Opinion ID: 2469678
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: appeal from fayette circuit court

Text: In May and June, 1984, several pro se petitions for writ of habeas corpus were filed in the Fayette Circuit Court by sentenced felons and parole violators, demanding they should be delivered immediately to the custody of the Kentucky Corrections Cabinet. The Fayette Circuit Court certified these claims as a class action on behalf of all persons in Fayette County Jail similarly situated. Ultimately Fayette Circuit Court directed the Cabinet to accept custody upon thirty days' notification. This order was entered March 13, 1986. Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government and the county jailer intervened. Their interest is in requiring payment to compensate for the financial loss borne by the county because of the difference between the cost of maintaining these prisoners in jail and the supplemental fee paid per day for each prisoner from the state treasury, which is $15-20. The Corrections Cabinet did not appeal, but refused to comply. On July 24, 1986, the court held a contempt hearing in which the Corrections Cabinet was to show cause as to why it should not be held in contempt, and punished accordingly, for failure to comply. Following the hearing the court entered the contempt order, now appealed, specifying this was a continuing contempt and imposing a fine for all prisoners held thereafter in violation of previous orders, on a sliding scale: $22 per day per prisoner who remains after thirty days and up to forty days; $25 per day per prisoner after forty days and up to fifty days; $28 per day per prisoner after fifty days up to sixty days; and $50 per day per prisoner for periods more than sixty days. The court treated these contempts as civil contempts, and ordered the fines collected to be dispersed 85% to Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, which must bear the expense for keeping these prisoners, and 15% to Fayette County Legal Aid Inc., which almost always bears the expense for representing these prisoners. We granted transfer of this appeal because of the two other cases with similar issues already before our Court. At the contempt hearing in Fayette Circuit Court, the Corrections Cabinet maintained it was impossible to comply with the previous mandamus order because of state prison overcrowding conditions and federal court limitations on the number of prisoners. The Corrections Cabinet presented evidence that it is under orders from twelve courts, both state and federal, directing it to receive convicted felons and parole violators on various terms and conditions, and the Corrections Cabinet argues that given the number of beds available in its penal institutions, the controlled intake procedure is an adequate response to foreclose a finding of contempt. The county/jailer and the prisoners point out the Commonwealth did not appeal the original mandamus order, now two years old, nor indeed any of the twelve court orders requiring the Cabinet to accept these prisoners. The Cabinet, representing the Executive Department, offers as an explanation that it did not appeal because it could not anticipate problems that would be caused by new statutes from the Legislative Department increasing criminal penalties and minimum length of incarceration before parole, statutes such as truth-in-sentencing, enacted in 1986. The Cabinet also complains of the increase of Kentucky's persistent felony offender convictions since 1975, but this complaint seems irrelevant in the present case where most of the increase presumably took place before Fayette Circuit Court entered its mandamus order in 1984. In sum, Corrections Cabinet is satisfied that its controlled intake procedure is both an appropriate response and a complete defense. A party cannot be punished for contempt for failure to perform an act which is impossible. Clay v. Winn, Ky., 434 S.W.2d 650 (1968); Tucker v. Commonwealth, 299 Ky. 820, 187 S.W.2d 291 (1945). However, an inability to comply must be shown clearly and categorically by the defendant. United States v. Bryan, 339 U.S. 323, 70 S.Ct. 724, 94 L.Ed. 884 (1949). Defendants so claiming must also prove they took all reasonable steps within their power to insure compliance with the orders. Sekaquaptewa v. MacDonald, 544 F.2d 396, 406 (9th Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 430 U.S. 931, 97 S.Ct. 1550, 51 L.Ed.2d 774 (1977). Kentucky recognizes this defense of impossibility to comply in Tucker v. Commonwealth, supra , but requires proving lack of fault to successfully defeat the contempt charge. 187 S.W.2d at 294-95. Fayette County, and its jailer, respond that the trial court found Corrections presented insufficient evidence to establish an impossibility defense, and this finding was not clearly erroneous. CR 52.01. The evidence before the trial court was that the controlled intake procedure, per se, was inadequate. There was evidence other remedies were available, such as extending operation of the controlled intake procedure from a central location to local facilities so as to rapidly identify those prisoners awaiting transfer who would be acceptable in minimum security institutions where beds are available [3] and funding from the Governor's emergency funds which has been utilized in the past to relieve overcrowding when faced by court orders. Further, appellees suggest that state officials faced with relieving overcrowding in one jail can contractually provide for state use of facilities in other counties where space is available, i.e., contract for the use of county and regional jails to care for state prisoners as agents of state government. This, of course, presupposes care of state prisoners under state supervision and payment of a mutually agreeable sum to cover the cost of use of county services. [4]