Opinion ID: 2807875
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Department’s Policy Rationales Are

Text: Reasonably Necessary to the Essence of Prison Administration At issue on appeal is whether the state established as a matter of law that sex-based restrictions are “a bona fide occupational qualification reasonably necessary” to normal prison operations. Under the well-worn standard of Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 56, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment because there is “no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the [state] is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). Teamsters failed to produce “specific facts showing there is a genuine issue for trial” to survive summary judgment. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 324 (1986) (quoting Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(e)). Curiously, Teamsters did not offer specific testimony from its members, former guards, or others with actual knowledge of on-the-block operations at the prisons. Although Teamsters offered up the reports of two experts, in the end their testimony does not create a material factual issue. For starters, the reports generally fail to address the specific posts at issue. Instead, they rehash alternatives to sex-based staffing that were exhausted and rejected by prison administrators or serve up proposals without any evidence of efficacy or practicality. Finally, the Union’s experts opine on the interpretation of social science research that is not central to the state policy in any event. Although the sexual assaults that spawned the Jane Doe class action permeate this lawsuit, the state did not justify its BFOQ positions solely as a means to prevent sexual assaults. Instead, it identified several intertwined reasons for TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. 21 designating the female-only positions. In the initial request to the Human Rights Commission, the Department cited the need to “enhance the security of the prisons, safety of staff and offenders, and to protect the privacy and dignity of female offenders.” The Commission, in turn, concluded that absent the BFOQ designations, the prison is “unable to ensure a proper balance between security considerations and privacy rights of offenders” and endorsed the female job assignments “for the explicit purpose of ensuring privacy rights of female offenders.” Not surprisingly, under our precedent all of these interrelated objectives go to the heart of prison operations. In Ambat, we held that, as a matter of law, “protecting female inmates from sexual misconduct by male deputies, maintaining jail security, [and] protecting inmate privacy” were all reasonably necessary to the essence of prison administration. 757 F.3d at 1027–28. The same holds true here. Security, of course, is the paramount concern of prison administrators. As the Supreme Court has noted: “The essence of a correctional counselor’s job is to maintain prison security.” Dothard, 433 U.S. at 335; see also Everson, 391 F.3d at 753 (“Unquestionably, the security of the prisons relates to the essence of [prison business].”). That maxim is no less true today. Security concerns are necessarily intertwined with prison programs and objectives. Inmate privacy encompasses the inmate’s “interest in not being viewed unclothed by members of the opposite sex”—an interest that “survives incarceration” despite prisoners’ diminished privacy expectations. See Robino, 145 F.3d at 1111. In the same vein, inmates have a privacy interest in 22 TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. having non-emergency strip and pat searches—a pervasive fact of prison life—performed by guards of the same sex. See Jordan, 986 F.2d at 1524; Tharp, 68 F.3d at 226. Preventing sexual assaults is also a legitimate prison objective. First and foremost, prison administrators have a high interest in shielding inmates from abusive and inherently coercive encounters. Indeed, even allegations of sexual misconduct can destabilize prison life: they can breed mistrust and damage morale among officers and prisoners; drain prison resources; and undercut the effectiveness of male officers with the looming threat of a career-ending accusation. See Robino, 145 F.3d at 1111 (discussing damage to prison morale caused by allegations of male staff sexual misconduct); Everson, 391 F.3d at 753 (“[A]llegations of sexual abuse, whether true or not, create a ‘poisoned atmosphere’ that breeds misconduct on the part of inmates and guards.”). Amazingly, one of the Union’s experts offered the following view: Female inmates cannot be shielded from the world in which we live. If they are to reintegrate into society, they have to be taught how to deal with abusive staff, male or female. They have to be taught what constitutes a healthy interaction and what does not. They cannot learn those skills if they are sheltered from contact with males in a position of authority. ¶ Sexual abuse is present in all areas of our society: in schools, (at all levels), business, government, military and families. Just as females have to be TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. 