IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT

No. 18-40568

MANUEL SOTO, 

 Plaintiff - Appellee

v.

NELDA BROCK, Probation Officer, sued in her individual capacity, 

 Defendant - Appellant

Appeal from the United States District Court 

for the Southern District of Texas

USDC No. 1:17-CV-145

Before OWEN, Chief Judge, and HAYNES and COSTA, Circuit Judges.

PER CURIAM:*

Nelda Brock appeals the district court’s denial of summary judgment 

based on qualified immunity. For the reasons set forth below, we AFFIRM.

I. Background

Manuel Soto was convicted of aggravated sexual assault of a child, and 

he is currently an inmate in the custody of the Texas Department of Criminal 

Justice (“TDCJ”). Soto’s son, A.M.S., was a minor in the state’s custody at the 

 

* Pursuant to 5TH CIR. R. 47.5, the court has determined that this opinion should not 

be published and is not precedent except under the limited circumstances set forth in 5TH 

CIR. R. 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

November 20, 2019

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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Amador R. Rodriguez Boot Camp, a post-adjudication correctional facility. 

Juveniles at the boot camp, referred to as “cadets,” are permitted to 

communicate only with parents or legal guardians listed on a Cadet Contact 

Authorization form. In May 2015, A.M.S.’s mother signed a Cadet Contact 

Authorization form, but the form did not include Soto’s name.1 

In June 2015, Soto’s mother contacted Nelda Brock—a probation officer 

at the boot camp—to ascertain if Soto would be permitted to write a letter to 

A.M.S. Brock said Soto was not permitted to contact A.M.S. because of Soto’s 

status as an inmate and because of the nature of his crime. Additionally, when 

Soto’s mother asked to speak to Brock’s supervisor, Brock informed Soto’s 

mother that Brock was the person responsible for making decisions about who 

could send letters to A.M.S. In July, TDCJ gave Soto permission to write to 

A.M.S. Then, in August, Soto sent a letter to Brock and demanded that he be 

allowed to correspond with A.M.S. 

On September 3, 2015, Soto mailed a letter to A.M.S., which the boot 

camp received on September 5, 2015. A.M.S. did not receive the letter. On 

September 8, 2015, A.M.S.’s mother wrote a letter to the boot camp. She 

requested that Soto not be permitted to contact A.M.S., and she asserted that

such contact was not allowed “per . . . Nelda Brock.” The boot camp then 

returned Soto’s letter to him and included their mail policy and A.M.S.’s Cadet 

Contact Authorization form with the letter. Soto alleged that he received no 

written explanation for the rejection of his letter and that the boot camp had 

no process in place to appeal the rejection. 

Soto filed suit against Brock and Cameron County, alleging, inter alia, 

that Brock’s actions violated Soto’s due process rights because the boot camp 

had no procedural safeguards built in to its mail policy and did not provide 

 

1 The form listed A.M.S.’s mother and A.M.S.’s brother.

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Soto with a way to appeal its decision. The district court dismissed all of Soto’s 

claims except for his procedural due process claim and denied Brock’s assertion 

of qualified immunity as to that claim. 

Brock filed an interlocutory appeal from the order of the district court 

denying her motion for summary judgment based on qualified immunity. 

Brock argues that she did not violate Soto’s procedural due process rights when 

she returned his letter, but that if she did, such rights were not clearly 

established, and her actions were objectively reasonable.

II. Legal Standard

The denial of a motion for summary judgment based on qualified 

immunity is a “collateral order capable of immediate review.” Kinney v. 

Weaver, 367 F.3d 337, 346 (5th Cir. 2004) (en banc). Our jurisdiction to review 

the denial is “significantly limited,” extending to questions of law only. Id. We 

review the district court’s resolution of these solely legal issues de novo. Lytle 

v. Bexar Cty., Tex., 560 F.3d 404, 409 (5th Cir. 2009). 

