Lyons v. Gilligan

• Decision Date: 09 September 1974
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. C 74-271.
• Citation: 382 F. Supp. 198
• Parties: Michael LYONS et al., Plaintiffs, v. John J. GILLIGAN, Individually and in his capacity as Governor of the State of Ohio, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Northern District of Ohio

382 F. Supp. 198

Michael LYONS et al., Plaintiffs, v. John J. GILLIGAN, Individually and in his capacity as Governor of the State of Ohio, et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. C 74-271.

United States District Court, N. D. Ohio, E. D.

September 9, 1974.

Ovid C. Lewis, University Heights, Ohio, for plaintiffs.

Richard B. Igo, Asst. Atty. Gen., Columbus, Ohio, for defendants.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

WILLIAM K. THOMAS, District Judge.

Plaintiffs, two inmates of the Marion Correctional Institution of Marion, Ohio, and their wives, bring this action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (1970) against various state officials on the theory that the absence of the opportunity for conjugal visits at the institution denies the plaintiffs their constitutional right of privacy and constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Defendants move to dismiss the complaint pursuant to Rule 12(b), Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted. The truth of the facts hereafter set forth is accepted as alleged in the complaint for purposes of considering defendants' motion.

Since October, 1972 plaintiff Michael Lyons has been serving a one- to seven-year sentence for stealing auto parts; plaintiff Donald Richards began a five-to 30-year sentence following a conviction for burglary and larceny in March, 1973. Both were married while they were inmates in the Cuyahoga County Jail. They allege that before their commitment to county jail they had been living with their prospective spouses, and each couple had held itself out to the community as man and wife. During that time both couples "engaged regularly in sexual intercourse" and, their complaint continues, they "felt that sex and private displays of affection for one another were an important part of their relationship and marriage." The rules of the Marion Correctional Institution "completely prohibit any acts of sexual intimacy between inmates and their visitors." Plaintiffs allege and defendants have not denied that no facilities exist for either of the two couples to engage in acts of sexual intimacy. Proceeding from these facts the plaintiffs say in substance that the denial of conjugal visits causes constitutional deprivation of their claimed right of marital privacy and intimacy and the imposition of cruel and unusual punishment.

Plaintiffs contend at the outset that this case is governed by the rule that a motion to dismiss pursuant to Rule 12(b)(6) should not be granted "unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of his claim which would entitle him to relief." Conley v. Gibson, 355 U.S. 41, 45, 78 S.Ct. 99, 102, 2 L.Ed.2d 80 (1957). Because these claims turn on constitutional considerations that may be fully tested in light of the facts alleged in the complaint and accepted as true for the purpose of considering the defendants' motion to dismiss, it is concluded that this case does not fall within that rule.

I.

Elaborating their first claim, plaintiffs say:

The right to engage in sexual relations with one's lawfully-wedded spouse, free from intrusion or regulation by the State, is part of the fundamental right of privacy guaranteed to all persons by the Constitution of the United States.

They then allege that defendants abridge this fundamental right

. . . by formulating rules denying Plaintiffs their right to engage in sexual relations with their respective spouses, and by failing to provide facilities which would allow Plaintiffs to engage in sexual relations with their respective spouses . . ..

