Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-89-03282/USCOURTS-ca10-89-03282-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Jouett Edgar Arney
Appellant
Mike Hayden
Appellee

Document Text:

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

JOUETT EDGAR ARNEY, 

Plaintiff-Appellant, 

FILED 

United States Coun of Appeals 

Tenth Circuit 

FEB 7 1990 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

vs. 

MIKE HAYDEN, GOVERNOR, 

STATE OF KANSAS, 

No. 89-3282 

(D.C. No. 89-3388-S) 

( D. Kan.) 

Defendant-Appellee. 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Before TACHA, BALDOCK and BRORBY, Circuit Judges.** 

Plaintiff-appellant, Jouett Arney, moves this court to 

proceed on appeal in forma pauperis, 28 U.S.C. § 1915, from the 

district court's order dismissing his§ 1983 complaint. 

Plaintiff, an inmate at the Kansas State Penitentiary, seeks 

compensation for work he claims to have performed in a lawsuit 

successfully challenging the conditions of confinement at the 

* This order and judgment has no precedential value and shall not 

be cited, or used by any court within the Tenth Circuit, except 

for purposes of establishing the doctrines of the law of the case, 

res judicata, or collateral estoppel. 10th Cir. R. 36.3. 

** After examining the briefs and appellate record, this panel 

has determined unanimously that oral argument would not materially 

assist the determination of this appeal. See Fed. R. App. P. 

34(a); 10th Cir. R. 34.1.9. The cause therefore is ordered 

submitted without oral argument. 

Appellate Case: 89-3282 Document: 01019962937 Date Filed: 02/07/1990 Page: 1 
prison. Arney v. Hayden, No. 77-3045-R (D. Kan. 1977) (Rogers, 

J., presiding). The district court (Saffels, J., presiding) 

dismissed the instant complaint as lacking an arguable basis for 

imposing liability upon the defendant under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, and 

denied plaintiff's motion for leave to proceed on appeal in forma 

pauperis as not taken in good faith, 28 U.S.C. § 1915(a). 

We sustain the district court's denial of plaintiff's motion 

to proceed in forma pauperis on appeal on two grounds. First, the 

proper procedure by which to challenge a district court's denial 

of attorney's fees is to file a direct appeal, not a separate 

§ 1983 action before another district judge as plaintiff did in 

this case. Even discounting the procedural defects in plaintiff's 

case, however, his claim would not entitle him to the relief he 

seeks. In Turman v. Tuttle, 711 F.2d 148, 149 (10th Cir. 1983), 

we held that an award of attorney's fees to prose movants in 

§ 1983 actions was impermissible. The provision for an award of 

attorney's fees to a successful litigant in a civil rights action, 

42 U.S.C. § 1988, was implemented "not to compensate prose 

litigants but to enable litigants with valid claims to present 

their claims without having to bear the burden of costs." Turman, 

711 F.2d at 149. See also Polythress v. Kessler, 475 U.S. 1129 

(1986) (Burger, C.J., dissenting from denial of certiorari) 

(circuit courts have uniformly held that a prose litigant may not 

recover attorney's fees under§ 1988 since such a litigant does 

not require the assistance of an attorney to enforce his rights). 

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Appellate Case: 89-3282 Document: 01019962937 Date Filed: 02/07/1990 Page: 2 
Accordingly, plaintiff's motion to proceed on appeal in forma 

pauperis under 28 U.S.C. § 1915 is DENIED. This appeal is 

DISMISSED pursuant to§ 1915(d) as wholly without merit. See 

Neitzke v. Williams, 109 S. Ct. 1827, 1831 (1989) (complaint 

frivolous under§ 1915 where it lacks arguable basis in law or 

fact). 

SO ORDERED. 

Entered for the Court 

Bobby R. Baldock 

Circuit Judge 

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Appellate Case: 89-3282 Document: 01019962937 Date Filed: 02/07/1990 Page: 3