Opinion ID: 179531
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Hebbe's court access claim survives the motion to dismiss

Text: Hebbe alleges that the prison officials violated his constitutional right to court access, grounded in the First Amendment right to petition and the Fourteenth Amendment right to due process, by denying him access to the prison law library while the facility was on lockdown, and that the denial prevented him from filing a brief in support of his appeal of his state court conviction. In 1977 the United States Supreme Court held that the fundamental constitutional right of access to the courts requires prison authorities to assist inmates in the preparation and filing of meaningful legal papers by providing prisoners with adequate law libraries or adequate assistance from persons trained in the law. Bounds v. Smith, 430 U.S. 817, 828, 97 S.Ct. 1491, 52 L.Ed.2d 72 (1977). Nineteen years later, in Lewis v. Casey, the Court reiterated that penal institutions have a duty to afford prisoners a reasonably adequate opportunity to present claimed violations of fundamental constitutional rights to the courts. 518 U.S. 343, 351, 116 S.Ct. 2174, 135 L.Ed.2d 606 (1996) ( citing Bounds, 430 U.S. at 825, 97 S.Ct. 1491). However, the Lewis Court narrowed the scope of Bounds by holding that there is no abstract, freestanding right to a law library or legal assistance[. A]n inmate ... must... demonstrate that the alleged shortcomings in the library or legal assistance program hindered his efforts to pursue a legal claim. Id. at 351, 353 n. 3, 116 S.Ct. 2174. The Court explained that its actual injury requirement meant that the state was not required to provide library access to enable the prisoner to discover grievances that might be aired, id. at 354, 97 S.Ct. 1491 (emphasis in original), but rather was required to provide such access to facilitate the prisoner's pursuit of a certain type of frustrated legal claim, such as direct appeals from the convictions for which[he] w[as] incarcerated or actions under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 to vindicate `basic constitutional rights.' Id. (citing Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 579, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974)). Thus, the tools that Lewis and Bounds require[] to be provided are those that the inmates need in order to attack their sentences, directly or collaterally, and in order to challenge the conditions of their confinement. Id. at 355, 97 S.Ct. 1491. Hebbe's claim that he was frustrated in his desire to use the law library facilities to research the pro se brief that he wished to file on direct appeal of his state court conviction plausibly alleges exactly the type of actual injury discussed in Lewis. Hebbe did not wish to go on a fishing expedition to discover grievances, rather he wished simply to appeal his conviction, as was his fundamental right. When Hebbe's pro bono appellate counsel filed a Wende brief and withdrew from his case on November 18, 1998, the California Court of Appeal correctly advised him of his right to file, pro se, a supplemental appellate brief. Hebbe unquestionably had a right to use the legal materials available in the prison to research which issues he might address in that brief. The fact that Hebbe's former attorney had filed a Wende brief did not affect his right to file his own brief or his right to use the prison library facilities to research that brief. Nor did the former attorney's filing of the Wende brief necessarily demonstrate that there were no nonfrivolous claims that Hebbe might raise on direct appeal. As we held in Delgado v. Lewis, the filing of a Wende brief does not show dispositively that an appeal is without merit. 223 F.3d 976 (9th Cir.2000). Similarly, the fact that Hebbe entered a guilty plea did not affect his right to appeal, nor did it affect his right to use the prison library to research the pro se brief that he wished to file in support of that appeal. Under California law, individuals who have pleaded guilty may nonetheless prevail upon appeal in certain circumstances. See Cal.Penal Code § 1237.5(a) (stating that individuals who enter guilty pleas may appeal on the basis of reasonable constitutional, jurisdictional, or other grounds going to the legality of the proceedings.). Hebbe thus had a right to use the prison law library to research the constitutional, jurisdictional, or other issues he might raise on appeal. Lewis may not have guarantee[d] inmates the where-withal to transform themselves into litigating engines capable of filing everything from shareholder derivative actions to slip-and-fall claims, Lewis, 518 U.S. at 355, 116 S.Ct. 2174, but it did guarantee individuals like Hebbe the right to use the prison law library to attack their sentences, directly. Id. If true, the facts Hebbe alleges would establish that he was impermissibly denied the opportunity to appeal his conviction, which denial would fulfill Lewis's actual injury requirement. We therefore reverse the district court's ruling on Hebbe's first claim.