Crutchfield v. Hannigan, 73643
| Decision Date | 01 December 1995 |
| Docket Number | No. 73643,73643 |
| Citation | 906 P.2d 184,21 Kan.App.2d 693 |
| Parties | Frank L. CRUTCHFIELD, Appellant, v. Robert D. HANNIGAN, et al., Appellees. |
| Court | Kansas Court of Appeals |
Syllabus by the Court
1. A urinalysis test of a prison inmate constitutes a search for purposes of the Fourth Amendment and, therefore, must be reasonable. In determining whether a search of a prisoner is reasonable, the privacy interests of the prisoner are limited by the security interests of the penal institution.
2. The maintenance and administration of penal institutions are executive functions and, before courts will interfere, the institutional treatment must be of such a nature as to clearly infringe upon constitutional rights, be of such a character or consequence as to shock the general conscience, or be intolerable to fundamental fairness. To avoid summary dismissal of a K.S.A. 60-1501 petition, allegations must be made of shocking and intolerable conduct or continuing mistreatment of a constitutional nature.
3. The Fourth Amendment does not prohibit prison authorities from randomly testing inmates for drugs through urinalysis.
4. The testing of urine samples by the immunoassay test procedure used by the Kansas Department of Corrections is sufficiently reliable to satisfy constitutional standards under the Fourth Amendment and an inmate's right to due process of law.
Frank L. Crutchfield, pro se.
Mary Ann Shirley, administrative attorney, of Hutchinson Correctional Facility, Hutchinson, for appellee.
Before ELLIOTT, P.J., MARQUARDT, J., and DAVID PRAGER, Chief Justice Retired, assigned.
Frank L. Crutchfield, an inmate at the Hutchinson Correctional Facility, appeals the denial of his K.S.A. 60-1501 petition claiming that prison authorities violated his Fourth Amendment rights in collecting a urine sample from him and that he was denied due process in the prison disciplinary hearing, which resulted in his loss of 9 months of good time credit, a $40 fine, 66 days of disciplinary segregation, and 90 days of restriction from privileges. The district court, after considering the policies and procedures followed in the disciplinary proceedings, dismissed his petition as frivolous.
The basic facts of the case are not in dispute and are as follows: On April 11, 1994, Crutchfield was subjected to a urinalysis test and tested positive for use of stimulants. The following day, he pled no contest to the use of stimulants in violation of K.A.R. 44-12-312. On July 29, 1994, he again tested positive and was charged with another violation. Crutchfield pled not guilty but was found guilty of the charge after a disciplinary hearing on August 18, 1994. He appealed the decision to the Secretary of Corrections, who determined that the evidence supported the hearing officer's determination.
Crutchfield then filed a pro se K.S.A. 60-1501 petition in district court. He alleged that the urine immunoassay test used by the Department of Corrections (DOC) is unreliable and frequently renders false positive results and that the use of the immunoassay test instead of the more accurate mass-spectroscopy test denied him due process. He further claimed that he was denied due process because there was no chain of custody established as to the urine sample offered at the hearing, the sample was sealed with identification tape rather than evidence tape, thesample cup was not new or sealed prior to the collection of the sample, and the disciplinary administrator was biased and denied him documentary evidence at the hearing. As to the Fourth Amendment claim, the petition alleged that the collection of the urine sample was an unreasonable seizure designed to harass him, that the sample was collected in a manner degrading to him, and that collection of the sample served no legitimate state interest.
We hold that Crutchfield's claim of a violation of his Fourth Amendment rights is without merit. We agree that a urinalysis constitutes a search for purposes of the Fourth Amendment and, therefore, must be reasonable. See Spence v. Farrier, 807 F.2d 753, 755 (8th Cir.1986). In determining whether a search of a prisoner are reasonable, the privacy interests of the prisoner are limited by the security interests the penal institution. Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 560, ...
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