Goff v. Harper

• Decision Date: 26 July 1995
• Docket Number: No. 94-3915,94-3915
• Citation: 60 F.3d 518
• Parties: George GOFF, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Charles HARPER, Defendant-Appellant. Crispus Nix, Defendant. Ronald Welder, Defendant-Appellant. John Henry, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

Page 518

60 F.3d 518

George GOFF, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Charles HARPER, Defendant-Appellant Crispus Nix, Defendant Ronald Welder, Defendant-Appellant John Henry, Defendant.

No. 94-3915.

United States Court of Appeals Eighth Circuit.

Submitted June 13, 1995.

Decided July 26, 1995.

Kristin Ensign, Des Moines, IA, argued, for appellant.

Jason Walke, Iowa City, IA (student intern), argued, Barbara A. Schwartz and John B. Whiston, Iowa City, IA, on brief, for appellee.

Before McMILLIAN, Circuit Judge, LAY, Senior Circuit Judge, and LOKEN, Circuit Judge.

McMILLIAN, Circuit Judge.

Defendants Charles Harper and Ron Welder, employees of the Iowa State Penitentiary, appeal from an order entered in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Iowa, granting plaintiff-inmate George Goff's motion for a preliminary injunction prohibiting them from participating in any disciplinary proceeding involving Goff during the pendency of his underlying civil rights action. For reversal, they argue that the district court improperly applied the test for granting a preliminary injunction which we set out in Dataphase Systems v. C.L. Systems, 640 F.2d 109 (8th Cir.1981) (en banc) (Dataphase). For the reasons discussed below, we vacate the injunction and remand the case to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

Goff is an inmate in the Iowa State Penitentiary. He is a frequent litigant and has been a party to numerous cases before our court. In July 1990, he filed a pro se civil rights action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, alleging that defendants used the prison disciplinary system to punish those prisoners, including himself, who filed lawsuits against the prison. Harper is an administrative law judge at the penitentiary, and Welder is the warden's representative who responds to inmate appeals of prison disciplinary hearings. Goff alleged that prisoners filing lawsuits against the prison were punished unfairly in that they received disproportionately severe disciplinary sanctions, e.g., longer periods in administrative segregation.

On December 14, 1993, Goff filed a motion for a preliminary injunction to prevent defendants from participating in any disciplinary hearings to which he might be subject during the pendency of his lawsuit. In support of this motion, Goff submitted a copy of a disciplinary decision dated November 22, 1993, signed by Harper. Goff had apparently requested a continuance of the disciplinary proceeding so that he could file his request for a preliminary injunction disqualifying defendants from participation in any of his disciplinary hearings. In denying this request, Harper indicated that he found it difficult to believe that a federal court would entertain such action. Further, Goff alleges that Harper indicated that he considered Goff's intent to seek an injunction as a "false statement." Under prison rules, a false statement could be the basis for disciplinary sanction.

Between the time Goff filed his motion for an injunction and the district court's order granting it, the district court heard three days of testimony. In its order issuing the injunction, the district court stated that Goff could "likely suffer substantial harm" if defendants serve on a disciplinary committee reviewing him and impose a harsher sentence on him in retaliation for the present action. Goff v. Harper, No. 4:90-CV-50365, slip op. at 2 (S.D.Iowa Oct. 21, 1994) (Order). Further, the district court reasoned that the harm to defendants would be minimal in that they would only have to find replacements to serve on the disciplinary committees. The district court also concluded that Goff had shown at least a fifty percent likelihood of success on the merits of his underlying claim. Id. This appeal followed.

"[W]hether a preliminary injunction should issue involves consideration of (1) the threat of irreparable harm to the movant; (2) the state of balance between this harm and the injury that granting the injunction will inflict upon other parties litigant; (3) the probability that [the] movant will succeed on the merits; and (4) the public interest." Dataphase, 640 F.2d 109 at 114. The burden of proving that a preliminary injunction should be issued rests entirely with the movant. Modern Computer Systems v. Modern Banking Systems, 871 F.2d 734, 737 (8th Cir.1989) (en banc). We review a district court's grant or denial of preliminary injunctive relief for an abuse of discretion or misplaced reliance on an erroneous legal premise. Id. While no single factor in the balancing of the equities is determinative, the absence of a finding of irreparable injury is sufficient grounds for vacating a preliminary injunction. Id. at 738.

In reaching its conclusion to grant a preliminary injunction, the district court put great reliance on Mahers v. State, No. 3-011/91-1846, 513 N.W.2d 421 (Iowa Ct.App.1993) (per curiam). Harper was a defendant in that case as well. Mahers, a prison inmate, sought postconviction relief from a decision in a prison disciplinary proceeding. Because Harper also was a defendant in a federal civil rights lawsuit...