Krist v. Smith, 2549.

• Decision Date: 25 February 1970
• Docket Number: No. 2549.,2549.
• Citation: 309 F. Supp. 497
• Parties: Gary Steven KRIST, Petitioner, v. S. Lamont SMITH, Warden, Georgia State Prison, Reidsville, Georgia, Respondent.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of Georgia

309 F. Supp. 497

Gary Steven KRIST, Petitioner, v. S. Lamont SMITH, Warden, Georgia State Prison, Reidsville, Georgia, Respondent.

No. 2549.

United States District Court, S. D. Georgia, Savannah Division.

February 13, 1970.

Supplemental and Final Order February 25, 1970.

Gary Steven Krist, pro se.

William R. Childers, Jr., Deputy Asst. Atty. Gen., Atlanta, Ga., for respondent.

ORDER

LAWRENCE, Chief Judge.

In December, 1968, Gary Steven Krist abducted Miss Barbara Jane Mackle for ransom and buried her alive for eighty hours in a wooden box equipped with such amenities of living as an air pump and two vents, a battery-powered light and some food and water. Sentenced to life imprisonment after his conviction for kidnapping, he comes to the District Court complaining of the minuteness of his cell, the loneliness of life under maximum security conditions, the food served at Georgia State Prison and other objectionable conditions there.

Asserting that he is being cruelly, unusually and "sub-humanly" punished by solitary confinement, Petitioner seeks injunctive relief under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments and under the Civil Rights Act, 42 U.S.C. § 1983. In a similar action in the State courts relief was denied Krist on the ground that prison administration is not a judicial function. Recently Petitioner voluntarily dismissed the appeal from that ruling which was pending in the Supreme Court of Georgia.

The complaints about Krist's life in prison make the Book of Lamentations sound like a paean of thanksgiving.¹ He objects to practically everything connected with his imprisonment. His quarters, 9 feet × 5 feet, are too cramped. He complains that he "rots in his concrete Georgia garbage can." There is no window in his cell at Reidsville Gaol and he cannot look even with a "wistful eye at that little tent of blue which prisoners call the sky." A "gregarious" person, or so he characterizes himself, the only cellmates he has are roaches. His quarters contain only a bed, a table, a basin, shelf and a commode. He is supplied nothing except Bon Ami to cleanse the latter. Food is passed to him through an opening under the door. The food is terrible, the diet unbalanced. There are no fresh vegetables or fruit and far too much of a nauseous herb called turnip greens. He gets no exercise. He is restricted to two shower baths a week. He suffers from a scalp disorder and the right kind of shampoo is not available. There is no television and no movies. He cannot get books from the prison library without considerable trouble. He is not permitted to attend church services. The medical setup equally disenchants Krist. He complains that he did not get proper medication for an ear infection and that he received too much for a nervous condition in the form of tranquillizers dispensed by a non-licensed prison technician. No doctor is available at night. Furthermore, the physicians do not speak English.

Petitioner represented himself at the evidentiary hearing.² His principal point is that the solitary confinement imposed on him is arbitrary and capricious and that maximum security is, in his case, in itself a punishment, which is not merited by his conduct in the prison.³ He says that his life sentence has been modified to a de facto sentence of "life imprisonment in solitary confinement." He argues that prolonged confinement in isolation without physical activity can produce ulcers, muscle atrophy, nervous disorders, pulmonary embolism, hypertension, excessive weight gain, etc. He introduced as exhibits results of research in space and undersea experiments as to humans in relation to the effect of isolation and inactivity. He claims that he has suffered physical effects from enforced idleness and segregation. I permitted Petitioner to submit interrogatories to two inmates. They agreed as to the adverse physical effects of prolonged segregated confinement.

The maximum security wing of the Reidsville prison houses around 200 inmates. Confinement there is called administrative segregation. It differs from disciplinary segregation which involves solitary confinement where a prisoner receives one meal a day and has no bed. When Krist first entered the prison he was classified by the Warden as a member of the general inmate population and was assigned for a time to a detail that worked outside the prison under armed guard. Subsequently, on July 15, 1969, Wallace Lambert, Associate Director of the State Board of Corrections, for the reasons later set forth in this opinion ordered the Warden to change the classification to that of maximum security.

