Plyler v. Evatt, 90-6789

• Decision Date: 12 February 1991
• Docket Number: No. 90-6789,90-6789
• Parties: Harry PLYLER (Formerly Gary Wayne Nelson, et al.), Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Parker EVATT, Commissioner, South Carolina Department of Corrections; Members of the South Carolina Board of Corrections, Defendants-Appellants.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit

Page 1321

924 F.2d 1321

Harry PLYLER (Formerly Gary Wayne Nelson, et al.), Plaintiff-Appellee, v. Parker EVATT, Commissioner, South Carolina Department of Corrections; Members of the South Carolina Board of Corrections, Defendants-Appellants.

No. 90-6789.

United States Court of Appeals Fourth Circuit.

Argued June 6, 1990.

Decided Jan. 23, 1991.

As Amended Feb. 12, 1991.

Kenneth Paul Woodington, argued, Sr. Asst. Atty. Gen., for appellants. (T. Travis Medlock, Atty. Gen., Charles W. Gambrell, Jr., Deputy Atty. Gen., Henry J. White, Staff Atty., Larry C. Batson, Legal Advisor, on brief), South Carolina Dept. of Corrections, Columbia, S.C., for defendants-appellants.

W. Gaston Fairey, argued, Fairey & Parise, P.A., Columbia, S.C. (Al Bronstein, National Prison Project, American Civil Liberties Union, Washington, D.C.; John Morris, Southern Prisoner's Defense Committee, Atlanta, Georgia, on brief), for plaintiff-appellee.

Before PHILLIPS, SPROUSE and WILKINS, Circuit Judges.

PHILLIPS, Circuit Judge:

The Commissioner of the South Carolina Department of Corrections and the members of the South Carolina Board of Corrections (collectively, SCDC or the state) appeal an order of the United States District Court for the District of South Carolina denying their motion for modification of a consent decree relating to the design, construction and operation of state prison facilities. Because we conclude that the court erred in declining to give the state any relief by modification of the decree, we vacate the order and remand with instructions for reconsideration of the motion.

I

This case is a reprise of Plyler v. Evatt, 846 F.2d 208 (4th Cir.1988) (Plyler I ), in which this court reversed the district court's refusal to modify the consent decree in other particulars, and remanded with directions permanently to modify the decree as requested by the state. The general background leading to entry of the consent decree and the ensuing difficulties that arose in its implementation are extensively developed in the Plyler I opinion and need not be fully laid out again here. A brief summary of that background suffices.

The consent decree, signed by the parties in January 1985, settled a class action brought in 1982 by state prison inmates against state officials, claiming unconstitutional conditions of confinement in various state prison facilities. The decree effected a comprehensive settlement dealing with all facets of state prison administration as that bore upon conditions of confinement within the system. The gist of the settlement was an agreement by the state to improve prison conditions in specifically detailed ways in return for the inmates' agreement to forego any claims they might have as a class for monetary or other relief because of the state's maintenance of any provable unconstitutional conditions of confinement. The district court approved entry of the consent decree in March of 1986, after careful review of its details, and after specifically finding that it was knowingly and willingly entered into by the prisoner class and by responsible officials of the state. Because the class action was settled, the claim of unconstitutional conditions has never been adjudicated.

Although, as indicated, the decree swept broadly, its central provisions were those concerned with avoiding overcrowding and its attendant ills by laying down minimum space requirements principally expressed in terms of cell space per inmate. Timetables for achieving compliance in stages were provided. New and renovated facilities were subjected to specific space requirements for single and double cells. Old, existing facilities were subjected both to specific space requirements and to other, more flexible requirements designed to accommodate the practical constraints which their construction imposed on efforts to avoid overcrowding. Critical to this appeal were the restrictions for the then existing Womens' Correctional Center (WCC), a facility built in 1973, which was one of three facilities that then housed women prisoners. At WCC the decree permitted the state originally to double-cell no more than one-half of the cells then being used for general population in five of the seven then existing forty-eight cell cottages and required the state to construct additional cottage space to house 96 inmates by December 31, 1985.

