Temple v. Ellerthorpe

• Citation: 586 F. Supp. 848
• Decision Date: 23 May 1984
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 84-0194 S.
• Parties: William H. TEMPLE, Plaintiff, v. Donald O. ELLERTHORPE and Stafford Quick, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Rhode Island

586 F. Supp. 848

William H. TEMPLE, Plaintiff, v. Donald O. ELLERTHORPE and Stafford Quick, Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 84-0194 S.

United States District Court, D. Rhode Island.

May 23, 1984.

William H. Temple, pro se.

Anthony C. Cipriano, Legal Counsel for Rhode Island Dept. of Corrections, Cranston, R.I., for defendants.

MEMORANDUM AND ORDER

SELYA, District Judge.

This is an action brought pro se by William H. Temple, an inmate at the Adult Correctional Institution (ACI), Cranston, Rhode Island, a state penal facility, challenging his classification and the conditions of his confinement at the ACI. The defendants are officials of the Rhode Island Department of Corrections having supervisory authority over the ACI and those enrolled therein. While the complaint is silent as to its jurisdictional bases, the allegations purport to invoke, by implication, the plaintiff's civil rights, viz., the fifth, sixth, eighth and fourteenth amendments to the United States Constitution and 42 U.S.C. § 1983.

Temple seeks to proceed in forma pauperis without prepayment of fees and costs or the necessity of giving security therefor, pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1915.¹ He has tendered a form application in connection therewith, executed under penalties of perjury on April 9, 1984. The defendants object, arguing that Temple possesses the ability to pay for the filing and service of his complaint, and is ineligible for forma pauperis status. In support of their objection, they have submitted the affidavit of Carol A. Padula, a business management officer at the ACI, as well as Temple's inmate ledger card. These documents show unequivocally that the plaintiff had, from this source alone, funds on hand as of April 9 in the amount of $551.31. The latest entry in the ledger (May 9, 1984) reflects a residual balance of $526.36.

In his application, Temple answered in the affirmative the question: "Do you own any cash, or do you have money in checking or savings account (include any funds in prison accounts)?; and stated the "total value" of these assets as being $22.98. In light of the revelations contained in the ACI accounting records, this assertion was demonstrably false when made. The federal courts, beseiged as they are with prisoner suits, cannot wink at inmate prevarication. If meritorious cases are to receive sorely-needed attention, the judiciary can ill afford to tolerate disinformation or benignly to indulge those who gild, or as Judge Aldrich would have it, Maram v. Universidad Interamericana de Puerto Rico, 722 F.2d 953, 959 & n. 3 (1st Cir.1983), paint the lily. Temple's action is, under 28 U.S.C. § 1915(d),² subject to dismissal for this reason alone — inasmuch as his representations anent his financial condition were patently untrue. See Sturdevant v. Deer, 69 F.R.D. 17, 18 (E.D.Wis. 1975).

But, because the question of eligibility for the forma pauperis mantle is a recurring one, and because there is a dearth of caselaw in this district on the topic, the court will in this instance look beyond the obvious.

"Inability to pay" is a nettlesome concept; the noun predicate is subject to myriad shades of meaning in varying contexts and the operative verb is eternally dependent upon the unmentioned object (i.e., to pay for what?). Thus, the due interpretation of the phrase lends itself to a fluid case-by-case approach. Certainly, one need not be penniless to enjoy the benefits of § 1915. Justice Black, speaking for a unanimous Court, observed some thirty-five years ago:

To say that no persons are entitled to the statute's benefits until they have sworn to contribute to payment of costs, the last dollar they have or can get, and thus make themselves and their dependents wholly destitute, would be to construe the statute in a way that would throw its beneficiaries into the category of public charges. The public would not be profited if relieved of paying costs of a particular litigation only to have imposed on it the expense of supporting the person thereby made an object of public support.

Adkins v. E.I. DuPont de Nemours & Co., 335 U.S. 331, 339, 69 S.Ct. 85, 89, 93 L.Ed. 43 (1948).

Yet, there is a flip side to the forma pauperis coin. The First Circuit has phrased it bluntly:

(A) plaintiff, even though of small means, could reasonably be asked to some small degree to "put his money where his mouth is," it being all too easy to file suits, even with sufficient pro forma allegations, if it costs nothing whatever to do so.

In re Stump, 449 F.2d 1297, 1298 (1st Cir.1971) (per curiam).

The views of the Court in Adkins and of the First Circuit in Stump are comfortably reconcilable in theory. Whether one lowers the water or raises the bridge, the identic result inures. Taken in concert, these cases require the nisi prius court to hold the balance steady and true as between fairness to the putatively indigent suitor and fairness to the society which ultimately foots the bill.

