US v. District of Columbia

• Decision Date: 10 November 1988
• Docket Number: Civ. A. No. 88-2897.
• Citation: 703 F. Supp. 982
• Parties: UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, et al., Defendants.
• Court: U.S. District Court — District of Columbia

703 F. Supp. 982

UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff, v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA, et al., Defendants.

Civ. A. No. 88-2897.

United States District Court, District of Columbia.

November 10, 1988.

John D. Bates, Asst. U.S. Atty., Washington, D.C., for plaintiff.

Paul Quander, Corp. Counsel's Office, for District of Columbia, Washington, D.C., for defendants.

MEMORANDUM OPINION

THOMAS F. HOGAN, District Judge.

In this action for permanent injunctive relief and declaratory judgment, the United States of America seeks to enjoin the District of Columbia; Marion S. Barry, Jr., Mayor of the District of Columbia; William Plaut, Administrator of the District of Columbia Jail; and Hallem H. Williams, Jr., Director of the District of Columbia Department of Corrections, from refusing to accept into the District of Columbia Jail, or any other District of Columbia Department of Corrections facility, prisoners who have been sentenced by the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.

On October 4, 1988, the District of Columbia announced that it would no longer accept newly sentenced prisoners into the District of Columbia Department of Corrections. The District undertook this extraordinary action in response to two federal court orders issued on September 29, 1988. In the first order, Judge William Bryant ruled that the 1,694 inmate population ceiling at the District of Columbia Jail may not be exceeded. Campbell v. McGruder, Civil Action No. 71-1462 (D.D.C.). In the second order, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia lifted a stay of, and thereby affirmed, the August 1, 1988 order of Judge June Green requiring, inter alia, the District to cease transferring inmates to the Central Facility at Lorton until the population of Central returns to the 1,166 inmate population ceiling set by a consent decree. Twelve John Does v. District of Columbia, D.C. Civil Action No. 80-2136.

The District's alarming response to the recent Court orders represents the unfortunate culmination of a prison crisis that has plagued the District of Columbia, the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and the federal courts in the District of Columbia for decades. By literally barring the jail-house doors, the District has finally forced the United States to bring to this Court the ultimate issue of identifying the locus of responsibility for housing adult male prisoners sentenced by the Superior Court of the District of Columbia.

The United States filed its complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief and its motions for a temporary restraining order and for a preliminary injunction on October 6, 1988. After an emergency hearing, the Court denied plaintiff's motion for a temporary restraining order. On October 12, 1988, plaintiff moved for consolidation of the hearing on the preliminary injunction with the trial on the merits, pursuant to Fed.R.Civ.P. 65(a)(2), and amended its pleadings to seek a permanent injunction. The Court granted plaintiff's motion pursuant to its bench opinion of October 17, 1988.

To obtain equitable relief in the present action, the United States must succeed on the merits and show that it is threatened with harm for which it has no adequate remedy at law. Reed Enterprises v. Corcoran, 354 F.2d 519, 522 (D.C.Cir.1965); 11 C. Wright, A. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2942, at 368-69 (1973). Since October 3, 1988, the United States has accepted over 200 D.C. prisoners into federal prisons, eight of whose sentences have already expired. The prospective infusion of similar numbers of prisoners ad infinitum into a federal prison system that is currently operating at 157% of design capacity (as compared to the District system which is currently operating at 114% of design capacity) clearly constitutes threatened injury for which the United States has no adequate remedy at law.

The Court's current inquiry thus focuses on the merits of the case. That is, under D.C.Code § 24-425, must the District continue to accept and provide for prisoners duly designated by the Attorney General to the District of Columbia Department of Corrections; or must the Attorney General house and maintain D.C. prisoners, for some indefinite period of time, upon the District's unilateral refusal to accept properly assigned prisoners into its facilities. It is the decision of this Court that under D.C.Code § 24-425: (1) the District of Columbia must continue to accept and maintain prisoners duly designated by the Attorney General to the District of Columbia Department of Corrections, provided that such designation would not cause the D.C. facilities to exceed population limits set by the United States District Court; (2) the Attorney General must retain custody of said prisoners whenever all facilities within the District of Columbia Department of Corrections meet or exceed the court ordered population caps such that no facility exists within the District of Columbia to serve as an available, suitable, and appropriate place of confinement; and (3) the District of Columbia must immediately undertake all feasible measures to provide space for all adult male prisoners sentenced hereafter by the Superior Court.