Following entry of the consent decree, the state succeeded in meeting most of its obligations, with the notable exception of those pertaining to cell space. As to those central obligations, it has had difficulty from the outset due to an increase in prison population that quickly and substantially exceeded the projections upon which the state officials relied when the consent decree was signed. Indeed the state was already out of compliance with this critical aspect of the decree at the time of its entry in March of 1986.

Failure of the state to achieve compliance with various of the space requirements has led to a series of efforts by the inmate class to secure enforcement orders from the court, and responsive efforts by the state to obtain extensions of time to comply and, eventually, permanent modifications of the decree.

In July of 1986 the court granted a motion to enforce, and denied a countering motion to modify with respect to certain cell-space requirements. The state's appeal from this order was dismissed as moot when the state achieved compliance with the requirements while the appeal was pending. Plyler v. Leeke, 804 F.2d 1251 (4th Cir.1986).

Again in May of 1987, when the inmate class sought an enforcement order, the state countered with a motion for permanent modification of the decree to permit it to continue non-complying double-celling of male inmates in certain newly constructed facilities. When the district court again refused to modify and instead ordered compliance, the state again appealed. This led to this court's reversal in Plyler I.

The present appeal originated with a set of countering motions filed in early 1989 respecting the decree's space requirements for women inmates at WCC. The inmate class had moved for an enforcement order; the state soon countered with a motion to modify the decree either temporarily through early January 1991, or permanently, to relieve it of its alleged noncompliance. It was undisputed at the time these motions were heard that the state was not in compliance as to the WCC requirements. Specifically, TV rooms in old cottages 1 through 7 were being used to house inmates although the decree specifically forbade this. More critically, all the cottages, 1 through 7, in existence when the decree was signed, were being fully double-celled, although the decree permitted double-celling of no more than fifty percent of five of these facilities. Finally, inmates in two cottages constructed after the consent decree, cottages 8 and 9, were fully double-celled in cells of approximately 73 square feet, although the decree required that in these newly constructed facilities only single-celling should occur unless at least 100 square feet of cell space was provided.

In May 1989, the district court granted the state temporary relief from compliance with these provisions and set a hearing for August 1, 1989, to consider a more permanent solution. In the interval, the state was directed to submit alternative methods for achieving compliance. Following the requested submissions, the court conducted a hearing in September of 1989, and on February 15, 1990, entered an order which (1) denied the state's motion for modification, either temporarily or permanently, and (2) required the state to "place the Womens' Correctional Center in full compliance with the Consent Decree no later than April 2, 1990," and provided that the state was "free to take whatever steps they deem advisable to gain such compliance."

The state then took this appeal, and the district court's order was stayed by this court pending the appeal.

II

A

The general principles guiding the district court's consideration of the state's motion to modify the consent decree and those guiding our review of its denial of that motion are well-settled. Plyler I, dealing with the same type issues raised in this case, recently restated those principles as they apply to such issues, and we summarize them again here briefly.

Under its inherent equity powers, as now expressed in Fed.R.Civ.P. 60(b)(5), a district court may modify a judgment if "it is no longer equitable that the judgment should have prospective application." Plyler I, 846 F.2d at 211. In exercise of that power, consent decrees such as that here in issue may be modified in appropriate cases on the basis of material changes in operative law or facts. Id. (citing Nelson v. Collins, 659 F.2d 420, 424 (4th Cir.1981) (en banc)). While underlying principles of finality and repose dictate great caution in modifying consent decrees on no other basis than material changes in law or fact, "the unique nature and demands of institutional reform litigation necessitate a more flexible approach to modification" than may be appropriate with respect to consent decrees between private parties. Id. at 212 (citing Ruiz v. Lynaugh, 811 F.2d 856, 860-61 (5th Cir.1987)) (citing New York State Ass'n for Retarded Children v. Carey, 706 F.2d 956, 970 (2d Cir.1983)). The "uniqueness" of institutional reform litigation lies in the fact that it is necessarily aimed at achieving "broad public policy objectives in a complex, ongoing fact situation," with the consequence that consent decrees settling such litigation must be viewed as embodying "not so much peremptory commands to be obeyed in terms, as ... future-oriented plans designed to achieve [those] objectives." Id. (citing Carey, 706 F.2d at 970 n. 17).

Prison reform litigation, and consent decrees settling such litigation, present particularly sensitive problems for courts asked by prison officials to modify decrees because of...