Court Opinion

ID: 9484522
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:55:47.321184+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:17.582850
License: Public Domain

REYNOLDS, Senior District Judge,
concurring.
I agree with the majority that we should affirm the district court’s decision, but I think we should do so by reaching the merits of the underlying claim. Plaintiff-appellant Paul Knox was put in segregated confinement twice between 1986 at 1990 and remains under the total control of those who put him there. If put there again, he will automatically' be placed in the black box whenever he leaves his cell. Periods of segregated confinement are relatively short in duration; Knox’ most recent one began in March 1990, and ended in October 1990, about five months after this action was filed.
On these facts, I think it is safe to say that the challenged action in this case is “capable of repetition, yet evading review,” and that therefore Knox’ claim for injunctive relief is not moot. Murphy v. Hunt, 455 U.S. 478, 482, 102 S.Ct. 1181, 1183, 71 L.Ed.2d 353 (1982). See Clark v. Brewer, 776 F.2d 226, 229 (8th Cir.1985) (holding that prisoner’s challenge to conditions of segregated confinement was not mooted by his release from it). The instant case is quite unlike City of Los Angeles v. Lyons, 461 U.S. 95, 103 S.Ct. 1660, 75 L.Ed.2d 675 (1983), where the plaintiff was held to lack standing to seek injunc-tive relief against a police department’s use of the chokehold. That decision was based not on the assumption that the plaintiff would not be stopped by police in the future, but on the assumption that even if he were stopped, it would be highly unlikely that the police would “again render him unconscious without any provocation.” Lyons, 461 U.S. at 105-06, 103 S.Ct. at 1667. In this case, by contrast, there is no question that Knox will be forced to wear the black box if he is segregated again. Further, as noted above, he remains under the complete control of those who decide whether to segregate him.
A review of the merits of Knox’ claim is constrained by the district court’s refusal to accept his late-filed summary judgment response, for I agree that the refusal was not an abuse of discretion. It follows, I think, that we must accept as undisputed the defendants-appellees’ assertion below that the black box serves the legitimate penological purpose of preventing high-risk prisoners from tampering with their handcuffs while outside their cells.' If we accept that assertion, then there seems to be no genuine issue of fact as to “whether force was applied in a good faith effort to maintain or restore discipline or maliciously and sadistically for the very purpose of causing harm.” Hudson v. McMillian, — U.S. -, -, 112 S.Ct. 995, 998, 117 L.Ed.2d 156 (1992).
Thus,- I believe Knox’ claim fads because he has not attempted to challenge defendants’ assertion regarding the penological justification for the black box, not because he lacks standing.