Browning v. Vernon

• Decision Date: 30 September 1994
• Docket Number: Civ. No. 91-0409-S-HLR.
• Citation: Browning v. Vernon, 874 F.Supp. 1112 (D. Idaho 1994)
• Parties: Lawny Lamar BROWNING, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Richard VERNON, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Idaho

874 F. Supp. 1112

Lawny Lamar BROWNING, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Richard VERNON, et al., Defendants.

Civ. No. 91-0409-S-HLR.

United States District Court, D. Idaho.

September 30, 1994.

Gar Hackney, Lynn Scott Hackney & Sullivan, Boise, ID, Katharine K. Nanda, Stephen L. Pevar, American Civil Liberties Union, Denver, CO, for plaintiffs.

Timothy D. Wilson, Deputy Atty. Gen., Dept. of Corrections, Boise, ID, for defendants.

ORDER ADOPTING REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION, VACATING TRIAL AND ADMINISTRATIVELY TERMINATING CASE

RYAN, Senior District Judge.

I. INTRODUCTION

All pretrial matters in the above-entitled class action were referred to United States Magistrate Judge Mikel H. Williams. Plaintiffs filed a motion for summary judgment on February 22, 1994, seeking a declaration that they were denied rights guaranteed to them under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Specifically, plaintiffs ask the court to declare that defendants failed to provide adequate notice and meaningful opportunities to be heard in connection with the rider program at NICI as required by Idaho Code § 19-2601.

On June 16, 1994, Magistrate Judge Williams filed a Report and Recommendation in which he recommends the following disposition of Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment: (1) that plaintiffs' motion be granted to the extent it seeks a ruling that the defendants must provide written regulations governing the operation of the rider program; (2) that defendants be given sixty days to produce written regulations that comply with the statements made in the Report and Recommendation; (3) that counsel for both parties meet during this sixty-day period and attempt to reach an agreement on the contents of the regulations; and (4) that at the end of the sixty-day period, the parties submit to the court a set of the agreed-upon written regulations for approval.

Magistrate Judge Williams also recommends that plaintiffs' request for a declaratory judgment that past practices of the NICI violate due process, and for an injunction against those practices, be granted in part and denied in part. Ultimately, Magistrate Judge Williams recommends that plaintiffs' motion should be granted as to the following five practices, and denied as to the remainder:

1. Failing to notify the rider in writing, prior to April 1991, on the Form 022 or its equivalent of the rider's right to present witnesses at his rebuttal hearing.

2. Failing to provide copies of the staff evaluations to riders.

3. Failing to provide sex offender or other riders with a copy of their psychological report.

4. Failing to provide a means for segregated riders to prepare for the rebuttal hearing, i.e., providing staff assistance to contact witnesses, access to a telephone to contact legal counsel.

5. Failing to give segregated riders more than twenty-four hours to prepare for the rebuttal hearing.

Report and Recommendation, filed June 16, 1994, at 27-28.

Plaintiffs' Partial Objection to Magistrate's Report and Recommendation was filed on July 5, 1994. After receiving an extension of time, defendants filed their Objection to Report and Recommendation on August 4, 1994. Thereafter, plaintiffs filed their Reply to Defendants' Objection to the Magistrate's Report on August 17, 1994. Accordingly, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)-(1), this court is required to engage in a de novo review of the record.

II. DISCUSSION

A. Plaintiffs' Partial Objection

Essentially, plaintiffs object to Magistrate Judge Williams' recommendation on the following basis: "The Magistrate's Report and Recommendation deserves to be adopted by this Court in all respects except one. While the Report finds six constitutional violations, it provides insufficient redress for them. Indeed, the limited remedy suggested by the Magistrate could render his entire Report a hollow victory." Plaintiffs' Partial Objection, filed July 5, 1994, at 2 n. 1 (emphasis added).

To the extent Magistrate Judge Williams "suggested" that plaintiffs must prove actual prejudice before they may obtain new hearings, such a suggestion was merely dicta, and is not binding on any members of the plaintiff class. Indeed, by way of post conviction proceedings, it will be up to the state courts of Idaho to determine appropriate remedies for the constitutional violations that occurred at NICI. Accordingly, although plaintiffs' partial objection in this regard is compelling, this court will not delve into the merits of plaintiffs' arguments.

