cents-per-day pay rate, although he had performed his work at Somers in all respects satisfactorily. Plaintiff further alleges that some transferees from Somers to Enfield do not forfeit their existing positions on the pay scale. Based on these factual allegations, plaintiff has brought a class action under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983, seeking declaratory and injunctive relief for violation of his rights under the Fourteenth Amendment.

Defendants, who are various officers of the Connecticut Department of Correction and its Correctional Institutions, have moved for summary judgment on the ground that payment of any compensation to state prisoners is a matter of grace which the state may condition in any manner it chooses. Thus defendants argue that plaintiff has failed to allege the denial of any federally protected right.

I doubt defendants are prepared to argue seriously that because the state need not provide compensation in the first place, therefore any condition may be attached to the payment of compensation to prisoners, such as payment only to prisoners of certain races or religions, free of federal scrutiny. And in fact, defendants' decision to move for summary judgment rather than for a motion to dismiss appears to be based on the belief that no improper denial of equal protection has occurred in this case, rather than the belief that plaintiff is not entitled to the equal protection of the laws. Thus defendants have attached to their motion for summary judgment the affidavit of defendant Richard M. Steinert, Superintendent of Enfield. This affidavit includes the following declarations:

"As contrasted with Somers the institution at Enfield is a minimum security institution and generally transfers from Somers to Enfield are highly desired by inmates.

The following are the procedures used in placing inmates in job assignments, in the absence of unusual circumstances:

a. Transfers from Somers to Enfield are made on Thursdays so that inmates can be settled prior to the weekend for visiting purposes.

b. Upon such transfer the job detail assigned to inmates is window washing until they are evaluated for a more permanent job assignment. Generally this job assignment takes place within one week of the transfer.

c. Placement in a more permanent job assignment turns upon such factors as the inmate's skill, security of the institution, job openings and the inmate's job preference.

Absolutely no favoritism is involved in placing an inmate in a job assignment. Any difference in pay scales among inmates is entirely due to the factors set forth in subparagraph (c) above."

In an opposing affidavit submitted by a former plaintiff, see n. 1, supra, it is stated that defendant Steinert has represented that the reason for the abrogation of the pay scale rank of transferees to Enfield from Somers is the different budget of Enfield.² The affidavit goes on to maintain that transferees are not forewarned of their loss of pay, that transfer serves to eliminate overcrowding at Somers, and hence that inmates are under pressure to accept such transfers, that pay scale rank is ordinarily reduced only for disciplinary reasons,³ that reducing an inmate's pay scale rank merely because of his transfer to Enfield is irrational and arbitrary (because other privileges earned at Somers, such as "good time" and spending allowances, are carried over intact at Enfield), and finally that the reduction of pay scale rank for a non-disciplinary reason such as transfer sabotages the prisoner rehabilitation which the pay scale otherwise seeks to promote.

Facts

Comparing the two affidavits submitted by the parties, I find no dispute as to the material facts of the case.⁴ There is no necessary conflict between the budgetary considerations expressed by defendant Steinert to LaReau, see n. 2, supra, and the considerations expressed by defendant Steinert to the Court. The affidavits do not raise a genuine issue with respect to the fact that a pay scale keyed to job assignments exists at Enfield, rank in which is controlled by the factors set forth in defendant Steinert's affidavit. A transferee from Somers loses his seniority at Somers and starts over again at Enfield, unless he has skills for a job in which Enfield has an opening which will allow him to start at Enfield at a higher rate of pay then the 38 cents-per-day base rate. The pay scale at Enfield is tied in to the Enfield budget, which will not permit new positions to be created on the pay scale to accommodate transferees from Somers who have been earning more at Somers than they will earn at any available job at Enfield. Implicit in defendant Steinert's affidavit is the proposition that the seniority system within Enfield is not disrupted by bumping from their positions on the Enfield pay scale men with less overall seniority than transferees from Somers, so that such transferees might retain their pre-transfer rates of pay.

