Opinion ID: 739082
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Protest Letters

Text: 19 Johnson 8 challenges the statutory requirement and perceived Board custom of accepting and considering protest letters in the parole process. Johnson claims that these letters, which include statements from victims, prosecutors, law enforcement personnel and the general public opposing the prisoner's parole, often contain inaccurate information about the prisoner's background or the circumstances of his or her offense. Furthermore, much of the information submitted in these letters bears no relationship to the two statutory factors, i.e., the likelihood of harm to the public and the likelihood of a favorable parole outcome, which the Board is purportedly required to consider in making parole determinations. Johnson submits that the resultant system is arbitrary and capricious and treats prisoners who are the target of protest letters differently from prisoners who do not receive protest letters. B. The Magistrate Judge's Ruling 20 The magistrate judge found, after reviewing testimony from both prisoners and Board members, that inmates who receive protest letters of any kind are treated differently from inmates who do not. Johnson II, 910 F.Supp. at 1218. He continued by noting that the Board has no promulgated rule or articulated policy regarding the verification or consideration or effect of protest letters. Id. at 1218-1219. The magistrate judge further found that these letters, in some instances spawned by vindictiveness or political pressure, often contain inaccurate statements of fact or discuss unadjudicated offenses. Id. at 1219-1220. 21 The magistrate judge began his legal analysis by correctly noting that Texas law does not create a liberty interest in parole and accordingly Johnson could not state a claim for a Due Process violation based upon the Board's procedures. Allison v. Kyle, 66 F.3d 71 (5th Cir.1995); Orellana v. Kyle, 65 F.3d 29 (5th Cir.1995), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 116 S.Ct. 736, 133 L.Ed.2d 686 (1996); Gilbertson; Creel; Williams v. Briscoe, 641 F.2d 274 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 454 U.S. 854, 102 S.Ct. 299, 70 L.Ed.2d 147 (1981). The magistrate judge did, however, accept Johnson's argument that prisoners who receive protest letters constitute a governmental classification for Equal Protection purposes. Johnson II, 910 F.Supp. at 1221. After conducting an extensive analysis of the legislative scheme set out by Texas Code of Criminal article 42.18, the magistrate judge observed that almost all of the letters introduced into evidence have little or nothing to do with the two statutory factors that the Board is to consider when making parole decisions. 9 Id. at 1227. The magistrate judge then reached the following, sweeping conclusion: 22 The Court hereby determines that the statutory scheme under which the Board can accept statements, whether written or oral, and then prevent knowledge of said statements' existence and prohibit disclosure of their contents and of the writer's or speaker's identity, violates the equal protection rights of inmates because the Board, as a rule, denies parole to inmates who have received protest statements. The Board's sole function is to determine whether an inmate should be released on parole; its function is not to effectively re-try the case by accepting 'testimony' which was inadmissible at trial on evidentiary grounds (or would have been inadmissible had introduction been attempted) or was excluded as part of trial strategy, or by entering findings which the actual jury did not find at the inmate's trial. Evidentiary determinations are to be made in the trial court. The Board is not to consider unadjudicated offenses or offenses extraneous to the conviction for which the inmate is currently incarcerated. The Board must be bound by the conviction which the inmate received and must apply the statutory requirements regarding the time to be served on parole for that conviction, without adding ad hoc information which results in additional time being served. Id. at 1228-1229 (footnote omitted ). 