“Government officials performing discretionary functions are entitled to 

qualified immunity from civil liability to the extent that ‘their conduct does not 

violate clearly established statutory or constitutional rights of which a 

reasonable person would have known.’” Longoria v. Texas, 473 F.3d 586, 592 

(5th Cir. 2006) (quoting Harlow v. Fitzgerald, 457 U.S. 800, 818 (1982)). The 

test for qualified immunity is twofold: “(1) whether the plaintiff has alleged a

violation of a clearly established constitutional right; and (2) if so, whether the 

defendant’s conduct was objectively unreasonable in light of the clearly 

established law at the time of the incident.” Domino v. Tex. Dep’t of Criminal 

Justice, 239 F.3d 752, 755 (5th Cir. 2001) (quoting Hare v. City of Corinth, 135 

F.3d 320 (5th Cir. 1998) (en banc)).

When a defendant asserts qualified immunity, the usual summary 

judgment burden of proof shifts to the plaintiff, who must establish a genuine 

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fact dispute “as to whether the official’s allegedly wrongful conduct violated 

clearly established law.” Brown v. Callahan, 623 F.3d 249, 253 (5th Cir. 2010). 

Though the plaintiff has the burden of negating qualified immunity, the court 

must draw all inferences in his favor. Id. In an interlocutory appeal from the 

denial of qualified immunity, jurisdiction extends only to “the purely legal 

question whether a given course of conduct would be objectively unreasonable 

in light of clearly established law,” not to whether the fact dispute is genuine. 

Kinney, 367 F.3d at 347.

III. Discussion

A. Whether Constitutional Rights Were Violated

This appeal hinges on whether qualified immunity shields Brock from 

Soto’s procedural due process claim. First, we must determine whether Brock’s 

actions violated Soto’s due process rights. “The interest of prisoners and their 

correspondents in uncensored communication by letter, grounded as it is in the 

First Amendment, is plainly a ‘liberty’ interest within the meaning of the 

Fourteenth Amendment even though qualified of necessity by the 

circumstance of imprisonment.” Procunier v. Martinez, 416 U.S. 396, 418 

(1974), overruled on other grounds by Thornburgh v. Abbott, 490 U.S. 401 

(1989). Therefore, when a letter has been rejected, both senders and 

addressees are entitled to procedural due process protections, including notice 

and an opportunity to be heard. See Martinez, 416 U.S. at 417–19. The 

Supreme Court has approved of procedural due process safeguards requiring 

that “an inmate be notified of the rejection of a letter written by or addressed 

to him, that the author of that letter be given a reasonable opportunity to 

protest that decision, and that complaints be referred to a prison official other 

than the person who originally disapproved the correspondence.” Id. at 418–

19; see also Prison Legal News v. Livingston, 683 F.3d 201, 224 (5th Cir. 2012)

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(stating that senders and addressees of personal letters that are censored by a 

prison are entitled to notice and the opportunity to be heard).

Moreover, this is not a situation in which the recipient is prohibited from 

receiving mail. We have explained that minors in boot camps are “not free to 

leave” and thus are afforded constitutional protections applicable to prisoners. 

Austin v. Johnson, 328 F.3d 204, 208–09 (5th Cir. 2003). Brock acknowledged 

that the boot camp was a “post-adjudication secure correctional facility,” which 

Texas law defines as “[a] secure facility administered by a governing board that 

includes construction and fixtures designed to physically restrict the 

movements and activities of the residents . . . .” 37 TEX. ADMIN. CODE 

§ 343.100(48). 

Here, A.M.S. was detained in a correctional facility, which triggered a 

liberty interest in A.M.S.’s mail subject to due process protections. See

Martinez, 416 U.S. at 418. Soto alleges that his letter to A.M.S. was rejected 

under Brock’s direction without clear notice as to why it was rejected. Soto 

was not given an opportunity to respond or appeal Brock’s determination to 

another official at the boot camp. Accordingly, Soto did not receive the 

requisite due process.

That Soto is incarcerated for a sexual offense is undisputed and a matter 

of public record. However, in the cases cited by Brock intimating that a sex 

offender’s right to access children can be restricted, the offenders were subject 

to sex offender registration laws and their rights were adjudicated in the 

original criminal proceeding. See Duarte v. City of Lewisville, 858 F.3d 348, 

352–53 (5th Cir. 2017); United States v. Rodriguez, 558 F.3d 408, 417–18 (5th 

Cir. 2009) (upholding a court-imposed condition restricting the offender from 

unsupervised access to children). There is no evidence showing that sex 

offender registration laws or the criminal court prevented Soto from contacting 

his son based on his status as a sex offender. Accordingly, Brock has failed to 

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demonstrate that the district court erred by holding that Soto had a due 

process interest in communicating with his detained son.

