Reynolds v. Arnone

• Decision Date: 27 August 2019
• Docket Number: No. 3:13-cv-1465 (SRU),3:13-cv-1465 (SRU)
• Parties: Richard REYNOLDS, Plaintiff, v. Leo ARNONE, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Connecticut

402 F.Supp.3d 3

Richard REYNOLDS, Plaintiff,

v.Leo ARNONE, et al., Defendants.

No. 3:13-cv-1465 (SRU)

United States District Court, D. Connecticut.

Signed August 27, 2019

Brett Dignam, Morningside Heights Legal Services, Inc., New York, NY, for Plaintiff.

Madeline A. Melchionne, Michael A. Martone, Steven R. Strom, Office of the Attorney General, Hartford, CT, for Defendants.

MEMORANDUM OF DECISION

Stefan R. Underhill, United States District Judge

Richard Reynolds has spent the past twenty-three years in solitary confinement. Reynolds' conditions of confinement are the most restrictive available in the Connecticut prison system. As the result of state legislation directed against him, Reynolds has no genuine opportunity to have his conditions relaxed for the remainder of his life sentence. Reynolds has moved for summary judgment on his claim that the punishment meted out by the State of Connecticut violates the Constitution’s protection against cruel and unusual punishment. For the reasons that follow, Reynolds' motion is granted.

I. Introduction

Reynolds committed a heinous crime – he murdered a law enforcement officer. Reynolds was sentenced to death and awaited execution for twenty-one years. When the death penalty was abolished retroactively in Connecticut, Reynolds was resentenced to life without the possibility of release.

The fact that people commit inhumane crimes does not give the state the right to treat them inhumanely. Solitary confinement is an extreme form of punishment with a long history in American penal systems. Since its origins at Pennsylvania’s Eastern State Penitentiary in the 1800s, the anguish of those held in complete isolation has been well-documented.

[V]ery few men are capable of estimating the immense amount of torture and agony which this dreadful punishment, prolonged for years, inflicts upon the sufferers.... I hold this slow and daily tampering with the mysteries of the brain to be immeasurably worse than any torture of the body ... because its wounds are not upon the surface, and it extorts few cries that human ears can hear.

C. Dickens, American Notes for General Circulation 123–24 (Paris, Baudry’s European Library, 1842).

Today, an estimated 61,000 prisoners are held in solitary confinement in American prisons.¹ See Reforming Restrictive Housing: The 2018 ASCA-Liman Nationwide Survey of Time-in-Cell , Yale Law School 2018 (hereinafter "ASCA-Liman Report") at 10.² Those inmates are separated from the general population and are held in their cells for twenty-two hours or more per day. See id. at 4. An abundance of clinical literature regarding the psychiatric effects of solitary confinement supports a near-universal conclusion: "The restriction of environmental stimulation and social isolation associated with confinement in solitary are strikingly toxic to mental functioning." Stuart Grassian, Psychiatric Effects of Solitary Confinement , 22 Wash. U. J.L. & Pol'y 325, 354 (2006). As the mental effects of solitary confinement garner national attention, calls to abolish or reform its use are increasing nationwide. See, e.g., Editorial Board, Solitary confinement is torture. Will the Bureau of Prisons finally stop using it? , Wash. Post, July 15, 2017; Joe Hernandez, New Jersey considers restricting the use of solitary confinement , The Phila. Tribune, June 7, 2019. "As of the spring of 2018, legislation to eliminate or to limit restrictive housing for subpopulations had been enacted in California, Colorado, Washington, D.C., and Tennessee, and proposed in several other jurisdictions, including Connecticut, Hawaii, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, and Virginia." ASCA-Liman Report at 88.

Despite the growing consensus among the scientific community that solitary confinement inflicts severe harm on prisoners, a select group of "special circumstances high security" inmates in Connecticut are all-but-certain to be housed in prolonged isolation for the rest of their lives. Other than two daily hours of recreation and two 15-minute breaks to eat lunch and dinner, each such inmate is effectively condemned to spend the rest of his life in a cell roughly the size of a parking space.

II. Background

Reynolds was convicted of murder and sentenced to death.³ In 2017, he was re-sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of release, following the judicial abolition of the death penalty in Connecticut in 2015. See Mem in Supp. Defs' Mot. for Summary Judgment ("Defs' Mot.") (Doc. No. 117-26) at 1. Reynolds has been confined at Northern Correctional Institution ("Northern"), a level 5 maximum security prison, for the past twenty-three years. Mem. in Supp. Pl.’s Mot. for Summary Judgment ("Pl.’s Mot.") (Doc. No. 122) at 1. Pursuant to Connecticut General Statutes Section 18-10b (" Section 18-10b"),⁴ Reynolds is classified as a "special circumstances high security" inmate. See id. at 4. As an inmate on special circumstances status, he lives alone in a 12 foot by 7 foot cell. See Joint Smt. of Undisputed Facts ("JSUF") (Doc. No. 120) ¶¶ 33–34. His cell is enclosed by concrete walls, a metal door, and a three-inch wide window. Id. ¶¶ 34, 37–38.