Also included within their partial objection, plaintiffs note that, although the report recommends that their motion be denied in part and granted in part, "the Report does not indicate anything that was denied." Plaintiffs' Partial Objection, at 2 n. 1. More specifically, plaintiffs state:

The Report concludes with an itemized list of five of the six remedies plaintiffs requested, but the only one missing — the right to an impartial hearing examiner — is mandated in an earlier portion of the Report at page 21. Plaintiffs are not trying to read more into the Report than exists, but it certainly appears that the Magistrate upholds plaintiffs' arguments on all six issues presented.

Id.

The court has fully reviewed the record with respect to this issue, and finds that plaintiffs' point is well taken. Plaintiffs' entitlement to an impartial hearing examiner should have been added to the practices delineated at the end of the magistrate judge's report. Accordingly, to the extent that issue was omitted from the magistrate judge's ultimate conclusion, the Report and Recommendation warrants modification by this court.

B. Defendants' Objections

The court has reviewed defendants' objections to Magistrate Judge Williams' Report and Recommendation, together with plaintiffs' reply thereto. Based on this review, and the record as a whole, the court does not find any of defendants' objections to be well taken. Therefore, rather than engaging in a lengthy discussion of defendants' objections, and because the court finds Magistrate Williams' Report and Recommendation to be thorough, well reasoned, and well supported in the law, aside from the one modification discussed in the preceding section, the Report and Recommendation shall be incorporated by reference and adopted in its entirety.

C. Motion to Vacate and Order of Administrative Termination

On September 26, 1994, defendants filed a Motion to Vacate Hearing,¹ asking the court to vacate the trial date of November 1, 1994, in light of the interlocutory appeal that has been filed in this matter. The court has also received a letter from plaintiffs' counsel, dated September 29, 1994, asking that the present trial date be vacated.

Having considered the requests from counsel, and the record as a whole, the court finds that, pending resolution of the interlocutory appeal before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the November 1, 1994, trial date should be vacated. In addition, although the order set forth below contemplates further review to be conducted by Magistrate Judge Williams, the court finds the case appropriate for administrative termination at this time.

III. ORDER

Based upon the foregoing and the court being fully advised in the premises,

IT IS HEREBY ORDERED that the Report and Recommendation filed on June 16, 1994, should be and is hereby INCORPORATED by reference, ADOPTED in its entirety and MODIFIED to the extent that, rather than indicating that Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment should be granted in part and denied in part, the report shall be considered to: (1) include the recommendation that Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment should be granted in its entirety; and (2) include plaintiffs' entitlement to an impartial hearing examiner among those practices enumerated at pages 27 and 28 of the report.

IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment, filed February 22, 1994, should be, and is hereby, GRANTED. Plaintiffs were not afforded their rights under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, and therefore:

(1) defendants shall provide written regulations governing the operation of the rider program;

(2) within sixty days of this order, defendants shall produce written regulations that comply with the requirements set forth in the Report and Recommendation;

(3) counsel for both parties shall meet during this sixty-day period and attempt to reach an agreement on the contents of the regulations; and

(4) at the end of the sixty-day period, the parties shall submit to the court a set of the agreed-upon written regulations for review and approval by United States Magistrate Judge Mikel H. Williams.

IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that defendants' Motion to Vacate Hearing filed on September 26, 1994, should be, and is hereby, GRANTED; and the trial currently set on November 1, 1994, should be, and is hereby, VACATED pending resolution of the interlocutory appeal before the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.

IT IS FURTHER ORDERED that the Clerk of Court shall ADMINISTRATIVELY TERMINATE the above-entitled action in his records, without prejudice to the right of the parties to reopen this proceeding for good cause shown or for the entry of any stipulation or order, or for any other purpose required to obtain a final determination of this litigation.

REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION

WILLIAMS, United States Magistrate Judge.

INTRODUCTION

This case is before this Court pursuant to Judge Harold L. Ryan's Order of Reference entered September 25, 1991, which refers all pretrial matters to this Court. Currently before the Court is Plaintiffs' Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. # 75). Briefing on the motion is now complete, and the Court heard oral argument on April 18, 1994.

REPORT

I. Background Facts

The Plaintiffs are a class of inmates incarcerated at the North Idaho Correctional Institution (NICI). These inmates — known as "riders" — were sentenced under Idaho Code § 19-2601(4) which allows the sentencing judge to...