Court Opinion

ID: 9727431
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 13:36:55.597442+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:15:26.208286
License: Public Domain

Abrams, J.
(concurring, with whom Nolan, J., joins). I agree that the plaintiff is entitled to review of his classification under the department’s regulations. The plaintiff argues status as if it were a constitutional attack on the use of transfers.*3381 The only issue being remanded is status, not the constitutionality of-the transfer statute.
I also write separately on the issue of water standards. The court’s opinion assumes that Massachusetts water standards differ from Federal standards with respect to the alleged contaminants and that the Massachusetts standards are higher. There is no basis for such an assumption on this record. The plaintiff makes no such allegation. Indeed, the complaint does not allege any violation of either Federal or Massachusetts water standards. The exhibits attached to the plaintiff’s opposition to the commissioner’s motion to dismiss or for summary judgment focus on whether the water at USP, Marion, violates Federal standards. Because the question whether the water at USP, Marion, meets Federal standards is being litigated in Illinois, see Wyler v. Environmental Protection Agency, et al., U.S. Dist. Ct. for So. Dist., Ill., No. (1994), I would expressly limit the remand hearing to the question whether Massachusetts water standards differ from Federal water standards with respect to the alleged contaminants. If the standards are essentially the same, then the Superior Court judge should await the outcome of the litigation in Illinois.2 Illinois is the appropriate venue for the *339determination whether the water at USP, Marion, meets Federal standards.
Last, I would follow the test annunciated in Helling v. McKinney, 113 S. Ct. 2475 (1993).3 In Helling, supra at 2481, the United States Supreme Court held that “[a prisoner] could state a cause of action under the Eighth Amendment by alleging that [prison officials] have, with deliberate indifference, exposed him to levels of [environmental tobacco smoke] that pose an unreasonable risk of serious damage to his future health.” The Supreme Court then remanded the case “to the District Court to provide an opportunity for [the prisoner] to prove his allegations, which will require him to prove both the subjective [deliberate indifference] and the objective [unreasonable risk of serious damage to his future health] elements necessary to prove an Eighth Amendment violation. The District Court will have the usual authority to control the order of proof, and if there is a failure of proof on the first element that it chooses to consider, it would not be an abuse of discretion to give judgment for [the prison officials] without taking further evidence.” Id. at 2481-2482. The Supreme Court went on to note that, “with respect to the objective factor, determining whether [the prisoner’s] conditions of confinement violate the Eighth Amendment requires more than a scientific and statistical inquiry into the seriousness of the potential harm and the likelihood that such injury to health will actually be caused by exposure to [environmental tobacco smoke]. It also requires a court to assess whether society considers the risk that the prisoner complains of to be so grave that it violates contemporary standards of decency to expose anyone unwillingly to such a risk. In other words, the prisoner must show that the risk of which he complains is not one that today’s society chooses to tolerate.” (Emphasis in original.) Id. at 2482. If it is determined that the Massachusetts water standards are essentially the same as the Federal standards with respect to the alleged contaminants and that the water at USP, Marion, satisfies the Fed*340eral standards, then summary judgment should enter for the commissioner because such a determination would establish that the risk of which the plaintiff complains is one that “today’s society chooses to tolerate."

The plaintiff argues a due process interest in being incarcerated “in the Massachusetts prison system . . . [with] the comfort of contact with persons who have had similar life experiences, who grew up.in the same neighborhoods as he did and who have similar backgrounds.” He also argues that “a part of his daily life in Massachusetts would include the Red Sox (for better or worse), Celtics, Patriots and Bruins, not as in Illinois, the White Sox, Cubs, Bulls, Bears, and Blackhawks as sources of daily conversation. The exploits of Governor Weld, Senate President Bulger, his brother Whitey and the Massachusetts Lottery all contribute to the local prison discourse. Chowder and boiled dinners form the prison fare; not grits and okra. Each item forms one of the threads of daily existence that is woven by the inmates into the fabric of their prison life. Even within prisons, geographic regions maintain a distinct cultural identity .... [The pjlaintiff has a natural liberty interest in being imprisoned within a familiar culture.”

Additionally, such an approach would mean that taxpayers would not have to fund the adjudication of the same issue (i.e., whether the water at-USP, Marion, meets Federal standards) in two States.

The court appears to restate the Helling standard in its own words.