Opinion ID: 150843
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: A genuine issue of material fact exists as to whether the prison officials acted reasonably in depriving Thomas of all out-of-cell exercise for 13 months and 25 days in light of all the circumstances

Text: The district court concluded that there was insufficient evidence to establish that a genuine issue of material fact existed as to whether the prison officials' deprivation of Thomas's right to out-of-cell exercise was reasonable. Given the record before us, and the seriousness of the risk to which Thomas was subjected, it is difficult to conceive how the prison officials actions would be deemed reasonable. Nevertheless, the issue is one of fact that must be presented to a fact-finder. The district court found that the prison officials acted reasonably in light of Thomas's lengthy disciplinary history and of other actual or threatened violence at Facility C in 2005 and 2006, and because Thomas could have signed the pledge form at any time. We reverse this ruling, as well. We hold that the evidence in the record demonstrates that Thomas, at the least, raised a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the prison officials acted reasonably in light of: the serious risk to Thomas's mental and physical health; the level of documented assaults and threats at the facility during the last 11 months Thomas was deprived of exercise; Thomas's limited disciplinary record; his execution of other forms provided by the prison in which he promised to program nonviolently; and the prison authorities' failure to consider providing him with alternative opportunities to exercise. In reaching its conclusion that the prison officials reasonably relied on Thomas's disciplinary history when they decided to deprive him of exercise for almost 14 months, the district court relied on LeMaire v. Maass, 12 F.3d 1444 (9th Cir. 1993) in which a prisoner had attacked a prison guard, savagely attacked another inmate, assaulted numerous prison officers with hot water, toilet water, food, feces, and urine, had at least 25 major rule violations in a two year period, and attacked two prison officials as he exited an exercise cubicle (an act he vowed to repeat if he were allowed to exercise again). Id. at 1448, 1458. The LeMaire court found that restricting such a prisoner's exercise privileges was reasonable because he both abused them and represent[ed] a grave security risk. Id. at 1458. However, Thomas's disciplinary history, as it appears in the record before us, bears very little resemblance to LeMaire's. Thomas's record lists only two disciplinary infractions: one episode of battery of an inmate in 2003 and one threat of violence to an inmate in 2002. The only disciplinary infraction during Thomas's 13-month-25-day confinement without out-of-cell exercise was a report filed by a prison official charging him with willfully obstructing a police officer because he submitted a complaint to the prison Warden about the officials' refusal to allow him to exercise. LeMaire, therefore, has little relevance to the present case. Furthermore, the evidence in the record demonstrates that the sole reason that Thomas was kept on modified programming was his failure to sign the pledge form, not any fear that prison officials harbored about Thomas's dangerousness. The very fact that as soon as Thomas signed the pledge form he was permitted to engage in out-of-cell exercise shows that the prison officials did not consider him to be intrinsically dangerous, but apparently thought that he was dangerous only as long as he refused to sign the form. Both the district court and the prison officials assert that if Thomas had signed the pledge at any time he would have gained immediate access to outdoor exercise. [8] Thus, there was apparently nothing about Thomas that warranted deprivation of out-of-cell exercise other than the absence of his signature on the pledge. In addition, the record also shows that, apart from his refusal to sign the pledge form, Thomas cooperated with the multiple interviewers, and committed in writing to non-violence in separate contemporaneous interview forms. The district court did not consider these contemporaneous signed interview forms, [9] even though they pose a significant obstacle to the prison officials' assertion that they deprived Thomas of out-of-cell exercise because they were concerned that he posed a threat of violence to other inmatesa threat that they later say would have been alleviated had he signed the pledge itself. In reaching its conclusion that the prison officials' refusal to allow Thomas to exercise outdoors was reasonable, the district court also considered the history of violence at SVSP. According to the district court, the prison officials acted reasonably in depriving Thomas of exercise because they were responding to a genuine emergency. We have held previously that prisons may curtail inmates' outdoor exercise when a genuine emergency exists. Specifically, prison officials may be more restrictive than they otherwise may be, and certain services may be suspended temporarily. Hoptowit v. Ray, 682 F.2d 1237, 1259 (9th Cir.1982) abrogated on other grounds by Sandin v. Conner, 515 U.S. 472, 115 S.Ct. 2293, 132 L.Ed.2d 418 (1995). Such an emergency may occur following outbreaks of extraordinary levels of violence in a prison. Norwood v. Vance, 572 F.3d 626, 631 (9th Cir.2009) (When violence rises to unusually high levels, prison officials can reasonably believe it is lawful to temporarily restrict outdoor exercise to help bring the violence under control.) In this case, the prison officials make no substantial argument that the emergency caused by the July 14, 2005 incident in which a Facility C inmate stabbed two correctional officers endured for the 13 months and 25 days that Thomas was deprived of out-of-cell exercise. To the contrary, they admit that the lockdown that the emergency precipitated lasted for less than two months, from July 14, 2005 to September 9, 2005. Thereafter, the authorities introduced the modified program, to which individual prisoners were subject until they signed the pledge. The record shows that no further lockdown occurred at the facility, and 148 other Facility C inmates returned to normal programming while the deprivation of Thomas's out-of-cell exercise remained in force. The prison officials' contention that from July 14, 2005 through June 2006 there were several other documented threats and assaults that took place at SVSP does not establish that following the end of the lockdown on September 9, 2005, there was a state of emergency in the prison. [10] Documented threats and assaults happen frequently in prisons. Given that an emergency is different from normal prison conduct, an emergency cannot be deemed to exist simply because there are documented threats and assaults from time to time otherwise every prison would be in a constant