Brock also argues that the State did not interfere with Soto’s right to due 

process because A.M.S.’s mother signed a form that did not authorize Soto to 

contact his son, and Brock was simply following policy. However, the district 

court found fact disputes in the summary judgment evidence based upon Soto’s 

mother’s statements in her affidavit that supported the claim that Brock had 

interfered with Soto’s rights. Specifically, among other things, Soto’s mother 

averred that Brock stated that she was responsible for making decisions about 

who could send mail. This undercuts Brock’s contention that she was simply 

following the boot camp’s policy and supports a conclusion that Brock had 

discretion as to whether Soto could contact his son. At this stage in the 

litigation, we cannot review the district court’s conclusion that genuine factual 

disputes exist. See Meadours v. Ermel, 483 F.3d 417, 422 (5th Cir. 2007). 

In sum, analyzing the facts favorable to Soto supports his contention that 

he did not receive the procedural protections that due process requires. 

Additionally, Brock has failed to show that Soto’s status as a sex offender or 

the existence of A.M.S.’s Cadet Contact Authorization form should alter the 

due process interest that Soto had in writing his son. 

B. Whether the Rights Were Clearly Established

Having determined that, construing facts favorably to Soto, the evidence 

supports finding that his rights were clearly violated, we next consider whether 

his rights were clearly established for qualified immunity purposes. “A right 

is clearly established when ‘it would be clear to a reasonable officer that his 

conduct was unlawful in the situation he confronted.’” Ramirez v. Martinez, 

716 F.3d 369, 375 (5th Cir. 2013) (quoting Jones v. Lowndes Cty., 678 F.3d 344, 

351 (5th Cir. 2012)). For a right to be clearly established, its contours must be 

“sufficiently definite that any reasonable official in the defendant’s shoes would 

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have understood that he was violating it.” Plumhoff v. Rickard, 572 U.S. 765, 

778–79 (2014). Courts must not “define clearly established law at a high level 

of generality,” as “[t]he dispositive question is ‘whether the violative nature of 

particular conduct is clearly established.’” Mullenix v. Luna, 136 S. Ct. 305, 

308 (2015) (quoting Ashcroft v. al-Kidd, 563 U.S. 731, 742 (2011)). It is not 

required that the “very action in question has previously been held unlawful.” 

Anderson v. Creighton, 483 U.S. 635, 640 (1987). Instead, “in the light of preexisting law the unlawfulness must be apparent.” Id. 

In this case, the specific right at issue was clearly established. At the 

time of the alleged violation, the law made clear that (1) due process 

safeguards—specifically, notice of why the letter was rejected and an 

opportunity to appeal the decision—are required when a prisoner’s letter is 

rejected, and (2) the fact that Soto’s son was a minor does not change the 

analysis. See Martinez, 416 U.S. at 417–19; Prison Legal News, 683 F.3d at 

224; Austin, 328 F.3d at 208–09. Thus, a reasonable official would have 

understood that failing to provide adequate notice and an opportunity to 

appeal after rejecting a letter sent to a minor detained in a boot camp would

violate the sender’s constitutional rights.

Finally, Brock contends that she acted reasonably by preventing Soto’s 

contact with A.M.S. because Soto was not authorized to contact A.M.S. 

pursuant to the Cadet Contact Authorization form that A.M.S.’s mother 

signed. Again, Brock’s authority to allow contact is in dispute, since there is 

evidence she claimed to have the power to make that decision. But even if 

Brock was constrained by policy and therefore acted reasonably by initially 

withholding Soto’s letter, she was required to afford Soto procedural due 

process. See Johnson v. El Paso Cty. Sheriff’s Dep’t, No. 92-8514, 1995 WL 

152720, at *5 (5th Cir. Mar. 20, 1995) (noting that the rejection of 

correspondence and notification of the rejection are separate constitutional 

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inquiries). That is, even if it was objectively reasonable for Brock to reject 

Soto’s correspondence based on the contents of A.M.S.’s Cadet Contact

Authorization form, it is clearly established that due process required Brock to 

provide Soto with notice of the decision and an opportunity to respond.

IV. Conclusion

Based on the foregoing, the judgment of the district court is AFFIRMED, 

and the case is REMANDED for further proceedings.

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