Haywood v. Drown, 146.
| Decision Date | 27 November 2007 |
| Docket Number | 146. |
| Citation | 9 N.Y.3d 481,851 N.Y.S.2d 84,881 N.E.2d 180 |
| Parties | Keith HAYWOOD, Appellant, v. Curtis DROWN, Respondent. (Action No. 1.) Keith Haywood, Appellant, v. Pat Smith et al., Respondents. (Action No. 2.) |
| Court | New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals |
Pursuant to Correction Law § 24, New York courts lack jurisdiction under state or federal law to entertain civil actions seeking money damages against correction officers. The issue in this case is whether section 24 violates the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution because state courts cannot adjudicate federal 42 USC § 1983 causes of action alleging violations of civil rights. We hold that the statute is not unconstitutional.
Plaintiff Keith Haywood was sentenced as a second violent felony offender to a 15-to-30-year term of imprisonment after being convicted in 1990 of escape in the first degree and eight counts of robbery in the first degree.1 While incarcerated at the Attica Correctional Facility, plaintiff was the subject of two misbehavior reports in June 2003, one for assaulting a correction officer and the other for failing a urinalysis test. After separate administrative hearings, plaintiff was found guilty of both disciplinary charges. About a year later, another misbehavior report was issued charging plaintiff with improper mail solicitation, A hearing officer determined that plaintiff was guilty of that charge.
In the aftermath of these disciplinary findings, plaintiff commenced two unrelated, pro se civil actions in state Supreme Court premised on 42 USC § 1983 against employees of the state Department of Correctional. Services (DOCS).2 The first complaint alleged that defendant Curtis Drown, the DOCS hearing officer who found plaintiff guilty of improper mail solicitation failed to conduct a fair and impartial hearing, that his determination was based on insufficient evidence and that the
penalty imposed was intended to censor plaintiff in violation of the First Amendment. Asserting that his federal civil rights had been impaired, plaintiff sought expungement of the misbehavior charge, punitive damages and attorneys' fees under 42 USC § 1983.3
Plaintiff's second lawsuit was filed against defendant Pat Smith, a DOCS hearing officer, two correction officers and two of their superior officers. According to plaintiff, he had been grabbed from behind without justification by one of the correction officers and sustained a "minor injury to his left pinkie finger." He claimed that the correction officer involved in the incident had conspired with his superiors to fabricate the facts set forth in his June 2003 misbehavior report. Plaintiff further alleged that the urinalysis test conducted in June 2003 had been tampered with by DOCS employees. The complaint, relying on 42 USC § 1983, accused defendants of conspiring to violate plaintiff's federal civil rights by assaulting him without cause, creating a false misbehavior report, tampering with his urinalysis test and denying him a fair and impartial hearing.4
The defendants in both actions, represented by the Office of the Attorney General pursuant to Public Officers Law § 17, moved to dismiss the complaints on the ground that plaintiffs claims—both state and federal—were barred by Correction Law § 24. This statute provides, in pertinent part:
Supreme Court dismissed both complaints on this statutory basis, citing Woodward v. State of New York, 23 A.D.3d 852, 805 N.Y.S.2d 670 (3d Dept 2005), lv. dismissed 6 N.Y.3d 807, 812 N.Y.S.2d 445, 845 N.E.2d 1276 (2006). The Appellate Division affirmed, concluding that section 24 did not violate the Supremacy Clause of the United States Constitution. Plaintiff appeals as of right and we now affirm.
Plaintiff contends that when Congress enacted 42 USC § 1983, it imposed a national policy that was intended to allow 'persons who are injured by others acting under color of law to seek judicial redress. He olaims that by prohibiting section 1983 actions for money damages, Correction Law § 24 impermissibly discriminates against the federal cause of action contrary to the purpose of the Supremacy Clause.5 Defendants submit that there is no constitutional violation because the states are free to limit the subject matter jurisdiction of their courts. They maintain that section 24 treats all state and federal monetary claims identically since none can be brought against a correction officer personally and, therefore, section 24 does not discriminate against a federal cause of action in favor of a state cause of action.
The Supremacy Clause declares that the
"Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; .and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding" (U.S. Const art. VI[2]).