Having presumed this "fundamental right of privacy," plaintiffs urge that this right may not be denied prisoners unless that denial is necessitated by the fact of incarceration and the state can show a compelling interest for denying the right as well as the absence of less onerous means of effectuating that interest. Necessarily a prerequisite to these contentions is establishment of the claimed fundamental right of privacy. But this requires a long leap beyond the present concept of the privacy right guaranteed by the Constitution. The right of marital privacy was first recognized by the Supreme Court when it held in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, 85 S.Ct. 1678, 14 L.Ed.2d 510 (1965) that a statute forbidding the use of contraceptives violates the right of marital privacy guaranteed by the Bill of Rights. The Court's concern was that a prohibition on the use of contraceptives necessarily anticipated searches of marital bedrooms for proof, and it concluded, "The very idea is repulsive to the notions of privacy surrounding the marriage relationship." Griswold, supra at 485-486, 85 S.Ct. at 1682. Cf. Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 89 S.Ct. 1243, 22 L.Ed.2d 542 (1969). In an attempt to establish that Griswold has a broad reach, plaintiffs point out that since that case the Indiana sodomy statute has been declared inapplicable to married couples, to protect marital relations "from regulation by the state through the use of a criminal penalty." Cotner v. Henry, 394 F.2d 873, 875 (7 Cir. 1968), cert. den. 393 U.S. 847, 89 S.Ct. 132, 21 L.Ed.2d 118 (1969). Again, police enforcement of such a statute would require intrusion into the intimacies of the marital relationship. Cotner has not been extended. In Lovisi v. Slayton, 363 F.Supp. 620 (E.D.Va. 1973) a district court concluded that the sodomy statute is enforceable where a married couple has relinquished its privacy. Thus, that court also recognized that the right of privacy on which plaintiffs rely is bottomed on the need to ensure private citizens that the police will not intrude upon their most intimate affairs. It does not follow, however, that because the state cannot pass criminal laws the enforcement of which will require such intrusion, the state is obligated by the Constitution to create private places for the conduct of marital relations. The nub of Griswold was restraint on governmental intrusion. It cannot be extended to impose an affirmative duty on the government. Moreover, imprisonment of persons convicted of crimes is not tantamount to an intrusion into the prisoner's home. Thus it is concluded and determined that the plaintiffs' constitutional right of privacy is not being infringed by the absence of facilities for conjugal visits or by prison rules prohibiting acts of sexual intimacy between prisoners and their wives during visits. Cf. Gittlemacker v. Prasse, 428 F.2d 1 (3 Cir. 1970).¹

II.

Plaintiffs contend that the deprivation of conjugal visits is causing great physical and psychological stress to them and is "endangering the stability and the very existence of Plaintiffs' marriages." They assert that these results

are beyond the purview of acceptable punishments which the state may impose upon Plaintiffs Michael Lyons and Donald Richards.

The wives, because of the deprivation of sexual relations with their husbands, are allegedly being punished "equally with their husbands although they have not been adjudged guilty of any crime or offense against the State of Ohio." Hence it is asserted that the deprivation of conjugal visits "amounts to the imposition of cruel and unusual punishment upon the several Plaintiffs."

It is true that Harlena Lyons and LaQuita Richards in effect are penalized by their husbands' incarceration without having themselves been convicted of a crime. But the Eighth Amendment prohibition does not reach so far as to require the state to ensure against hardships caused to third persons as a result of the incarceration of one convicted of a crime. Accordingly, if an Eighth Amendment violation were found here, the rights affected would only be those of plaintiffs Michael Lyons and Donald Richards.

There is no ready formula for determining what treatment constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86, 99, 78 S.Ct. 590, 2 L.Ed.2d 630 (1958) (plurality opinion); see Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238, 92 S.Ct. 2726, 33 L.Ed.2d 346 (1972) (memorandum opinion and nine separate opinions). The Supreme Court guidelines on the Eighth Amendment are few: For example, the death penalty as applied in particular cases violates the Eighth Amendment. Furman, supra. Punishment is cruel and unusual if it is inflicted pursuant to a law that makes a crime of the illness of narcotic addiction. Robinson v. California, 370 U.S. 660, 82 S.Ct. 1417, 8 L.Ed.2d 758 (1962). Denationalization as a punishment is barred by the Eighth Amendment, for it is "the total destruction of the individual's status in society" and places his "very existence . . . at the sufferance of the country in which he happens to find himself." Trop v. Dulles, supra (plurality opinion). Finally, the severe and excessive punishment of bearing a chain night and day and being forced to do painful and hard labor for 12 years for falsifying public records violates the Eighth Amendment. Weems v. United States, 217 U.S. 349, 30 S.Ct. 544, 54 L.Ed. 793 (1910).

Without attempting to summarize all the Supreme Court's applications of the Eighth Amendment, it may be said for purposes of this case that punishment must be meted out only for crimes committed, must comport with human dignity, and must not be excessively severe in itself or in relation to the crime. The Court has noted, in addition, that the concept of acceptable punishment is not static, but "must draw its meaning from the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society." Trop, supra, 356 U.S. at 101, 78 S.Ct. at 598 (plurality opinion).

The absence of conjugal visiting in prisons is not excessive punishment in itself or disproportional to plaintiffs' crimes. It is merely a customary concomitant of the punishment of incarceration. Plaintiffs allege that they are suffering physical stress; yet less than ideal physical conditions characterize prisons: for example, institutionalized diets, confining...