Reynolds is allowed out of his cell for two fifteen-minute periods to eat lunch and dinner. He is allowed to take one fifteen-minute shower each day. See Defs' Local Rule 56(a)(1) Stmt., (Doc. No. 117-27) ¶¶ 142, 294. He is allotted two hours of recreation each day for six days a week and two hours of weekly indoor gym recreation. See Robles Decl. (Doc. No. 117-6) ¶¶ 61–67. Reynolds may, upon request, receive visits from clergy, attorneys, or prison medical staff. Defs' Mot. at 57. Other than those periods, Reynolds remains isolated with no contact with anyone but the six other inmates on special circumstances status. See PL.’s Mot. at 4; JSUF ¶ 28. Although he is allowed social visits with family members, no physical contact is permitted during those visits, which occur through Plexiglass. Pl.’s Local Rule 56(a)(1) Stmt. (Doc. No. 121) ¶ 84. Reynolds' conditions of confinement are more restrictive than any other form of incarceration available within the State of Connecticut prison system.

On or about October 4, 2013, Reynolds filed his original pro se complaint challenging his conditions of confinement. Doc. No. 1. On June 29, 2015, I granted Reynolds' request for appointment of counsel. Doc. No. 52. About a month later, on August 25, 2015, the Connecticut Supreme Court held that the prospective repeal of the death penalty enacted by the Connecticut State Legislature in 2012 violated the state Constitution and ordered that individuals on death row be re-sentenced to life without the possibility of release. See State v. Santiago , 318 Conn. 1, 122 A.3d 1 (2015). Accordingly, Reynolds was resentenced on April 21, 2017. On June 29, 2017, Reynolds filed his second amended complaint, which now serves as the operative complaint. Doc. No. 71-1.

Reynolds has sued former Connecticut Department of Corrections ("DOC") Commissioner Leo Arnone and various prisoner officials at Northern Correctional Institution ("Defendants"), pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983. He seeks declaratory and injunctive relief; as well as damages.

The parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment on November 9, 2018. In his motion, Reynolds contends that his conditions offend multiple constitutional protections as well as basic principles of human decency. Pl.’s Mot. at 2–3. He seeks declaratory and injunctive relief. Id. at 58, 122 A.3d 1. Defendants argue that they are entitled to qualified immunity because there "is no clearly established law either in the U.S. Supreme Court or the Second Circuit regarding the management of inmates on death row/special circumstances." Defs' Mot. at 1. In addition, Defendants state that Reynolds' claims are unripe because he failed to exhaust his state habeas court remedies regarding Section 18-10b. Id. at 2, 122 A.3d 1. I held oral argument on April 18, 2019, at which time I took the motions under advisement. See Doc. No. 151. For the following reasons, I grant Reynolds' motion and deny the Defendants' motion.

III. Standard of Review

A. Summary Judgment

Summary judgment is appropriate when the record demonstrates that "there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a) ; see also Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc. , 477 U.S. 242, 256, 106 S.Ct. 2505, 91 L.Ed.2d 202 (1986) (plaintiff must present affirmative evidence in order to defeat a properly supported motion for summary judgment).

When ruling on a summary judgment motion, the court must construe the facts of record in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party and must resolve all ambiguities and draw all reasonable inferences against the moving party. Anderson , 477 U.S. at 255, 106 S.Ct. 2505 ; Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp. , 475 U.S. 574, 587, 106 S.Ct. 1348, 89 L.Ed.2d 538 (1986) ; Adickes v. S.H. Kress & Co. , 398 U.S. 144, 158–59, 90 S.Ct. 1598, 26 L.Ed.2d 142 (1970) ; see also Aldrich v. Randolph Cent. Sch. Dist. , 963 F.2d 520, 523 (2d Cir. 1992) (court is required to "resolve all ambiguities and draw all inferences in favor of the nonmoving party"). In the context of cross-motions for summary judgment, the same standard is applied. See Scholastic, Inc. v. Harris , 259 F.3d 73, 81 (2d Cir. 2001). However, in deciding each motion, the court must construe the evidence in the light most favorable to the non-moving party. Id.

"Only when reasonable minds could not differ as to the import of the evidence is summary judgment proper." Bryant v. Maffucci , 923 F.2d 979, 982 (2d Cir. 1991) ; see also Suburban Propane v. Proctor Gas, Inc. , 953 F.2d 780, 788 (2d Cir. 1992).

If the nonmoving party submits evidence that is "merely colorable," or is not "significantly probative," summary judgment may be granted. Anderson , 477 U.S. at 249–50, 106 S.Ct. 2505.

The mere existence of some alleged factual dispute between

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