Taylor v. Rogers
| Decision Date | 21 January 1986 |
| Docket Number | No. 85-6413,85-6413 |
| Citation | 781 F.2d 1047 |
| Parties | Enith Lester TAYLOR, Jr., Appellant, and Larry Parnell; Jerry Lee Beeson, Intervenor Ptfs. v. P.M. ROGERS; James Woodard; Rae H. McNamara, Appellees. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Fourth Circuit |
Charles T.L. Anderson, Apex, N.C., (Richard E. Giroux; Raleigh, N.C., Prisoner Legal Services, Inc. on brief) for appellants.
Jacob L. Safron, Sp. Deputy Atty. Gen., Raleigh, N.C., (Lacy H. Thornburg, Atty. Gen., Webster, N.C., on brief) for appellees.
Before WINTER, Chief Judge, SNEEDEN, Circuit Judge, and HILTON, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Virginia, sitting by designation.
Three inmates of North Carolina's penal institutions appeal from the summary judgment entered for defendants in the inmate's suits to redress claimed deprivations of due process of law, equal protection of the laws and the Eighth Amendment guarantee against cruel and unusual punishment arising from their being in protective custody. We affirm.
Plaintiffs are all prison inmates who have elected to be placed in protective custody because of actual or perceived danger to them from other inmates. Two are confined at Caswell prison and one at Southern Prison Unit. 1 They alleged and offered proof to establish that as protective custody inmates they received different and more restrictive treatment than inmates in the general prison population with regard to: (1) access to religious services, (2) physical recreation opportunities and facilities, (3) recreation (television, films), (4) availability of rehabilitative programs, (5) availability of prison employment, (6) family visitation, (7) family phone privileges, (8) access to law library, (9) canteen calls, and (10) access to library. They offered proof also that prisoners in protective custody in other North Carolina penal institutions did not have imposed on them restrictions of such severity. Further, they offered proof that they have been denied promotion to honor grade or to minimum security custody, with attendant privileges, unless and until they were willing to forgo protective custody. Finally, they adduced expert testimony that the protective custody practices at Caswell and elsewhere thwart rehabilitation and correction of the subject inmates and "would foreseeably result in the extension of protective custody inmates' term of imprisonment." The expert expressed the view, as a result of his review of records of the North Carolina prison system, that minimum custody is denied to inmates in protective custody and that for inmates serving sentences beginning prior to July 1, 1981, minimum custody "is virtually a prerequisite for parole review." 2
Defendants do not dispute some of the differences in treatment between inmates in protective custody and inmates in the general prison population. But they offered explanations for the differences. For example, at Caswell, which is designated as a place of temporary assignment for protective custody inmates and where, with few exceptions, prisoners remain no longer than sixty days, there is no law library. There is no telephone in the cell block in which prisoners in protective custody are lodged. The exercise yard for the segregation facility is not as commodious as that for the general population. Overall, the limited availability of staff and the need to protect prisoners in protective custody limits or prohibits organized recreational activities, organized drug counseling, vocational training and other rehabilitative classes, the availability of organized religious services, visitation rights and the availability of gain time or incentive wage jobs.
Similarly, at Southern Prison, where the restrictions are not as severe as at Caswell, the limited availability of staff and considerations of security, restrict the prisoners in protective custody, as compared to prisoners in the general population, to less time out of their cells, less time outdoors, fewer religious services, fewer or no organized recreational activities, and fewer incentive wage-gain time jobs and gain-time jobs. Defendants attempted to explain these acknowledged differences by offering proof establishing that overall, with respect to both institutions, the restrictions on prisoners in protective custody vis-a-vis prisoners in the general prison population stemmed from considerations of security, and that differences among prisoners in protective custody in various institutions resulted from differences in facilities and staffing among those institutions.
Plaintiffs advanced to the district court three theories entitling them to equitable and legal relief 3--denial of equal protection, denial of due process, and denial of the right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment by conditioning the grant of protection from inmate violence on the relinquishment of amenities and privileges. The magistrate, assigned by the district court to hear the case, found, on motion for summary judgment, that the restrictions applied to prisoners in protective custody were rationally related to the need for prison security and order and therefore did not deny them equal protection of the laws. He rejected also the due process claim, ruling that Sweet v. South Carolina Dept. of Corrections, 529 F.2d 854, 861 n. 16 (4 Cir.1975), held that when a prisoner elects protective custody, he may not contend that his right to due process has been abridged by the restrictions and limitations appertaining thereto. Finally, the magistrate rejected plaintiffs' argument that the denial to prisoners who elect protective custody of the opportunities afforded prisoners in the general prison population is a denial of their Eighth Amendment rights.
The rights of prisoners in protective custody have been considered by us in a series of cases beginning with Breeden v. Jackson, 457 F.2d 578 (4 Cir.1972), and followed by...
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Ramadan v. Fbop, Civil Action No. 1:14-cv-25757
...(4th Cir.1991)("[T]he transfer of a prisoner render[s] moot his claim for injunctive and declaratory relief."); Taylors v. Rogers, 781 F.2d 1047, 1048, n. 1 (4th Cir. 1986)(finding that a prisoner's transfer mooted his request for declaratory and injunctive relief). Clearly, injunctive and ......
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Amos v. Maryland Dept. of Public Safety and Correctional Services
...823 (4th Cir.1991) (holding that prisoner's transfer to another facility mooted his claims for injunctive relief); Taylor v. Rogers, 781 F.2d 1047, 1048 n. 1 (4th Cir.1986) (holding that prisoner's transfer mooted a request for declaratory and injunctive relief).2 The majority erroneously s......
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Amos v. Maryland Dept. of Public Safety and Correctional Services
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