Guy v. Lampert
| Decision Date | 03 August 2016 |
| Docket Number | S–15–0237 |
| Citation | 2016 WY 77,376 P.3d 499 |
| Parties | JonMichael Guy, Appellant (Plaintiff), v. Robert Lampert, Wyoming Department of Corrections Director, Steve Hargett, Wyoming Medium Correctional Institution Warden, and Kathy Long, Wyoming Medium Correctional Institution Business Manager, Appellees (Defendants). |
| Court | Wyoming Supreme Court |
Representing Appellant: Pro se.
Representing Appellee: Peter K. Michael, Wyoming Attorney General; James Kaste, Deputy Attorney General; Elizabeth Morrisseau, Assistant Attorney General.
Before BURKE, C.J., and HILL, DAVIS, FOX, JJ, and CAMPBELL, DJ.
, District Judge.
[¶1] JonMichael Guy is an inmate at Wyoming's medium-security correctional facility in Torrington. He appeals from two orders of the district court relating to his request to examine certain public records of that institution.1 We affirm.
[¶2] Stripped of several overwrought technical arguments relating to Issue 1, which were rendered largely pointless by two recent decisions of this Court,2 the issues raised by Guy may be reduced to the following:
[¶3] On January 6, 2014, Guy wrote a letter to Warden Steve Hargett, wherein he asked to inspect records created during the four most recent fiscal years, predominantly those related to the Inmate Commissary Fund and the Departmental Assistance Fund accounts. His request was for all documents pertaining in any way to expenditures and transfers of funds into and out of those accounts, or for procuring inmate “educational materials.”3 On January 10, 2014, the warden advised Guy in writing that the institution would immediately begin to make the requested records available for his inspection.
[¶4] After considering security issues and concerns with the integrity of the files involved, as well as the volume of the records requested, the warden again wrote to Guy on January 27 to inform him that the documents would be provided to him in electronic form.4 The Warden also informed Guy of the anticipated schedule of delivery of the material, and that there would be two installments, one in March and one in May 2014.
[¶5] As a consequence of staffing issues within the business office and the timing of the requests (coincident with the institution's June 30th budget deadline), they were unable to complete work on Guy's request in accordance with the warden's projected schedule. By the end of May 2014, they had provided only 16 CDs containing 1348 files and 10,164 pages of documents. Those totals eventually grew to delivery of 29 CDs containing 2069 files and 15,127 pages of documents.
[¶6] The Warden honored Guy's request to meet with him and business manager Kathy Long, and on May 23 again assured that Ms. Long would provide him with all requested documents. Nevertheless, Guy soon filed an institutional grievance over the matter and later pursued a two-level appeal from the denial of that grievance to, sequentially, the warden and the director of the Department of Corrections. The director advised him on August 24, 2014, that his final grievance appeal had been denied.
[¶7] On September 12, 2014, Guy filed his “Complaint for Order of Enforcement and Request to Show Cause” in the district court.5 He asserted that, because the institution's employees had not timely completed their efforts to fulfill his records request, they had in effect refused to comply under the law. He sought an order that required Appellees to comply with the Act and release the records set out in his January 6 request. In addition, he asked the court to declare that their alleged noncompliance constituted a knowing and intentional violation of his rights under the First and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution, to enjoin them from thereafter failing to act on any public records requests, and to award him monetary “compensatory damages” for the costs incurred in this action.
[¶8] On November 17, 2014, the State defendants filed their answer, noting that they continued to transfer the records requested to CDs and make them available. They also contended that awarding damages or granting declaratory or injunctive relief would be unlawful in a statutory judicial proceeding under the Public Records Act.
[¶9] On November 26, Guy filed a motion for summary judgment in which he asserted there was no issue of material fact as to whether the institution had finished compiling the records addressed in his January 6 request. The defendants moved to strike that motion on December 15, and a hearing on all matters was conducted on February 10, 2015.