23 taught how to deal with those abuses in the larger society, female inmates must be taught as part of the rehabilitation process how to deal with all abusive staff: males and females, custody staff and civilian staff. To state something so obvious we never imagined it would need to be written: we reject any suggestion that female prisoners would benefit from being subjected to abusive prison guards as “part of the rehabilitation process” so that they may better “reintegrate into society.” See, e.g., Prison Rape Elimination Act, 42 U.S.C. § 15601(11) (“Victims of prison rape suffer severe physical and psychological effects that hinder their ability to integrate into the community and maintain stable employment upon their release from prison.”). We have little difficulty holding that the state’s reasons for adopting the BFOQ designations—improving security, protecting inmate privacy, and preventing sexual assaults—are each reasonably necessary to the essence of operating Washington’s women’s prisons. That conclusion does not end the analysis, however. The state also must demonstrate that sex is a “legitimate proxy” to achieve one or more of these goals, meaning that there is a “high correlation between sex and ability to perform job functions.” Breiner, 610 F.3d at 1213 (quoting Johnson Controls, 499 U.S. at 202). In addition, the state must show that alternatives to the sex-based classification were “reasonably considered and refuted.” Ambat, 757 F.3d at 1028. Before addressing these remaining requirements in the context of specific positions, we consider Teamsters’ overarching arguments that the staffing policy is based on 24 TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. stereotypes and that the state failed to consider nondiscriminatory alternatives. Teamsters argues at length that the state policy is based on an impermissible stereotype that male guards are more likely to commit sexual misconduct than their female counterparts. This stereotyping argument misses the mark. To begin, the Union acknowledged that the policy was adopted in the face of documented allegations of abuse.5 The Department also did not rest on assumptions; it provided objective legal and operational justifications for why only women can perform particular job functions, like observing inmates unclothed and conducting non-emergency searches. We also reject Teamsters’ argument that the Department could simply have hired new executives or reconfigured prison layouts. As our discussion of the day-to-day realities of the positions at issue demonstrates, neither of those alternatives actually addresses the specific operational challenges of maintaining prison security, preserving inmates’ privacy, and stopping abuse. 5 Because the 2009 policy stemmed from a documented history of sexual misconduct in Washington prisons, this case is distinguishable from Breiner. There, Nevada prison officials designated as female-only three upper-management positions based on the assumption that men were “incapable of adequately supervising front line staff in female prisons.” 610 F.3d at 1213. The record disclosed no evidence that anyone in upper-management had ever abused an inmate. Id. at 1214. Here, by contrast, the sex-based job assignments are all “front line” positions that require direct, day-to-day interaction with female inmates. Washington has substantiated dozens of instances of sexual abuse implicating every job category at issue in this lawsuit. TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. 25 B. Sex is an Objective, Verifiable Job Qualification for the Designated Positions We conclude that sex is an objective, verifiable job qualification for the posts designated as female-only by the Department and that the Department appropriately considered reasonable alternatives.
The staffing restriction with the “largest impact,” according to the Union, involves 18 positions at the mediumand high-security housing units at Washington Corrections Center.6 The housing units have two guards on duty on each shift. Unlike other states, the Department did not ban male guards entirely; rather, the staffing policy requires at least one female guard per shift, an approach recommended by one of the state’s consultants. In the housing units, correctional officers “must conduct pat and strip searches of female offenders entering and leaving the facility” as well as frequent random and suspicion-based searches within the housing units. In the segregation and mental illness units, inmates are strip searched every time they enter or leave their cells. Except in emergency circumstances, male guards cannot legally perform any of these searches. Jordan, 986 F.2d at 1523; see also Wash. Rev. Code § 9.94A.631(2). 6 The Union concedes that positions in minimum-security housing units are properly designated female-only. Because Mission Creek is a minimum-security facility, the housing-unit positions at that prison are not at issue here. 26 TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. Beyond searches, officers in the housing units also “may encounter female offenders in varying states of undress while showering, toileting, and dressing.” Guards must collect urine samples from inmates, and a failure to “observ[e] the offenders during the entire process of urinalysis collection significantly impacts the reliability of the test results . . .” According to the state, “[m]ale staff cannot observe female offenders when they are engaged in these activities.” Given these operational needs, there is no reasonable substitute for having female guards inside housings units, according to the Department. Notably, temporarily removing a female guard from another part of the prison to cover in a housing unit “creates a gap for dealing with privacy issues at the post vacated.” At best, that solution fixes one problem but creates another. The evidence Teamsters puts forward to counter the Department’s justifications is entirely inapposite. One of its experts points out that sexual assault is not a severe problem in medium- and high-security housing because “as the level of security increases, the opportunity for sexual assault decreases.” This may be true, but it fails to acknowledge that the staffing decisions were designed to protect inmate privacy, which is “essential to the operation of a corrections facility and has been recognized as justifying facially discriminatory policies in other contexts.” Ambat, 757 F.3d at 1028. The Union’s other expert quarrels with citations to social science regarding female inmates’ privacy needs and matters relating to sexual relationships between inmates and guards. This testimony again fails to raise any genuine dispute of material fact as to the Department’s reasoned determination that the realities of operating Washington’s TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. 27 women’s prisons necessitate designating these specific positions as female-only.
