Johnson v. Lark
| Citation | 365 F. Supp. 289 |
| Decision Date | 13 July 1973 |
| Docket Number | No. 71 C 114(3).,71 C 114(3). |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Eastern District of Missouri |
| Parties | Harold Count JOHNSON, and all other plaintiffs, as per list, namely Russell Peden, et al., Plaintiffs, v. Al LARK, Individually and as Warden of the St. Louis City Jail, et al., Defendants. |
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Phillip F. Fishman and Walter Heiser, Legal Aid Society, St. Louis, Mo., for plaintiffs.
Jack L. Koehr, City Counselor and John J. FitzGibbon, Associate City Counselor, St. Louis, Mo., for defendants Al Lark and City of St. Louis.
Richard O. Funsch, Carter, Bull, Baer, Presberg & Lee, St. Louis, Mo., for Dr. Jones.
Plaintiff Harold Count Johnson brought this civil rights action as a class action to redress alleged infringements of his constitutional rights and the rights of other members of the class while federal prisoners detained in the St. Louis City Jail, and to obtain declaratory and injunctive relief. Plaintiff bases Count I of the complaint upon 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 and 1988 and 28 U.S. C. § 2201. Jurisdiction is founded upon 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3) and (4), and 28 U. S.C. § 1331.
In Count II, plaintiff asserts a class claim for damages against defendant City of St. Louis as third party beneficiaries under a contract between the City of St. Louis and the United States Bureau of Prisons for occasional custody of federal prisoners, alleging that such contract had been breached by defendant City of St. Louis to the damage of the defendant and the class. The claim is founded upon a federal statute, 18 U.S. C. § 4002, and jurisdiction is asserted under 28 U.S.C. § 1343(3) and (4); and 28 U.S.C. § 1331.1
Defendant Al Lark was at all times material to this action warden of the St. Louis City Jail and is sued in his individual and official capacity. Defendant Augustine Jones, M.D., was, at the time of the filing of the action, the physician for the city jail and was so engaged during the period of January 9, 1971 to and including May 4, 1971. The City of St. Louis, originally named as a party defendant in Count I, was dismissed as to that count by court order dated August 4, 1972, on motion of plaintiff.
Plaintiff brought this action on behalf of all federal prisoners in the city jail. Immediately prior to trial, the court found that the class was so numerous that the joinder of all members was impractical; that there were questions of law and fact common to the class; that the conditions of which plaintiff complained were typical of the claims of the class, and that plaintiff would fairly and adequately protect the interests of the class.2 Rule 23(a), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. The court further found that defendants were alleged to have acted or refused to have acted on grounds generally applicable to the class, thereby making appropriate final injunctive relief or corresponding declaratory relief with respect to the class as a whole. Fed.R.Civ.P. 23(b)(2).
With respect to the class, however, the court limited the class, insofar as the complaint sought declaratory and injunctive relief, to all federal prisoners who were in the city jail during the period January 9, 1971 to and including May 4, 1971,3 and all present and future federal prisoners in the city jail.
In Count I, plaintiff Johnson complains of conditions in the city jail and treatment to which he was subjected while a federal prisoner confined there awaiting trial on a federal charge. He claims that the following conditions, individually and collectively, constituted cruel and unusual punishment and, as to some, a denial of due process of law:
Plaintiff further contends that these conditions, which will be more particularly described infra, deprived him of the equal protection of the laws in that these conditions were worse than conditions to which most federal prisoners are subjected.
Plaintiff further contends that by denying him access to law books and reasonable visits by counsel, he was deprived of effective assistance of counsel in violation of his Sixth and Fourteenth Amendment Rights.
Plaintiff alleges that his treatment resulted in severe rash and headaches, for which he seeks actual damages of $5,000. On behalf of the class he seeks declaratory and injunctive relief intended to correct and forbid the conditions claimed to be violative of the constitutional rights of the class.
Plaintiff and defendant have stipulated with respect to certain conditions prevailing during the period January 9, 1971 through May 4, 1971.
In the course of the trial, the court heard testimony of federal prisoners who were inmates during the period at issue, January-May, 1971. The court also heard expert testimony from physicians and penologists who inspected the city jail on behalf of plaintiff. Both defendants testified with respect to jail conditions. In addition, defendants offered the testimony of jail administrators and newly added personnel and consultants with respect to changes which have occurred in jail conditions since the institution of this action.
The court is mindful of the fact that the members of the class are limited to federal prisoners whose presence in the city jail was the result of a contract between the City of St. Louis and the Bureau of Prisons. It, therefore, does not seem appropriate, and this court declines to use this civil rights action as a vehicle to make a searching inquiry into all aspects of the operation of the jail. Burns v. Swenson, 430 F.2d 771, 775 (8th Cir. 1970); see Sostre v. McGinnis, 442 F.2d 178, 183-185 (2d Cir. 1971).