Plaintiff's Claims for Relief

Reading plaintiff's complaint with the liberality due to pro se pleadings, see Haines v. Kerner, 404 U.S. 519, 520, 92 S.Ct. 594, 30 L.Ed.2d 652 (1972), and hence treating as if incorporated in the complaint the argumentative portions of the affidavit in opposition to defendants' motion for summary judgment, I gather that plaintiff finds in the set of facts recited above a basis for attack on three fronts. It appears that plaintiff asserts that federal rights are violated by (1) other than voluntary or disciplinary transfers of inmates from Somers to Enfield; (2) the refusal of defendants to give transferees to Enfield a pay scale rank equal to that held by the transferees at Somers; and (3) the inequality of treatment among the transferees from Somers to Enfield, insofar as some transferees receive assignments at Enfield to jobs with equal or higher pay scale rank than their prior work assignments at Somers.

Due Process Constraints on Prison Transfers

As to the voluntariness of inmate transfers from Somers to Enfield, plaintiff's position appears to be that while an inmate can successfully refuse such a transfer, his objection may result in a loss of privileges at Somers. Plaintiff also seems to object to the fact that many inmates acquiesce in their transfer from Somers to Enfield in ignorance of the fact that they may suffer a loss in pay scale rank through such a transfer. Plaintiff points out that a reduction in pay scale rank, other than as an incident of an inmate's transfer from Somers to Enfield, is supposedly a disciplinary measure. Thus plaintiff seems to argue that federal rights are violated when an inmate is transferred from Somers to Enfield without his informed consent or without some misconduct on his part which would justify his reduction in pay scale rank at Enfield.

Plaintiff's position in this regard is untenable. It is true that a prisoner's right to due process may be infringed if he is arbitrarily subjected to a serious deprivation. See, e.g., Morrissey v. Brewer, 408 U.S. 471, 481-484, 92 S.Ct. 2593, 33 L.Ed.2d 484 (1972); Sostre v. McGinnis, 442 F.2d 178, 194-199 (2d Cir. 1971), cert. denied 404 U.S. 1049, 92 S.Ct. 719, 30 L.Ed.2d 740, cert. denied, Oswald v. Sostre, 405 U.S. 978, 92 S.Ct. 1190, 31 L.Ed.2d. 254 (1972). Due process has thus been held to place some strictures on the interstate transfer of a prisoner, largely because of the resulting deprivation of that prisoner's proximity to family, friends, and counsel. See Croom v. Manson, 367 F.Supp. 586 (D.Conn. Nov. 14, 1973); Park v. Thompson, 356 F.Supp. 783 (D.Haw. 1973); Gomes v. Travisono, 353 F.Supp. 457 (D.R.I.1973); Capitan v. Cupp, 356 F.Supp. 302 (D.Or.1972). Although the same sort of deprivation may result from an intrastate transfer of a prisoner, the magnitude of such deprivation has generally been held insufficient to invoke federal due process protection vis-à-vis intrastate transfers. See United States ex rel. Stuart v. Yeager, 293 F.Supp. 1079, 1081 (D.N.J.1968), aff'd 419 F.2d 126 (3d Cir. 1969), cert. denied 397 U.S. 1055, 90 S.Ct. 1400, 25 L.Ed.2d 673 (1970); Lewis v. Gladden, 230 F. Supp. 786 (D.Or.1964). See also Bell v. Warden, 207 Md. 618, 113 A.2d 482 (1955). The incidental deprivation of the sort of privileges here in issue, including the type of job previously held and the pay or other benefits earned through that job, is similarly insufficient to bring an intrastate transfer within the purview of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of due process. See Hanvey v. Pinto, 441 F.2d 1154 (3d Cir. 1971). See also Lloyd v. Oliver, 363 F. Supp. 821, 822 (E.D.Va.1973). Only when intrastate transfers have been made for apparently disciplinary reasons, with the prisoner being deprived of the benefits of a minimum-security institution by being moved to a maximum-security institution, have due process strictures been imposed on such transfers. See Newkirk v. Butler, 364 F.Supp. 497 (S.D.N.Y.1973); White v. Gillman...