Opinion ID: 2824637
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Application of the RLUIPA Standard to this Case

Text: The ADOC does not dispute that its hair-length policy substantially burdens Plaintiffs’ religious exercise, nor could it. Plaintiffs’ expert on Native American spirituality offered extensive, undisputed testimony that long hair has great religious significance for many Native Americans, and each Plaintiff confirmed that his desire to wear unshorn hair stemmed from deep religious convictions. Plaintiffs’ expert further gave an uncontradicted opinion that forcing Native Americans to cut their long hair would amount to an “assault on their sacredness.” The sincerity of these firmly-held beliefs—and the gravity of preventing their exercise—should come as no surprise to anyone familiar with Biblical Scripture. 6 6 See, e.g., Judges 16:4-30 (chronicling Delilah’s betrayal of Samson, the forced cutting of Samson’s hair in contravention to his Nazirite vow, and Samson’s subsequent destruction of the Philistine temple); Numbers 6:1-21 (describing the Nazirite vow, which included a promise to refrain from cutting one’s hair unless it became defiled by a sudden death that occurred in the 17 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 18 of 27 It is also beyond dispute that the ADOC has compelling interests in security, discipline, hygiene, and safety within its prisons and in the public’s safety in the event of escapes and alteration of appearances. Lathan, 251 F. App’x at 667. The crux of this appeal, then, is simply whether the ADOC’s blanket short-hair policy furthers those goals and is the least restrictive means of doing so. i. In Furtherance of a Compelling Governmental Interest As to the first RLUIPA prong, Plaintiffs merely mount an attack on the District Court’s factual findings and choice to credit the testimony of the ADOC’s witnesses. This attack must surely fail, as the detailed record developed during the trial of this case amply supports the District Court’s factual findings about the risks and costs associated with permitting male inmates to wear long hair. Ronald Angelone described specific incidents in which male inmates had used long hair to conceal weapons and contraband, as well as a situation in which a male inmate had cut his long hair to significantly change his appearance after a successful escape. Angelone further testified that prison staff have cut their hands on hidden razors when searching male inmates’ long hair. In addition, Angelone and Grantt Culliver testified that long hair had concealed male inmates’ fungus outbreaks, sores, cysts, and tumors, and even a spider’s nest. The ADOC’s witnesses also offered credible opinions, based on decades of combined correctional experience, Nazirite’s presence, and which entailed the shaving of one’s head and sacrifice of the hair at the close of one’s period of dedication). 18 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 19 of 27 that inmates can grab long hair during fights, long hair impedes the ability of prison staff to readily identify inmates inside the prison, and an exceptionless short-hair policy promotes order and discipline while removing a physical characteristic that inmates can use to form gangs. Plainly, the ADOC’s witnesses offered more than simply “speculation, exaggerated fears, or post-hoc rationalizations.” Rather, they offered a reasoned and fairly detailed explanation of how the ADOC’s short-hair policy addresses genuine security, discipline, hygiene, and safety concerns. Plaintiffs point out that their witnesses offered competing testimony, but the District Court, as the finder of fact, remained free to reject it. We cannot say that the District Court clearly erred in its material factual findings with regard to male inmate hair-length.7 Nor can we say that it arbitrarily ignored the testimony of Plaintiffs’ expert when the ADOC’s witnesses contradicted his testimony. 8 Given the District Court’s factual findings, it is apparent that the ADOC’s short-hair 7 Plaintiffs direct their most vociferous objection toward the District Court’s somewhat conclusory finding that the ADOC’s current inmate population is “younger, bolder and meaner” than in previous years. We cannot say that this finding was wholly unsupported by the record, since the District Court also found that disciplinary actions increased markedly in 2007. But to the extent that the record was insufficient to support this particular factual finding, the error was harmless because it had no substantial influence on the outcome and sufficient evidence uninfected by error supports the District Court’s determination that the ADOC’s policy furthers compelling governmental interests. Dickerson, 248 F.3d at 1048. 8 As the ADOC points out in its brief, the District Court may have chosen to discredit George Sullivan’s testimony because he has testified in many prisoner religious rights cases, but never on behalf of a prison system, and because he admitted a lack of familiarity with the ADOC’s prisons. 19 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 20 of 27 policy furthers its compelling interests in security, discipline, hygiene, and safety within its prisons and in the public’s safety in the event of escapes and alteration of appearances. ii. Least Restrictive Means of Furthering the Interest Plaintiffs cannot prevail on their RLUIPA claim because the ADOC has shown that its exceptionless short-hair policy for male inmates is the least restrictive means of furthering the compelling governmental interests that we have mentioned. The ADOC has shown that Plaintiffs’ proposed alternative—allowing an exemption for Native American inmates, requiring exempted inmates to search their own hair, and using a computer program to manipulate inmate photographs— does not eliminate the ADOC’s security, discipline, hygiene, and safety concerns. As the District Court found, inmates can manipulate searches of their own hair to conceal weapons and contraband, and using a computer program to alter photographs does nothing to address the impediments that long hair causes for the identification of inmates within the prisons. Alternatively, even assuming that the proposed alternative could eliminate the ADOC’s concerns as to concealment of weapons and contraband and inmate identification, Plaintiffs’ proposed alternative does nothing to assuage the ADOC’s concerns about gang-formation and hair-pulling during fights, or the concealment of infections and infestations. Thus, based on these concerns, the ADOC