Williams v. Bass

• Decision Date: 29 August 1995
• Docket Number: 94-5154,Nos. 93-6327,s. 93-6327
• Parties: Larry WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant, v. Charles BASS, Assistant Commissioner Tennessee Department of Corrections; Jim Dickman; James B. Britt; Penny Laurer; Sammie Bonner, Defendants-Appellants/Cross-Appellees, Larry Lopp, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

Page 483

63 F.3d 483

Larry WILLIAMS, Plaintiff-Appellee/Cross-Appellant, v. Charles BASS, Assistant Commissioner Tennessee Department of Corrections; Jim Dickman; James B. Britt; Penny Laurer; Sammie Bonner Defendants-Appellants/Cross-Appellees Larry Lopp, Defendant.

Nos. 93-6327, 94-5154.

United States Court of Appeals Sixth Circuit.

Argued March 30, 1995.

Decided Aug. 29, 1995.

Larry Williams (briefed), Clifton, TN, pro se.

Douglas L. Payne (argued and briefed), Greeneville, TN, for Larry Williams.

Sharon T. Rousseau (argued and briefed), Office of Atty. Gen., Civ. Rights and Claims Div., Nashville, TN, for Charles Bass, Jim Dickman, James B. Britt, Penny Laurer, Sammie Bonner and Larry Lopp.

Before: JONES, NELSON, and RONEY, Circuit Judges. ^*

RONEY, Circuit Judge.

When an inmate at the Nashville Community Service Center ("NCSC"), Larry Williams, was in a single car accident while out of the facility on an eight-hour pass, the prison disciplinary board found him guilty of driving under the influence of alcohol and transferred him from minimum security status to a medium security facility. He sued various officials connected to the Tennessee prison system under section 1983 seeking declaratory and monetary relief on the ground they violated his due process rights.

The district court, adopting the magistrate judge's recommendation, concluded that Williams' disciplinary conviction violated his right to due process because it was based on no evidence. The court entered declaratory relief, and ordered the conviction expunged from the record, but denied monetary relief because the defendants were entitled to qualified immunity. Although doubting Williams had a liberty or property interest subject to due process requirements, we reverse the district court on the ground there was sufficient evidence for the board's action. We affirm the decision that defendants have qualified immunity from this suit.

After the accident, Williams was arrested for driving while intoxicated and driving with a revoked license. Three days later, Williams testified before a three-member disciplinary board at NCSC that he was indeed intoxicated, not by alcohol as the trooper reported however, but by fumes from gasoline that soaked his clothes in the accident.

The board found Williams guilty of the disciplinary infraction of intoxication by alcohol, and upon the board's recommendation, Williams was stripped of his minimum security status and transferred to a medium security facility. Williams subsequently appealed the board's decision to the NCSC warden Jim Dickman and to Charles Bass, Assistant Commissioner of the Tennessee Department of Correction, both of whom affirmed the board's decision.

Williams then filed this civil rights action under section 1983 pro se against Dickman, Bass, and the three disciplinary board members, James B. Britt, Penny Laurer, and Sammie Bonner, claiming that defendants had violated his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process in finding him guilty of intoxication from alcohol and issuing a disciplinary report without sufficient evidence of his guilt.

There is considerable doubt that any constitutionally protected property or liberty interest is involved in this case. The first inquiry in every section 1983 case is whether there has been the deprivation of a right secured by the Constitution or laws of the United States. Baker v. McCollan, 443 U.S. 137, 140, 99 S.Ct. 2689, 2692-93, 61 L.Ed.2d 433 (1979). Prisoners claiming a due process violation under the Fourteenth Amendment must demonstrate that they have been deprived of a protected liberty or property interest by arbitrary governmental action. Such a liberty interest can arise from the Constitution or from state statutes, policies and practices. Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. 460, 466, 103 S.Ct. 864, 868-69, 74 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983).

The board's sanction was to terminate Williams' minimum security status. As a general proposition, an inmate possesses no inherent constitutional right to placement in any particular prison or in any particular section within the prison system. Olim v. Wakinekona, 461 U.S. 238, 103 S.Ct. 1741, 75 L.Ed.2d 813 (1983); Hewitt v. Helms, 459 U.S. 460, 103 S.Ct. 864, 74 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983); Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 225, 96 S.Ct. 2532, 2538-39, 49 L.Ed.2d 451 (1976); Montanye v. Haymes, 427 U.S. 236, 242, 96 S.Ct. 2543, 2547, 49 L.Ed.2d 466 (1976). Nor does Williams allege that any state law provides such a right. The mere fact of discipline or the imposition of sanctions in prison does not automatically trigger due process protections. E.g., Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 557, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 2975, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974).

The only other action of the board was to include its report as part of Williams' prison record. The district court in its Order identified the presence of the report in Williams' file as a "cognizable harm to him, since it is reasonably foreseeable that he may be returned to prison in the event of a violation of the terms of his parole." Williams cites no authority for the proposition that this speculative injury provides a source of due process protection. Based on this record, it is extremely doubtful that Williams has a cognizable due process claim.

In any event, assuming without deciding an interest protectible by constitutional due process, it is quite evident that...