Twelve John Does v. District of Columbia, Civ. A. No. 80-2136.

• Decision Date: 31 July 1987
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 80-2136.
• Citation: 668 F. Supp. 20
• Parties: TWELVE JOHN DOES, et al., Plaintiffs, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, Marion S. Barry, Jr. and Edwin Meese, Attorney General of the United States, Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Columbia

668 F. Supp. 20

TWELVE JOHN DOES, et al., Plaintiffs, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, Marion S. Barry, Jr. and Edwin Meese, Attorney General of the United States, Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 80-2136.

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

July 31, 1987.

Peter J. Nickles, Alan A. Pemberton, John F. Seymour, Covington & Burling, Washington, D.C., for plaintiffs.

Michael E. Zielinski, Asst. Deputy Corp. Counsel, District of Columbia, Civ. Div., Edward Allen, Asst. Corp. Counsel, District of Columbia Dept. of Corrections, Correctional Litigation Section, Joseph E. DiGenova, U.S. Atty., Royce C. Lamberth, John Oliver Birch, John Faciolla, Bradley L. Kelly, Asst. U.S. Attys., Washington, D.C., for defendants.

OPINION

JUNE L. GREEN, District Judge.

Plaintiffs in this prison conditions litigation request the Court to enjoin the Attorney General of the United States from designating newly sentenced individuals to facilities operated by the District of Columbia Department of Corrections ("DCDC") at the Lorton Correctional Complex until the Court determines that those facilities are "available, suitable and appropriate institutions" within the meaning of D.C.Code § 24-425 (1981). In consideration of the persistent and unacceptable overcrowding at DCDC's Lorton facilities, the Court will grant plaintiffs' motion for a preliminary injunction.

I. Background

The Court has confronted in three separate lawsuits the prison conditions that prevail at the Lorton Correctional Complex. On April 28, 1982, the Court entered a Final Settlement and Consent Decree in Twelve John Does v. District of Columbia, Civil Action No. 80-2136 ("No. 80-2136"); on March 23, 1984, the Court entered a similar Final Settlement and Consent Decree in John Doe v. District of Columbia, Civil Action No. 79-1726 ("No. 79-1726"); and on December 22, 1986, the Court entered an opinion and order in Inmates of Occoquan v. Marion Barry, Civil Action No. 86-2128 ("No. 86-2128"). In each case the Court addressed extensively the conditions at the particular institutions and, inter alia, set inmate population limits.

Central to the relief ordered in each case, was the imposition of inmate population limits. E.g., No. 79-1726, March 23, 1984, Consent Decree at 12-14; No. 80-2136, April 28, 1982, Consent Decree at 54 ("The elements of the Consent Decree rest fundamentally on the number of residents committed to the Central Facility."); No. 86-2128, 650 F.Supp. 619, 632-33 (D.D. C.1986). In the intervening years, the Court has entertained countless motions from the parties, conducted hearings, and issued numerous orders and memoranda as it has struggled to bring prison conditions at Lorton up to constitutionally acceptable standards.

The pace of events has accelerated considerably in recent months. Despite DCDC's efforts over the past 10 years to increase prison space and develop suitable alternatives to incarceration, more inmates enter the Lorton facilities each month than are released. See, e.g., Report of Specially Appointed Officer of the Court, filed July 20, 1987, in Civil Action Nos. 79-1726, 80-2136, 86-2128; Declaration of Hallem H. Williams, Jr. of April 17, 1987. Indicative of the mounting population pressure at the Lorton Complex, is the recent population increase at the Central Facility in violation of the April 28, 1982, Consent Decree in No. 80-2136. See July 13, 1987, Letter from Hallem H. Williams, Jr., Director, Department of Corrections, to Peter J. Nickles, Esq. Further, despite years of compliance with the population limits set forth in the Consent Decree in No. 80-2136, Director Williams indicated that the violation of the Consent Decree occurred because of the need to transfer inmates from seriously overcrowded Occoquan facilities to Central. Id. There is no indication that the Central population increase is temporary. Indeed, with continued innovative law enforcement efforts such as the laudable "Operation Clean-Sweep," and the other Court orders imposing population limits on the Maximum and Occoquan facilities, there is every reason to believe that the violation of the Consent Decree in No. 80-2136 will only become more severe.

II. Discussion

A. D.C.Code § 24-425 (1981)

D.C.Code § 24-425 provides that prisoners convicted in the District of Columbia shall be committed "to the custody of the Attorney General of the United States ..., who shall designate the places of confinement where the sentences of all such persons shall be served." The statute provides further that "the Attorney General may designate any available, suitable and appropriate institutions, whether maintained by the District of Columbia government, the federal government or otherwise, or whether within or without the District of Columbia." (Emphasis added). Plaintiffs assert that the Lorton facilities are no longer "available, suitable and appropriate institutions" by reason of the present population crisis, and thereby rely on D.C.Code § 24-425 in seeking to enjoin the Attorney General from designating any new prisoners to the Lorton facilities.