BACKGROUND

In an effort to bring some cohesion to the byzantine labyrinth of the recurrent prison problem and resultant litigation, the Court has reviewed the extensive court records, consultant reports, opinions, and orders in prior related actions. A brief historical overview of the District of Columbia's chronic prison problem sheds light on the parties' conflicting statutory interpretations and places the current crisis in context.

The District of Columbia's correctional facilities have been the subject of public and judicial scrutiny for over 150 years. See, e.g., S. McConville, A Review of the Correctional Policies of the District of Columbia 1 (1986) (surveying the overcrowding and dilapidated conditions in the District's prisons and Jail from 1825 through 1986). During the past two decades, the federal courts in the District of Columbia have heard several ongoing class actions challenging the overcrowding and deteriorating conditions at the various institutions comprising the District of Columbia Department of Corrections. The suits have been marked with repeated judicial orders, consent decrees, and contempt citations exposing the District's mismanagement of its prison system and attempting to compel the District's compliance with laws, court orders, and consent decrees.

As chronicled by Judges Bryant and Green, at the root of the most recent suits is the District's intransigent refusal adequately and expeditiously to expand its prison capacity. Over ten years ago, Judge Bryant listed the litany of constitutional abuses at the old D.C. Jail including overcrowding, integration of sentenced and unsentenced residents, lack of classification programs for determining the level of security needed for unsentenced residents, and numerous violations of building codes, plumbing codes, housing regulations, health regulations, food regulations, and fire codes. Campbell v. McGruder, 416 F.Supp. 100 (D.D.C.1975). Yet, despite the Court's findings and subsequent orders, the deplorable conditions persisted. Six months after his ruling, Judge Bryant found that "defendants have failed to take reasonable and obvious steps to alleviate overcrowding." Campbell v. McGruder, 416 F.Supp. 111 (D.D.C.1976). Nine years later, despite the construction of a new D.C. Jail, Judge Bryant was forced to conclude that the District's cavalier attitude still had not changed:

Time and time again, defendants have requested the court to defer to their accumulated wisdom, to stay its hand, to give them more time. Time and again, these requests have been honored in the hope and expectation that defendants would solve these problems expeditiously and effectively. However, instead of matters improving they have deteriorated.

Campbell v. McGruder, Civil Action No. 71-1462, Memorandum and Order at 50 (D.D.C. July 15, 1985) (emphasis added). See generally S. McConville, A Review of the Correctional Policies of the District of Columbia 33-44 (1986) (detailing the "damming and disturbing list of deficiencies" in the D.C. Jail, including gross overcrowding, unhygienic and inadequate washing and sanitary facilities, lighting and vent difficulties, rodent and insect infestation, and deficient medical and dental care).

In response to the District's failure to address the overcrowding crisis of its own accord, Judge Bryant established the first cap on the D.C. Jail. Through a consent decree, Judge Bryant set a 1,694 inmate limit to the Jail's population. In view of facts indicating that, with the exception of short daily periods when prisoners were counted, the District had consistently exceeded the 1,694 inmate ceiling, Judge Bryant subsequently entered an oral order on September 29, 1988, requiring the District to comply, in spirit and in fact, with the actual cap of 1,694 at the D.C. Jail. Campbell v. McGruder, Civil Action No. 71-1462 (D.D.C.).

The recent litigation involving the District's Central Facility at Lorton reveals a similarly bleak cycle of dismal conditions, disregarded court decrees, and duplicative contempt citations. On August 1, 1988, the interminable overcrowding, fires, and riots at Central lead Judge June Green to order a population cap on the prison. Twelve John Does v. District of Columbia, Civil Action No. 80-2136 (D.D.C.). Judge June Green ordered, inter alia, (1) that no additional inmates be admitted to the District of Columbia's Central Facility at Lorton after August 8, 1988, (2) that by September 1, 1988, the population at Central must be reduced by at least 150 inmates, and (3) that the population at Central must be reduced every 30 days thereafter by at least 150 inmates until the population reaches 1,166 inmates, the ceiling imposed upon Central under a 1982 consent decree. That order was promptly stayed pending appeal by the...