Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca10-90-06328/USCOURTS-ca10-90-06328-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Joseph Macastle Jackson
Appellant
Oklahoma Department of Corrections
Appellee

Document Text:

FIL · D 

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALeJ'flited Stat 5 Courr of Appeals 

TENTH CIRCUIT 

JOSEPH MACASTLE JACKSON, ) 

) 

Plaintiff-Appellant, ) 

) 

V • ) 

) 

OKLAHOMA DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS,) 

) 

Defendant-Appellee. ) 

ORDER AND JUDGMENT* 

Tenth Ci~ruit 

A?n 2 6 1~ 1 

ROBERT L. HOECKER 

Clerk 

No. 90-6328 

(D.C. No. CIV-90-1563-T) 

(W.D. Oklahoma) 

Before LOGAN, MOORE, and BALDOCK, Circuit Judges. 

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 case is therefore ordered submitted without oral argument. 

Plaintiff Joseph Macastle Jackson brought a cause of action 

under 42 u.s.c. § 1983 seeking damages and injunctive relief. The 

only named defendant in the caption of the complaint is "A 

Religious Office in the Structure of the State of Oklahoma Department of Corrections Requiring a Religious Test as a Qualification, 

* 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. 

Appellate Case: 90-6328 Document: 010110105195 Date Filed: 04/26/1991 Page: 1 
and the Religious Agents Thereof and Elsewhere." The body of the 

complaint, however, lists the Oklahoma Department of Corrections 

as the defendant. Plaintiff alleges that his constitutional 

rights have been violated by a state policy that allows prison 

officials to intervene excessively in the plaintiff's exercise of 

his religious beliefs. The district court dismissed the action, 

without prejudice to further proceedings against a suable 

defendant in a proper judicial district. Its stated grounds were 

that the Department of Corrections is protected from suit by the 

Eleventh Amendment and that plaintiff has failed to name as a 

defendant any particular person who had deprived plaintiff of his 

constitutional rights under color of state law. It also found 

that venue was improper and should have been in the Northern, 

instead of the Western, District of Oklahoma. 

We agree with the district court that suit against the 

Oklahoma Department of Corrections, for either injunctive relief 

or damages, is barred by the Eleventh Amendment. Alabama v. Pugh, 

438 U.S. 781, 782 (1978); Eastwood v. Dep't of Corrections, 846 

F.2d 627, 631-32 (10th Cir. 1988). We also agree with the 

district court's ruling that no other person acting under color of 

state law has been identified as a defendant. 

AFFRIRMED. 

The mandate shall issue forthwith. 

-2-

Entered for the Court 

James K. Logan 

Circuit Judge 

Appellate Case: 90-6328 Document: 010110105195 Date Filed: 04/26/1991 Page: 2