NOT FOR PUBLICATION UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT
MICHAEL STRAUSBAUGH,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v. UNKNOWN BACON, F-Unit Manager, USP Tucson and UNKNOWN HILLERS, Unit Manager FCI Waseca; nam es as Mrs. Hiller, Defendants-Appellees. No. 16-15736 D.C. No. 4:14-cv-01937-JAS
MEMORANDUM *

Appeal fromthe United States District Court for the District of Arizona Jam es Alan Soto, District Judge, Presiding Argued and Subm itted April 9, 2018 Pasadena, California Before: SCHROEDER and M. SMITH, Circuit Judges, and DRAIN, * * District Judge. 

# FILED
JUN 12 2018 MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

* This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent except as provided by Ninth Circuit Rule 36-3.

* * The Honorable Gershwin A. Drain, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan, sitting by designation.Plaintiff-Appellant Michael Strausbaugh, who is an inm ate in a federal

prison in Arizona, filed this action pro se against Defendant-Appellee Bacon, his Unit Manager, and Defendant-Appellee Hillers, a Unit Manager in the federal prison in Minnesota where his wife was an inm ate. He sought dam ages and injunctive relief in claim s arising out of the officials’ alleged refusal to perm it him to serve by m ail his filings in divorce proceedings instituted by his wife. The district court granted Defendants-Appellees’ m otion to dism iss. The court held it lacked personal jurisdiction over the Minnesota defendant, Hillers, and that the claim for dam a ges against the Arizona defendant, Bacon, was barred by qualified im m unity. The district court denied Mr. Strausbaugh’s claim for equitable relief on im m unity grounds. We appointed pro bono counsel on appeal. We agree with the district court that it lacked personal jurisdiction over Defendant-Appellee Hillers, who has taken no deliberate action creating requisite contacts with the forum state, Arizona. See Walden v. Fiore , 134 S. Ct. 1115, 1122 (2014) (“[O] ur ‘m inimumcontacts’ analysis looks to the defendant’s contacts with the forum State itself, not the defendant’s contacts with persons who reside there.”). Hillers’s alleged conduct is insufficient to establish specific personal jurisdiction.

2The district court’s dism issal of the claim s against Defendant-Appellee

Bacon raises issues relating, first, to the availability of an action for dam a ges in the wake of Suprem e Court decisions post- Bivens v. Six Unknown Federal Narcotics Agents , 403 U.S. 388 (1971), and second, to the availability of injunctive relief. The district court, however, did not consider whether a Bivens rem edy was available here, because it correctly concluded that, in any event, Defendant Bacon was entitled to qualified im m unity. It was not clearly established that precluding the use of the m ail for service of docum ents under the circum stances of this case violated a constitutional right of access to the courts. The relevant regulation, 28 C.F.R. § 540.17, provides that inm ates “m ay” be perm itted to correspond with incarcerated fam ily m em bers. It then m a kes specific reference to legal proceedings. See 28 C.F.R. § 540.17(b)(1) (“The appropriate unit m anager at each institution m ust approve of the correspondence if both inm ates are housed in Federal institutions and both inm ates
are m em bers of the sam e im m ediate fam ily or are a party or witness in a legal action in which both inm ates are involved.”); Turner v. Safley , 482 U.S. 78, 93 (1987) (citing the regulation for the proposition that “well-run prison system s, including the Federal Bureau of Prisons, have concluded that . . . restrictions on inm ate correspondence were necessary to protect institutional order and security”).
3The denial did not clearly violate what the Court in B ounds v. Smith , 430 U.S. 817

(1977), and Lewis v. Casey , 518 U.S. 343 (1996), recognized as a right to access for prisoners seeking review of their convictions or prison conditions of confinem ent. The district court properly concluded Bacon was entitled to qualified im m unity. He violated no right that was clearly established. Qualified im m

unity, however, does not constitute a bar to equitable relief. See Hydrick v. Hunter , 669 F.3d 937, 939–40 (9th Cir. 2012) (“Qualified im m unity is only an im m

unity from a suit for m oney dam ages, and does not provide im m unity from a suit seeking declaratory or injunctive relief.” (citations om itted)). The district court therefore erred in dism issing the claim for injunctive relief on the ground that the rem aining Defendant, Bacon, was entitled to qualified im m unity. The governm ent on appeal points only to the fact that the final am ended com plaint does not expressly allege a cause of action against defendants in their official capacity and argues equitable relief is therefore unavailable to him
. See Ministerio Roca Solida v. McKelvey , 820 F.3d 1090, 1094 (9th Cir. 2016). The com plaint, however, did expressly seek injunctive relief. It m ay be that the claim for injunctive relief is by now m oot because of the finality and unreviewabili ty of the divorce proceedings, but that is for the district court to determ ine in the first instance.
4The judgm ent dism issing the action against Defendant Hillers for lack of

personal jurisdiction is affirm ed. The judgm ent dism issing the Bivens claim against Defendant Bacon is affirm ed and the case is rem anded for further proceedings on the claim for equitable relief. AFFIRMED in part, REVERSED in part, and REMANDED in part. The parties shall bear their own costs.

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