Opinion ID: 415359
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: National Prison Standards and Cruel and Unusual Punishment

Text: 76 A significant portion of the hypothetical evaluation in the Concurring Opinion of appellees' evidence takes the form of comparative analysis. Thus, in assessing appellees' claim that the situation at the prison was aggravated by understaffing, the Concurring Opinion observes that the inmate-to-guard ratio at Maximum was better than the national average. In considering the prevalence of violence, the opinion stresses that assaults occurred less frequently at Maximum than at other prisons where Eighth Amendment violations have been found. Moreover, the opinion notes, the incidence of violence was within the range of figures that an expert witness had testified was to be expected in a prison like Maximum. The Concurring Opinion insists that these observations should be fatal to appellees' Eighth Amendment cause of action. Unless inmates can show that the conditions of their confinement are worse than average, it argues, they cannot make out a claim that they have been subjected to cruel and unusual punishment. 77 When the Concurring Opinion applies this kind of comparative analysis to appellees' negligence claims, it falls into patent error. It has long been hornbook law that conformity to industry standards is insufficient to establish due care. As Judge Learned Hand once put it: 78 Indeed in most cases reasonable prudence is in fact common prudence; but strictly it is never its measure; a whole calling may have unduly lagged in the adoption of new and available devices. It never may set its own tests, however persuasive be its usages. Courts must in the end say what is required; there are precautions so imperative that even their universal disregard will not excuse their omission. 79 The T.J. Hooper, 60 F.2d 737, 740 (2d Cir.) (citations omitted) (dicta), cert. denied, 287 U.S. 662, 53 S.Ct. 220, 77 L.Ed. 571 (1932). 24 80 The mode of analysis employed in the Concurring Opinion is equally inappropriate when applied to the Eighth Amendment. Whatever may have been the original meaning of the constitutional provision, 25 it is now well established that the ban on cruel and unusual punishment is defined with reference, not to prevailing penal practices, but to the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society. Estelle v. Gamble, 429 U.S. 97, 102, 97 S.Ct. 285, 290, 50 L.Ed.2d 251 (1976) (quoting Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86, 101, 78 S.Ct. 590, 598, 2 L.Ed.2d 630 (1958)). In determining whether a given condition violates the amendment, courts and juries are to look, not to circumstances common in other prisons, but to the public attitude toward a given sanction. Rhodes v. Chapman, 452 U.S. at 349 n. 13, 101 S.Ct. at 2400 n. 13 (1981) (quoting Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 173, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 2925, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976) (joint opinion)). The touchstone is what the general public would consider decent. Hoptowit v. Ray, 682 F.2d at 1246 (citation omitted). 81 Although the public at large may at times close its eyes to the sad truth, it is undeniable that conditions in the nation's prisons often are extraordinarily brutal and degrading. 26 It would thus not be surprising if many aspects of current industry standards fell below what the general public would consider decent. In any case, it is clearly erroneous to assume that average conditions will invariably pass constitutional muster.