23 The magistrate judge ordered that the Board adopt a rule providing that both written and oral protest statements shall not be accepted or considered by parole panels for any purpose when making parole decisions and shall not be placed in the inmate's file. Id. at 1229. C. Analysis 24 The Fourteenth Amendment's promise that no person shall be denied the equal protection of the laws must co-exist with the practical necessity that most legislation classifies for one purpose or another, with resulting disadvantage to various groups or persons. Romer v. Evans, --- U.S. ----, ----, 116 S.Ct. 1620, 1627, 134 L.Ed.2d 855 (1996) (citations omitted). Thus, a State does not violate the Equal Protection Clause merely because the classifications made by its laws are imperfect. Dandridge v. Williams, 397 U.S. 471, 485, 90 S.Ct. 1153, 1161, 25 L.Ed.2d 491 (1970). Rather, as long as they do not burden a fundamental right or target a suspect class, state agencies may pursue legitimate purposes by any means having a conceivable rational relationship to those purposes. Stern v. Tarrant County Hosp. Dist., 778 F.2d 1052, 1054 (5th Cir.1985) (en banc ), cert. denied, 476 U.S. 1108, 106 S.Ct. 1957, 90 L.Ed.2d 365 (1986). 25 Even the deferential rational basis scrutiny which is applied to ordinary governmental classifications is not appropriate, however, when the challenged law does not create any classifications at all. As we have previously stated, if the challenged government action does not appear to classify or distinguish between two or more relevant persons or groups, then the action----even if irrational----does not deny them equal protection of the laws. Brennan v. Stewart, 834 F.2d 1248, 1257 (5th Cir.1988) (citation omitted). Thus, when we are confronted with a state action which does not so classify or distinguish, we need not consider whether there is a rational basis for that action because such state actions are not subject to Equal Protection scrutiny. Vera v. Tue, 73 F.3d 604, 609-610 (5th Cir.1996), citing Brennan, 834 F.2d at 1257. 26 State actors may create classifications facially, when such categorization appears in the language of legislation or regulation, see, e.g., McGinnis v. Royster, 410 U.S. 263, 270, 93 S.Ct. 1055, 1059, 35 L.Ed.2d 282 (1973) ([t]he determination of an optimal time for parole eligibility elicited multiple legislative classifications and groupings), or de facto, through the enforcement of a facially neutral law in a manner so as to disparately impact a discernible group. The Supreme Court has instructed us time and again, however, that disparate impact alone cannot suffice to state an Equal Protection violation; otherwise, any law could be challenged on Equal Protection grounds by whomever it has negatively impacted. See Washington v. Davis, 426 U.S. 229, 246-250, 96 S.Ct. 2040, 2051-2052, 48 L.Ed.2d 597 (1976). Thus, a party who wishes to make out an Equal Protection claim must prove the existence of purposeful discrimination motivating the state action which caused the complained-of injury. McCleskey v. Kemp, 481 U.S. 279, 292-293, 107 S.Ct. 1756, 1767, 95 L.Ed.2d 262 (1987) (citation omitted); Arlington Heights v. Metropolitan Housing Development Corp., 429 U.S. 252, 264-266, 97 S.Ct. 555, 563, 50 L.Ed.2d 450 (1977); Davis, 426 U.S. at 238-240, 96 S.Ct. at 2047. Discriminatory purpose in an equal protection context implies that the decisionmaker selected a particular course of action at least in part because of, and not simply in spite of, the adverse impact it would have on an identifiable group. Woods v. Edwards, 51 F.3d 577, 580 (5th Cir.1995), quoting United States v. Galloway, 951 F.2d 64, 65 (5th Cir.1992). 27 The existence of a discoverable group or classification antedating the challenged state action is a sine qua non for proving purposeful discrimination; it cannot tenably be maintained that the state selected a particular course of action to harm an identifiable group when that body did not exist until after the state acted. In this case, there is no basis for discerning any such pre-existing identifiable group. The magistrate judge found that a class composed of those prisoners who received protest letters was denied equal treatment by the Texas statutes authorizing the receipt, use, and confidentiality of protest letters. The challenged laws, however, do not discriminate among prisoners; they apply to all prisoners equally and impact the prison population in a manner which the magistrate judge himself correctly described as unpredictable. Johnson II, 910 F.Supp. at 1226-1227 ([o]bviously, an inmate's potential for receiving protest letters is unpredictable). Such a finding of unpredictability negates any argument that the Texas Legislature or the Board intended that the use of protest letters evidenced by this record detrimentally impact any particular identifiable segment of the prison population. 