Martorell v. McElwee
| Decision Date | 02 July 1992 |
| Docket Number | No. 91 Civ. 4147 (CSH).,91 Civ. 4147 (CSH). |
| Parties | Joaquine MARTORELL, #87A8465, Plaintiff, v. James McELWEE, Senior Parole Officer, James White, Parole Officer, William Goggins, Parole Officer, Anthony K. Umina, Commissioner, N.Y.S. Parole Board, Eugene S. Callender, Commissioner, N.Y.S. Parole Board, Rodriguez Rivera, Chairman, N.Y.S. Parole Board, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York |
Joaquine Martorell, pro se.
Robert Abrams, Atty. Gen. of the State of N.Y., New York City (Susan A. Winston, of counsel), for defendants.
Plaintiff, a New York State prisoner, filed this pro se civil rights action under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against defendants who are involved in the state parole system. Plaintiff contends that his parole hearing was constitutionally flawed. He requests immediate release on parole and compensatory damages.
Defendants McElwee, White, Goggins, and Umina now move under Rule 12(b)(6), Fed.R.Civ.P., to dismiss the complaint for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted1. Unaccountably, the moving defendants do not question the Court's subject matter jurisdiction. The Court addresses this issue sua sponte.
Plaintiff Joaquine Martorell is an inmate at the Mid-Orange Correction Facility in Westchester County, New York. He is serving an indeterminate sentence of four years to life for Criminal Sale of a Controlled Substance in the second degree, involving five kilos of cocaine. After serving nearly four years, plaintiff had a hearing before the New York State Parole Board ("The Board"). Presiding over the Board were Commissioners Anthony K. Umina and Eugene S. Callender. Also present at the hearing were Senior Parole Officer James McElwee, Parole Officers James White and William Goggins, and Parole Program Aide Ruth Miller.
After interviewing plaintiff, Commissioners Umina and Callender denied him parole. Hearing transcripts and the Board's Release Decision Notice indicate that plaintiff was not released because the seriousness of the instant offense, and his involvement in "serious institutional behavior including continued use of controlled substance." (Pl.Ex. F). The Board concluded that early release was incompatible with the welfare of society, and that there was a reasonable probability that plaintiff would break the law if released.
Plaintiff alleges several violations of his rights:
Plaintiff's complaint demands the following relief:
To have a trial in this matter, in order to determine why the Plaintiff's minimum was extended by the within Defendant's by a period of twenty-four months and to be released immediately to parole if there is a finding of the Defendants' to be guilty of these allegations, and to have them pay me (the Plaintiff) $250,000 dollars for their wrongful doing in this matter. And to have them, the Defendants' show cause as to why they did not allow the Plaintiff an impartial interpreter in that Parole Adjudication Process.
The first issue to be determined is whether this action can be maintained under § 19832, or is more properly a writ of habeas corpus, subject to 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b)3. While both § 1983 and habeas corpus are designed to protect the rights of prisoners, there are important procedural and substantive differences between the two statutes. Section 1983 permits a prisoner to bring an action before the federal courts immediately. Habeas corpus, however, requires exhaustion of available state remedies before a federal court can consider the matter, see Rose v. Lundy, 455 U.S. 509, 102 S.Ct. 1198, 71 L.Ed.2d 379 (1982). Thus a determination that an action is a writ of habeas corpus may impact this Court's subject matter jurisdiction.
