Clark v. Beard

• Decision Date: 13 February 2007
• Citation: 918 A.2d 155
• Court: Pennsylvania Commonwealth Court
• Parties: Ronald CLARK, William Wallace, Jr., Jerome Gibson, Ernest Porter, Ronald Collins, Robert L. Cook, Jr., and Lawrence Smith, Appellants v. Jeffrey A. BEARD, Secretary of D.O.C., William S. Stickman, Louis S. Folino, Kenneth Miller, Brenda Martin, Mary Ann Mistrik, Sandra Vuvnovic, Craig Harris, Ms. Balisteiri, Paul J. Stowitzky, Michael C. Barone, Diane Thomas, Sharon D'Eletto, Jean Mears, Dan Davis, Bonnie Lindley, Dr. Finley, Robert Tretinik, Susan Croftcheck, John Doe, & Jane Doe, (Numbers 1 through 99) et al.

918 A.2d 155

Ronald CLARK, William Wallace, Jr., Jerome Gibson, Ernest Porter, Ronald Collins, Robert L. Cook, Jr., and Lawrence Smith, Appellants v. Jeffrey A. BEARD, Secretary of D.O.C., William S. Stickman, Louis S. Folino, Kenneth Miller, Brenda Martin, Mary Ann Mistrik, Sandra Vuvnovic, Craig Harris, Ms. Balisteiri, Paul J. Stowitzky, Michael C. Barone, Diane Thomas, Sharon D'Eletto, Jean Mears, Dan Davis, Bonnie Lindley, Dr. Finley, Robert Tretinik, Susan Croftcheck, John Doe, & Jane Doe, (Numbers 1 through 99) et al.

Commonwealth Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued October 17, 2006.

Decided February 13, 2007.

Rehearing Denied En Banc April 10, 2007.

Teri B. Himebaugh, Schwenksville, for appellants.

Vincent R. Mazeski, Camp Hill, for appellees.

BEFORE: FRIEDMAN, Judge, LEADBETTER, Judge, LEAVITT, Judge.

OPINION BY Judge LEAVITT.

Ronald Clark, William Wallace, Jr., Jerome Gibson, Ernest Porter, Ronald Collins, Robert L. Cook, Jr. and Lawrence Smith (Appellants) appeal from an order of the Court of Common Pleas of Greene County (trial court) dismissing Appellants' complaint. In doing so, the trial court sustained a preliminary objection in the nature of a demurrer filed by the Secretary of Corrections and various employees of the Department of Corrections ("Department Defendants" or "Department"). Appellants claim that the Department Defendants are unlawfully detaining them in the Capital Case Units in two of the Commonwealth's State Correctional Institutions (SCI) despite the fact that their death sentences have been vacated. In this case we consider whether Appellants have pleaded legally cognizable claims for mandamus relief and compensatory damages.

FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND

Appellants were all sentenced to death for serious criminal offenses and are currently incarcerated in the Capital Case Unit at SCI-Greene or SCI-Graterford. Several Appellants initiated actions in the trial court in 2004 with at least one, Ronald Clark, filing a petition for writ of habeas corpus. The gravamen of these various actions was that each Appellant had his death sentence vacated or overturned but the Department continued his confinement in the Capital Case Unit.

In early 2005, Appellants filed a complaint, entitled "civil action in mandamus," in this Court's original jurisdiction against the Department Defendants. Appellants sought money damages as well as a writ of mandamus directing their immediate release into the general prison population. Because Appellants sought compensatory damages, this Court transferred the matter to the trial court by order of February 2, 2005. That order was subsequently vacated. Upon further review, we determined that this Court lacked original jurisdiction over such claims:

Here, [Appellants'] request for damages and request for mandamus relief both rest on the allegation that the Department is intentionally and/or negligently harming them by keeping them on death row. Therefore, [Appellants'] action in equity, the request for mandamus, stems from the Department's alleged tortious conduct. Following Stackhouse,¹ we conclude that [Appellants'] petition for review sounds in trespass and that this court lacks original jurisdiction over the matter.

Clark, et al. v. Beard, et al. (No. 53 M.D. 2005, filed August 31, 2005), at 4-5 (footnote omitted). Accordingly, we sustained the Department's preliminary objection to this Court's original jurisdiction and transferred the matter back to the trial court.

On October 6, 2005, the trial court entered an order consolidating Appellants' case with several other claims raising the identical issue. Appellants filed an amended complaint on October 31, 2005, that was identical to the original complaint in all important respects. Appellants averred that prisoners assigned to the Capital Case Unit are held in solitary confinement; have limited hours of non-contact visitation; are given ten hours of exercise per week in a small cage; are allowed no indoor exercise; can make only three fifteen-minute phone calls per week; and most have no opportunities to work or to participate in educational or rehabilitative programming. Amended Complaint, ¶ 8. Appellants also averred that they suffer from poor health due to long-term confinement in small cells, lack of normal mobility and lack of sunshine. Id. Appellants alleged that these conditions are appropriate for some inmates in the Capital Case Unit, but not for those inmates whose death sentences have been vacated. Amended Complaint, ¶ 9. Appellants fall into this latter category, because their death sentences have been vacated by a court of competent jurisdiction.² Amended Complaint, ¶ 4. Nevertheless, the Department has refused to reassign Appellants from the Capital Case Unit into the general prison population.