10 Because Johnson has failed to demonstrate that the State's action targeted a discernible sub-class among the general prison population, the magistrate judge's ruling must be reversed. 28 Moreover, the magistrate judge, incorrectly perceiving an Equal Protection question before him, also failed to properly consider Texas' justification for the protest letter scheme before finding an Equal Protection violation. See Bowen v. Owens, 476 U.S. 340, 106 S.Ct. 1881, 90 L.Ed.2d 316 (1986). Under the rational basis scrutiny which the magistrate judge should have undertaken if, as he incorrectly assumed, the protest letter issue was properly resolvable under an Equal Protection analysis, it was merely necessary to determine whether the classification at issue bears some fair relationship to a legitimate public purpose. 11 Plyler v. Doe, 457 U.S. 202, 216, 102 S.Ct. 2382, 2394, 72 L.Ed.2d 786 (1982). The magistrate judge's opinion, however, dwells upon the nature of the evidence which the Board considers, the inability of prisoners to examine and rebut such evidence, and the possibility that false information will enter the prisoner's parole file by way of a protest letter. 12 In so doing, the magistrate judge conflated what should have been two distinct inquiries: 1) is the application of the laws discriminatory, a matter for the Equal Protection Clause, and 2) does the application of the laws produce a result which is unreliable, a concern which speaks to procedural Due Process. 29 The protections of the Due Process Clause are only invoked when State procedures which may produce erroneous or unreliable results imperil a protected liberty or property interest. See Olim v. Wakinekona, 461 U.S. 238, 250-251, 103 S.Ct. 1741, 1748, 75 L.Ed.2d 813 (1983); Jago, 454 U.S. at 16-18, 102 S.Ct. at 34; Meachum v. Fano, 427 U.S. 215, 223-225, 96 S.Ct. 2532, 2538, 49 L.Ed.2d 451 (1976); Jay v. Boyd, 351 U.S. 345, 352-361, 76 S.Ct. 919, 924-928, 100 L.Ed. 1242 (1956). It is therefore axiomatic that because Texas prisoners have no protected liberty interest in parole they cannot mount a challenge against any state parole review procedure on procedural (or substantive) Due Process grounds. Allison; Orellana; Gilbertson; Creel. Accord, Hill v. Jackson, 64 F.3d 163 (4th Cir.1995); O'Kelley v. Snow, 53 F.3d 319 (11th Cir.1995); McCall v. Delo, 41 F.3d 1219 (8th Cir.1994), cert. denied, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 2623, 132 L.Ed.2d 865 (1995); Malek v. Haun, 26 F.3d 1013 (10th Cir.1994); Phillips v. Brennan, 969 F.2d 384 (7th Cir.1992), cert. denied, 506 U.S. 1057, 113 S.Ct. 990, 122 L.Ed.2d 142 (1993); Brandon v. D.C. Board of Parole, 823 F.2d 644 (D.C.Cir.1987); White v. Hyman, 647 A.2d 1175 (D.C.C.A.1994); State ex rel. Hattie v. Goldhardt, 69 Ohio St.3d 123, 630 N.E.2d 696 (1994). Were we to allow Johnson's Equal Protection challenge in the absence of any showing of de jure or de facto governmental classification, we would be in effect endorsing, under the aegis of Equal Protection, the general federal constitutional right to be free from arbitrary and capricious state action which our procedural Due Process precedents eschew. Irving v. Thigpen, 732 F.2d 1215, 1218 (5th Cir.1984) (where Mississippi parole law does not create a protected liberty interest, a prisoner cannot maintain a section 1983 action or a habeas petition on the grounds that the parole board deprived him of procedural due process) (citations omitted). Johnson's allegations that the Board considers unreliable or even false information in making parole determinations, without more, simply do not assert a federal constitutional violation. 13 Compare Dock, 729 F.2d at 1290 (there simply is no constitutional guarantee that all executive decisionmaking must comply with standards that assure error-free determinations) (citations omitted ). Rather, such concerns are matters for the responsible state agencies and it is to those bodies that grievances concerning parole procedures should be addressed. Brandon, 823 F.2d at 649. 30 A violation of the equal protection clause occurs only when, inter alia, the governmental action in question classifies between two or more relevant persons or groups. Vera, 73 F.3d at 609-610. Johnson has failed to demonstrate this necessary predicate to his claim. 14 We therefore reverse the magistrate judge's contrary ruling and order that on remand the protest letters claim be dismissed with prejudice.