Opinion ID: 360429
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Entitlements Created Under State Law.

Text: 53 The third theory on which the plaintiffs base their claims is that they enjoy certain state law entitlements, the deprivation of which triggers the procedural protections of the Fourteenth Amendment. Essentially, they claim that Illinois statutes, prison administrative regulations, and prison practices created rights to have the opportunity to earn compensatory good time, participate in educational programs, and be free of segregatory confinement. 54 Meachum and Montanye make it clear that the Supreme Court looks primarily to state law as the source of prisoners' liberty interests. Essentially a plaintiff must demonstrate a justifiable expectation that he will not be deprived of a benefit absent the occurrence of specified events. Meachum, 427 U.S. at 226-27, 96 S.Ct. 2532; Montanye, 427 U.S. at 242, 96 S.Ct. 2543. 55 The question then is what is sufficient to create the necessary justifiable expectation. In Meachum and Montanye, the Supreme Court failed to find a liberty interest in being free from interprison transfers to institutions with drastically less favorable conditions of confinement. The Court reviewed the state statutes involved and came up empty. Upon finding that the underlying statutes placed full discretion for transfers in the hands of prison officials, the Court concluded that there was no liberty interest to protect. In essence, prisoners must show some restriction upon the prison officials' discretion to remove the benefit sought. Lombardo v. Meachum, 548 F.2d 13 (1st Cir. 1977). In Meachum and Montanye, the Court indicated that the states could create the necessary entitlements by statute, by rule or regulation, or by interpretation of their own constitutions. Meachum, 427 U.S. at 229, 96 S.Ct. at 2540. 56 In analyzing this problem, the Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit stated that (i)n effect, Meachum equated the threshold test for the finding of a liberty interest with that for determining whether a property interest exists. Walker, 558 F.2d at 1251. After reviewing several Supreme Court cases in this area, including Perry v. Sindermann, 408 U.S. 593, 92 S.Ct. 2694, 33 L.Ed.2d 570 (1972), in which the Supreme Court found an entitlement to tenured professorship implied in a teaching contract, the Sixth Circuit concluded that a prisoner's liberty interest, not provided for by statute, could alternatively be predicated on written prison policy statements. 558 F.2d at 1255. 57 This Court, on the other hand, through Solomon, limited the possible sources of state law entitlements. Solomon held that in the face of statutes previously held to grant full discretion to prison officials, prison policy statements and guidelines were insufficient to create a liberty interest. In fact, in dicta, the Court read Meachum, Montanye and Moody as requiring a statutory or constitutional basis for entitlements. 563 F.2d at 342-43. 58 This dicta in Solomon is inconsistent with the Supreme Court's language in Meachum that the state could create a liberty interest by statute, by rule or regulation. 427 U.S. at 229, 96 S.Ct. at 2540. However, any limitations Solomon may have placed upon the scope of sources of state law entitlement have been taken from the board by the rationale and holding in Durso v. Rowe, 579 F.2d 1365 (7th Cir. 1978). The principal issue in Durso was whether revocation of a prisoner's work-release status constitutes a deprivation of liberty protected by the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. (At p. 1367.) Pertinent to this case, the plaintiff in Durso alleged that prison authorities customarily do not interfere with one's work-release status unless the participant violates some rule of the program or of his work-release contract. (At p. 1371.) The District Court dismissed the complaint for failure to state a claim and for lack of subject matter jurisdiction, with the conclusion that Durso had shown no protected liberty interest. Durso v. Rowe, 430 F.Supp. 49 (N.D.Ill.1977). This Court on appeal reversed and remanded with the succinct holding, Without reference to Solomon, that (t)he predicate necessary to trigger the Due Process Clause is not restricted to statutorily-created rights; it may also be found in Official policies or practices. (Emphasis added) (At p. 1369.) Thus Durso places this Circuit consistent with Walker of the Sixth Circuit and the Supreme Court's decisions in Meachum and the more recent summary affirmance in Enomoto v. Wright, 434 U.S. 1052, 98 S.Ct. 1223, 55 L.Ed.2d 756 (1978). In Enomoto, a three-judge District Court held that an administrative regulation of the California Department of Corrections was sufficient to create an entitlement that prisoners would not be placed in segregation absent a specified factual predicate. On that basis, the Court held that prisoners could not be segregated without procedural protections required in Wolff. 59 As pointed out above, the plaintiffs here allege that Illinois statutes, prison administration regulations, and prison practices create rights to have the opportunity to: (a) earn good time, (b) participate in educational programs, and (c) be free from arbitrary segregated confinement. 