In the event of a conflict between federal and state law, the Supremacy Clause preempts operation of state law because when Congress adopts an act it speaks "`for all the people and all the States, and thereby establishe[s] a policy for all. That policy is
as much the policy of [the State] as if the act had emanated from its own legislature, and should be respected accordingly in the courts of the State'" (Howlett v. Rose, 496 U.S. 356, 371, 110 S.Ct. 2430, 110 L.Ed.2d 332 [1990], quoting Mondou v. New York, N.H. & H.R. Co., 223 U.S. 1, 57, 32 S.Ct. 169, 56 L.Ed. 327 r19121; see e.g. Testa v. Katt, 330 U.S. 386, 393, 67 S.Ct. 810, 91 L.Ed. 967 [1947]). Thus, under the Supremacy Clause, "[t]he relative importance to the State of its own law is not material when there is a conflict with a valid federal law" (Felder v. Casey, 487 U.S. 131, 138, 108 S.Ct. 2302, 101 L.Ed.2d 123 [1988] [internal quotation marks omitted] ).
The alleged conflict between federal and state law in this case arises from the fact that, although a claim based on 42 USC § 1983 for monetary damages against government officials in their personal capacity can generally be asserted in a New York court (see generally Will v. Michigan Dept. of State Police, 491 U.S. 58, 66, 109 S.Ct. 2304, 105 L.Ed.2d 45 [1989]), Correction Law § 24 restricts a state court from exercising jurisdiction over such a cause of action if it involves DOCS employees. At first glance, this prohibition appears questionable under the Supremacy Clause since the United States Supreme Court has cautioned that "[c]onduct by persons acting under color of state law which is wrongful under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 ... cannot be immunized by state law" and that a "construction of the federal statute which permitted a state immunity defense to have controlling effect would transmute a basic guarantee into an illusory promise" (Martinez v. California, 444 U.S. 277, 284 n. 8, 100 S.Ct. 553, 62 L.Ed.2d 481 [1980] [internal quotation marks, omitted] ).
Upon closer scrutiny, however, the Supremacy Clause imposes no constitutional impediment to the operation of Correction Law § 24. The Supremacy Clause gives states the power to deny enforcement of a federal right if they have' a "`valid excuse'" for doing so (Howlett, 496 U.S. at 369, 110 S.Ct. 2430, quoting Douglas v. New York, N.H. & H.R. Co., 279 U.S. 377, 388, 49 S.Ct. 355, 73 L.Ed. 747 [1929]). One permissible exception is when a state court lacks jurisdiction due to a "neutral state rule regarding the administration of the courts" (Howlett, 496 U.S. at 372, 110 S.Ct. 2430). The Supreme Court has explained that states "have great latitude to establish the structure and jurisdiction of their own courts" and that Congress must "take[] the state courts as it finds them" (id. [internal quotation marks omitted]; see also Brown v. Gerdes, 321 U.S. 178, 189, 64 S.Ct. 487, 88 L.Ed. 659 [1944, Frankfurter, J., concurring] ["(t)he Constitution does not require New York to give jurisdiction to its courts against its will"]; National Private Truck Council, Inc. v. Oklahoma Tax Comm'n, 515 U.S. 582, 587 n. 4, 115 S.Ct. 2351, 132 L.Ed.2d 509 [1995]).
A corollary to this principle is that a state rule will be deemed "neutral" and "valid" if it does not discriminate against federal claims in favor of analogous state claims (see McKnett v. St. Louis & San Francisco R. Co., 292 U.S. 230, 233-234, 54 S.Ct. 690, 78 L.Ed. 1227 [1934]). In other words, if the same type of claim, "arising under state law, would be enforced in the state courts, the state courts are generally not free to refuse enforcement of the federal claim" (Martinez v. California, 444 U.S. at...
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Haywood v. Drown
... ... Federal law must prevail when Congress validly enacts a statute that expressly supersedes state law, see Sprietsma v. Mercury Marine, 537 U.S. 51, 62–63, 123 S.Ct. 518, 154 L.Ed.2d 466 (2002); United States v. Locke, 529 U.S. 89, 109, 120 S.Ct. 1135, 146 L.Ed.2d 69 (2000), or when the state law conflicts with a federal statute, see American Telephone & Telegraph Co. v. Central Office Telephone, Inc., 524 U.S. 214, 118 S.Ct. 1956, 141 L.Ed.2d 222 (1998); Florida Lime & Avocado Growers, Inc. v. Paul, 373 U.S. 132, 83 S.Ct. 1210, 10 L.Ed.2d 248 ... ...
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