Gayle v. Gonyea

Decision Date10 December 2002
Docket NumberDocket No. 01-0218.
PartiesGregory GAYLE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. P. GONYEA, T. Sheehan, Hearing Officer, F. Iby, Co, P. Duheme, Co, T. Rocque, Sgt., R.T. Dubray, D.S.S., P.J. Lacy, Supt., Glen S. Goord, Commissioner of NYS DOCS, D. Selsky, Director of Shu, New York State Department of Correctional Services, H. Fayette, Senior Counselor & T.J. Lucas, Defendants-Appellees.
CourtU.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit

Gregory Gayle, pro se, New York, NY, for Plaintiff-Appellant.

Martin A. Hotvet, Assistant Solicitor General (Elliot Spitzer, Attorney General of the State of New York, Nancy A. Spiegel, of counsel), Albany, NY, for Defendants-Appellees.

Before CALABRESI, SACK, and B.D. PARKER, JR., Circuit Judges.

SACK, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff-appellant Gregory Gayle, pro se and in forma pauperis, appeals from the August 7, 2001 Decision and Order of the United States District Court for the Northern District of New York (Thomas J. McAvoy, Judge) granting defendants-appellees' motion for summary judgment, pursuant to Rule 56 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, on all of the plaintiff's claims. The plaintiff had filed a 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action seeking compensatory damages against Captain P. Gonyea, Hearing Officer T. Sheehan, Correctional Officers F. Iby and P. Duheme, Sergeant T. Rocque, Deputy Superintendent R.T. Dubray, Superintendent P.J. Lacy, Commissioner of New York State Department of Correctional Services Glen S. Goord, Director of Special Housing Units Donald Selsky, the New York State Department of Correctional Services, Senior Counselor H. Fayette, and T.J. Lucas. The plaintiff alleged, inter alia, that some of the defendants were responsible for issuing a false misbehavior report against the plaintiff and subjecting the plaintiff to solitary confinement in retaliation for his exercising his constitutional right to utilize the prisoner grievance system. On August 7, 2001, the district court adopted the May 18, 2001 order and report-recommendation of Magistrate Judge Gustave J. DiBianco recommending that the court grant the defendants' motion for summary judgment because there were no genuine issues as to any material fact and the defendants were entitled to judgment as a matter of law. The plaintiff now appeals the judgment as to all of his claims.

We conclude that the plaintiff provided sufficient evidence to withstand a motion for summary judgment with regard to his claim alleging that the defendants issued a false misbehavior report and subjected the plaintiff to solitary confinement in retaliation for his exercising his constitutional right to utilize the prisoner grievance system. We therefore vacate and remand with respect to that claim. We are filing a summary order today in which we affirm with respect to the district court's resolution of the plaintiff's other claims.1

BACKGROUND

Gregory Gayle, an African-American male, was an inmate at various facilities of the New York State Department of Correctional Services ("DOCS") from July 15, 1986 until his release on March 2, 1998, after serving two months beyond his minimum sentence of twelve years and six months for robbery in the first degree. In March 1993, Gayle completed a seventy-eight hour course in Legal Research and Law Library Management at the Greenhaven Correctional Facility, which qualified him to work as a clerk in the facility's law library. Between May and July of 1997, Gayle was transferred from Tappan/Sing Sing Correctional Facility ("Sing Sing"), to which he had been assigned, to the Bare Hill Correctional Facility ("Bare Hill") and then to the Clinton Correctional Facility ("Clinton") where he served the duration of his sentence. While at Bare Hill, DOCS officials filed a misbehavior report against Gayle and punished him with solitary confinement. Gayle alleges that the misbehavior report and confinement were in retaliation for his exercising his constitutional right to file grievances.

The Grievance and the Misbehavior Report That Followed

On July 3, 1997, Gayle wrote a formal complaint addressed to defendant Peter J. Lacey, Superintendent of Bare Hill, complaining of an incident that allegedly occurred on July 2, 1997, in which a prison vehicle ran over another inmate. In his letter, Gayle stated that he had overheard prison staff praising the officer who had "used the van as a deadly weapon" and describing "the incident as a video game where Blacks and Hispanics are the targets." Letter of Gayle to Lacy dated July 3, 1997, at 2. In response, defendant Captain P. Gonyea interviewed Gayle in the early afternoon of July 9, 1997. In the misbehavior report he subsequently filed, Gonyea described the interview as follows:

Gayle ... told me he was an inmate advocate against staff racism and misconduct.... Inmate Gayle admitted to me that he had no personal knowledge of the incident but he was telling other inmates in population to write complaints to Albany and the Superintendent on the matter.... Gayle stated inmate action would be the only way to make people aware of the problems with staff at Bare Hill. Gayle threatened inmate unrest and people getting hurt. Gayle stated he advocated inmates and officers taking off their shirts and fighting to solve their disagreements. Gayle stated that he advises other inmates to file law suits and write complaints against staff at this facility. Gayle stated he would continue to be the facility [sic] biggest problem until he got transferred.

