Evans v. Holm, 00-2800-D/V.

• Citation: 114 F.Supp.2d 706
• Decision Date: 06 September 2000
• Docket Number: No. 00-2800-D/V.,00-2800-D/V.
• Parties: Terry Lee EVANS, Petitioner, v. Michael HOLM, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Western District of Tennessee

114 F.Supp.2d 706

Terry Lee EVANS, Petitioner, v. Michael HOLM, Respondent.

No. 00-2800-D/V.

United States District Court, W.D. Tennessee, Western Division.

September 6, 2000.

Terry Lee Evans, Mason, TN, pro se.

ORDER OF DISMISSAL ORDER DENYING CERTIFICATE OF APPEALABILITY AND ORDER CERTIFYING APPEAL NOT TAKEN IN GOOD FAITH

DONALD, District Judge.

Petitioner, Terry Lee Evans, an inmate at the West Tennessee Detention Facility (WTDF), has filed an irregular document with the Court. The WTDF, which is owned by Corrections Corporation of America, is a privately operated penal facility in Mason, Tennessee. WTDF houses federal pre-trial detainees under a contract with the United States Marshal Service and state inmates under contracts with individual jurisdictions. The petitioner has neither paid any filing fee nor submitted an application to proceed in forma pauperis.

The Clerk of Court shall docket the case and shall not issue any process, but shall record the respondent as Michael Holm.¹

Petitioner alleges that he is improperly confined at the WTDF. Although the irregular document is somewhat vague on the exact nature of the relationship between petitioner's current custodians and the State of Wisconsin, this Court is well aware from numerous prior lawsuits in this district that CCA houses Wisconsin prisoners at WTDF under a contract with the Wisconsin Department of Corrections (WDOC). Petitioner contends that by transferring him to a private prison outside the state of Wisconsin, Wisconsin has waived any jurisdiction over him, entitling him to unconditional release. He styled the document as a "Motion To Declare Residency in the State of Tennessee."

Since Wisconsin contracted with CCA to house its prisoners, this Court has had occasion well over a dozen times to consider claims that the transfer of a Wisconsin prisoner from an institution operated by the Wisconsin Department of Corrections to a CCA prison in another state abrogates the original sentence and entitles the prisoner to release. This Court has uniformly rejected these claims. See, e.g., Donaldson v. Figeuroa, No. 00-1215 (W.D.Tenn. July 31, 2000); Smith v. Pitzer, No. 00-1170 (W.D. Tenn. June 19, 2000); Washington v. Pitzer, No. 00-1151 (W.D.Tenn. May 26, 2000); Day v. Pitzer, No. 00-1140 (W.D.Tenn. May 19, 2000); Eastman v. Holm, No. 00-2383-D/V (W.D.Tenn. May 9, 2000); Edmonds v. Holm, No. 00-2199-G/Bre (W.D.Tenn. Mar. 14, 2000); Page v. Pitzer, No. 99-1328 (W.D.Tenn. Dec. 30, 1999); Belton v. Pitzer, No. 99-1311 (W.D.Tenn. Nov. 23, 1999); Sanders v. Pitzer, No. 99-1290 (W.D. Tenn. June 19, 2000); Nickl v. Pitzer, No. 99-1198 (W.D.Tenn. Sept. 2, 1999); Sturdevant v. Pitzer, No. 99-1189 (W.D.Tenn. Sept. 2, 1999); Eckert v. Pitzer, No. 99-1189 (W.D.Tenn. July 30, 1999); McClain v. Pitzer, No. 99-1072 (W.D.Tenn. Apr. 28, 1999); Schaitel v. Pitzer, No. 99-1034 (W.D.Tenn. Feb. 22, 1999).

Evans' claim is a slightly different twist on the previous claims. The above cases relied on a dubious theory that a state waives all jurisdiction over a prisoner by confining him beyond the state boundaries. Evans, however, takes a different tack. Evans relies on § 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment, which establishes that "[a]ll persons born or naturalized in the United States" are "citizens of the State in which they reside." According to Evans, he no longer resides in Wisconsin, though not of his own free decision, so he is now a citizen of Tennessee and Wisconsin cannot continue to confine him. Evans' request, therefore, is for a declaratory judgment that he is a citizen of the State of Tennessee. In Evans' view, such a declaration would then carry the logical consequence of requiring the Court to order his release.

Since Evans asserts a right to complete release from confinement, he seeks relief that is only available through a petition for a writ of habeas corpus. Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475, 500, 93 S.Ct. 1827, 36 L.Ed.2d 439 (1973). This means that he does not owe a filing fee under the Prison Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PLRA), Title VIII of Pub.L. 104-134, 110 Stat. 1321 (April 26, 1996), amended the in forma pauperis statute, 28 U.S.C. § 1915. He must, however, either pay the $5 habeas filing fee under 28 U.S.C. § 1914 or file an in forma pauperis application demonstrating his indigence. Accordingly, within twenty (20) days of the entry of this order, Evans must either pay the filing fee or submit a properly supported in forma pauperis application. The Clerk shall enclose a copy of the form application with this order. The application need not be notarized. Evans' completion of the certificate under penalty of perjury is sufficient.