For example, it is not necessary, in order to determine this case, for the court to make detailed findings with respect to what medical supplies, equipment and personnel are appropriate for the operation of a jail under the most enlightened conditions. Rather, the court will consider whether the facilities available to the class were so inadequate as to constitute, separately or in conjunction with other inadequacies, a deprivation of constitutionally protected rights.
We turn first to conditions as they were at the time plaintiff Johnson was a federal prisoner in the city jail pursuant to a contract for service between the City of St. Louis and the U.S. Bureau of Prisons,4 and then to conditions as subsequently modified.
The St. Louis City Jail was built in 1914. It was designed to hold a capacity of 384 male prisoners and 48 female prisoners, or a total of 432. It is a maximum security facility. Floors 2 through 4 of the St. Louis City Jail have cells designed to hold 2 inmates each, and floor 5 has cells designed to hold 8 inmates each. During the period January 9, 1971 through May 4, 1971, all of the 156 cells in the jail were in use. At that time, there were approximately 542 inmates being held in the St. Louis Jail, a figure 110 in excess of the designed inmate capacity. Chief Deputy U.S. Marshal Duane Caldwell testified that during the period January-May, 1971, 412 federal prisoners spent time in city jail.5
During the January-May, 1971 period, the federal prisoners were held in two-man cells on the second floor of the jail during their confinement. The two-man cells are 8'2" long, 5'2" wide and 8'2" high. All of the two-man cells have one commode, one washstand and one drinking fountain. At time of trial, federal prisoners were being housed on the third and fourth floors, primarily in one tier.
The St. Louis City Jail provided no personal clothing (jail issue) for federal prisoners. The only laundry facilities available for washing prisoners' clothes were buckets, wash basins and soap. There was a pay laundry for inmates who wanted someone else to wash their personal clothing. Inmates wore normal street clothes in the jail.
St. Louis City Jail had a steam heating system employing radiators on each floor. Ventilation was accomplished by means of windows opening on to a central air shaft with a large ventilator fan on the seventh floor to exhaust air to the outside. There was no air conditioning system.
There were no games or sports involving physical contact carried on at the city jail. Prisoners had access to television. They could purchase playing cards and checker sets at the commissary. No jail employee was designated to be in charge of any recreation that did exist. Inmates were never allowed out-of-doors for recreational purposes.
The city jail had a commissary for all inmates, including federal prisoners. Federal prisoners could buy candy and tobacco and other items not provided free by the jail. The office of the warden received the monies collected from the sale of items from the commissary during the period of plaintiff's confinement.
During the period of plaintiff's confinement at the city jail, there was no social worker, trained counselor or psychologist employed at the jail. On occasion, defendant Augustine Jones, Rev. Paul Bynes and defendant Warden Lark were available to see pre-trial detainees and federal prisoners at the city jail. Under the "Rules for Guidance of Inmates" an inmate could discuss a problem with a jail guard.
Regulations of the Bureau of Prisons for custody and treatment of federal prisoners in non-federal institutions provide that "federal prisoners will be held in clean quarters, adequately heated and ventilated and will receive adequate and wholesome food and proper medical attention."
Each of the prisoner witnesses who was a witness on behalf of plaintiff and the class testified that he was at various times confined in 4' × 8'6 cells, designed for two persons, with three persons in the cell....
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Smith v. West Virginia State Bd. of Educ.
... ... Bishop, 404 F.2d 571 (8th Cir. 1968) (whipping adult [170 W.Va. 600] prisoners with leather strap); Johnson v. Al Lark, 365 F.Supp. 289 (E.D.Mo.1973) (striking of a prisoner by the warden); Morales v. Turman, 364 F.Supp. 166 (E.D.Tex.1973) (beating, ... ...
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Owens v. Haas
... ... See Hampton v. Holmesburg Prison Officials, supra, 546 F.2d at 1082; Williams v. United States, 405 F.2d 951, 954 (9th Cir. 1969); Johnson v. Lark, 365 F.Supp. 289, 301 (E.D.Mo.1973) ... Next, Owens claims a right to collect damages for breach of contract as a third ... ...
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Johnson-El v. Schoemehl
... ... Teasdale, 603 F.2d 59, 62 (8th Cir.1979). We note that the City has improved the conditions at the Jail somewhat since previous litigation which found the totality of conditions unconstitutional. Johnson v. Lark, 365 F.Supp. 289 (E.D.Mo.1973) (prisoners beat into unconsciousness, denied food and medical care, and thrown into the "hole" for many days at a time without a hearing). Some of the less barbarous problems complained of then, however, seem to remain. Id. (mail, ventilation, recreation, ... ...
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Padgett v. Stein, 72-487 Civil.
... ... Plaintiffs — Henry Padgett, Eugene Washington, and William Johnson, inmates at the York County Prison — on behalf of themselves and all other inmates incarcerated at the York County Prison brought this action under ... See, e. g., Johnson v. Lark, E.D.Mo. 1973, 365 F.Supp. 289, 301-303; Collins v. Schoonfield, D.Md. 1972, 344 F.Supp. 257, 264-265; Jones v. Wittenberg, N.D.Ohio 1971, 323 ... ...