state of emergency. Indeed, Thomas's case is readily distinguishable from our genuine emergency cases, upon which the district court relied. The district court cited, for example, Hayward v. Procunier, 629 F.2d 599 (9th Cir. 1980), a case in which we ruled that a genuine emergency existed at San Quentin prison in 1974 following a series of extremely violent incidents. Id. at 600, 603. We held that a five-month lockdown of the prison, including restrictions on out-of-cell exerciseinitially on all out of cell exercise, but with [s]ome yard exercise... permitted within a month after the lockdown beganwas permissible in such circumstances. Id. at 600. The extremely violent incidents, including 82 assaults with weapons and 12 killings, as well as 71 cases of possession of weapons and 2 attempted escapes, id., at San Quentin in 1974 were, however, quite distinct from the single stabbing incident, albeit of two guards, that occurred while Thomas was a prisoner at SVSP. Moreover, we held that the restrictions on outdoor exercise imposed in Hayward were permissible in part because they were temporary, and because the inmates in that case were allowed approximately the minimum exercise mandated in Spain within a month after the imposition of the lockdown. Id. at 603. The prison officials contend that Thomas's deprivation of out-of-cell exercise was, like that of Hayward, a temporary measure, because Thomas could have signed the pledge at any time. Thomas's 13 month and 25 day confinement without out-of-cell exercise was not, however, temporary. Whether a deprivation is temporary depends on the expiration date, if any, of the prison's policy, not on whether an individual can escape its application by one means or another. Here, the policy was of indefinite duration. In Thomas's case the deprivation would have lasted even longer than the almost 14 months it did, had Thomas not capitulated and signed the form because the ban on exercise had begun to affect his health. The district court's conclusion that the prison officials' policy was reasonable is also highly questionable in light of the absence of any evidence in the record that the prison officials considered whether there were any alternative means of providing Thomas out-of-cell exercise. Even where security concerns might justify a limitation on permitting a prisoner to mingle with the general prison population such concerns do not explain why other exercise arrangements [are] not made. Spain, 600 F.2d at 200; see also Lopez, 203 F.3d at 1133 (holding that even if denying Lopez access to the general recreation yard was reasonable, it does not explain why Lopez was not given some other opportunity for outdoor exercise.). The prison officials argue that Thomas was offered alternatives to no exercise, when Defendants offered him opportunities for outdoor exercise once in August 2005, once in September 2005, once in October 2005, twice in November 2005, and an unspecified number of times between January 2006 and June 2006. The occasions cited by the prison officials are, in each case, those on which Thomas was offered the pledge form and refused to sign, not occasions on which he was offered some other opportunity for outdoor exercise, and declined to accept that offer. The prison officials' repeated assertion that the deprivation of exercise was reasonable because Thomas could have signed the pledge form at any time and thereafter would been permitted to exercise misses the point completely and is entirely inconsistent with our previous holdings. See Foster, 554 F.3d at 814. As we discuss supra, we have held that deprivation of exercise may be reasonable in certain situations, such as during a state of emergency in a prison, or when a prisoner poses such a threat to inmates or guards that his confinement without exercise is the only way to maintain the security of the facility. Under the circumstances present here, however, in which the punishment of deprivation of exercise appears clearly not to have been necessary to maintain order in the prison, it is difficult to conceive of how a deprivation of a basic human necessity, LeMaire, 12 F.3d at 1457, may be deemed reasonable. Thomas testified that during the 13 month 25 day period of confinement without out-of-cell exercise he did not sign and had no intention of ever signing the pledge form. Like the inmate in Foster, Thomas refused repeatedly to abide by a prison policy, and complained to prison officials about the deprivation inflicted upon him by prison officials in response to his refusal to adhere to the policy. [11] Foster, 554 F.3d at 812. In common with Foster, Thomas could have chosen to behave differently, but he did not, and in punishing him for that choice the prison officials placed him at risk of substantial physical and mental harm. Id. at 812-14. We therefore hold that, as in Foster, Thomas has, at the very least, raised a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the prison officials' actions were reasonable. In sum, Thomas has, at the very least, raised a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the prison officials acted reasonably in denying him of all out-of-cell exercise for 13 months and 25 days. The record shows that Thomas had already promised to program non-violently in the separate interview forms that he signed. Neither Thomas's own limited disciplinary record, nor the occasional documented threats or acts of other prisoners appears to have rendered it reasonable to deprive him of all out-of-cell exercise opportunities during the lengthy period involved. The record also reflects that the prison officials failed to consider other ways of providing Thomas with sufficient exercise that would not have implicated any of their purported security concerns. Finally, the prison authorities' contention that Thomas could have signed the pledge form at any time would not appear to provide a justification for their actions over so long a period. We therefore hold that the district court erred in ruling that there was insufficient evidence to raise a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the prison officials acted reasonably. Accordingly, we reverse the district court's ruling granting summary judgment to the prison officials. We should add that we have difficulty in conceiving how the prison officials might be able to justify the deprivation of so critical a human necessity as exercise for a period of almost 14 months on the basis of reasonableness, as they would have been willing to allow Thomas to enjoy out-of-cell exercise throughout almost all of this period if he had signed the pledge form. Nevertheless, because we are asked to decide only whether the district court's ruling on the prison officials' motion for summary judgment was erroneous and because Thomas has not asked us to grant him relief in the form of summary judgment, we are reluctant to do more than reverse and remand for further proceedings.