Persuasive support for plaintiffs' assertion is found in the July 21, 1987, affidavit of Hallem H. Williams, Director of DCDC ("Williams Affidavit"). He states:

After personal inspection of the conditions of various Lorton facilities and consultation with the officials charged with the day-to-day operation of those institutions, it is my considered judgment as Director of DCDC that those institutions are not suitable or appropriate for the housing of additional prisoners and that they should not be available for that purpose.

B. The Standard for Injunctive Relief

In order to be entitled to injunctive relief, plaintiffs must demonstrate that (1) they are likely to prevail on the merits, (2) that they will suffer irreparable harm if injunctive relief is denied, (3) that the other parties will not suffer substantial injury if injunctive relief is granted, and (4) that the granting of injunctive relief is consistent with, or at least not contrary to, the public interest. Washington Metropolitan Transit Commission v. Holiday Tours, Inc., 559 F.2d 841, 843 (D.C.Cir.1977); accord Virginia Petroleum Jobbers Ass'n v. FPC, 259 F.2d 921, 925 (D.C.Cir.1958); see also Cuomo v. U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, 772 F.2d 972, 974 (D.C.Cir.1985) (Relief may be granted "with either a high probability of success and some injury, or vice versa."). Applying this standard to the exigent facts of this case, the Court concludes that plaintiffs are entitled to a preliminary injunction.

1. Likelihood of Success on the Merits

Plaintiffs are likely to succeed on the merits of their claim that continued designations of sentenced prisoners to the Lorton facilities by the Attorney General violates D.C.Code § 24-425. Supplemental Complaint, ¶¶ 22-25. There is no doubt that the Lorton facilities are so overcrowded that they cannot be considered "available," let alone "suitable" or "appropriate," for housing additional prisoners. See, e.g., Inmates of Occoquan v. Barry, 650 F.Supp. 619, 620-31 (D.D.C.1986); Williams Affidavit. Indeed, to continue designating prisoners to the Lorton facilities under the present conditions can only be considered an arbitrary and capricious abuse of discretion granted to the Attorney General under D.C.Code § 24-425.

The DCDC Director's letter to Peter C. Nickles, Esq., of July 13, 1987, is a blunt confession that on June 30, 1987, the system-wide prison overcrowding reached such a point that DCDC was compelled to violate the Court's Consent Decree in No. 80-2136 setting a population limit at the Central Facility, after years of abiding by its terms. See also Williams Affidavit at ¶¶ 6-7. While in the past year DCDC has been able to "manage" by using other Lorton facilities as "escape valves," and has overcrowded these facilities as part of an effort to remain in compliance with the Consent Decree in No. 80-2136, the systemic overcrowding has now reached such a point that DCDC has concluded that it simply cannot warehouse safely any more inmates in such other facilities. See, e.g., Inmates of Occoquan v. Barry, 650 F.Supp. at 634 (referring to Occoquan facilities as "the system safety valve"); Williams Affidavit at ¶¶ 13-14.

As a further indication of the unbearable pressure that the Lorton facilities are experiencing, the Mayor of the District of Columbia has declared a state of emergency pursuant to the Prison Overcrowding Emergency Act of 1987, initiating the emergency release of certain inmates. See Williams Affidavit at ¶¶ 8-9. Still, DCDC is compelled to violate the Court's orders in attempting to cope with this crisis.

Although D.C.Code § 24-425 has not previously been employed by the courts to relieve overcrowding in the District of Columbia, courts have indicated that the statutory duty to designate "suitable and appropriate" facilities imposes substantial and reviewable obligations on the Attorney General. In Murphy v. United States, 653 F.2d 637 (D.C.Cir.1981), an inmate plaintiff, injured in an assault at Lorton, sought to hold the United States liable in tort for the Attorney General's failure to designate an "appropriate" prison. While the plaintiff did not prevail, the court recognized that D.C.Code § 24-425 might impose an obligation to assign the plaintiff to an appropriate institution. Id. at 642 n. 16.

In Board of Sup'rs of Fairfax County, Va. v. United States, 408 F.Supp. 556 (E.D. Va.1976), appeal dismissed, 551 F.2d 305 (4th Cir.1977), the County of Fairfax sought to obtain injunctive relief and recover monetary damages against the United States, the Attorney General, and the District of Columbia for injuries resulting from the operation of the Lorton Reformatory. In pertinent part, the court noted that:

Should the plaintiff prove that the Lorton Complex is in fact a public nuisance, then it would not be a `suitable' place of confinement for persons convicted of crimes in the District

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