Turning to the merits of Evans' claim, his specious attempt at reasoning is insupportable. Evans' conclusions do not at all follow from his premises. First, the fundamental unspoken premise supporting this syllogism is that a state lacks criminal jurisdiction over a citizen of another state. This is plainly so absurd as not to warrant discussion. By committing a crime in Wisconsin, Evans subjected himself to that state's jurisdiction, regardless of where he claims residence. The Constitution plainly does not preclude one state from enforcing its own criminal law by prosecuting the citizens of another state for crimes committed within the prosecuting state's jurisdiction.

Furthermore, Evans' fundamental premise is also mistaken. He does not "reside" in Tennessee except insofar as he is physically present here. That is, as Evans himself admits, he has not chosen to live here. Rather, he was brought here, and at some point when and if he approaches a release date near the end of his sentence, the WDOC will have him returned to Wisconsin for release and whatever post-release supervision required by that state's laws and his sentence. Most recently released prisoners are subject to post-release supervision and consequent restrictions on travel and change of residence, so even then Evans may not be able to adopt the State of Tennessee without getting permission from the supervising authority. If and when Evans satisfies his obligation to the citizens of the State of Wisconsin, however, he may travel to Tennessee and establish residency and domicile (the two concepts are distinct), without permission from a court. So his motion for a declaratory judgment is completely nonsensical.

Insofar as the waiver theory that has been repeatedly rejected by this Court, the Court will repeat the analysis here. An inmate does not have a liberty interest in assignment to a particular institution. Olim v. Wakinekona, 461 U.S. 238, 245, 103 S.Ct. 1741, 75 L.Ed.2d 813 (1983); Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 224-25, 96 S.Ct. 2532, 49 L.Ed.2d 451 (1976); Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U.S. 236, 243, 96 S.Ct. 2543, 49 L.Ed.2d 466 (1976); Moody v. Daggett, 429 U.S. 78, 88 n. 9, 97 S.Ct. 274, 50 L.Ed.2d 236 (1976); Newell v. Brown, 981 F.2d 880, 883 (6th Cir.1992); Beard v. Livesay, 798 F.2d 874, 876 (6th Cir.1986). In Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 564-71, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974), the Supreme Court identified the procedural requirements prison officials must adopt to satisfy due process when depriving a prisoner of various liberty interests, including deprivation of sentence credits and confinement to segregation. In Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. 460, 472, 103 S.Ct. 864, 74 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983), the Court limited the Wolff requirements applicable to purely administrative, rather than punitive segregation, but broadened the scope of federal court authority over prison administration by recognizing that the mandatory language of state regulations could create liberty interests protected by due process requirements. Courts were required to consider whether "the repeated use of explicitly mandatory language in connection with requiring specific substantive predicates demands a conclusion that the State [or federal government] has created a protected liberty interest." Hewitt, 459 U.S. at 472, 103 S.Ct. 864. In Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 484-87, 115 S.Ct. 2293, 132 L.Ed.2d 418 (1995), however, the Court rejected Hewitt and much of the lower-court jurisprudence that relied on Wolff. Without explicitly overruling Hewitt itself, Sandin returned to the question left open in Wolff, 418 U.S. at 564-71, 94 S.Ct. 2963: whether inmates even have a liberty interest in freedom from segregation, punitive or administrative. The Court rejected Hewitt's methodology and concluded that they do not.

The time has come to return to the due process principles we believe were correctly established and applied in Wolff and Meachum. Following Wolff, we recognize that States may under certain circumstances create liberty interests which are protected by the Due Process Clause. See also Board of Pardons v. Allen, 482 U.S. 369, 107 S.Ct. 2415, 96 L.Ed.2d 303 (1987). But these interests will be generally limited to freedom from restraint which, while not exceeding the sentence in such an unexpected manner as to give rise to protection by the Due Process Clause of its own force, see, e.g., Vitek[ v. Jones, 445 U.S. 480,] 493, 100 S.Ct. 1254, 63 L.Ed.2d 552 [ (1980) ] (transfer to mental hospital), and Washington[ v. Harper, 494 U.S. 210,] 221-222, 110 S.Ct. 1028, 108 L.Ed.2d 178 [(1990)] (involuntary administration of psychotropic drugs), nonetheless imposes atypical and significant hardship on the inmate in relation to the ordinary incidents of prison life.

Conner asserts, incorrectly, that any state action taken for a punitive reason encroaches upon a liberty interest under the Due Process Clause even in the absence of any state regulation. Neither Bell v. Wolfish, 441 U.S. 520, 99 S.Ct. 1861, 60 L.Ed.2d 447 (1979), nor Ingraham v. Wright, 430 U.S. 651, 97 S.Ct. 1401, 51 L.Ed.2d 711 (1977), requires such a rule.... We hold that Conner's discipline in segregated confinement did not present the type of atypical, significant deprivation in which a state might...