Opinion ID: 197525
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: issues

Text: 20 As a threshold matter, Gilday insists that the DOC defendants are collaterally estopped from contending that the MITS does not violate the Gilday injunction, because this issue was resolved in Langton v. Hogan, No. 79-2167-Z, 1995 WL 96948 (D.Mass. Feb.21, 1995), which culminated in a permanent injunction (the Langton injunction) almost identical to the Gilday injunction. 21 Collateral estoppel, or issue preclusion, bars relitigation of any issue actually decided in previous litigation 'between the parties, whether on the same or a different claim.'  Grella v. Salem Five Cent Sav. Bank, 42 F.3d 26, 30 (1st Cir.1994) (quoting Dennis v. Rhode Island Hosp. Trust, 744 F.2d 893, 899 (1st Cir.1984) (emphasis in original) (quoting Restatement (Second) of Judgments, § 27 (1982))). Although [a]n issue may be 'actually' decided even if it is not explicitly decided, for it may have constituted, logically or practically, a necessary component of the decision reached in the prior litigation, Grella, 42 F.3d at 30-31 (emphasis in original), the narrow, fact-based district court decision in Langton had simply declined to modify the injunction in that case, to permit monitoring and recording, because there was no evidence of inmate-telephone abuse by Langton or his fellow plaintiff. Thus, as the district court ruling on the petition for modification in Langton neither addressed nor implicated the question whether the MITS violates either the state or federal wiretap statute, see Langton, No. 79-2167-Z, 1995 WL 96948, it neither actually nor necessarily determined that the MITS regime violated the Langton injunction, let alone the Gilday injunction. See Grella, 42 F.3d at 30 (stating that the determination of the issue must have been essential to the judgment); see also NLRB v. Donna-Lee Sportswear Co., Inc., 836 F.2d 31, 34 (1st Cir.1987) (same). 8