Court Opinion

ID: 9461669
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:22:22.491412+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:13.229027
License: Public Domain

WEINSTEIN, District Judge
(concurring):
I concur. The issues, however, are troublesome.
Disciplinary proceedings in prisons or jails utilize a matrix with which courts are familiar — a charge that a specific forbidden act has been committed and limited discretion to “punish” on a finding of guilt. Administrative segregation in correctional institutions presents less familiar territory — a judgment that dangers may exist in the future and an undefined discretion to “protect.”
The possibilities of arbitrariness and of abuses in this second category of cases are obvious. Yet, it is equally clear that there are great potential dangers when *1196large numbers of criminals, many with demonstrated tendencies towards violence and with severe emotional and intellectual problems, are forced into the close, tension-provoking quarters of our prisons. How to balance the need for fairness and the demand for effective authority in such circumstances is a matter courts have only begun to consider. See, e. g., Newkirk v. Butler, 499 F.2d 1214, 1217 (2d Cir. 1974), cert. granted, 419 U.S. 894, 95 S.Ct. 172, 42 L.Ed.2d 138 (1974); Gomes v. Travisono, 490 F.2d 1209, 1213-14 (1st Cir. 1973), remanded, 418 U.S. 909, 94 S.Ct. 3200, 41 L.Ed.2d 1155 (1974) (relying on Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974), setting minimum due process requirements in prison disciplinary hearings); United States ex rel. Walker v. Mancusi, 467 F.2d 51 (2d Cir. 1972); Wilson v. Beame, 380 F.Supp. 1232, 1235-36 (E.D.N.Y.1974) (protective segregation prior to conviction); Ault v. Holmes, 369 F.Supp. 288, 290-91 (W.D. Ky.1973) (administrative segregation when prisoner placed himself in position “detrimental to his own welfare”); Hoitt v. Vitek, 361 F.Supp. 1238, 1251-52 (D.N.H.1973), aff’d sub nom. Laaman v. Vitek, 502 F.2d 1158 (1st Cir. 1973) (“quarantine segregation” at receiving prison); Bowers v. Smith, 353 F.Supp. 1339, 1345 (D.Vt.1972) (“safekeeping status” based on prisoner’s prior record of escapes); Urbano v. McCorkle, 334 F.Supp. 161, 168 (D.N.J. 1971), aff’d, 481 F.2d 1400 (3d Cir. 1973) (“prisoners who are confined to administrative segregation for the good of the institution should be entitled to the same minimal due process that is afforded prisoners who are confined to segregation for disciplinary infractions”); Long v. Harris, 332 F.Supp. 262, 264 (D.Kan.1971), aff’d, 473 F.2d 1387 (10th Cir. 1973) (describing Bureau of Prisons procedures for “segregated confinement”); Bundy v. Cannon, 328 F.Supp. 165, 173 (D.Md.1971). See also Note, “Procedural Due Process in the Involuntary Institutional Transfers of Prisoners,” 60 U.Va.L.Rev. 333 (1974).
No information presented to us indicates that the New York state correctional authorities have yet provided fully satisfactory standards and procedures to determine when and how prisoners may be segregated administratively for their own protection or that of other inmates and personnel when they have, while in custody, committed no act warranting disciplinary action. Nevertheless, the case before us does not provide a suitable factual basis for a full consideration of the problem.