60 ( a) The plaintiffs do not argue on appeal that they have any statutory or administrative regulatory state law entitlement to earn good time. They concede that the single good time State of Illinois statute, Ill.Rev.Stat. ch. 38 § 1003-6-3(a), does no more than to authorize the Department of Corrections to promulgate regulations governing the diminution of sentences on account of good conduct or meritorious service. They also concede that throughout the critical period the Department of Corrections had not promulgated any regulation governing good time. Rather they argue that under the rationale of Perry v. Sindermann, they enjoy a state law entitlement to good time based upon institutional policy and custom. This contention of the plaintiffs is, under the facts before the District Court, without merit. The record before the District Court is devoid of evidence of any extant institutional practice or custom related to the allowance of good time. Hence, the District Court did not err in granting the summary judgment on this issue in favor of the Department. 61 It now appears in the briefings of the parties before us that there did exist at the pertinent times some four intra- and inter-institutional directives providing guidelines for allowing and denying compensatory and custodial good time in the event of the segregation of a prisoner. These directives were not known to the plaintiffs and they were thus prevented in making the same a part of the record before the District Court. 62 In view of the ultimate remand of the causes and in the furtherance of justice, the summary judgment on the issue of the loss of good time during the segregation periods of the various plaintiffs is vacated and the issue is remanded to the District Court for further evidentiary hearing and adjudication as to whether such directives create any state law entitlements in favor of the plaintiffs. 63 ( b) The plaintiffs' claim of a loss of participation in educational programs, unlike their loss of good time argument, is based upon an Illinois statute cited as Ill.Rev.Stat. ch. 38 § 1003-6-2(d). However, the statute cited does not condition withdrawal of access to educational programs upon specified events. Rather this statute is obviously the type of general policy statement which is insufficient to create an entitlement. See Lombardo v. Meachum, 548 F.2d at 15. 64 (c) The plaintiffs' claim of freedom from segregation short of due process per Wolff is based upon A.R. 807, which provides in part that (s)egregation is a classification category for inmates in Adult Division institutions. Inmates may be placed in a segregation classification by the Institutional Assignment Committee or Program Team if they: 65 1. Indicate a chronic inability to adjust in the general prison population. 66 2. Constitute a serious threat to the security of the institution. 67 3. Require maximum protection for themselves or if others require maximum protection from them. 68 The Department argues that the segregation decisions made for all the plaintiffs were classification decisions. It is on that basis that they attempt to justify the failure to provide hearings meeting their own requirements for disciplinary proceedings. 69 The Department does not explain why this section does not create a justifiable expectation that one will not be placed in segregation absent a finding that he falls within one of the three specified categories. Rather, they merely say that this regulation does not condition segregation on particular acts of misconduct. Nothing in Meachum says that the necessary specified events are limited to forms of misconduct. The Department attempts to rely on other regulations such as A.R. 809 which permits temporary segregation on an emergency basis pending investigation with the express concurrence of the Administrator of Adult Division Services. However, with the possible exception of the Stateville plaintiffs, the Department submitted no evidence which would support a foundation for summary judgment that A.R. 809 was the basis of any of the removals to segregation or that the terms of A.R. 809 were complied with. The District Court, through its narrow reading of Meachum, erred in granting summary judgment on this claim. 70 The decision as to whether A.R. 807 created an entitlement is, of course, a matter of state law. The Illinois statutes governing the conditions of imprisonment were completely revised in 1972, apparently with a view toward more clearly delineating prisoners' rights. McAnany, Imprisonment Under the Illinois Unified Code of Corrections: Due Process, Flexibility, and Some Future Doubts, 49 Chicago-Kent L.Rev. 178 (1972). In the few intervening years since this comprehensive overhaul of the Code of Corrections, there has been very little interpretation of it by the Illinois Supreme Court. The parties have cited and we have found no Illinois court adjudication on point either on the facts or on the pertinent statutory sections. 5 71 We believe the better practice is for the District Court on remand to have the first opportunity to consider and determine whether A.R. 807 creates a state law entitlement deserving of due process protection. We accordingly reverse the summary judgment on this issue and remand the cause to the District Court for evidentiary hearing and further proceedings in view of Durso and consistent herewith. 6 72 REVERSED AND REMANDED.