Court Opinion

ID: 9757927
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 23:04:58.009693+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:28:45.602338
License: Public Domain

STUMBO, Justice,
dissenting.
Respectfully, I dissent from the majority opinion because I believe the Court of Appeals decision that Appellee’s Petition For Declaratory Judgment was timely filed in the Morgan Circuit Court should be affirmed, as Appellee’s cause of action accrued as “[a]n action upon a liability created by statute.” KRS 413.120(2).
Appellee Raymer petitioned the Morgan Circuit Court for a judicial declaration that his due process rights were violated by the Department of Corrections’ (DOC) handling of his prison disciplinary hearing and asked that his prison disciplinary conviction be reversed and expunged from his *920record in its entirety. KRS 196.030(l)(a) grants to the DOC the authority to “exercise all functions of the state in relation to ... [m]anagement of penal, reform, and correctional institutions.” Likewise, KRS 197.020(l)(a) mandates that the DOC shall “[flormulate and prescribe all necessary regulations and bylaws for the government and discipline of the penitentiary ....” In turn, the DOC has implemented CCP 15.6, which establishes certain procedures for governing disciplinary violations by inmates. CCP 15.6 makes clear that “[a]n inmate’s due process rights shall be fully protected.” CCP 15.6 confers upon inmates, among other things, the right to a hearing, the right to the assistance of legal aide, and the right to an appeal of any adverse decision. Accordingly, any rights created by the regulations and policies of the DOC promulgated pursuant to the authority granted to it by KRS 196.080, KRS 197.020, and Section 254 of the Kentucky Constitution, also impose upon the DOC the corresponding liability of ensuring that those rights comply with procedural due process requirements. See Wolff v. McDonnell, 418 U.S. 539, 556-557, 94 S.Ct. 2963, 2975, 41 L.Ed.2d 935 (1974). These procedural requirements (and resulting constitutionally protected liberty interest) exist only because they arose from certain rights created by state statutes and DOC regulations. See Mahoney v. Carter, Ky., 938 S.W.2d 575, 576 (1997) (observing that “prison officials may create liberty interests through official promulgations, policy statements, or regulations”). As such, Raymer’s cause of action was properly brought as “[a]n action upon a liability created by statute.”
The majority opinion concludes that since the underlying theory of law asserted throughout Raymer’s pro se petition was grounded in federal constitutional law, it is analogous to a claim made under 42 U.S.C. Section 1983, and therefore the one-year statute of limitations applies. Presumably then, had Raymer more artfully pled the same claim as a violation of the Kentucky Constitution and Kentucky statutory law, his action would still be viable pursuant to KRS 413.120. This Court has many times held that when a prisoner elects to proceed pro se, he is not subject to the same standard of pleading as is legal counsel; and that rules are to be “construed liberally in his favor.” Case v. Commonwealth, Ky., 467 S.W.2d 367, 368 (1971). See also Commonwealth v. Miller, Ky., 416 S.W.2d 358, 360 (1967). Raymer should not be precluded from judicial relief on this basis alone.
The legislature’s subsequent amendment of KRS 413.140 to include within the purview of the one-year statute of limitations “[a]n action arising out of a detention facility disciplinary proceeding, whether based upon state or federal law,” is not indicative of the original legislative intent. Indeed, “there is no presumption from the amendment that such is what the statute meant originally. On the contrary, the presumption is that the legislature, by the amendment, intended to change the law.” Whitley County Bd. of Educ. v. Meadors, Ky., 444 S.W.2d 890, 891 (1969). Accordingly, we can presume that the legislature intended to effect a change in the law when it added actions “arising out of a detention facility disciplinary proceeding” to those items already specifically enumerated in KRS 413.140, thereby subjecting such claims to a one-year statute of limitations.
For the reasons stated above, I would affirm the Court of Appeals decision reversing the Morgan Circuit Court’s order that dismissed Raymer’s cause of action as time barred.
LAMBERT, C.J., joins this dissent.