The Supreme Court considered the substantive distinction between habeas corpus and § 1983 in Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U.S. 475, 93 S.Ct. 1827, 36 L.Ed.2d 439 (1973). In Preiser, state prisoners filed a § 1983 action seeking restoration of revoked good-time credits. The Court held that while the broad language of § 1983 could encompass suits seeking restoration of good-time, "Congress has determined that habeas corpus is the appropriate remedy for state prisoners attacking the validity of the fact or the length of their confinement, and that specific determination must override the general terms of § 1983." Id. at 490, 93 S.Ct. at 1836. If the action is properly characterized as habeas corpus, the exhaustion requirements of § 2254(b) must first be satisfied. Id. at 492, 93 S.Ct. at 1837-38. In contrast, a § 1983 action "is a proper remedy for a state prisoner who is making a constitutional challenge to the conditions of his prison life, but not to the fact or length of his custody." Id. at 499, 93 S.Ct. at 1841. The Court further explained the differences between § 1983 and habeas corpus:
If a state prisoner is seeking damages, he is attacking something other than the fact or length of his confinement, and he is seeking something other than immediate or more speedy release — the traditional purpose of habeas corpus. In the case of a damages claim, habeas corpus is not an appropriate or available federal remedy. Accordingly ... a damages action by a state prisoner could be brought under the Civil Rights Act in federal court without any requirement of prior exhaustion of state remedies. Id. at 494, 93 S.Ct. at 1838 (emphasis in original).
In a footnote, the Court commented on situations where a court is presented with both § 1983 and habeas corpus claims:
If a prisoner seeks to attack both the conditions of his confinement and the fact or length of that confinement, his latter claim, under our decision today, is cognizable only in federal habeas corpus, with its attendant requirement of exhaustion of state remedies. But, consistent with our prior decisions, that holding in no way precludes him from simultaneously litigating in federal court, under § 1983, his claim relating to the conditions of his confinement. Id. at 499, n. 14, 93 S.Ct. at 1841, n. 14.
This holding was reiterated in Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974). Wolff involved a § 1983 challenge to the conditions of confinement at a Nebraska prison. Specifically, the plaintiff in Wolff complained of the manner in which disciplinary proceedings were conducted, the legal assistance program, and the inspection of prisoners' mail. He sought restoration of good-time credits and money damages. The Court held that while restoration of good-time credits was foreclosed under Preiser, a prisoner could utilize the Civil Rights Act to seek damages because Preiser "expressly contemplated that claims properly brought under § 1983 could go forward while actual restoration of good-time credits is sought in state proceedings." Id. at 554, 94 S.Ct. at 2974. At that point in the text, the Court dropped footnote 12: "One would anticipate that normal principles of res judicata would apply in such circumstances."
In the case at bar, Martorell cannot use a § 1983 action to challenge the duration of his confinement or to obtain his release on parole. Under Preiser, those claims may be made only by habeas corpus. See Mack v. Varelas, 835 F.2d 995, 998 (2d Cir.1987). However Preiser and Wolff also make it clear that there is no conceptual bar to a § 1983 action for damages proceeding simultaneously with a state proceeding required by § 2254(b) exhaustion. Wolff's footnote 12 further suggests that resolution of the former would have res judicata effect upon the latter.
Neither case squarely addresses the situation at bar, where a resolution of the § 1983 action in plaintiff's favor would arguably, under res judicata, automatically entitle plaintiff to be released from prison: the traditional remedy of habeas corpus.
A number of circuits have concluded that Preiser and Wolff do not exempt all § 1983 damages claims from § 2554(b) analysis. In Crump v. Lane, 807 F.2d 1394 (7th Cir.1986), the Seventh Circuit considered the case of a prisoner who filed a habeas corpus and a § 1983 action after being denied parole eight times. In vacating the prisoner's § 1983 claims, the Court held:
The core of Crump's claim concerns the fact or duration of his confinement, and any award of damages would be entirely dependent upon the favorable resolution of that issue. Before Crump may properly maintain a § 1983 action for damages arising out of his allegedly illegal confinement, he must first exhaust his state court remedies as required by 28 U.S.C. § 2254(b). Id. at 1401.
A similar result was reached in Todd v. Baskerville, 712 F.2d 70 (4th Cir.1983). The Court refused to interpret Preiser as always permitting prisoners to simultaneously litigate § 1983 and habeas corpus claims. If the core of a prisoner's § 1983 claim goes to the length or duration of confinement "and any claim of damages is purely ancillary to and dependent on a favorable resolution of the length or duration of his sentence, the proceeding is in habeas." Id. at 73 (citing Preiser, 411 U.S. at 505, ...
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