In their prayer for relief, Appellants requested monetary damages in an amount sufficient to compensate them for the pain and mental anguish they suffered due to the "deliberate indifference and intentional misconduct . . . [or] negligence" of the Department Defendants in failing to release them from the Capital Case Unit. Amended Complaint at 6-7.³ Appellants also sought an order directing the Department to reassign them, immediately, to the general prison population and to revise its "illegal" policies regarding housing of inmates whose death sentences have been vacated. Id. at 7.

The Department Defendants filed a preliminary objection in the nature of a demurrer, contending that Appellants failed to state a claim against any of them upon which relief could be granted. The trial court held, as a matter of law, that Appellants have no clear legal right to be housed outside of the Capital Case Unit and, concomitantly, that the Department has no corresponding duty to assign them to any particular area of the prison. For these reasons the trial court concluded that Appellants failed to state a claim for mandamus relief or for compensatory damages and sustained the demurrer. This appeal followed.⁴

NATURE OF APPELLANTS' ACTION

Appellants' action, as noted by the trial court and this Court in its prior opinion, proceeds along two tracks. First, Appellants seek mandamus relief in the form of an order directing the Department Defendants to release them from the Capital Case Unit into the general population and to institute a new policy for prisoners similarly situated to Appellants.⁵ Second, Appellants seek compensatory damages for the pain and mental anguish they have allegedly suffered as a result of their continued confinement in the Capital Case Unit after their death sentences were vacated. In this appeal from a demurrer, we must determine whether Appellants stated legally cognizable causes of action. We consider, first, whether the Appellants have a clear right to a writ of mandamus to enforce a duty of the Department Defendants arising from the applicable capital punishment statute or arising from Appellants' purported liberty interest. Next, we consider whether the allegations in the complaint state a cause of action for compensatory damages.⁶

MANDAMUS

Mandamus is an extraordinary writ that lies to compel an official's performance of a ministerial act or mandatory duty where there is a clear legal right in the plaintiff, a corresponding duty in the defendant, and want of any other appropriate and adequate remedy. Pennsylvania Dental Association v. Insurance Department, 512 Pa. 217, 227, 516 A.2d 647, 652 (1986). Mandamus is not used to direct the exercise of judgment or discretion of an official in a particular way. Id. at 228, 516 A.2d at 652. Furthermore, the purpose of mandamus is not to establish legal rights, but to enforce those rights which are already established. Jamieson v. Pennsylvania Board of Probation and Parole, 90 Pa.Cmwlth. 318, 495 A.2d 623, 625 (1985). Mandamus will not issue to compel a defendant to do that which is illegal, invalid or in violation of a statute. Id. at 625-626. Finally, mandamus is not a proper vehicle for challenging the constitutionality of a statute, regulation or policy. Waters v. Department of Corrections, 97 Pa.Cmwlth. 283, 509 A.2d 430, 433 (1986).

With the foregoing principles in mind, we turn to Appellants' claim for mandamus relief. Appellants aver that, because their death sentences have been vacated by court orders, they have a clear legal right to be removed from the Capital Case Unit, and the Department Defendants have a corresponding duty to reassign them to the general population. The Department Defendants respond that no inmate has any right to pick the place of his incarceration, under statute or under the U.S. Constitution.

Act of June 18, 1998, P.L. 622, No. 80

When a criminal defendant is sentenced to death, the governor is required, by statute, to issue an execution warrant within 90 days specifying a day for execution which shall be no later than 60 days after the date the warrant is signed. Section 2(a) of the Act of June 18, 1998, P.L. 622, No. 80, 61 P.S. § 3002(a) (Act 80).⁷ Then,

[u]pon receipt of the warrant, the [Department] shall, until infliction of the death penalty or until lawful discharge from custody, keep the inmate in solitary confinement. During the confinement, no person except the staff of the department, the inmate's counsel of record or other attorney requested by the inmate and a spiritual adviser selected by the inmate or the members of the immediate family of the inmate shall be allowed access to the inmate without an order of the sentencing court.

Section 3 of Act 80, 61 P.S. § 3003 (emphasis added). The Department argues that upon receiving execution warrants for each Appellant, it was required by Act 80 to place each Appellant in the solitary confinement of the Capital Case Unit. The question, then, is how Act 80 governs their placement after their death sentences are vacated.

According to Section 3 of Act 80, the only way out of the Capital Case Unit, besides execution, is a "discharge from...