Opinion ID: 2659293
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Religious Freedom

Text: Smith argues that the District Court erred in granting summary judgment on his RLUIPA claim, as the record discloses that the defendants imposed a substantial burden on his practice of Odinism. 7 Specifically, he challenges the decision by the RARC to deny his requests for four items for religious use: a sacred container for runes, a leather folder for study materials, a quartz crystal, and an outdoor fire pit.8 The RARC denied his requests solely because he failed to 7 RLUIPA, 42 U.S.C.A. § 2000cc-1, Protection of religious exercise of institutionalized persons, states, in pertinent part: (a) General rule No government shall impose a substantial burden on the religious exercise of a person residing in or confined to an institution, . . . even if the burden results from a rule of general applicability, unless the government demonstrates that imposition of the burden on that person-- (1) is in furtherance of a compelling governmental interest; and (2) is the least restrictive means of furthering that compelling governmental interest. 8 Smith’s initial suit addressed RARC’s denial of a number of religious items, but Smith only mentions four of the items in his appeal brief. 9 Case: 13-11173 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 Page: 10 of 23 provide the committee with an authoritative source showing that the items were necessary for his religious worship. He also argues that the court wrongly concluded that he failed to prove his RLUIPA claim because he did not point to any authoritative sources in support of his requests for the religious items. Smith contends that requiring him to cite to religious sources placed a heightened burden on him, as RLUIPA does not require plaintiffs to prove the truth of their beliefs. The First Amendment provides, “Congress shall make no law . . . prohibiting the free exercise [of religion].” U.S. Const. amend. I. The Free Exercise Clause of the First Amendment is applicable to the states through the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Cantwell v. Connecticut, 310 U.S. 296, 303, 60 S.Ct. 900, 903, 84 L.Ed. 1213 (1940). In addition, Section 3(a) of RLUIPA “protects institutionalized persons who are unable freely to attend to their religious needs and are therefore dependent on the government’s permission and accommodation for exercise of their religion.” Cutter v. Wilkinson, 544 U.S. 709, 721, 125 S.Ct. 2113, 2122, 161 L.Ed.2d 1020 (2005). More expansive than prisoners’ rights under the First Amendment, RLUIPA “affords to prison inmates a heightened protection from government-imposed burdens, by requiring that the government demonstrate that the substantial burden on the prisoner’s religious exercise is justified by a compelling, rather than merely a legitimate, governmental interest.” Allen, 502 F.3d at 1266. To establish a prima facie case under section 3 10 Case: 13-11173 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 Page: 11 of 23 of RLUIPA, a plaintiff must demonstrate “1) that he engaged in a religious exercise, and 2) that the religious exercise was substantially burdened.” Id. at 1276; see also 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-1(a). Once a plaintiff has made this prima facie showing, the defendant bears the burden to prove that the challenged regulation is the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling governmental interest. Allen, 502 F.3d at 1276. “[A]n individual’s exercise of religion is ‘substantially burdened’ if a regulation completely prevents the individual from engaging in religiously mandated activity, or if the regulation requires participation in an activity prohibited by religion.” Midrash Sephardi, Inc. v. Town of Surfside, 366 F.3d 1214, 1227 (11th Cir. 2004) (discussing a town zoning ordinance). “While it is true that courts are not to inquire into the centrality of a particular religious tenet in undertaking the substantial burden analysis, at a minimum the substantial burden test requires that a RLUIPA plaintiff demonstrate that the government’s denial of a particular religious item or observance was more than an inconvenience to one’s religious practice.” See Allen, 366 F.3d at 1278. Further, we have declined to find that the denial of a requested religious item substantially burdened a prisoner, based solely on the fact that he sincerely believed the items were necessary to his practice. See id. We explained as follows: If the word ‘substantial’ in the statutory phrase ‘substantial burden,’ 42 U.S.C. § 2000cc-1(a), is to retain any meaning, it must, at a 11 Case: 13-11173 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 Page: 12 of 23 minimum, be construed as requiring something more than solely the denial of a request that is sincere. An alternate approach . . . would result in the word ‘substantial’ in § 2000cc-1(a) as being mere surplusage, since every governmental action denying a requested item to be used in religious observance would give rise to a prima facie RLUIPA claim. Id. Smith failed to establish a prima facie case under RLUIPA because he failed to show that the RARC’s denial of the four items in question had substantially burdened his religious practice. Allen, 502 F.3d at 1276. Smith offered no evidence establishing that the four items were fundamental to his practice of Odinism or that the absence of the items caused anything more than a mere inconvenience on his religious exercise. See Midrash, 366 F.3d at 1227. While Smith presented to the court statements in his own affidavit that he needed these items for worship, those personal assertions—without any support from authoritative sources—cannot meet the standard for proving a substantial burden. Allen, 366 F.3d at 1278-79. Moreover, Smith failed to demonstrate how the RARC’s demand for prisoners to provide authoritative sources in support of their requests for religious items constituted a substantial burden, as the failure to name a source does not mandate that an inmate’s request be denied, nor does it prevent a prisoner from actually engaging in his religious activities. Smith therefore fell short of demonstrating that the approval of his religious items hinged on his ability 12 Case: 13-11173 Date Filed: 04/02/2014 Page: 13 of 23 to provide an authoritative source. Allen, 502 F.3d 1276; Midrash, 366 F.3d at 1227. The District Court did not err in denying this RLUIPA claim.