[¶10] Between July 9, 2014 and January 15, 2015, the institution had made available to Guy thirteen CDs containing the remainder of the requested records that had not yet been scanned and delivered to him by his May 2014 meeting.
[¶11] On February 27, 2015, the district court issued its “Findings of Fact, Conclusions of Law and Order” relating to Guy's Public Records Act request, and a separate order relating to the defendants' contention that his allegations of constitutional errors should be dismissed because they did not state a claim for which relief could be granted. As to the Public Records Act proceeding, the court found that the defendants had not denied Guy access to any public records as they had provided him all the records he requested on January 6, 2014. The court concluded that only a narrow scope of judicial review was authorized under the Act, and that the Act's limited remedies did not entitle him to review of his constitutional claims.6 Because the defendants satisfied the request for records, the court dismissed Guy's complaint.
[¶12] Guy invoked the district court's jurisdiction under Wyo. Stat. Ann. § 16–4–203(f)
to evaluate the State defendants' response to his Public Records Act request. In his pleadings, he also asked the court to consider federal constitutional claims and to grant him declaratory and injunctive relief and compensatory damages on those claims. He now challenges the court's conclusion that the limited judicial review authorized by the Act does not extend to such claims and forms of relief.
[¶13] That poses a question of statutory interpretation, a legal question that we examine de novo . Powder River Basin Resource Council v. Wyoming Oil & Gas Conservation Comm'n , 2014 WY 37, ¶ 19, 320 P.3d 222, 228 (Wyo. 2014)
.
[¶14] In crafting the WPRA, the legislature anticipated that disagreements would arise between members of the public and the various custodians of public records as to whether particular documents or pieces of information are subject to disclosure and inspection under the Act. It therefore specified that those conflicts could be resolved in the district court by applying for an order directing the custodian to show cause why inspection of a denied record should not be permitted. In short, the custodian must explain why she denied access to specified records, and/or explain why the court should not grant the requesting party some relief from the custodian's decision. Id. at ¶¶ 22–23, 320 P.3d at 229–30
. That procedure is the exclusive means of challenging a State governmental entity's denial of access to the records it maintains. Id. at ¶ 28, 320 P.3d at 230.
[¶15] More recently, we had occasion to consider the limited scope of the judicial review procedures created by the WPRA in Guy v. Lampert , 2015 WY 148, 362 P.3d 331 (Wyo. 2015)
. That case involved a separate public records request by this same Appellant for the Code of Ethics promulgated by the Department of Corrections. Although that request was initially denied, he was later permitted to view the document less than a month after he submitted the request. Id. at ¶¶ 4–5, 362 P.3d at 333. Nevertheless, Guy sought WPRA judicial review of his request and, as in the present case, he accompanied his allegations of violations of the act with claims of constitutional violations and prayers for declaratory and injunctive relief and compensatory damages. Id. at ¶ 8, 362 P.3d at 334.
[¶16] Relying primarily on the principle of statutory construction that we should “not read remedies into a statute that were not put there by the legislature,” we affirmed the district court's dismissal of the action. Id. at ¶ 19, 362 P.3d at 338
. We held that the WPRA provides remedies only for the denial of access to public records, and that once that access is ultimately, even if belatedly, granted—whether as a product of the custodian's volition or a court order following a determination that non-disclosure is contrary to the Act—no other remedy is available, whether it be declaratory or injunctive in nature or a monetary remedy at the behest of a private citizen. Id. at ¶¶ 18–21, 362 P.3d at 338–39.
[¶17] We find those principles equally applicable to the present case, and therefore affirm the district court's determination in that regard.
[¶18] Guy insists the defendants denied him access to the documents set out in his records request of January 6, 2014, and claims the district court's contrary conclusion rested on both legal and factual errors. Because the alleged legal error turns on interpretation of the language of the WPRA, our review of that question—as noted above—is de novo . We review challenges to the factual findings of the district court under the clearly erroneous standard. Cross v. Berg Lumber Co. , 7 P.3d 922, 928 (Wyo. 2000)
.
[¶19] For...
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