Opinion ID: 526494
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Parratt and Its Progeny Generally

Text: 30 In Parratt, a state prisoner sued prison officials under 42 U.S.C. Sec. 1983, alleging that their negligent loss of a hobby kit, which the prisoner had ordered from a mail-order catalog, deprived the prisoner of property without due process of law in violation of the fourteenth amendment. The Supreme Court disagreed, noting that nothing in the fourteenth amendment protects against all deprivations of life, liberty, or property, and instead prohibits only those deprivations which occur without due process of law. 451 U.S. at 537, 101 S.Ct. at 1914. The Court then rejected the proposition that a state is always required to provide a hearing prior to a deprivation. 451 U.S. at 540, 101 S.Ct. at 1915. The Court stated that: 31 either the necessity of quick action by the State or the impracticality of providing any meaningful deprivation process, when coupled with the availability of some meaningful means by which to assess the propriety of the State's action at some time after the initial taking ... satisf[ies] the requirements of procedural due process. 32 451 U.S. at 539, 101 S.Ct. at 1915 (footnote omitted). 33 The Court noted that the state had promulgated predeprivation procedures which were adequate to protect the plaintiff's property interests, but that the state employee failed to follow the established policy. 451 U.S. at 543, 101 S.Ct. at 1917. The Court concluded that situations involving a tortious loss of ... property as a result of a random and unauthorized act by a state employee, which by definition is not a loss resulting from some established state procedure, are beyond the state's control and cannot be predicted. 451 U.S. at 541, 101 S.Ct. at 1916. The Court consequently held that negligent deprivations which occur without a prior hearing do not violate the fourteenth amendment's due process clause as long as the state provides a meaningful post-deprivation remedy. 451 U.S. at 544, 101 S.Ct. at 1917. To hold otherwise, the Court opined, would result in turning every alleged injury which may have been inflicted by a state official acting under 'color of state law' into a violation of the Fourteenth Amendment under Sec. 1983, ... [and] 'would make of the Fourteenth Amendment a font of tort law to be superimposed upon whatever systems may already be administered by the States.'  451 U.S. at 544, 101 S.Ct. at 1917 (citations omitted). 34 The Court reaffirmed the Parratt rationale in Logan v. Zimmerman Brush Co., 455 U.S. 422, 102 S.Ct. 1148, 71 L.Ed.2d 265 (1982). In Logan, a plaintiff filed a timely charge of unlawful conduct with a state employment commission. According to state law, the commission then had 120 days in which to convene a fact-finding conference. However, through the commission's inadvertence, it scheduled the plaintiff's hearing five days beyond the jurisdictional deadline and subsequently refused to consider the claim. 35 The Supreme Court held that Parratt did not bar the plaintiff's section 1983 action, based upon the fourteenth amendment's due process clause, because the plaintiff was not challenging the commission's error. Instead, the Court believed that the plaintiff was challenging an inadequate  'established state procedure' that destroys his entitlement without according him proper procedural safeguards. 455 U.S. at 436, 102 S.Ct. at 1158. The Court noted that it is the state system itself that destroys a complainant's property interest, by operation of law, whenever the Commission fails to convene a timely conference.... 455 U.S. at 436, 102 S.Ct. at 1158. In contrast, Parratt dealt with a state agent's failure to follow otherwise adequate established state procedure. Id. The Court concluded that post-deprivation remedies do not satisfy due process where a deprivation of property is caused by conduct pursuant to established state procedure, rather than random and unauthorized action. Hudson v. Palmer, 468 U.S. 517, 532, 104 S.Ct. 3194, 3203, 82 L.Ed.2d 393 (1984) (footnote omitted) (interpreting Logan, 455 U.S. at 435-36, 102 S.Ct. at 1158). 36 Finally, in Hudson v. Palmer, the Court extended Parratt to cover the random and unauthorized intentional conduct of state employees. In that case, a federal inmate brought a section 1983 action against a correctional officer for depriving him of certain property without due process of law. During a shakedown of the plaintiff's cell, the officer apparently destroyed certain noncontraband personal items of the plaintiff. The Court found that the officer's intentional conduct fell within the Parratt doctrine. The Court reasoned that a state can no more anticipate and control in advance the random and unauthorized conduct of its employees than it can anticipate similar negligent conduct. Hudson, 468 U.S. at 533, 104 S.Ct. at 3203. It also rejected an argument that because an agent of the state who intends to deprive a person of his property 'can provide predeprivation process, then as a matter of due process he must do so.'  468 U.S. at 534, 104 S.Ct. at 3204 (emphasis in original). The Court believed that the controlling inquiry is whether the state is in a position to provide for predeprivation process. Id. 37