The trial court must be careful to avoid construing the statute so narrowly that a litigant is presented with a Hobson's choice between eschewing a potentially meritorious claim or foregoing life's plain necessities. Potnick v. Eastern State Hospital, 701 F.2d 243, 244 (2d Cir.1983) (per curiam); Carson v. Polley, 689 F.2d 562, 586 (5th Cir.1982). But, the same evenhanded care must be employed to assure that federal funds are not squandered to underwrite, at public expense, either frivolous claims or the remonstrances of a suitor who is financially able, in whole or in material part, to pull his own oar. Brewster v. North American Van Lines, Inc., 461 F.2d 649, 651 (7th Cir.1972). In practice, however, the idiosyncrasies of individual cases and the difficulties so often inherent in the hands-on application of highminded principle tend to blur the picture.

Many courts have held that petitioners with modest cash reserves are not paupers within the intendment of 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a) for the purpose of filing fees, initial service of process costs and the like.³ See, e.g., Stump, supra (order that prisoner with institutional account totaling $218 pay filing fees affirmed); Ali v. Cuyler, 547 F.Supp. 129, 130 (E.D.Pa.1982) ("plaintiff possessed savings of $450 and the magistrate correctly determined that this amount was more than sufficient to allow the plaintiff to pay the filing fee in this action ..."); United States ex rel. Irons v. Pennsylvania, 407 F.Supp. 746, 747 (not an abuse of discretion to require a state prisoner who had $170.40 on hand to pay filing fee in habeas corpus proceeding); Ward v. Werner, 61 F.R.D. 639, 640 (M.D.Pa.1974) (prison inmates who had accounts of $50 and $65, respectively, were not entitled to proceed as paupers); Shimabuku v. Britton, 357 F.Supp. 825, 826 (D.Kan.1973), aff'd, 503 F.2d 38 (10th Cir.1974) (rejecting indigency standing for inmates who had prison accounts ranging from $315.31 to $45, respectively); Carroll v. United States, 320 F.Supp. 581, 582 (S.D.Tex.1970) (forma pauperis inappropriate vis-a-vis filing fees since plaintiff had stashed away upwards of $200). Cf. Williams v. Spencer, 455 F.Supp. 205, 209 (D.Md.1978); Braden v. Estelle, 428 F.Supp. 595, 600 (S.D. Tex.1977).⁴

But, there is no bright-line demarcation. At bottom, the recipe to be utilized must be one in which ingredients of fairness and human decency are brewed in a cauldron of economic reality. If an applicant has the wherewithal to pay court costs, or some part thereof, without depriving himself and his dependents (if any there be) of the necessities of life, then he should be required, in the First Circuit's phrase, to "put his money where his mouth is." Stump, 449 F.2d at 1298. Accord Adkins, 335 U.S. at 339, 69 S.Ct. at 89; Ali, 547 F.Supp. at 130; Carroll, 320 F.Supp. at 582. Conversely, if a contribution towards such expenses is outside an applicant's means or would so deplete his resources as to work a deprivation of basic human needs, resort to forma pauperis is entirely appropriate. See Adkins, supra; In re Smith, 600 F.2d 714, 716 (8th Cir. 1979); Souder v. McGuire, 516 F.2d 820, 824 (3d Cir.1975); Ali, 547 F.Supp. at 130. Accord Zaun v. Dobbin, 628 F.2d 990, 992-93 (7th Cir.1980).

Prisoner cases, however, present a unique taxonomy: by definition, a convict's "basic human needs" — food, shelter, clothing, health care, and the like — are fully subsidized by the government in consequence of his institutionalization. Unless dependents are somehow involved, there is certainly less cause for concern as to a prisoner's need for personal funds to sustain his existence. Yet, human dignity comes in variegated shapes and sizes. As the Third Circuit has noted:

We do not think that prisoners must totally deprive themselves of those small amenities of life which they are permitted to acquire in a prison ... beyond the food, clothing, and lodging already furnished by the state. An account of $50.07 would not purchase many such amenities; perhaps cigarettes and some occasional reading material. These need not be surrendered in order for a prisoner ... to litigate in forma pauperis in the district court.

Souder, 516 F.2d at 824.

The Souder appraisal harmonizes nicely with the views of the Court in Adkins, and appears eminently sound—so long as a fact-finder is able to differentiate Souder's "small amenities" from more extravagant fripperies. Penitentiaries, too, have their functional equivalent of the poverty level. On a forma pauperis application, "what may be required by the district court in the exercise of its discretion is a payment which is fair in the light of the actual financial situation of the particular pro se litigant." Bullock v. Suomela, 710 F.2d 102, 103 (3d Cir.1983).⁵

With this general discussion in mind, the court now turns to Temple's situation. The fees and costs involved at this stage of the proceedings are small: the filing fee, 28 U.S.C. § 1914, is $60, and expenses for service of process (which would not, in the case...