At this point an examination of the jurisdiction and powers of federal courts to interfere in the operation of a state prison system is appropriate. Where a prisoner does not seek release from custody on petition for habeas corpus but complains of cruel or unusual punishment he may obtain relief in a proper case under the Civil Rights Act without prior application to or without exhaustion of remedies in the state courts. Hancock v. Avery, D.C., 301 F.Supp. 786.

However, administration of state detention facilities is a state function with which federal courts will not interfere except where paramount federal constitutional or statutory rights intervene. Johnson v. Avery, 393 U.S. 483, 89 S.Ct. 747, 21 L.Ed.2d 718; Hancock v. Avery, supra. Maintenance of discipline in prisons being an executive function, the judicial branch is loath to intrude. Jackson v. Godwin, 5 Cir., 400 F.2d 529; Beard v. Lee, 5 Cir., 396 F.2d 749. State prison officials are vested with wide discretion in controlling prisoners and their discretion will not be interfered with unless abused or arbitrarily or capriciously exercised. Graham v. Willingham, D.C., 265 F.Supp. 763; Rentfrow v. Carter, D.C., 296 F. Supp. 301; Courtney v. Bishop, 8 Cir., 409 F.2d 1185; Roy v. Wainwright, 5 Cir., 418 F.2d 231. Only in extreme cases do federal courts intervene in the conduct of a state prison or discipline of prisoners. Jones v. Peyton, D.C., 294 F.Supp. 173; Tabor v. Hardwick, 5 Cir., 224 F.2d 526; Jackson v. Godwin, supra. Solitary confinement is not in itself a cruel and unusual punishment (Kostal v. Tinsley, 10 Cir., 337 F.2d 845; Graham v. Willingham, supra) and the discretion of prison officials in that regard is ordinarily not subject to judicial review. Kostal v. Tinsley, supra. However, the rule is different where a substantive constitutional right is violated. Nolan v. Scafati, D.C., 306 F.Supp. 1. It has been held that in such a case that judicial interposition may extend to examination of maximum security conditions in state prisons in determining whether solitary confinement violates the Eighth Amendment. See Hancock v. Avery, supra.

In the last mentioned case District Judge Miller held that the treatment of the Petitioner was violative of the Eighth Amendment. He said that "the concept of cruel and unusual punishment is one of wide application capable of acquiring new depths of meaning to conform to more enlightened concepts of criminal justice." ibid., 301 F.Supp. 791. Hancock was confined in a "dry cell" which lacked minimal sanitary conditions, was not permitted to wear clothing and slept on the concrete floor without a blanket. His existence was not unlike that of a caged animal.

The cell in which Krist is confined and the conditions of his isolation are radically different from what the prisoner experienced in Hancock v. Avery. However, Krist contends that solitary confinement is in itself a species of punishment and that it represents in his case an arbitrary modification of his life sentence to a harsher one. As stated above, solitary confinement is not per se an unconstitutional form of punishment. It is permissible where its object is protection of the general prison population or the personnel, protection of the prisoner himself, for disobedience of orders or for prevention of his escape. The latter theory is the reason for Krist being held in maximum security.

Was this a capricious and arbitrary determination on the part of Associate Director Lambert?

In an affidavit furnished by Mr. Lambert subsequent to the evidentiary hearing he stated that a thorough classification evaluation was conducted when Krist was confined at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Center.⁴ The Committee "listed his security classification as `MAXIMUM-Multiple Escapee'," based on "a history of three (3) escapes and one (1) attempt to escape from out of state authorities." The Superintendent of the Center considered Krist "a high escape potential."

At the hearing Petitioner admitted to two of the escapes. He objected to any introduction in evidence of the escape from the Deuel Vocational Institution in California on the ground that he had never been indicted and tried for such escape. The objection was meritless but I ordered defendant to obtain a certified copy of Krist's escape...