P. Gonyea, Inmate Misbehavior Report dated July 9, 1997. The misbehavior report charges Gayle with violating prison rule 104.12,2 which prohibits inmates from leading, organizing, participating, or urging other inmates to participate in action which may be detrimental to the order of the facility, and prison rule 104.13, which prohibits inmates from engaging in conduct which disturbs the order of the facility. Id.

In the course of the disciplinary hearing that followed, conducted by defendant Hearing Officer T. Sheehan, Gonyea testified that Gayle told him he thought that "if you and I had a problem ... we go in that room take off our shirts and we'd fight and that would be the end of it." Tr. of July 17, 1997 Tier III Hearing, at 12. Gayle explained that while discussing the racist slurs he had been subjected to at the facility, he had made that statement hypothetically in order to support his theory that "racism is nothing but a coward afraid of himself." Id. at 20. Gayle denied having threatened to become the facility's "biggest problem" and explained that he was merely reporting what he had heard prison officials saying about him. Id. at 23. Gayle also denied that he had threatened to instigate inmate unrest, explaining that he had only warned that the van incident would, in all likelihood, lead to inmate unrest he did not want to be a part of. Id. at 9.

Gonyea asserted that he feared that Gayle was encouraging the inmates to file grievances and that this would cause inmate unrest. In response to Gayle's question at the hearing as to which inmates he was allegedly organizing, Gonyea said that:

[Gayle] would not identify the inmates that he was encouraging to write complaints. [He] stated to me that he had no personal knowledge of the incident. [He] said they saw the incident and he was drawing conclusion of what took place and talking this among population. That an officer intentionally ran into an inmate with a van. Recklessly, without any regard for human life. Making these statements without factual knowledge that type of stuff talking this up with other inmates in which he stated he has done. That is extremely dangerous. And I was extremely concerned about this. For the fact that this incident did not take place and he is advocating that it did take place. It could definitely cause inmate unrest and that is the reason for his confinement, removing him from general population.

Id. at 17.3

Gayle testified that he had identified the inmates with whom he had discussed the van incident. While he was walking with four other inmates, one of them said he had witnessed the incident, and Gayle recommended that he file a grievance. Id. at 8, 17, 20-21. Gayle mentioned the incident to two other inmates, both prisoner representatives to whom prisoners are supposed to turn with their grievances. Id.

Sheehan found Gayle guilty of urging other inmates to participate in action detrimental to the order of the facility in violation of prison rule 104.12 but not guilty of creating a disturbance in violation of prison rule 104.13. Id. at 38. Sheehan then imposed a penalty of ninety days' keeplock. Id. Gayle was transferred from Bare Hill to Clinton on July 18, 1997.

On July 13, 1997, Gayle wrote to defendant Glen Goord, Commissioner of DOCS, complaining, among other things, of the misbehavior report of July 9, 1997, alleging that it was false and that it had been filed in retaliation for his exercising his constitutional right to file the July 3, 1997 grievance regarding the van incident. Gayle also wrote a letter to Goord appealing the decision of Sheehan after the July 17, 1997 disciplinary hearing and sent copies of the letter to defendant Lacy, defendant Donald Selsky, Director of Special Housing Units, and defendant R.T. DuBray, who was then Deputy Superintendent of Bare Hill. Selsky affirmed the decision on September 12, 1997. In a letter dated September 16, 1997, Gayle requested that Selsky again review the decision, a request that Selsky denied. Gayle then filed a proceeding against Goord in New York State court pursuant to Article 78 of the New York Civil Practice Law and Rules, challenging the affirmance of the decision. On April 2, 1998, one month after Gayle's release from prison, Selsky administratively reversed the July 17, 1997 hearing without explanation.

Procedural History

Gayle's 42 U.S.C. § 1983 action, pro se and in forma pauperis, was filed on December 4,...

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