has 20 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 21 of 27 shown, at the very least, that its short-hair policy, as applied to Plaintiffs, is the least restrictive means of furthering its compelling interests in safety and hygiene. Plaintiffs cannot point to a less restrictive alternative that accomplishes the ADOC’s compelling goals, and neither can we. The ADOC has carried its burden on both RLUIPA prongs. We agree with the District Court that Harris v. Chapman, 97 F.3d 499 (11th Cir. 1996), compels the foregoing analysis. In Harris, this Court confronted a Rastafarian inmate’s RFRA challenge to the Florida DOC’s grooming policy, which, like the policy at-issue here, categorically forbade male inmates from wearing long hair.9 This Court upheld the short-hair policy, reasoning in regards to the first RFRA prong that “[i]t is well established that states have a compelling interest in security and order within their prisons,” and “[t]his general interest in security clearly includes other specific interests . . . such as the identification of escapees and the prevention of the secreting of contraband or weapons in hair or beards.” Id. at 504. This Court then held that “a reasonable hair length regulation satisfies the least restrictive means test” because neither we nor the plaintiff could conceive of any lesser means that would satisfy these compelling interests. Id. So it is in this case. Plaintiffs have not presented any less restrictive alternative that can adequately contain the risks associated with long hair; they have merely argued 9 As already mentioned, the RLUIPA essentially borrowed the RFRA standard, and the reasoning in Harris therefore applies with equal force in the RLUIPA context. 21 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 22 of 27 that the ADOC should volunteer to assume those risks. The RLUIPA places upon the ADOC no such duty. In response, Plaintiffs make three arguments that are worth addressing. First, they argue that the ADOC has failed to satisfy the “least restrictive means” standard because all its witnesses admitted that the ADOC never considered any less restrictive alternatives to its short-hair policy before adopting it. Second, Plaintiffs argue that the widespread adoption of permissive grooming policies in other jurisdictions demonstrates the viability of a religious exemption as a less restrictive alternative. Third, Plaintiffs argue that the ADOC’s choice to allow female inmates to wear shoulder-length hair proves that it is able to accommodate their requested religious exemption. All of these arguments are unavailing, and we respond to them in turn. It is true, as Plaintiffs point out, that some of our sister courts have focused on the RLUIPA’s command that prison administrators “demonstrate” the lawfulness of their policies and have held that notwithstanding Cutter’s deference mandate, prison administrators must show that they “actually considered and rejected the efficacy of less restrictive measures before adopting the challenged practice.” See, e.g., Warsoldier v. Woodford, 418 F.3d 989, 999 (9th Cir. 2005); Spratt v. Rhode Island Dep’t of Corr., 482 F.3d 33, 41 (1st Cir. 2007) (adopting Warsoldier’s heightened proof requirement); Washington v. Klem, 497 F.3d 272, 22 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 23 of 27 284 (3d Cir. 2007) (same). This, however, is not the law in this circuit, and none of this Court’s cases have adopted Warsoldier’s more strict proof requirement. The language of the RLUIPA directs us to inquire merely whether the policy under review is the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling governmental interest. It is certainly possible—though perhaps relatively less common—for prison administrators to promulgate an appropriately tailored policy without first considering and rejecting the efficacy of less restrictive measures. The RLUIPA asks only whether efficacious less restrictive measures actually exist, not whether the defendant considered alternatives to its policy. As already explained, the ADOC has shown that no efficacious less restrictive measures exist and has therefore carried its RLUIPA burden. Plaintiffs’ heavy fixation on the policies of other jurisdictions similarly misses the mark. While the practices of other institutions are relevant to the RLUIPA analysis, they are not controlling—the RLUIPA does not pit institutions against one another in a race to the top of the risk-tolerance or cost-absorption ladder. See Rich v. Sec’y, Fla. Dep’t of Corr., 716 F.3d 525, 534 (11th Cir. 2013) (practices of other institutions are relevant but not controlling); see also Daker v. Wetherington, 469 F. Supp. 2d 1231, 1239 (N.D. Ga. 2007) (interpreting the RLUIPA to leave “room for a particular prison to decline to join the ‘lowest common denominator’ when, in the discretion of its officials, the removal of a 23 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 24 of 27 challenged restriction poses an appreciable risk to security”). The ADOC has shown that Plaintiffs’ requested exemption poses actual security, discipline, hygiene, and safety risks. That other jurisdictions choose to allow male inmates to wear long hair shows only that they have elected to absorb those risks. The RLUIPA does not force institutions to follow the practices of their less risk-averse neighbors, so long as they can prove that they have employed the least restrictive means of furthering the compelling interests that they have chosen to address. The ADOC has shown that its departure from the practices of other jurisdictions stems not from a stubborn refusal to accept a workable alternative, but rather from a calculated decision not to absorb the added risks that its fellow institutions have chosen to tolerate. This cannot amount to an RLUIPA violation. Finally, Plaintiffs’ focus on the ADOC’s different grooming standards for female inmates ignores the District Court’s factual finding—supported by Ronald Angelone’s testimony—that men pose greater safety and security risks than women in prison populations. We are not the first court of appeals to uphold a grooming policy that treats male and female inmates differently when the record shows that there are valid reasons for the different treatment. See, e.g., Fegans v. Norris, 537 F.3d 897, 905 (8th Cir. 2008). Given the District Court’s finding that male inmates pose a greater threat than female inmates, the RLUIPA does not require the ADOC to enforce a sex-blind hair-length policy. 24 Case: 12-11926 Date Filed: 08/05/2015 Page: 25 of 27