Inman v. Pallito

• Citation: 2013 VT 94,87 A.3d 449
• Decision Date: 05 November 2013
• Docket Number: No. 12–382.,12–382.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Vermont
• Parties: Daniel C. INMAN v. Andrew PALLITO.

87 A.3d 449
2013 VT 94

Daniel C. INMAN
v.
Andrew PALLITO.

No. 12–382.

Supreme Court of Vermont.

Oct. 11, 2013.
Motion for Reargument Denied Nov. 5, 2013.

[87 A.3d 450]

Matthew F. Valerio, Defender General, and Kelly Green, Appellate Defender, Montpelier, for Plaintiff–Appellant.

William H. Sorrell, Attorney General, and David McLean, Assistant Attorney General, Montpelier, for Defendant–Appellee.

Present: REIBER, C.J., DOOLEY, SKOGLUND, BURGESS and ROBINSON, JJ.

DOOLEY, J.

¶ 1. Plaintiff Daniel Inman appeals the superior court judgment granting the State of Vermont's motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and denying judicial review of the Department of Corrections (DOC)'s decision to terminate his participation in the Incarcerative Domestic Abuse Treatment Program (InDAP). We affirm.

¶ 2. The following basic facts are undisputed. Plaintiff is an inmate serving a twenty-six-month to eight-year sentence for aggravated assault and escape in the Northern State Correctional Facility, which is administered by the DOC.

¶ 3. The DOC's InDAP program allows inmates convicted of crimes of domestic violence to participate in educational and reform based courses. Vt. Dep't of Corr., Vt. Domestic Abuse Teams and Programs (2007), http:// doc. vermont. gov/ programs/ d- viol/. Inmates can obtain an early, supervised release if they have served their minimum sentence, completed a minimum of 104 group InDAP meetings,¹ and met with DOC approval. See 28 V.S.A. § 723 (stating that conditional release is allowed after minimum sentence has been served); Vt. Dep't of Corr., Vt. Domestic Abuse

[87 A.3d 451]

Teams and Programs, supra (detailing group meeting and DOC assessment requirements that must be met prior to early release).

¶ 4. Plaintiff began participating in the InDAP program in December 2010, and continued to participate even after he had finished the minimum one-year program requirement. As plaintiff had completed more than one year of the InDAP program, he anticipated a potential conditional release once he met his minimum sentence date in April 2012.

¶ 5. As his anticipated release date approached, plaintiff sought a telephone hearing in the superior court to seek visitation with his children upon his release. In accordance with plaintiff's request, the Windsor Superior Court, Family Division held such a hearing on December 22, 2011. The facts are disputed from this point forward; the following summary is derived from plaintiff's filings. According to plaintiff, he was polite and well-behaved throughout the hearing, despite multiple interruptions from his wife, who was the complainant in his domestic assault case. The superior court transcript shows that plaintiff requested multiple times that his wife stop talking so that plaintiff could speak, and also accused her of lying. Upon conclusion of the hearing, plaintiff's caseworker informed his InDAP coordinator that plaintiff had asked his wife several times to “be quiet so I can tell my side of the story” and accused her of lying. Plaintiff vehemently contests this characterization of his behavior during the telephone hearing, claiming that the transcript “altogether refutes” the caseworker's representation.

¶ 6. Based on the caseworker's report, and plaintiff's response to that report, the InDAP staff placed plaintiff on probation from the InDAP program on January 17, 2012. The probation, which was for 90 days, included specific requirements for plaintiff to return to good standing and suspended his phone privileges. Six days later, on January 23, 2012, plaintiff was terminated from the InDAP program. The termination notice indicated the following grounds for the action: plaintiff “continuously justifies abuse towards his partner and blames others for his actions,” he “is just going through the motions to get through the program,” and he had “another person call his victim of record after being placed on probation for abuse towards her during the court call.”

¶ 7. Plaintiff apparently attempted to appeal, unsuccessfully, the termination within the DOC. Letters from DOC staff about that appeal suggest that a ground for the termination was a January 7, 2012 phone call plaintiff made to his wife that DOC alleges violated InDAP rules. Plaintiff argued that because the probation letter suspended his phone privileges only as of January 17, 2012, the call could not have been a ground for termination. The letters state that the call violated InDAP rules without stating why.²

¶ 8. Plaintiff subsequently appealed the termination of his participation in InDAP to the superior court, claiming that the decision was appealable under

[87 A.3d 452]

Vermont Rule of Civil Procedure 75 and that his termination was grounded in false accusations. The State filed a motion to dismiss, alleging that the court lacked subject matter jurisdiction over this case under Rheaume v. Pallito, 2011 VT 72, 190 Vt. 245, 30 A.3d 1263. The superior court granted the State's motion to dismiss, citing Rheaume. Plaintiff now appeals this decision, asserting that Rheaume should not apply to termination decisions that prevent potential early releases, and that subject matter jurisdiction has been established under Rule 75 via either certiorari or mandamus. Plaintiff further argues that even if Rheaume is extended to the termination of his participation in the InDAP program, the termination decision should still be reviewable via writ of mandamus as an “extreme abuse of discretion.”

¶ 9. We review a dismissal for lack of subject matter jurisdiction under V.R.C.P. 12(b)(1) de novo, “with all uncontroverted factual allegations of the complaint accepted as true and construed in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party.” Jordan v. State, ...