Programs and activities officers directly supervise inmate activities such as educational and religious classes, gym, crafts, and visitation hours. During these programs and activities, inmates are searched at random and if suspected of hiding contraband. Guards must collect urine samples from inmates and at times relieve housing unit officers, which requires “room checks” where they may “encounter female offenders in varying states of undress. . . .” These guards also supervise visitation hours, after which 50% of inmates are pat searched and 50% are strip searched. To fulfill these job functions, the state designated three programs and activities positions as female-only. The Union’s proposed alternative to designating these positions as female-only is a return to the system employed for the last two decades: dispatching female officers as rovers—or “response and movement” guards, in prison lingo—who could be paged when needed for searches.7 The Union offers no data, expert testimony, or other evidence to support the efficacy of this approach. Instead, undisputed evidence established that the rover system was rife with problems, to say the least. During this era, prison administrators “shuttle[d] women staff from location to location throughout the prisons to perform essential security 7 Union expert Gladwin says the female-only designation of programs and activities posts is “arbitrary,” because the programs and activities officer who supervises the bike program can be a male guard. That officer, however, is not required to perform searches. 28 TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. procedures, leaving other areas of the prison without appropriate staffing.” Wait times for searches lasted an hour or more. With female guards stretched thin, inmates went unsupervised showering, using the restroom, or dressing—raising security and safety risks. Superintendent Eldon Vail testified that, before the BFOQ positions were implemented, the prison functioned “in the broadest sense” but the shortage of female guards restricted the prison’s ability to deploy unannounced, random pat searches, an important tool in preventing the flow of contraband. In light of this checkered history, the Union’s conclusory assertion that the Department successfully “managed [privacy and search] issues for at least two decades” rings hollow. FTC v. Publ’g Clearing House, Inc., 104 F.3d 1168, 1171 (9th Cir. 1997) (“[C]onclusory, self-serving statements in appellate briefs . . . are insufficient to create a genuine issue of material fact.”). We will not displace prison administrators’ experience and expertise in favor of an alternative that boils down to the “same old, same old.” Cf. Torres, 859 F.2d at 1529 (“[P]rison administrators always have been expected to innovate and experiment.” (citing Turner v. Safley, 482 U.S. 78, 107 (1987) (prison administrators must be allowed “to adopt innovative solutions to the intractable problems of prison administration”)).
Work crew officers escort groups of ten prisoners to offsite work locations and supervise their workdays. Searches are again part and parcel of the job—comprising 70% of dayto-day responsibilities. Strip searches are required each time an inmate leaves and reenters the prison grounds. Before the 2009 staffing policy, female officers had to be “pulled from TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR. 29 somewhere else in the facility” to conduct these searches, which can “creat[e] [] a staff shortage in another area of the facility” and pose “a potential security risk,” according to the Human Rights Commission. During the workday, officers also must accompany female inmates as they use the restroom. The Department concluded that, because of these job responsibilities, it needed female officers alongside work crews. The Department therefore designated six positions as female-only. Nonetheless, with respect to work crews, the Union argues that the Department should merely station female guards at prison entry and exit points. If the need for a search arises “while work is in progress, this would constitute an ‘emergent’ search which is not prohibited for a male officer as a matter of law, policy or contract.” The Union produced no evidence or legal support for its emergency-search proposal. Even if the Department could disingenuously label every work-site search as an emergency, the state’s interest is broader than merely avoiding illegal searches. Having male officers conduct pat searches under any non-emergency circumstances is undesirable and harmful to prisoner privacy and security. Staging female officers at entry and exit points also ignores the state’s interest in preserving security during work assignments. The record showed that at least two inmates escaped from public bathrooms while on work crews, when they were not watched by male guards and no female guards were on hand. The Union does not explain, much less provide evidence for, how its alternative proposal would address concerns about on-the-job observation. 30 TEAMSTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 117 V. WASH. DEP’T OF CORR.
Officers in the 32 relief positions substitute for female guards in female-only positions when they have a regular day off, are on vacation, or are out sick. The relief officers perform the job responsibilities described above in housing units and elsewhere. As the Human Rights Commission put it, the relief positions “alleviate understaffing of female officers, because a BFOQ position needs to be relieved by a BFOQ position.” In other words, if only male officers are available to fill in for BFOQ positions, it undermines the documented need of making those positions female-only in the first place. According to the Union, 32 relief positions is too many, so the issue “must be reserved for trial because the Court cannot assess whether the relief sought was excessive without conducting a careful analysis of all such positions.” To survive summary judgment, however, the Union “may not merely state that it will discredit the moving party’s evidence at trial and proceed in the hope that something can be developed at trial in the way of evidence to support its claim.” T.W. Elec. Serv. v. Pac. Elec. Contractors Ass’n, 809 F.2d 626, 630 (9th Cir. 1987). Argument without evidence is hollow rhetoric that cannot defeat summary judgment.